Lyrics Alley

VI

On the last day that Soraya loved the sea, she was wearing her new blue dress, a dress that was made by a Greek dressmaker in Alexandria. It was the perfect beach dress, fresh watery blue and white splashes and a crisp white bow pinching her waist. Everyone said she was pretty. On the beach, under an orange umbrella she sat squinting from the sun, alert to the crescendo and break of the waves. With her were Fatma, Nassir, and their two children. They were waiting for Nur to join them. The long academic year was over and he had excelled in his Cambridge entrance examinations. He was now with some of his Victoria College friends who had not yet dispersed for the summer. Nassir was dozing in his deckchair, the newspaper he had been reading collapsed on the bulge of his stomach. He was too large for the shirt he was wearing and perspiring in spite of the breeze. Fatma looked out of place wearing her pink to be and annoyed that the children were kicking sand in her face. She preferred shopping to the beach. She would have been happier in Cairo, but Soraya adored the Alexandria lifestyle: the waking up late to the sound of the waves, and the aromas of a heavy breakfast. Waking up to the knowledge that all through the night Nur had been asleep on the couch in the living room, just outside the door, steps away from where she and the children slept. After coffee they would stroll across the Corniche, walk down the steps to the beach, hire an umbrella and some deckchairs, then settle down. Picking off from yesterday, the children were digging a canal. Zeinab, who was five, walked backwards and forwards filling her pail with seawater and dumping it in the hole. The sticky, pliant sand tempted even Fatma and Soraya to mould it into shapes.

‘Don’t spoil my canal,’ said Zeinab, sounding serious and bossy like her grandmother Waheeba. Her baby brother toddled after her, panting a little, small and soft in this vast expanse of sun, sea and sky.

Waiting for Nur suited Soraya. The anticipation made her eyes bright and her skin radiant. This was the best summer ever, because Idris had stayed behind in Sudan. Even Uncle Mahmoud and Nabilah were held up in Cairo. So day and night, in this most wonderful of cities, Soraya and Nur were chaperoned by the most indulgent and inefficient of patriarchs — Nassir Abuzeid. Yesterday he had given them permission to go the cinema. Alone. Fatma had protested and nearly persuaded him to withdraw his consent, but Nur and Soraya made a dash for it and were out of the door before Nassir could change his mind.

In the silver darkness of the cinema, during the boring newscast before the film began, Nur whispered to Soraya and made her giggle.

‘Baranah. I can’t believe we are by ourselves! Baranah.’

The theme of this summer, its signature tune, were the lyrics: I love you, Soraya. . I love you, too.

‘Will you marry me?’

This he said in English. It sounded formal and made her laugh. Who else would she marry? Who else could she marry? Her father, who in her eyes was a villain thwarting her every desire, would not dare, in his meanest of streaks, deny her the son of his eldest brother.

She put on her new glasses to watch the film. They were brand new and made her see as well as everyone else. The glasses were part of the summer. Away from her father and his disapproval, she had gone with Fatma to an eye doctor, chaperoned by the ever-generous Nassir, who paid all the bills and promised that he would never, drunk or sober, say a word to anyone lest it reached Idris. The prescription, tailored specially for Soraya, was superior to that of the pair Nur had given her all those months ago in Umdurman and instead of heavy, thick frames, these were petal shaped, delicately feminine, with a slight point on each side and a dash of glamour provided by a gold stud in each corner. Nassir paid for this fancy pair of ladies’ spectacles. He was in the best of positions — he was with funds. After months of reducing his allowance in Medani, his father had relented and given him his usual lavish holiday supplement. Nassir hired himself a motor car, made contacts with his friends who were also summering, and threw himself into the nightlife entertainment of downtown Alexandria. Fatma’s protests were silenced with enough money to keep her shopping every day, and Soraya’s glasses, too, were a bribe, to buy her goodwill and support. When she wore them she felt sophisticated, like a woman of twenty-eight, not a schoolgirl. They made her look intelligent, as if she had graduated from university and had opinions.

