Khan Al-Khalili

47

At noon the following day (a Friday), Ahmad did what his brother had asked. He took his money out of the bank, bought him some pajamas, household clothes, and a few other necessities, and then returned home. He was delighted that his brother had decided to go back to the sanitorium in Helwan.

When he got back to the apartment, he found his brother smoking a cigarette. He was utterly shocked. Rushdi had stopped smoking as soon as the disease had made its first appearance. He looked sheepish as his brother came in and gave him a bashful smile.

“Who on earth gave you that cigarette?” he shouted, forgetting all about the things he had just purchased. “What on earth are you trying to do to yourself?”

He gave his mother an inquisitorial look.

“Rushdi insisted,” she said by way of self-defense, “and I couldn’t resist. He wouldn’t keep quiet until he got what he wanted.”

“Don’t be hard on me, Ahmad,” Rushdi said without putting the cigarette away. “I had this sudden irresistible urge to smoke a cigarette.”

“This is absolute insanity!” Ahmad replied angrily.

“One cigarette’s not going to hurt,” Rushdi said by way of excuse. “It’s so good! Let me take a few puffs in peace.”

He finished smoking his cigarette with obvious relish. “Don’t get angry, Ahmad,” he said. “That’s my last cigarette. Now, what new clothes did you buy?”

Immediately after lunch he suddenly felt very weak, but did not feel like lying down. He sat on his bed, stretched his legs out, and rested his back against a folded pillow. His legs looked like two sticks, and his complexion was a pale yellow with a tinge of blue. There were dark circles around his eyes, and his eyes had an unfamiliar look to them, different from the normal sadness, as though gazing at some distant point invisible to the eye.

Late in the afternoon Ahmad came to chat with his brother before taking off for the Zahra Café.

“Are you going to the Zahra Café?” Rushdi asked him. “Say hello to all my friends there. How I wish I could spend the evening with my friends in al-Sakakini!”

Ahmad was much affected by his brother’s words. “God willing,” he replied, “you’ll get better, then you can go back to your friends and their Sakakini nights!”

“Am I ever going to get better?” Rushdi asked despondently. “Just look at my legs. Will they ever look like human legs again?”

“Do you think God cannot make that happen if He so wishes?”

Rushdi shook his head, spoke to his brother in a way he had never done before, as a kind of sage counselor. “Always keep a close watch on your health, Ahmad,” he said. “Never treat it lightly.”

For a second he stared at the floor. “Illness is like a woman,” he went on in a different tone of voice, “it sucks the youth out of you and destroys all hopes.”

Ahmad wondered to himself why Rushdi was talking like this and stared at him despondently.

“Microbes work unseen,” Rushdi went on. “Once they have grabbed their victim, they finish him off.”

“Rushdi, what are you saying?”

“I’m sharing a truth before parting. You may not see me any more after today.”

“What do you mean, Rushdi,” Ahmad asked in a panic, “I may not see you after today?”

Rushdi paused for a moment’s thought. “Isn’t it likely that you’ll lose patience?” he asked as though in his normal sarcastic tone. “You’ll either get fed up with the illness or else your studies will keep you preoccupied, so you’ll forget all about me in Helwan!”

“Heaven forbid, Rushdi, heaven forbid!”

Rushdi gave him a very odd look. “Why don’t they simply burn sick people?” he asked. “That would put them out of their misery and stop making them a burden on others!”

“Rushdi,” Ahmad protested, “why on earth are you talking this way?”

Again Rushdi paused for a moment. “God curse all illness,” he went on. “May God protect you from the evil of disease!”

Ahmad was totally stunned. His mother came back with a cup of coffee that he sipped in silence. He was worried in case Rushdi started talking the same way with his mother there, but he said nothing. Ahmad relaxed a bit and assumed that he was back to his normal behavior. He stole a glance in Rushdi’s direction and was struck by how weak and pale he looked and how skinny his legs were. “Can this really be you, Rushdi?” he asked himself sadly. “A pox on this disease!”

It was late when he got to the café. He always found that his time there helped calm his shattered nerves and grieving heart. He stayed there until nine-thirty, then came back to the apartment. As he walked past his brother’s room, he noticed that Rushdi had taken a sleeping pill to help him sleep but was not asleep as yet.

“Good evening!” Rushdi greeted his brother. “You’re back!”

“Yes,” Ahmad replied looking at his brother carefully. “How are you feeling?”

“Praise be to God. How was the tea at the Zahra Café?”

“As usual.”

“Drink it in good health then,” Rushdi said in a barely audible voice.

Ahmad left him to get some sleep, went to his own room, and got undressed. He was feeling tense, and his nerves were on edge. He could smell something foul, and that made him even more tense and nervous. Could the anxieties that populate the deepest recesses of the human soul actually smell bad? For an hour he tried to take his mind off things by reading, then he got up to go to bed. He spent a long hour, lying there prey to dreadful thoughts and misgivings.

Next morning he woke up early to the sound of movement inside the house. His senses were immediately on the alert. Looking at his watch, he saw that it was five o’clock. He wondered what could have woken anyone up at such an early hour. He got out of bed and rushed out of his room in a panic. Before he had gone even a couple of steps toward Rushdi’s room, the door was opened suddenly. Their mother emerged, holding her hands above her head as though begging for help. Then she lowered them and started slapping her cheeks violently, crazily.…