Ishmael's Oranges (35 page)

In the darkness of the maid's quarters, only two black bags were left. She dragged them into the garden and emptied them over the sand, every cell of her body listening for the sound of returning wheels.

Bricks of green bills wrapped in cord flopped out, more and more as if from a bottomless pit. She watched them fall until they lay in a heap, tens of thousands of dollars stinking in the warm
air.

When you choose peace, you choose the losing side.
Maybe it was true. But she would not let Rafan win either.

Walking into the kitchen she pulled the can of kerosene out from under the sink. A box of matches stood on the side, by the gas hob. The door swung as she carried it back into the garden where the banknotes trembled in the breeze. Their flickering became rapid, helpless as the fuel drenched
them.

Stepping back, she lit the match and looked into the tiny flame. The heat wavered at the tips of her fingers.

A hundred times she'd used that flame to celebrate life on birthdays, to kindle the lights during their secret Sabbath prayers. Now she would use it to set them all
free.

Her fingers let the match go; it floated down and the fire seemed to roar up to meet it. She was mesmerized; there were voices in the flames
. Go, Judith, go! For God's sake, girl.

Turning her back on the blaze she ran into the children's bedroom.

‘What's happening?' Sophie said, as Jude shook their shoulders and pushed them to their feet. Marc was already up, his face shining in the gloom.

‘Get your clothes packed,' she said, pulling their suitcases down from the top of the cupboard. ‘We're going to the airport. Uncle Tony has found you schools, and you'll sit the exam for places next month.'

Sophie put her hand over her mouth, her face white. Jude reached over to take her daughter's hand. ‘You were right,' she said, squeezing it tight. ‘It's time to find a happy place
–
for all of us.' Tears fell as Sophie nodded, one hand clutching her blanket painted with leaping horses.

Marc said instantly, ‘But what about Daddy?' The plea in his voice, the wild panic, almost derailed her. She knelt down beside him and took his face in her hands.

‘Your father needs to make an important decision,' she said. ‘Until he does, we need to go somewhere safe. I'll explain in the car, but now we must hurry.'

‘And my play?' His hands caught her shoulders, clutching helplessly at her. ‘What about my play?'

She pulled him into her arms. ‘I'm so sorry, Marc. Sometimes life is so hard, I know. But I promise, there are other things waiting for you, wonderful, exciting things. Do you trust
me?'

Marc nodded but his whole body wilted, like the lime tree he'd so carefully tended. He must have known, she thought, when his father walked out of the gate today, that his grand moment was like Puck himself
–
only ever a dream.

By the time their bags were packed and in the car, morning had arrived. The quiet of the desert surrounded them, as Jude drove to Kuwait's airport for the last
time.

The world slept, and somewhere out there Salim might be making his way back to an empty house. As if reading her mind, Sophie whispered from the back seat, ‘Will he ever forgive
us?'

‘He will,' Jude said.
I know who he is, even if he has forgotten
. ‘He loves us more than anything. He just needs to remember how that feels.'

As she drove, she wound down the window to let in the cool wind. It rang in her ears like the gusts down the Wear when she was a little girl, like the call of the crowd at the swimming championships she'd imagined in the silence of her
room.

And then she felt it, somewhere between a memory and a wish: her toes on the edge of the pool, the water dazzling beneath her, waiting for the whistle, poised to spring.

It unfolded in a perfect moment, just as it should have happened
–
the glorious blue of the water, the falling light, the thrill of the cheering and the bubbles of anticipation rising within her, carrying her forward into the race. On the other side was safety, the exultation of arms linked with hers as they ran home under the boundless northern
sky.