‘I want to start smoking,’ she whispered to Nur. ‘I want a cigarette.’

‘Now?’

He was taken aback. Sometimes she glimpsed a childish sweetness in him, a simplicity that was embedded and would not go away with time and age.

‘Well, no. But one day.’

It was the glasses that made her crave a cigarette between her fingers. She wanted the sophisticated look, high heels. .

‘Shush and watch the film,’ he said, squeezing her arm and guiding her mind back to the opening credits.

Fareed Al-Atrash’s latest film was his best and they floated out of the cinema with the tunes playing in their heads, the lyrics jumbled and half memorised. The Corniche was lively with lights and street vendors, the waves a background rhythm with the frills of their white foam a decoration. It was as if no one was asleep. Even the children, odd in their clothes after the beach nakedness of the day, their faces shiny with sunburn, were grabbing popcorn, candy floss and grilled corn as if they had not eaten all day. The breeze lifted dresses, and if Soraya had straight hair, it would have got tossed and tangled. Nur held her hand and they walked arm in arm like other couples did, unthinkable in Sudan or in the presence of anyone they knew. Here, husbands and wives linked arms, whereas back home they did not even walk side by side. This was what Soraya wanted for them, to be a modern couple, not to be like Fatma and Nassir each in their separate world.

She said to him, ‘I wish we could stay here forever. When you graduate, ask Uncle Mahmoud to let you work in the Cairo office.’

‘It’s dull in the Cairo office,’ he said. ‘The real work is in Sudan.’

‘But it is so much fun here!’

She was used to pleading for what she wanted, for her whims and passing fancies. And she knew the need to wait for what she wanted, while continuing with the gentle application of pressure. But she sensed a restlessness in Nur, even before he spoke.

‘Let’s go back home. If we’re too late, there will be a row.’ There was something he wasn’t telling her, but she would tease it out of him.

‘What’s the hurry?’

She stopped walking as if to make a point and sat on the low stone ledge that separated the Corniche from the beach below.

‘You’d laugh,’ he said, his hands in his pocket.

‘I won’t, I promise.’

People passed and left bits of their conversations; words in Greek and Arabic, French and English.

He looked down and said in a low voice, ‘I want to write down the lyrics from the film’s songs before I forget them.’

She had promised not to laugh and it was an easy promise to keep.

‘I can help you. I can jog your memory.’

‘No. I want to do it myself.’

There were corners in him that she didn’t have access to. The part of him that wrote the poems, his masculinity, and a purity she did not share. Inside her was selfishness and impatience, unforgiveness and self-pity, all camouflaged by a wholehearted love for others and a delightful femininity. Her nature was immature and wobbly, faults that a mother’s sound care would have corrected.

On the last afternoon that she loved the sea, she walked with Nur on the beach. She did not have her glasses on, but that was all right; there was nothing detailed she needed to focus on, nothing tricky. Nur had arrived without his friends, had left them behind in Sidi Bishr so that he could be with her. On the way he had gone to change and was now wearing his swimming trunks and a white shirt. They walked along the edge of the water because Soraya had seen other couples do that and she wanted to imitate them. Her arm brushed against Nur’s arm. They were the same height, the same build, the same colour. Their feet pushed into the wet sand and once in a while the froth of a wave would encircle their ankles. The beach was not flat. It dipped gradually to the water and, in other places, steeply, yet the stronger waves reached up higher and further. The beach was scattered with umbrellas. Each had a different design but they were all colourful and gay. Rainbow stripes, polka dots, bright greens and the orange Abuzeid umbrella they were walking away from had different shades like the segments of an orange.

He said, ‘Why don’t you swim?’

The red flag was hoisted today, which meant that the sea was boisterous but swimming was still allowed. A black flag meant keep away, and when the white flag fluttered, the sea was calm as a carpet.

