Alaa Al Aswany - Chicago

He rushed to her and held her hands and after some effort was able to stop her from slapping herself, but she threw herself on the chair and began to sob with such despair that she broke his heart. He spoke for the first time and his voice came out deep, as if coming from a well, “You’re mistaken.”

“What do you mean?”

“You couldn’t be pregnant.”

“I did the test twice.”

“I assure you it is impossible.”

She looked at him shrewishly and said, “You are a doctor and you know very well that what happened is possible.” It seemed the red line had been compromised.

A deep silence fell and she began to cry again, then she said in a shaking voice, “This morning I thought of committing suicide, but I fear God Almighty.”

She got up suddenly, got close to him, held his hand, and whispered in a hoarse voice: “Please protect me, Tariq. I implore you.”

He kept staring at her in silence. She said in a supplicating voice, “I’ve asked about the procedures. We can get married here in the consulate.”

“Marry here?”

“Our families will be upset because we didn’t ask them, but we have no choice. I’ve asked at the consulate. It’s a simple procedure that would take less than half an hour. After that a copy of the marriage document would be sent to the civil registry in Cairo.”

She said the last sentence in a matter-of-fact tone, as if he had agreed to the marriage and only the procedure remained. A heavy silence settled between them. He turned his face away so as not to look at her and said in a soft voice, as if talking to himself, “I also have a big problem. I’ve received an official warning from the university: my GPA has plunged.”

“We have to resolve our situation first. When do we go to the consulate?”

“Why?”

“To get married.”

“My circumstances would not permit marriage now.” Silence prevailed again. She began to breathe unsteadily. He went on in a pleading voice, “Please, Shaymaa. Understand me. I will never let you down. I will do all I can to help you, but I cannot marry this way.”

She stared at his face. She tried to say something but finally she half sighed, half sobbed, then pushed him with her hands as she shouted, “Get out of here! Go. I don’t want to see your face.”

I spent one of the worst nights in my life. I didn’t sleep at all. I called Wendy several times, but she didn’t answer then turned off her telephone. Early in the morning I put on my clothes and took the train to the Chicago Stock Exchange, where I had accompanied her several times. I stood waiting for her at the intersection. The snow that had fallen overnight had covered everything. I tightened the heavy coat around my body and covered my head and wrapped the scarf around my face. I remembered how Wendy had chosen these clothes for me. I had, due to my lack of experience with Chicago winters, bought a raincoat thinking it could ward off the cold of winter. When Wendy saw it she had laughed and then controlled herself and said in a low voice as if apologizing, “This coat is too light. Winter in Chicago requires heavy coats lined with fur.”

She took me to the Marshall Field’s department store and told me as the glass elevator took us upstairs, “Here they sell fancy fashions from the biggest names in design all over the world, but thank God they haven’t forgotten poor people like us, so on the last floor they sell slightly irregular or older-model merchandise at affordable prices.”

How she had loved me and has taken care of me! And I had treated her as harshly as she had treated me nicely. Yesterday she came to celebrate with me, bringing the dancing outfit that she had bought especially for me; she wanted to look like the Andalusian dancer that I had imagined. All this love I met with incredible cruelty. I accused her of spying, of treachery. I will apologize to her as soon as I see her. I’ll kiss her hands and beg her to forgive me. How could I have been so cruel? I was not myself. I was tense and miserable, so I took all my frustrations out on her: Safwat Shakir’s breaking into my apartment, his knowing all the details of my life, and his attempt to frighten me by threatening my mother and sister. All that made me a nervous wreck. My sister Noha, I can’t imagine that they’d actually arrest her. If they harm her I’ll kill this Safwat Shakir. Can they be humans like us? Were they at one time innocent children? How could a person’s job be simply to beat and torture people? How can a man who tortures another eat and sleep and make love to his wife and play with his children? Strangely enough, all State Security officers have the same features. The officer who tortured me when I was arrested at the university looked like Safwat Shakir: the same cold, sticky shine in his complexion, the same dead cruel eyes, and the same wooden, ashen face filled with bitterness.

A gust of icy wind blew, so I closed my eyes and started walking on the sidewalk in brisk steps so that blood would rush to my limbs. This method of coping with the cold I had also learned from Wendy. There are dozens of details and situations that we had shared that I couldn’t forget. I looked at my watch. It was seven-thirty. Why hadn’t she come? This is the route she took every day. Has she changed it to avoid me? I felt sadness weighing heavily on my heart. With the cold and exhaustion, I began to separate myself from my surroundings, as if I had suddenly moved to another, faraway realm, as if what I was seeing was happening to other people I was watching from behind glass. It was a trick that my mind involuntarily played to reduce my feeling of pain. Little by little mist covered the field of visibility before me, as if I were seeing the street and passersby through cloudy glasses. I don’t know how long I stayed in that condition but suddenly I saw her coming. There she was, walking with the measured, even gait that I like. She moved in accordance with a graceful, steady rhythm as if she were dancing. (I asked her once, “Why don’t you walk fast like other Americans?” She answered me, laughing, “Because I’m carrying the blood of my Andalusian grandmother who was in love with your grandfather.”) I rushed toward her as fast as I could. She stopped and looked at me. It seemed that, like me, she hadn’t had any sleep.

“Wendy.”

“I have to go to work.”

“Please. Just one minute.” A bitter wind blew and showered our faces with drifting snow.

I motioned to her and she hesitated for a while then followed me to the entryway of a nearby building. We were warmer there. I was breathing heavily with emotion. I held her by the shoulders and said, “Please forgive me. I don’t know why I said that. I was frustrated and drunk. I wasn’t myself.”

She bowed her head to avoid looking at me and said, “Our fight brought the truth out in the open.”

“I’ll do anything for you to forget what I said yesterday.”

“I can’t forget it. I can’t deceive myself.”

“What do you mean?”

“Our relationship is wonderful, but it has no future.”

“Why?”

“Because we belong to two different worlds.”

“Wendy, I made a mistake and I came to apologize.”

“There’s no mistake: ultimately I belong to the enemies of your country. No matter how much you love me, you’ll never forget that I’m Jewish. No matter how faithful I remain to you, your trust in me will always be fragile. I’ll be the first suspect in your view.”

“This isn’t true. I trust you and respect you.”

“We’re finished, Nagi.”

I was about to register one last desperate objection, but she smiled mysteriously and there came to her face that old sadness that would come over her. She moved toward me and hugged me and kissed me quickly on the cheek then said in a soft voice as she gave me my apartment key, “Please don’t call me. I’d like for our relationship to end as beautifully as it began. Thank you for the wonderful feelings I’ve shared with you.”