Alaa Al Aswany - The Yacoubian Building

“Abduh. You’re intelligent and sensitive and you can improve your circumstances through your own efforts. You’re earning money now, your family is taken care of, and your life is stable. But money isn’t everything. You have to get an education and become a respectable man.”

They’d finished the morning love session and Hatim got out of bed, naked, and took a dreamy, dancing step on the tips of his toes, his face full of contentment and animation as it usually was after he’d had his fill of lovemaking. He started to pour himself a drink while Abduh, stretched out on the bed, laughed and said jokingly, “Why do you want me to get an education?”

“So you can be respectable.”

“You mean I’m not respectable?”

“Of course you’re respectable. But you have to study and get a certificate to bear witness to that.”

“ ‘There is no god but God’ is the only witnessing I’ll ever do!”

Abduh laughed uproariously, but Hatim looked at him reproachfully and said, “I’m serious. You have to make an effort. Study, get the Intermediate and the Secondary, and go to a major faculty, like law, for instance.”

“ ‘You can’t teach an old dog new tricks,’ as the old saying goes.”

“No, Abduh. Don’t think that way. You’re twenty-four years old. Your whole life’s ahead of you.”

“Everything’s fate and destiny.”

“That backward stuff again? You can make your destiny in this world on your own. If there were any justice in this country, someone like you would get educated at state expense. Education, medical treatment, and work are the natural rights of every citizen in the world, but the regime in Egypt is determined to abandon the poor like you to ignorance so it can rob them. Have you noticed that the government selects the Central Security troops from the poorest and most ignorant recruits? If you were educated, Abduh, you’d never agree to work for Central Security, in the worst conditions and for pennies. And at the same time the big men steal millions from the people’s pockets.”

“You want me to stop the big men from stealing? I couldn’t stand up to the major who commanded the camp and now you want me to take on the big men?”

“Start with yourself, Abduh. Make an effort and teach yourself. It’s the first step toward getting your rights.”

Hatim looked at Abduh for a while, then said lovingly, “ And who knows? Maybe one day you’ll be Mr. Abd Rabbuh the lawyer.”

Abduh got off the bed, went up to him, took hold of his shoulders, kissed him on the cheek, and said, “And who’ll pay for my education? And who’ll open me an office when I graduate?”

Hatim’s feelings suddenly took fire and he put his face close to Abduh’s and said in a whisper, “I will, my darling. I’ll never leave you and I’ll never be stingy with you.”

Abduh hugged him and the two of them lost themselves in long, hot kisses. However, a distant sound reached them and gradually they became aware of repeated loud knocks on the door. Hatim looked at Abduh anxiously and they rushed to put on their clothes any old how. Hatim preceded him in the direction of the door, preparing his face with an annoyed and haughty expression for whomever he might find there. He peered through the peephole and said in surprise, “It’s your wife, Abduh.”

Abduh came forward quickly, opened the door, and shouted angrily, “What’s the matter, Hidiya? Why are you here at this hour? What do you want?”

Pointing to her child, who was sleeping in her arms, she said, “Help me, Abduh! The boy’s burning hot and he keeps throwing up. He’s been crying all night long. Hatim Bey, I beg you, get us a doctor or take us to the hospital!”

When Busayna opened the door of the bathroom, she found Zaki el Dessouki stretched out on the floor, his clothes covered with vomit, and unable to move. Bending down, she took his hand and found it was as cold as ice.

“Zaki Bey! Are you ill?”

He muttered some incomprehensible words and continued to stare into space. She brought a chair, took him in her arms, sat him down on it (discovering at the same time how very light his body was), removed his soiled clothes, and washed his face, hands, and chest with hot water. Soon he started to come round a little. He was able to stand and walk, leaning on her, and she put him to bed and went up to her room on the roof and quickly returned with a large glass of hot mint, which Zaki drank before surrendering to a deep sleep. She spent the night next to him on the couch and examined him several times. She checked the heat of his brow with her hand and put a finger under his nose to make sure that his breathing was regular. She stayed awake and determined to call a doctor if his condition got worse. As she contemplated his aged sleeping face, he appeared to her, for the first time, in simple reality, as just a good-hearted, drunk old man, frail, mild-tempered, and deserving of compassion, like a child.

In the morning, she made him a light breakfast with a glass of warm milk. Abaskharon had arrived and discovered what had happened and he stood before his sick master with his head bent in sorrow, saying over and over in an agonized voice, “A thousand wishes for your recovery, Excellency!”

Zaki opened his eyes and made a sign for him to leave. Then he got up with difficulty, leaned against the wall, and taking his head in his hands grumbled in a low voice, “I’ve got a terrible headache and my stomach hurts a lot.”

“Do you want me to call a doctor?”

“No. It’s nothing. I drank too much. This has happened to me so many times. I drink a cup of Turkish coffee without sugar and I’m fine.”

He was putting on a show of holding up and being tough and she laughed and said, “So listen. That’s enough machismo. You’re an old man now and your health is weak. No more drinking and staying up late. You’re supposed to go to bed early like old people your age.”

Zaki smiled and looking at her gratefully said, “Thank you, Busayna. You’re a good and loyal person. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

She put her hands on his face and kissed his brow.

She had kissed him often before, but this time she felt the touch of his face differently. She felt as she pressed her lips to his brow that she knew him well, that she loved his old, coarse smell, and that he was no longer that Bey, who, far removed from her, told her about the old days. He wasn’t any longer even that rebarbative male lover who was different from her. Now he was close to her, as though she had known him for ages, as though he was her father or her uncle, as though he carried the same smell and blood as she. She wanted to hug him hard so that she could take his weak, fragile body in her arms and fill her nostrils with that old, coarse smell of his that she loved.

She thought that what was happening between them was strange and unexpected. She remembered that only yesterday she’d tried to trick him and get hold of his signature, and she felt ashamed. It occurred to her that the trick she’d played on him yesterday had been her last try at resisting her real feelings toward him. Inside she’d wanted to flee from her love for him. She’d have been more comfortable in a way if she had limited her relationship to him to sex and money — he wanted sex and she wanted money, that was how she had pictured the relationship — but she had overstepped the bounds.

Now she is facing her true feelings and she understands them clearly. She wants to stay with him, to take care of him, and to respect him, gratefully confident that he will understand anything she may say to him. She will tell him about her life, her father and her mother, and her old love for Taha; she’ll even tell him the sordid details of her relationship with Talal and she won’t be ashamed with him. She will feel at peace once she’s told him, as though she has relieved herself of a heavy burden. How she warms to the sight of his aged face listening attentively to her as he asks her to explain some detail of her stories, then comments on them!