She lifted her dress up to her knee as a wave splashed up and reached them.

‘I don’t have a bathing suit.’

‘We’ll go and buy you one.’

She laughed and dropped her dress. Their feet were imprinted in the wet sand and the imprint would last until the next strong wave.

‘I don’t know how to swim.’

‘I’ll teach you.’ He held her hand, which meant they were out of sight of Fatma and Nassir.

‘I knew you’d say this.’

‘Say what?’

‘Say you’d teach me.’ She had to raise her voice above the sound of the waves.

‘I am sure you will learn in no time.’

‘I don’t know any girls who swim.’

‘Not a single one?’

‘Not one.’ But she did not sound so certain. ‘Apart from Nabilah.’ Every summer Nabilah shocked the Abuzeid women by donning her striped navy swimsuit, pushing her hair in a white cap and striding into the waves. But Nabilah was Egyptian. ‘I wouldn’t be allowed to swim,’ said Soraya. She stopped walking and waved her hand towards the orange umbrella. ‘Have you seen Fatma this summer? She’s refusing even to wear a dress. Every summer since I can remember we come here and wear dresses. This time she’s saying she’s married, so she shouldn’t take off her to be!’

‘She was married last year and the year before. What got into her?’ He started to walk again.

She followed him. ‘Fatma would never allow me to wear a swimsuit.’

‘I’ll talk her into it.’

She believed him. He could do that.

‘My father would have a heart attack,’ she said with a giggle.

‘He’s not here. Tonight we’ll buy you the swimsuit and tomorrow your lessons start.’

She imagined a dazzling white swimsuit, her long legs bare on the sand, his eyes on them. She held his hand tight.

‘Is it difficult to swim?’

‘No, it’s easy. Diving is harder. I’ll teach you to dive too.’

She gasped and laughed at the same time. ‘Even Nabilah doesn’t dive.’

‘Why do you talk about her so much?’

‘Do I?’

‘Yes, you’re always going on — Nabilah does this, Nabilah said that.’

Soraya was taken aback. She did not want her admiration for Nabilah to be questioned, because it was not reciprocated. Nabilah had no time or sympathy for her, but Soraya was confident that she could win her over in time.

‘You’re still against her! You just don’t like her, do you?’

He raised his eyebrows. ‘Am I supposed to, when she causes my mother so much grief?’

‘She doesn’t mean to.’

‘She knew my father was married. She knew he had grownup children so why did she marry him? Because of his money, that’s why!’

He was blaming Nabilah to avoid blaming his father, but Soraya understood why her uncle had married Nabilah. She could imagine clearly his desperation to move from the hoash to a salon with a pretty, cultured wife by his side. Everyone loved Uncle Mahmoud, even though they were in awe of him. It made her say, ‘I would trade you my father for Uncle Mahmoud and Nabilah any day.’

He laughed. ‘Uncle Idris? Keep him.’

‘Do you hate him because he tore up your poem?’

‘And the things he said.’ He wasn’t smiling any more. ‘He certainly knew how to stop it in me.’

His bitterness did not surprise her.

‘Just ignore him and keep writing.’

He sat down on the sand and looked out at the sea.

‘It doesn’t come to me any more. As if it’s all gone dull inside. I read collections, I memorise whole poems, and I copy down the lyrics of songs that I like, but that poem he tore up was the last one I composed.’

She tucked her dress behind her knees and sat next to him.

‘Can’t you make yourself do it? Like homework?’

‘No, it’s not like that. Besides, I don’t care for it any more. No, that’s not true, I do care but I don’t have hope that I can amount to anything as a poet. After university, I am going to join the family business; I am not going to become a poet, so there is no point in wasting my time on it. Every family has a vocation. We are traders, not scholars or army men. We are men of the souq, not rulers or judges or engineers. Our great-grandfather started with one dingy shop in the Souq Al-Arabi and look how far we’ve come. Father has invested so much in my education and Nassir is not pulling his weight. I can’t deviate and be something else.’

