The Mirage

21

Marriage! Marriage! It was all I could think about anymore. I couldn’t imagine my life having meaning unless this dream could be fulfilled. I thought to myself: If we don’t marry, what are we living for? In fact, why were we even brought into existence? I ached for it so badly, it made my heart weep. Marriage is the paradise of those who’ve been afflicted by the fires of hell. Not for a moment did I stop imagining it in those wandering daydreams of mine that would absent me from my surroundings. I’d see myself next to my beloved, her comely face concealed by a silken veil embroidered with jasmine blossoms, and with candles glowing all about us. I’d see myself taking her to a dwelling at the other end of Cairo, though I didn’t know why I liked for it to be at the other end of Cairo. Then I’d see her waiting for me on the balcony and, released from the prison of the warehousing section, I’d come rushing toward her. I was blessed with a happiness that transported me so thoroughly, one would have thought I could defy gravity, and which was so wondrous, I couldn’t imagine it even in my dreams. However, I didn’t enjoy such fantasies undisturbed, for time and time again, the euphoria produced by my imaginary joy would be followed by a vague melancholy that I couldn’t explain. Never was my mother’s beloved face absent from my mind. Consequently, I’d be assailed by a shame so devastating that my forehead would be wet with perspiration, and a guilt so loathsome that my mouth would be contorted with revulsion.

There was also the fact that I hadn’t rid myself entirely of a certain predilection for the single life. The love of solitude is a kind of malady. It’s like a drug from which you’d like to flee, yet you can’t give it up. You loathe it in yourself, yet at the same time you long for it. Would I really have the nerve to renounce my long past? At times my soul would pine for the happy married life. Then at other times I’d be possessed by the fear of losing the delight of placid solitude and the tranquility born of being exempt from responsibility. Flight from responsibility was a long-standing sickness of mine. It was such a part of me that I’d even chafe at having to shave or do my necktie. How, then, would I manage the responsibilities of a household, children, and all they’d bring with them by way of social life and its attendant obligations and traditions? The mere thought of such duties made my limbs grow cold. At the same time, though, there wasn’t so much as a moment when I didn’t long to be married.

I began to feel that I’d fallen prey to two deadly concerns: my indecision and my mother. And for all I knew, my mother was the only concern. Everything in me desired a peaceful haven in which to take refuge. So I made up my mind to face the danger head on, come what may.

One evening as I was sitting with my mother, I said to her suddenly, “I’ve noticed, Mama, that you’d rather I didn’t get married. Is this so?”

Her beautiful green eyes opened wide in astonishment and I could see a flicker of uncertainty pass through them.

Then, her voice altered, she said, “I always want your happiness, and that’s my main concern. If I haven’t agreed in the past to the proposals made to me in this connection, it was because they fell short of what I want for you. You surely realize this. But.…”

She hesitated for a moment, then continued, “But … why are you asking me this question?”

I looked away from her as though I were afraid she might read my mind.

Then I said casually, “It was just a question. I always like to know what’s going on in your mind.”

Her voice trembling, she replied, “There’s nothing in my mind but the desire for you to have far more happiness than you could even wish for yourself. However, marriage isn’t fun and games. Take your mother’s tragedy, for example, which is the most powerful evidence in favor of what I’m saying. Remember that choosing a wife is no easy task. Besides, it’s the task of the mother first and foremost, since this is the area in which she has the most experience. She knows her son better than he knows himself, and she places his happiness before her own. Besides, age is an important matter, too, and you’re still practically a child. So why do you ask me this question?”

(Here her voice began to tremble even more.)

“Think about your mother’s tragedy, which should never be absent from your mind. What pain and torment I’ve been through, and what insults I’ve had to bear! Think of all the tears I’ve shed over my children, who’ve lived as virtual strangers to me even though we were in the same city! And even you — the possibility that I might have to part with you used to haunt me every minute, and it caused me many a sleepless night. If they’d taken you away from me, I would have died of a broken heart. How many times I’ve wished I could die and find rest from this worrisome life of mine.…”

It seemed to me that she was referring to her present life with this last comment.

“This is why I devoted myself to taking care of you and sacrificed my own happiness for your sake. And.…”

Here she hesitated for a moment. She may have been about to remind me of the suitor she had refused on my account, but she thought better of it.

