Leila Aboulela - Lyrics Alley

True, he had given her a lot, and he did not want much from her in return. Not much but to bear this exile, to tolerate his family, to decorate his new mansion in Umdurman simply by being herself. She was loved and cherished, and the fact that he was already married was not really a threat. He and Hajjah Waheeba no longer lived as husband and wife, not since they moved into the saraya. He had, long before his second marriage, separated himself from Waheeba and kept his own room. He would not divorce her, though, he had made that clear from the beginning. Waheeba was the mother of his sons and Nabilah must not feel threatened by her. Yet since he had taken ill, he had craved Hajjah Waheeba’s food. In his exhaustion, his accent had become more heavily Sudanese, and when she saw him surrounded by his concerned family, he looked so much like them, was so unmistakably one of them, that their happy years in Cairo seemed distant and illusory.

When she was sure that the children were asleep, Nabilah put on her navy blue dotted dress and combed her hair, fixing the waves with a touch of cream. She put on her lipstick and used a tiny black brush to smooth her broad eyebrows, then she studied her reflection in the mirror and felt that something was missing. A handbag. She did not really need it because she was only going from one section of the saraya to another. But she picked up her handbag anyway. It completed her look and lifted her spirits, for the cloud of illness that was hanging over the saraya was depressing. It made Nabilah want escape, and her own circle of friends and acquaintances. Of course, propriety demanded that she stay at home. Only when her husband went back to work could she leave the house to resume her social activities among the community of Egyptian ladies — the wives of the engineers who worked on the irrigation projects, the wives of embassy staff, or the few transplants like herself, married to local men.

She expected Mahmoud Bey’s guests to have gone by now. Nur had been spending each night with him, but he went and had supper at his mother’s hoash before joining his father. It would be a good time to find her husband alone. She tiptoed downstairs and out the front door, then walked across the terrace past the huge clay flowerpots and down the garden steps. In Cairo, the nights were alive with the pleasures of leisurely walks, roasted peanuts and grilled corn, people chatting and shops that stayed open late — the liveliness and light of it all. Here, the heavy indigo sky was bearing down, the stars mysterious, and the clouds unnaturally large. As she walked around the garden to the other side of the saraya, she could hear frogs croaking and the hiss and breath of night creatures, as if this were a jungle. The huddle by the gate was a servant sleeping on a straw mat. They prayed Isha and slept as if this was the countryside not a city. In her fashionable dress and elegant high heels, she was wasted in this place, but she kept on walking to his room.

When she pushed open the door that had been slightly ajar, she saw Idris sitting on an armchair, toothpick in one hand, his face a snarl as he cleaned his teeth. He gave her his usual guarded greeting, but there was a hint of expectancy in the way he tilted his head and moved in his seat, adjusting his jellabiya. She turned towards the bed and saw the bulk of Hajjah Waheeba leaning over her husband. Mahmoud was lying on his stomach, head turned to one side, naked to the waist, and his wife was massaging his back. She was bearing down with her full weight, so that he was only able to grunt at Nabilah in recognition. She froze, not knowing what to do in the face of this unexpected intimacy. This was only her third time to be in the same room as Hajjah Waheeba. The first had been soon after her arrival in Umdurman, when many family members came round to take a good look at her. The women had made no attempts to hide their curiosity and had simply filed in, sat and stared at her, not bothering to introduce themselves or engage her in conversation. She had not even known which one of them was Hajjah Waheeba. They had all looked alike to her, these middle-aged Sudanese women swathed in to bes, their faces without make up and their hair in traditional tight braids close to the head. Later, she had come to know that Waheeba was the one with the tribal scars on her cheeks, those vertical scars that looked like cracks on a French loaf. The second time they had met, when Fatma gave birth, Nabilah took a good look at her co-wife and decided that she was neither interesting, nor worth competing with. They never exchanged words. Each avoided the other, marking her own territory, cautious and watching, as if they were assessing each other’s strengths and weaknesses.

Now Hajjah Waheeba looked up and smiled at her, a genuine smile. There was a serenity in her face, as well as a warm flush of exertion. Her to be was falling around her soft round stomach and slipping down to show her head and hennaed braids. Her large, plump hands were flat on Mahmoud’s back, pressing. There was a pinch, like a bracelet around her elbow and above that the moving fat of her upper arms. She shifted her weight and, instead of pressing down on him again, began, with her thumb and fingers, to lightly smooth and iron out the tightness of his muscles.

He could talk now, and he said to Nabilah, ‘My back has been giving me a lot of pain.’

This encouraged her to walk into the room and close the door behind her, just as Waheeba was saying to him.

‘This will release it.’

She leaned down closer, propping her right elbow on his shoulder. She began to work a particular spot as Nabilah sat down in her regular armchair. It was impossible to ignore what was happening on the bed and she and Idris sat and watched.

‘It’s here isn’t it?’

A grunt, a muffled, ‘To the left a bit.’

‘Here. .’ Waheeba smiled.

A groan and she laughed.

‘But this is the bit you want. Be still!’ Her laugh was hearty, coming from the throat. When it trailed off, she turned to look at Nabilah and pressed her lips, ‘Of course, in Egypt they didn’t teach you how to give a massage. But I can teach you.’

‘No thank you, I don’t wish to learn.’

Waheeba smiled, as if this was the exact reply she wanted. Her voice was soft and easy.

‘And why don’t you want to learn? Don’t you want to please your husband? He brought you here to this good life and you don’t want to serve him?’

Nabilah could not think of an able put down to what sounded like an accusation of ingratitude, to the insinuation that she had been needy or, at least, less well off before this marriage. She looked at her husband, but he turned his head so that she could not see his reaction. He did not come to her defence and, to make matters worse, Idris gave a chuckle. Nabilah looked at her husband’s back, at the black-and-white of his hair. His neck and skin were smooth with oil, glistening, and his wife’s dark hands, kneading now, her thumb moving, coaxing the sore muscles into calm suppleness. Nabilah knew she must control herself. She was well bred, she was cultivated; she must not overreact. She breathed and noticed, for the first time, Nur sitting at the desk in the far corner. He was writing in a notebook.

Mahmoud gave out a long, loud sigh of pain and Waheeba laughed in response, admonishing him to bear it. It was a laugh that was surprisingly attractive — but there is no competition, Nabilah reminded herself. How could she compete with me! She, who was obese, menopausal, illiterate. She, who had no concept of fashion or travel. She, who had never walked into a club or read a book or eaten with a knife and fork, or even been inside a hairdresser. Nabilah forced herself to smile, walked over to the desk and sat next to Nur.

‘What are you writing?’ Her voice was deliberately friendly. She was young, and she could read what her co-wife’s son had written.