Raja Alem - The Dove's Necklace

My ears flushed red when I watched you read that word; I thought it meant something like “making out,” or “sex” even! Do you know how far a word will go to disguise its meaning, just so it can hold on to the connotations of its first rhythms?

That’s the beat the word played on my heart, the chill it sent up my spine, and no matter how many times the religion teacher explained and elaborated, the word still winks at me and whispers: “Take her in your arms, crush bones and distances in one go.”

I still look for a word like that, a word that says something so it can say something else, and for faces that present certain features so they can disguise others. I look out for those dreams, as well, that make us dream so they can hide us inside the dreams of another being, even though that being doesn’t want us to be part of their dreams either. Their dreams, too, are the dreams of another being that doesn’t want to release them from the library of dreams dreamed by all the people who came before.

I rave and claim that I’m going to tear off all the masks. The first mask is yours.

Azza, have you really become a woman like you threatened when you said, “There’s a veil between my face and yours now, Yusuf!”

Okay, fine, then that must mean I’m a man now, and like all the other men in the Lane of Many Heads I need a veil to cover my impotence so you don’t see my shame.

How can you expect a man to be nothing more than a white scrap addressed to you? I’ve lost sight of the man I once promised you I’d be; his head’s been unplugged.

I’ve got to keep breathing so I can fill your chest with oxygen. I, too, can hear the contradictions in my voice. That’s always how it is when I’m with you. It’s what gets to you.

I’m sitting on the bus writing this scrap of paper to you. Did you know that I’m an Aquarius and that Aquarius empties his bucket for all of eternity? Suddenly fate — that eternal emptying — dragged me to my feet in the middle of the bus, my papers scattering everywhere. The dusty eyes of the immigrant workers all turned to stare. These men didn’t let a fear of emigrating hobble them, they chased their dreams — me on the other hand …

How old am I now?

My head sways every time the bus stops, every time a body beside me stands up, sits down, or slumps in its seat. I’ve got to collect all these shreds of my identity; me and everyone else in my petroleum generation.

Did you know that bodies can tell a story in sweat? Like the sweat of this worker who just sat down with his plastic bag, stained with oily chicken and rice; he’s between a rock and a hard place. He’s in a rush to get to the building site where only yesterday one of his friends fell off the top of the scaffolding. They waited for hours for a vehicle — any vehicle — before they could take him, finally, to the nearest clinic in the back of a truck, racing against death. They were charged four hundred riyals just to have him admitted, and he ended up dying on one of their stretchers.

The sweat of these men tries to wash over me, tries to seep out of me; it says we’re all running from a construction site to a destruction site.

My gaze takes refuge in the scrap of paper that longs for your eyes, and in the view of the road ahead. Every time I raise my eyes, people, shops, and colors flash past, jolting me. I’d bet you there’s nowhere else on earth where you can find two square meters with such a mix of complexions. Mecca is a dove whose neck is streaked with colors that surpass the spectrum of humanity.

Do you also see how the rails of goods in the storefronts cry out? Newly arrived migrants are hatching a new generation, and in doing so they’re splitting the physical and human geography of Mecca into two classes: the improvisers — whose one care in the world is selling as much as they can of whatever they can — and the consumers. During the pilgrimage season, alongside the religious ritual, they buy and sell to the tune of five billion dollars a month. They drink tea with milk, mint with pine nuts, strong coffee, Seven-Up, Pepsi, herbal teas, Boom Boom, and Bison (“Makes you move!”); they gobble up basmati rice and buy prayer rugs (“One hundred percent guaranteed to answer all your prayers!”). My mother used to warn me: “Make sure you fold up your prayer rug when you’re done praying, or else Satan will use it!” and as the bus speeds along I watch devils praying on rugs laid out on display in shop windows. If you ask me, marketing really is the answer to the devil’s prayers. O rugs of Mecca, if only you’d give me one that was guaranteed to answer my prayers!

“Meccans are slippery and sly, hot pepper that brings tears to the eye. They’re born businessmen who’d sell you the shade and the breeze. Never mind wool, they’ll pull your own mother’s placenta over your eyes!” My mother, Halima, loves repeating this little pearl; it’s like scrawling a naughty smirk onto the face of the mountains around Mecca.

I just got out of an interview with the recruiting team at Elaf Holdings, the company that handles most of the urban development and investment projects in Mecca, trading in soil that’s worth more than enriched uranium.

It was for the position of “historical researcher.” I’d be tasked with investigating potential sites for real estate development, with regard, of course, to preserving the unique nature of the Holy City.

The other interviewees had a real mixed bag of qualifications (priority was given to graduates of foreign universities!). When the man who was chairing the hiring committee, who also happened to be the managing director and the lead developer, asked me if I was Yusuf al-Hujubi, I wanted to punch him in the face. He said it like he was suspicious and he didn’t even wait for an answer. “If we decide that your qualifications are satisfactory, we may need to hire you on a probationary basis. If we were to take you on as an assistant, would you be able to put together a list of properties in Mecca whose charitable endowments are now defunct? And to find out whether the endowments are defunct because of a dispute among heirs, or just because they’ve been forgotten about?” The superior look that accompanied his question got on my nerves, and I was tempted to say, “I specialize in history, not family dramas.” The look was amplified when he said, “Leave us your number. We’ll be in touch.”

He dropped the sentence like a wall between our faces, yours and mine, severing every link: our noses and your full, peachy lips.

I stopped off to see Mushabbab on my way back. He was suspicious when I told him they were on the lookout for abandoned properties. We sat down in front of his computer together and searched for “Elaf Holdings.” You wouldn’t believe what we found: it’s like an octopus, with tentacles in companies, factories, hotels, hospitals, private universities, etc. It’s an empire on which the sun never sets. Mushabbab said it was vital that we keep track of the consortium’s activities on the ground — you never know what you might find out. To be honest, as I wrote down my suspicions it was like my eyes opened for the first time: the map was being redrawn right under our feet.

I’m not going to continue with Mushabbab’s line of thinking. I’m as deflated as a balloon today.

I dreamed of white thread last night. I dreamed that I tied the end of a string around your hand and flew you like a kite. You were leaning on your hand, as if seated in a chair, and I was flying you up over the mountains attached by only the thinnest string. We were watching Mecca wake up, though Mecca doesn’t have to wake up because she never sleeps: she only dreams, of the prayers and the footsteps of circumambulating pilgrims. And the dove: we undo the collar around its neck and the dove shakes it off like a splash of water. The thread that connects me to you makes a rainbow out of these colorful feathers, fanning them out over the Meccan horizon.