Nadine Gordimer - The Pickup

… we can’t go on accepting what our grandfathers do, what life is that, Ibrahim — the traditional interpreters of Islam … for them Islam hasn’t anything to do with the future, everything is complete, forever, you only have to …

… total Islamization — against world powers? — what a mad dream; no, no—

— we must cross-fertilize Islam with the world if the ideals of Islam are to survive, the old model doesn’t fit, any kind of isolation can’t stand a chance with what’s happening in the world, ask Ibrahim, technological revolution already here while we’re just talking, talking …!

And as young men do when they drink together they also spoke of women, but not in the way the men in the garage near the EL-AY Café did.

— Look, we don’t want to deny our past for the American sex we enjoy seeing on TV (there was a whistle and laughter) … but hijab, I mean you happen to make love with a married woman, she wants it, ay — and she must be stoned to death, who can accept that it’s the law, even if it isn’t carried out — who can accept that in this age!—

The university graduate emptied his glass and offered: — I just read it somewhere. ‘A Muslim doesn’t fall in love with a woman, but only with Allah.’— He kept a gloomy face, perhaps himself a lover in difficulties, while there was more laughter — the others evidently did not regard the cynicism as blasphemous.

— So what’s our life? With women? What? You tell me. What freedom do they have or we have with them?—

— But they’re the ones now with their own revolution—

— Oh it’s part of ours—

— But they want to decide for themselves. They don’t want anyone to tell them to wear the chador, all right, but if they do want to wear it, they won’t have some Westerner telling them to throw it away. They want to study or work anywhere they decide outside the kitchen, the modern world where men still think we’re the only ones to have a place.—

— We must get one of them to speak, you know, next time we have a meeting — never done that, we are true sons of our grandfathers—

— Will they dare to come—

— They’ll come. They’ll come. I know a few …

— Ah then you’ll really see how the government fathers get the police to go after us …

The graduate of the university where he himself gained the degree that had qualified him to be employed as, in another country, what her friends called a grease-monkey, turned to him where he was listening, silent.

— I’ll lend you a book. Ever heard of Shahrur Muhammad Shahrur? Written a book, al-Kitab wa-l-Qur’an: Qira’a mu’asira. He says people believed once that the sun revolved round the earth, but it was then discovered that the opposite was true, eh? Muslims still believe prejudices of religious authority that are the complete opposite of the correct perspective — conventional religious authority can’t exist with economic market forces today! But take care. Don’t leave the book lying around. You can’t find it, here, somebody sent it, and even then it had to be hidden in the cover of some other book, some nonsense. A package of anything printed that comes from overseas, it’s opened by the authorities, perhaps you’ve forgotten that, my brother.—

He was their brother in frustration. Sometimes he felt himself fired by them to act, join them to plot and agitate, risk, for change here — this desert. But within him something drew back appalled at the submission; the future of this place the world tried to confine him to was not his place in that world. Permanent residence; under no matter what government, religious law, secular law, what president in a keffiyeh or got up in military kit with braid and medals — that was not for him. The company of brothers in frustration salved his own, but this secret refusal, his refusal, roused in him strongly as any sexual desire.

Friday is the day for visits and family affairs. The shops are closed for noon prayers at the mosque, so is the vehicle workshop. During the day it was not unusual for the Uncle’s silver-blue BMW with tasselled blinds to draw up in the street before the gate. Tea was quickly made, sweetmeats taken from their biscuit tin, Coke from the refrigerator (which like the car for his nephew also had been his gift to the family) because the Uncle’s preferences are well-known. He always brings gifts for the children of the house, particularly for those of the son of the house who has not been heard from, disappeared to the oil fields, and he greets everyone with the enthusiasm of a mayor meeting his constituents, and then retires with the mother, his sister. They are left in private, either under the awning or in the parents’ room, where a special, comfortable chair for the Uncle is carried in by young Muhammad. It is understood that serious family matters are discussed. The father seldom takes part but this is not regarded by him, or anyone else, as demeaning of what would be his authority. No-one questions the position of Ibrahim’s mother.

On this Friday afternoon the brother and sister had emerged from their privacy and were in the company of the rest of the family, taking tea and refreshments. Only Ibrahim and his wife were not there; summoned by the mother, Maryam was sent to call them, rapping softly with the knuckle of her third finger on the clapboard door. They had heard the talk and laughter, orchestrated by the unmistakable lead of the Uncle’s voice — impossible not to, through the thin door — but Ibrahim was on the iron bed reading newspapers; Julie, amusing small Leila, who liked to spend time in the lean-to decking herself out in the few Ndebele and Zulu bead necklaces that had somehow been tossed into the elegant suitcase, had sent the child out to join the Friday gathering. Leila, your mummy wants you. The child caught the gist of English-Arabic pidgin, laughing, and obeyed, first resting her plump cheek a moment, smooth against the back of Julie’s hand.

After the knock on the door, Julie stretched, peered over the newspaper, opened her eyes wide and pulled her mouth down in a closed smile: come. A finger placed somewhere on a column answered that he would finish what he was reading. She brushed her hair for the company.

She took his hand as they entered, whether in support of him, comforting his reluctance to spend any part of his hours to himself with the voice that reverberated through the workshop, or to support herself in her claim to be one of the family. There were warm greetings; only Khadija seemed not to see them; whenever the Uncle appeared she sat transfixed, like that, on him, her children drawn around under her arms, watching his lips for word that he was going to do something for her — something to find and bring back her husband and the father of these children. Others could only look away from the sister-in-law, not to shame her in the spectacle of her demanding humiliation. Anyone could see she was expecting an announcement of some kind, believing her situation, the well-born woman deserted by a son of the family for a woman at the oil fields only after his money, must have been the matter deliberated between his Uncle and mother.

But apparently, unusually, whatever the private talk was about, the father had been present; been required? The three sat ranged together.

Ibrahim’s mother’s breast, prow of the family, rose and fell deeply; his wife saw it, ominous. At a signal to Maryam, the handing round of tea stopped and talk broke off, the gaiety of children was reduced to whispering.

The mother called her son and his wife over to her where room had been made for them to sit. She drew herself up and leaned forward, took another of her deep slow breaths that customarily ended in a sigh (she would rise from prayer with a breath like that) but now gave weight of importance to what she was about to say. It was an announcement, yes, but not for the one who awaited something.