He sounded grown-up and realistic, pushing back childish dreams. But it still seemed sad and she did not know what to say to him. Should she console him or applaud him? His words were heavy, too serious for this golden beach and holiday breeze.

‘Come on, let’s walk back.’

He stood up and they turned, retracing their footsteps, surprised that in many places the smudged imprints of their feet were unruffled by the reach of the waves. She felt him soften next to her, settle back to his normal, easy mood.

‘I have big feet for a girl, nearly as big as yours! Sometimes in shops I can’t find my size.’

They measured their feet against each other. He dug his right foot in the sand and then she nestled hers in the imprint. His feet, they concluded, were slightly but definitely larger.

Nur picked up a shell. He brushed away the damp sand from it and made it look like ivory. It was flatter and wider than the shells the fortune tellers used back in Umdurman.

‘Have you ever had your fortune told?’ she asked.

‘Yes. It was all nonsense. I didn’t like it.’

‘Oh, I love to have my fortune told. It’s exciting.’

He smiled and put the shell in her hand, closed her fingers over it. They were quiet for a while, facing the direction of the orange umbrella and the moss-covered rocks, reluctant to traverse the distance.

‘Do you know what time Nassir came home last night?’ He was smiling. ‘Three in the morning. I know because he made such a clatter and woke me up.’

She laughed. She had started to feel kinder towards Nassir this summer, especially after he had purchased her glasses.

‘Next week Uncle Mahmoud will come and he’ll have to behave himself.’

‘Yes.’ Nur smiled. ‘No more parties and no more belly dancers.’

‘Belly dancers!’ Her eyes widened.

‘What did you think — that his nights were men only?’

She shrugged. ‘I didn’t really think about it.’

‘Maybe he’ll take us with him one night.’

‘Us?’

‘Yes. You and I. We’ll go to a cabaret. You’ll like the show.’

A cabaret. Did she have anything to wear for that? She imagined wine-coloured chairs and laughter, cigarette smoke and English soldiers, Greek girls dancing and, at the end of the evening, the voluptuous belly dancer. No! It would be one prank too many. They would never get away with it. Nur had a mischievous look on his face and she responded to his delight, his sense of adventure. He started to tell her about a night he and his schoolmates had gone to the Petit Trianon. Behind the sweet counter was a ballroom where a band played and couples danced. She listened, enraptured, and he put his arm around her waist as if they were dancing in the European way. It made her laugh out loud, but they were close enough to see Fatma waving at them to come back. Soraya couldn’t make out the expression on her face.

‘I wish she was the short-sighted sister,’ said Nur and this made her laugh in a different way.

They quickened their footsteps towards the umbrella.

‘If we had walked in the other direction, we could have sat on the rocks,’ said Nur.

The rocks were covered with slippery green moss, a lurid green in contrast to the beige sand and pale blue water. It was not a colour Soraya favoured and she was glad they had not sat on the rocks. Perhaps the moss and the seaweed would have stained her new dress.

‘Tomorrow,’ she said to him. Tomorrow, when she would be wearing her new bathing suit.

Nassir woke up when they ducked under the umbrella and threw themselves on the sand.

‘Zeinab, come and give me a kiss,’ said Soraya. ‘These cheeks of yours, I just have to pinch them.’ She cuddled her niece while Nur grabbed the newspaper off Nassir’s belly and started to read it.

Fatma, as expected, was annoyed. She whispered to Soraya, ‘Every day you two get more ridiculous than the day before. Behave, girl.’

‘Tell him, don’t tell me.’ She wanted to tease Fatma. It was amusing to see her angry.

‘I will tell him. You think I won’t? He shouldn’t be spending so much time with you alone.’

‘Why not? There’s nothing wrong with it.’

‘Soraya, behave or I will send you back.’

‘Back where?’

‘Back to Cairo. Back to Umdurman.’

This was so far-fetched that it didn’t have a sting to it.