“And don’t think I’m trying to make you feel as though you owe me something. Mothers aren’t like that. If only sons felt the same kind of compassion that mothers do. How easily you forget.… Lord! Forgive me, I don’t know what I’m saying. But don’t think bad things about your mother. We give everything gladly, and then when our children grow up, all they think about is turning their backs on us and finding themselves some way of escape. Again, forgive me! Unfortunately, I’m not good at controlling myself. But we’ve had this whole lifetime together, and you’re my only hope in this world. If you turn me out, I will have nowhere to go. Our children are our lives in both our youth and our old age. As for you, you love us when you’re small, but when you grow up you hate us. Or, you love us when you don’t have anyone else to love. What did I say? God forgive me! Forgive me, Kamil, I’m agitated. And I’m no good at talking.”

I was astounded at how talking had sucked her into this downward spiral. It had been bearable at first, but then it had spun out of control. I tried to keep her from going on and on, but to no avail. Consequently, I’d had no choice but to drink the bitter potion to the dregs with all the pain and grief it brought in its wake. We exchanged a long look, with reproach coming from my end and consternation from hers. Alas, she wasn’t entirely in her right mind.

“So is this what a person gets for asking an innocent question?” I asked glumly.

With tears welling up in her eyes and her glance lowered, she said, “There are times when I’m no good at talking and it would be better for me to hold my tongue. Don’t worry about me. And if some day you’d like me to get out of your life, all you have to do is say the word, and you’ll never see me again!”

Clapping my hand over her mouth, I shouted, “May God forgive you! That’s enough talk! I made a huge mistake by asking my innocent question!”

Then she pretended to make light of the matter. In fact, she let out a long laugh as though nothing had happened, while I nursed my wounds in the privacy of my own heart. Her words had a profound impact on me. Indeed, they shook me violently, and I felt a grief the likes of which I’d never felt before. I wondered how on earth she could have allowed her agitation to get the better of her to the point of hurling such cruel accusations in my face. I wasn’t without a feeling of bitterness toward her, not because she’d accused me falsely — after all, anyone could do such a thing in a moment of passing anger — but rather because she’d met my unspoken desires with an outburst that had gone beyond the limits of reason. Giving free rein to my bitterness, I thought: She remembered herself more than she should have, and she forgot me more than she should have. As was my wont, I let my own selfishness have its say by accusing her of the very same fault.

Two days after our bizarre conversation, my mother succumbed to an ailment that left her bedridden, and I stayed by her side throughout her illness except for the times I was at work. Although it wasn’t serious, her face looked haggard and gaunt given her natural thinness, and it pained me no end. I couldn’t bear to see her deprived of her beauty and health. Her appearance and her self-neglect pained me. She would bind her head in a scarf from beneath which strands of her unkempt, neglected, graying hair would peek out, all of which distressed me greatly and caused the whole world to look dismal to me. Then one day, as I was sitting next to her, strange thoughts — prompted possibly by fear and pity — began running through my mind in a kind of stream of consciousness. I put to myself the following dangerous question: What would life be like if this tenderhearted mother weren’t a part of it? A chill went through me as the question presented itself, but my imagination refused to abandon its raving. The scenes kept passing before my eyes in succession and I surrendered to them in a heavy, wordless grief. I saw an abandoned house, and I saw myself wandering aimlessly like someone who’s lost his way in a vast desert expanse. My grandfather, disgruntled and bitter, was venting his wrath on the elderly servant and the cook. As for me, I sensed my inability to carry on with this forlorn existence, so I proposed to my grandfather that I marry so that we would have someone to take care of us. I saw my beloved with her lithe physique and her endearing poise as she came to take over the household and its residents with perfect compassion and boundless love. Then I saw all of us — my grandfather, my wife, and myself — standing over the grave of someone dear and watering it with our tears. When I came to myself in a fright, I felt tears in my eyes ready to fall. Remorse stung my heart and I was filled with resentment and rage. “Forgive me, God,” I mumbled to myself, “and grant her a long life.” Then I bent over and kissed her face tenderly. The memory of those fantasies haunted me frequently thereafter, leaving deep, painful scars. Even after she’d recovered and her vigor and beauty had returned, worry was my constant companion, and I nearly returned to that unwholesome way of thinking that sees life only in terms of what lies at the start and the finish — birth and death — while viewing everything in between as sheer vanity. This was the kind of thinking that had once led me to make an attempt on my own life and, if God hadn’t intervened, would have been the death of me.