The Dreams

Dream 123

I’m heading from Opera Square to the Horreya Café. When I get there I’m surprised to find it empty. Instead of being jammed with patrons as usual, there is only one man engrossed in reading some papers spread out before him.

Suddenly I realize this is my mentor, Shaykh Mustafa Abd al-Raziq. I rush over to him ecstatically, expecting to share our old intimacy, but he turns toward me scowling — and my heart sinks as rapidly as it just had risen.

Pointing toward the papers, the shaykh says he’s sorry to have seen my name listed among the witnesses against him.

I have no idea what to say, or how to get away.