Soraya laughed and gave her sister a hug. ‘When Uncle Mahmoud and Nabilah come every single one of us will be behaving properly.’ This was a reference to Nassir, and Fatma made a face.

‘Go play with them,’ Nassir was saying to Nur. ‘Why not? Go join them.’

Soraya turned to see that a football game had started further back in the beach where the sand was completely dry. Three men were kicking a ball; they were in their bathing trunks with their hair cut short.

‘Don’t you know they’re English soldiers?’ Nur didn’t look up and turned to a new page.

‘So what?’ Nassir said. ‘You’re the captain of the football team at Victoria. Tell them that.’

‘Nassir, you go and play with them,’ said Soraya and Nur chuckled.

‘Me!’ Nassir heaved himself up to an upright position. ‘Can’t you see I am out of shape?’

Nur folded the newspaper. ‘You used to be a fair player.’

‘Back then. .’ Nassir reclined back and folded his hands on his stomach.

‘Baba, look. The fresca man is coming. I want some,’ Zeinab pointed to the man with the white hat and large glass box balanced on his shoulders. He was loping towards them, making his way at the edge of the water.

Nassir hailed him and he came over and knelt on the sand, balancing the box on one knee. They all leaned forward to see what he was offering.

‘I want the coconut,’ said Soraya.

‘I want the flat one with the honey,’ said Zeinab.

‘Give us a mixture,’ said Fatma.

Nassir reached for his leather pouch. It was a characteristically slow gesture. He prized the pouch open and, with care, started to take the coins out. He was enjoying the process, enjoying paying for something, giving up money to get something in return. He had looked like that when he had paid for her glasses, generous, not questioning the amount. Soraya felt a fondness for him.

They munched in silence. Soraya enjoyed the sweetness of the coconut and the delicate crunch of the wafer. Nur had the one with the sticky peanuts. He bit half of one and gave her the rest. She dug her teeth in the honeyed peanuts and felt a surge of joy. This was his saliva she was tasting, and his lips.

The football rolled towards them. Nur was quick to stand up, place his foot on it and dribble away from the umbrella in the direction of the game. With one kick, he joined the game. He did not have to announce that he was captain of the school team; his footwork was enough for the soldiers to welcome him.

Nassir turned his deckchair, giving his back to the sea and his full concentration to the game. He shouted out comments in English, jovial and witty, to endear himself to the soldiers. Soraya could sense Nur showing off, conscious of the expectations of his older brother. He put all his energy into the game and was soon enjoying himself.

Soraya chatted with Fatma and played with the children. The football didn’t interest her, but watching Nur run was a pleasure, and she liked the English she was hearing from the soldiers, natural and fluent, not like the sentences in school books. The one who was called Stan had an accent she had not heard before; he was stocky and had freckles. Eddie was handsome, like an actor in a film. His hair was black and his nose was sharp. The third, who ended up in goal, looked older and more muscular, and she did not catch his name. Later, when she went over everything, when she spoke about that day — again and again — she would remember the game and see the players clearly in her mind. How they grunted and Stan became red in the face. How often Eddie swore and how Nur started to perspire.

Another group of players joined in. The newcomers, young Egyptians, challenged Nur and the soldiers. This was how a friendly languorous kicking of the ball turned into a serious match. A masculine dedication she could not share, though in the pit of her stomach she wanted Nur’s team to win and she wanted Nur to score again.

‘Clap for your uncle, children!’

Even Fatma clapped and laughed. Nassir was beside himself with excitement. He raised his arms up in the air every time there was a goal, and when the other team had the ball, he made kicking gestures with his feet, tossing up gusts of sand. Soraya sensed the sun change position and start to mellow into mid-afternoon. They should head home for lunch now. The baby had started to whine and Fatma was getting restless.

‘We won!’ Nassir raised his arm in the air for one last time. Nur came towards them drenched in sweat. He took off his shirt and said, ‘I’m going into the water to cool off.’ He ran towards the sea before they could detain him.