As the world blurred and the road whipped by she saw them all running beside her, clear as day
–
Kath and Peggy, Jack and Dora, Marc and Sophie, even Salim and Rafan
–
all hurtling homewards as the clouds streamed above them, chasing each other into an unknown future. Silence followed them, an emptiness slowly filling with another presence, flooding Jude with joy and relief.
You are here.
Rebecca was here, walking beside her, and she suddenly understood that
here
was the place they were supposed to meet, that she'd been waiting here all this time for Jude to find her on the long road. And so Jude reached up with love to grasp her grandmother's hand, finally ready to guide them both
home.

Naphtali Herz Imber

Ibrahim Nagi, ‘The Ruins',
sung by Umm Kulthum

He came back to silence, to a smouldering pile of embers in the driveway, scattered clothes in the bedroom and a letter from Jude. As he held it in numb fingers, he watched Rafan walk away from the remains of the fire, ashes drifting from his hands. A black bag lay crumpled like an empty skin on the porch. Rafan picked it up and shook it, his forearms black with burned paper.

Sal, you broke your promise
, Jude's note said.
I'm doing this to save our family. I'm taking us home. How could you be so blind, Sal? Jews or Arabs, what does it matter who we are? How dare you make our children part of a war they didn't start?

But the ending was kinder, the loving heart that had once opened for him.
You're still my husband
, she wrote.
I know you, I believe in you, in the man I married. You belong to us, Sal, to Sophie and Marc and me, not to your brother or to the past. It's your choice. Please, come home. It's not too late. Come home to us
. The last line said she would call when she got to England, from Tony's house.

He felt Rafan's hand on his shoulder, and his brother's voice came to him, as if from down a long tunnel.

‘I told you, big brother,' it said. ‘They take everything. Home, money, history. Even your children. Everything. There's only one thing they can't take.'

Salim turned slowly to face him, the letter tight in his
fist.

‘And what's that?' he said, over the roar of blood.

‘Our revenge.' And Rafan reached over to lift Jude's letter out of his
hand.

Later, Rafan dragged her clothes out of the house and threw them into the wasteland. Salim watched his face, working with effort and rage, as he heaved the summer dresses onto piles of tyres.

‘I have to get out of here,' Rafan told him later in the shadow of the porch, holding one of his empty bags. ‘Today. They won't believe I lost the money. That bitch.' The genial mask was gone; his face was an ugly blur of rage. ‘I can catch a flight to Amman. There are brothers there too. We can still be in touch, Salim, don't worry.' His hand closed on Salim's wrist, the fingers tight.

In the quiet house after Rafan's departure, Salim took the picture of the Orange House and curled up with it on their bed. And as he slept he dreamed that the oranges were ripening and there was food waiting for him on the table. He and Hassan looked just like Marc and Sophie, and his mother was laughing at Abu Hassan's jokes as they sat together and ate. He woke into an almost unbearable yearning.

Two days later, she called
him.

‘What did you expect?' She sounded calm over the miles. He'd been counting on remorse, on tears, but her voice was a smooth wall leaving him no purchase.

‘Rafan's gone,' he said. He heard her intake of breath.

‘I knew you would do the right thing.' Now life spread back into her
tone.

She went on, ‘Wait
–
someone wants to talk to you.' The line went dead for a moment, and then he heard breath coming quick and anxious. ‘Dad?'

‘Marc.' He'd been expecting Sophie, and in the spin of his thoughts he couldn't find words.

‘Are you angry with us?' the boy asked. Salim felt his own throat catch. Yes, he wanted to say. Yes yes
yes.

‘No, I'm not angry.'

‘Are you coming to England?'

‘I don't know.'

Marc fell silent. Salim looked out into the garden, over the dark spot where Jude's fire had sat. Marc had danced there only three days before. In the half-light Salim could still see his leaping form, a ghost of
joy.

‘When will you know?' Marc's voice was girlish and urgent. It pricked Salim with slivers of guilt.

‘You're too young to understand, you and Sophie,' he said. ‘Maybe it's better for us to be apart for a while.'

