Khaled Khalifa - Death Is Hard Work

He had watched his neighbors in the first days of the revolution and heard a large and astonishing collection of slogans it was impossible to believe, broadcast by all as if they were fact. His astonishment was redoubled when he saw men, whose names indicated they were members of the ulema, the religious authorities, appear on state television to analyze and confirm this propaganda to the delight of the heavily adorned female broadcasters who seemed confident of the upcoming victory. Bolbol couldn’t bear the commentaries that stated that the protesters had taken to the streets purely under the influence of drugs. One analyst took two hours to explain how the government of an unnamed reactionary country had promised each protester five hundred liras and a kebab to take part in a conspiracy to overthrow the regime. It was easy enough to blindly direct the herd of supporters anywhere you wanted them to go. Questions almost choked Bolbol. For him, the most disturbing thing was the fear that grew and embedded itself in his depths. Several times, he felt a pressing need to speak to Lamia and admit that whenever he went outside, he worried his neighbors would rape him. He avoided even looking toward the windows, and the obsession with spying he had enjoyed for several years no longer interested him. It was fewer than fifty meters from his house to al-Harra Square, where he waited at the stop for the official bus to the institute, and where he returned after work on the same bus to the same spot. On weekends he shut himself away in his house, keeping the windows open so the neighbors could have no grounds for suspecting he was hatching some conspiracy. He was utterly exhausted by defending himself and imagined everyone was watching him, but at the same time he was incapable of moving elsewhere. Renting a house to a man with his identity card would be considered a crime, and he couldn’t go back to S. He couldn’t bear to look his wretched neighbors’ victims in the eye as they were cursed so loudly and openly. Several times Bolbol hid his background, inventing stories about there being a mistake in his paperwork, how he wasn’t born anywhere near S…

Now here he was, walking with a bowed head alongside twenty others to be taught how to pray at gunpoint. He performed his freezing ablutions, following the instructions of someone in a mask, and felt ridiculous as all the prisoners lined up behind another masked man who explained each step of the prayer. Everything was ridiculous… After prayers, what would these people do with them? Would they kill them? Would they exchange them for ransom? Would they make them into slaves? Bolbol didn’t care in the slightest; to him, the imperative thing was that by now his father’s body would be underground, embracing the bones of his beloved sister, whose burning image had given him sleepless nights till his dying day. Yes, surely not a day had passed without his being reminded of his cowardice. His failure to defend her made him complicit in her suicide, and her choice to burn on the roof on her wedding day was a clear message to everyone: she would never forgive them. She could have committed suicide in a myriad of ways, but she wanted her story to live. She wanted to die in flaming defiance of the lies that would be told about her; she had chosen to die rather than live with a man she didn’t love.

Shortly after the sunset prayer, the guard came in and asked Bolbol to follow him. He walked behind the guard unquestioningly and was led to the room of a man who called himself a Sharia judge, where his uncle Nayif was waiting for him, having signed a pledge to instruct his nephew in his religious duties. His uncle kissed him and embraced him, offered his belated condolences, and took him by the hand, and they left. His cousin’s car was waiting outside. Everyone called him by his original name, Nabil, which he had almost forgotten, it was used so rarely. He liked regaining his original name and resolved not to let anyone call him Bolbol anymore. A heavy silence settled in the car. No one asked Bolbol any questions, and they kept Fatima’s muteness from him. His uncle exchanged a glance with his cousin; they were wondering about his sanity. His vacant eyes, trembling hands, and twitching body all indicated that something traumatic had happened to him overnight. Bolbol understood and assured them that the only reason for his appearance was the biting cold, saying that he would soon recover. When he reached the ʿaza , the women started crying again. Weeping, Fatima rushed toward him and embraced him. She tried for the last time to recover her voice, and her sobs grew louder when she realized she still couldn’t speak. Muteness had taken total possession of her. Bolbol wished it had been him rather than Fatima; he envied her eternal silence. Still, he was moved at having finally arrived; he felt great gratitude for being among people who were able to protect him. It had been a long time since they had left Damascus.

Hussein was ignoring him, which hurt. He’d considered it sufficient to ask Bolbol briefly if the extremists had tortured or harassed him. All Bolbol could hear in these questions was his brother saying I hate you , so he made do with a brief gesture of dismissal and returned to gazing into a far corner of the spacious but cozy guest room.

Bolbol bathed in warm water, and his cousin gave him clean pajamas. He ate dinner with everyone but kept silent, surrounded by sympathy on every side. When he lay down in bed, he was assailed by nightmares; he felt he was hanging from the ceiling of a wide room, flying in a narrow space, crossing a nearby border, and beginning a new life. Despite the nightmares he was able to sleep for a few hours and woke up at dawn. He didn’t yield to the temptation of remaining in the warm bed but got up at once and walked to the graveyard with his cousin. He stifled his anger when he saw his father’s grave had been dug at a distance from all the others. He hadn’t been buried beside his sister’s grave, and so his last wish had not been carried out after all. Nor, indeed, had he been buried near his mother or his grandmother. The grave was isolated in a distant corner of the graveyard. He had lived at a distance and had to be buried at a distance—but in the end he had a grave, and that was no trivial thing. They didn’t linger; Bolbol stayed just long enough to uproot some dead weeds from his mother’s grave. He felt an overwhelming grief; perhaps she’d never known that she hadn’t meant anything to his father, that she had been just a wife. Everything that had been said about their great love story had been a lie no one dared to refute even now; the living had to keep telling hypocritical stories about the dead. Bolbol didn’t protest or wonder why they had buried him so far from his loved ones. He thought, later, that a distant grave was the truest, most appropriate one for his father. His aunt hadn’t wanted anyone from her family to share her grave; she had wanted a solitary resting place, where no one would dare to sleep but her. Her legend grew day by day, exciting the imagination and widening the distance between herself and the living. Many had considered moving or even destroying her grave, but none of the living dared to raise a finger. Even her brother Nayif, the last witness, hadn’t been brave enough; he asked everyone to be content to forget. The story would endure, and any attempt to erase it would only reignite it. Layla shouldn’t be turned into the patron saint of lovers. She should be left to lie quietly in oblivion, without notice, in a neglected grave without a marker.

On the morning of their third day in Anabiya, Bolbol decided to cross the border to Turkey. One of his cousins drove with him in case he needed any help. The crowd at the Bab al-Salamah crossing was frighteningly large; thousands of people were waiting to cross. Bolbol thought then that his desire to start a new life was basically just another lie; he knew he was too weak to manage it. A new life meant a new unknown, and that required strength. He missed his house, and the repetitive moments of his work and his office, his pickles, his fear of the fascists who raised their rifles and wanted to plow through Deraa and plant it over with potatoes. His cousin sensed his confusion; his expression changed, and he suggested they go back to Anabiya and think again. He took Bolbol by the arm and drew him away. He was starting to be convinced that Bolbol had lost his mind; he couldn’t let him cross the border when his silent face showed plainly that he couldn’t tolerate the consequences of such a decision. On their way back to Anabiya, Bolbol’s cousin assured him that they could help him to cross into Turkey any time he liked.