‘Don’t be long,’ Fatma called after him.

‘It’s lunchtime,’ said Nassir.

Nur swivelled around and, trotting backwards, waved to them and mouthed, ‘Just a few minutes.’

There was an anti-climax after that, a drop after the game and Nur not being present to talk about it. The soldiers drifted past their umbrella and sat at the edge of the water on the damp sand, Eddie sat with his legs straight in the water. He scooped handfuls of water and wet his hair and shoulders. Stan lay on his back and, when a strong wave reached him, he let the water pull him closer to the sea, laughing out loud.

Soraya watched Nur climb the moss-covered rock and dive in the sea. Next to her Nassir rubbed his stomach.

‘I’m hungry.’

She was hungry, too. Their late breakfast of sausages, fried eggs and ta’miyyah had long been digested, the fresca too miniscule a snack to go far. Come on, Nur. Fatma started to gather their things together. Soraya didn’t want to help her; she wanted to watch Nur dive again. She saw him, blurred and brown, climb the low cliff again and dive. Could she really learn to dive like that? Her mind wandered to buying her new and very first swimsuit. Would she try it on in the shop or just take it home?

She looked back at the sea and couldn’t see Nur. She blinked and narrowed her eyes, which always made her see better but he was not there. She stood up and untangled her handbag from the spokes of the umbrella. She took her glasses out of their case and put them on. There he was! He was floating, his body straight and bobbing, the waves moving him around. He disappeared from sight as the sea dipped and, beneath him, a wave swept forward and rolled upwards. He was playing a game, she guessed, seeing how long he could hold his breath. She moved towards the sea, magnetised by the oddity of his pose. Something was not right. He should be swimming again now. She started to run; behind her, the surprise in Fatma’s voice, calling out. Stan and Eddie looked up and watched her run directly towards them. They kept watching her instead of looking out to the sea. She wanted to shout but the waves were too loud. When she stopped running, her voice came back. In English, that was important, so that they would understand. Help. Help was the word. She pointed and screamed.

Stan and Eddie ran into the sea. She walked forward until her calves were deep in the water, the hem of her dress soaked and heavy. Eddie and Stan lifted Nur’s arms and put them round their shoulders. He wouldn’t pull a prank on them. Not on them. They half-dragged, half-swam, half-carried him towards the shore and he wasn’t helping them in any way. His head was lolling to one side. She felt ashamed for him, because he looked bad and was so needy of help. The shame was visceral, as if it was hers, not his. When they laid him down on the wet sand, he spluttered and spat, raising his head but not sitting up or rolling sideways. He opened his eyes and closed them. Nassir was next to her now.

‘What happened?’ His voice was soft with concern. ‘What’s wrong with him?’

Eddie and Stan crouched on either side of Nur, pumping his chest, talking to one another over him. Their bodies dripped with water. Soraya and Nassir stayed back. When she heard Nur’s voice, when Stan sat back on his heels and Eddie stood up, she rushed forward, flooded with relief.

‘Nur, get up. Nur, let’s go home.’

She wanted the soldiers to go away, she wanted the day to be normal again.

Behind her Nassir was full of effusive thanks. The English words tumbled out of him. He was generous in his praise and his manners pleased the soldiers. They moved away from Nur. Stan smiled broadly; Eddie shook Nassir’s outstretched hand. Nassir moved next to Soraya and sank to his knees. He lunged forward, embracing his brother. Nur didn’t raise his arms to hug him back. One arm lay outstretched, entwined with seaweed; the other, motionless too, was at an awkward angle, the fingers grazing the sand.

‘Nur,’ she said. ‘Come on.’

‘He’s resting,’ Nassir said. ‘Let him rest.’

But she insisted, ‘Nur.’

He looked up at her as if he was distracted by a supreme heaviness that bewildered and absorbed him.

‘I can’t,’ he said. ‘I can’t move.’