‘But…' and now the tears came. ‘But you said we'd get better at talking to each other.' The boy's voice was still nowhere near breaking into manhood. ‘And it's really good here. I'm going to audition for White Lodge. It's the best ballet school in England. If I get in, I'll be famous one day.' Salim laughed aloud. This was how it was going to be
–
the flowering of their lives happening away from him, snatching something precious away before he had the chance to claim
it.

‘You have to come back,' Marc was saying. ‘Mum and Sophie want you to. I do
too.'

Salim gripped the telephone. Marc. Rafan. Palestine. The Orange House. It was too much for one mind to measure. Out of nowhere a ridiculous memory surfaced, the discussion with Jude at Virginia's all those lifetimes ago.
Who could you be
, she'd asked,
if you didn't mind giving up everything you are now?
And he'd told her it was impossible to weigh the value of things past against the price of those things yet to
come.

‘We'll work something out,' he told the boy at last. ‘You're right, we should be together.'

But the words that seemed so true for Marc on the telephone later began to fester. In the days that followed, every morning brought a rush of new anger, pitiless as the rising sun. The unfairness of it all rankled. Jude had forced his hand. If he refused to return, she would say
he
had chosen to leave
them.

‘You can't force me to live in England,' he told her when they discussed the arrangements. ‘But while the children are young I'll make sure I come often to visit.' She sounded taken aback.
What did you expect?
he wanted to throw at
her.

He moved into a small apartment in Kuwait City and took part-time work so he could come back to see them for a few months a year. The first time he touched down at Heathrow, Jude and the children met him at the airport. They came hurtling into his arms and for a while it was like those first years of their infancy, when all they knew was love. That night he lay next to Jude in their first marriage bed, the warm smell of sweat and bare skin surrounding them, and watched her sleeping
face.

By the third year of their separation, he'd moved into the spare room. And the children no longer came to the airport to meet him. Only Sophie still hugged him when he came through the door. And Marc, caught in the cruel pinch of adolescence, asked him to sign a piece of paper promising not to fight while he was there.

But the arguments came despite it all. No matter how many times he was driven to accuse her
–
of coldness, of betrayal, of rejection
–
she refused to bend. She was not sorry. She had done the right thing. In that house, everyone had a purpose. Jude had found her place teaching English, telling old stories to London's multicoloured classrooms. Jews and Arabs and all the rest, she liked to say. Sophie was one of her eager young students. And Marc was still caught in his dreams. Soon he would join the Royal Ballet School, and leave them all behind. The brightness of their lives cast a shadow over the failures of his. He brooded on them, until the steps onto the flight to Heathrow felt covered with nails.

One day Salim came from the airport to find the house empty. Jude was not back from work. The twins' bedrooms were dark. He stood for a moment, remembering that desolate morning in the desert four years earlier
–
the blank rooms, the closed doors.

Dropping his bag on the floor, he unzipped the front pocket and pulled out his picture of the Orange House. One by one, he picked every one of Jude's photographs off their mantelpiece in the living room
–
carelessly arranged snaps of their family picnics in Il-Saraj, of Marc in his ballet shoes and Sophie riding. Once the shelf was bare, he settled the picture of the Orange House reverently on the dusty wood. He'd bought a new gold frame for it in Kuwait, but the shine off the rim made the photograph look even more ghostly, the faintest imprint of yellow and brown.

When Jude came back an hour later with Marc she apologized for being
late.

‘I had to take Marc to the doctor for more tests,' she said. ‘They think he needs help concentrating and keeping calm. Right, pet?' Marc shrugged thin shoulders, his eyes downcast. ‘The teachers are stupid,' he said. ‘Dancers aren't supposed to be calm.'

Then the empty shelf and its lonely picture caught Marc's fleeting eye. ‘What's that doing there?' he asked.

‘It's our house in Palestine,' Salim said. He saw Marc's brow furrow and waited for the protests to start. But the boy just looked from the picture to his father. ‘I remember,' was all he
said.

One year later, on Salim's forty-fifth birthday, the picture vanished. He was due to leave for Kuwait the following day. Jude was at work and Sophie was home with a cold, cheerfully helping him
pack.

In the chaos of the spare bedroom he handed her clothes and she folded them with arms as sandy brown as Jaffa's beaches. He had to remind himself that the little girl he'd once thrown in the air would soon leave secondary school, a year ahead of her peers. Her blossoming intelligence left him awed and fearful, the child of his memory drifting out of his reach.

She was lecturing him now. ‘Don't you get tired of all this going back and forth?' she said, draping a shirt into the suitcase. ‘Whatever happened to the plan to move back here for good?'

‘You'd soon get tired of me if I did,' he said lightly, but she flicked him a questioning glance.

‘Is that the best excuse you can come up with?'

He looked away from her. It confounded him that despite her Arab colouring she was still Jude in essence
–
the same stubborn steadfastness. ‘You don't understand, Sophie.'

‘That you and Mum have problems? That Marc is difficult? I grew up in this family too, you know. I remember.'

‘You only remember what you want to,' he said, feeling defensive. ‘Or what your mother told you. It's not always the truth.'

‘You blame us for wanting to come back here. You always have.' Salim knew she was right even as he opened his mouth to protest. ‘We just wanted a place to settle down and be happy. You of all people should understand. I mean, after all those family stories about people running from one place to another
–
you, Uncle Rafan, Mum's family. Maybe you didn't have a choice about it then
–
but now we
do.'

‘That's what you think,' he said automatically. She rolled her eyes, took the shirt into her hands and started back into the bedroom. As she disappeared, she called back, ‘Dad, did you already pack the picture? I couldn't see
it.'

He turned to the mantelpiece, alarmed. Jude's pictures were back
–
restored after another fierce argument. But in the centre was a hollow space where the Orange House usually stood.

Panic flooded him. Jude must have finally thrown it away. How could she? Ripping through the dustbins, and then the cupboards in her room, he tasted the sourness of fear. His picture was nowhere to be found.

In desperation, he pushed open the door to Marc's room. The bed was neat and the wall papered with images of male dancers, their bodies arched in hidden
pain.

On the table lay the pills Marc was supposed to take when he got what he called his angry headaches. Jude had insisted after the Royal Ballet sent a warning letter: Marc had tried to start a fire in the car park
–
next to a car owned by a teacher with whom he was at
odds.

Beside the bottle was the Orange House, lying out of its frame. Next to it lay another photograph, a replica of Salim's blown up to twice its normal size. But this one had been defaced, Salim saw with horror. Marc had drawn other pictures over it in bold colours. Jude and Sophie stood by his tree with books in their arms. Marc was next to them in a dancer's pose, coloured with a red tutu and gold ballet shoes. On the edge stood Salim holding an orange. A Star of David was painted over the door, above the heads of Jude and Sophie. Marc's fingers pointed up to it, and another stretched out to his father.

As Salim lifted it in astonishment, he heard the click of the door. He turned to see Marc framed in the door with his ballet gear, poised like a bird ready to
flee.

‘I was making it for your birthday,' the boy said eventually. ‘It's better than looking at that old picture all the time. You should have a picture of us to take with
you.'

Salim held out the photograph. ‘You put a Star of David on my house.' Marc rubbed his forehead and cast his head down, his foot tracing a jagged path on the floor.

‘Sort of. But that's not what it means.'

‘What? What do you think it means?' Salim's relief at finding his precious picture was draining away, turning to anger.

‘I thought you'd understand!' Marc threw back, defiant. ‘It's all of us and the house together. You said it was
our
house. That means Mum too, and the star's for
her.'

‘And what about you?' Salim saw fear enter Marc's blue eyes. He pointed to the boy in the tutu. ‘Do you want to be Jewish, like those boys at your school? Is that why you dressed yourself like this? To remind me you can't be an Arab? You think I'd let a Jew inherit anything of mine?'