The Sand Fish (15 page)

It was only in the darkness that Noora saw her husband’s nurturing side. Once the sun kissed the courtyard, under the scrutiny of the other wives, Jassem’s stern face reemerged.

W
hat? You got the habit again?” Lateefa shook her head with disbelief.

Noora sighed and shrugged, let her glance drift to the corner of the room to try to catch Yaqoota’s eye as she paused in sweeping the floor. Only Yaqoota had the nerve to speak out, but right now the slave girl was too occupied, inspecting an army of red ants clustered around a crack in the floor.

“That’s not good, not good at all,” Lateefa continued, and lifted her head to catch some air. They were sitting under the wind tower of the family
majlis
. “Why did you get the habit?”

“I don’t know,” said Noora.

Yaqoota flexed her foot, took aim with her heel, and squished the ants in one go. Only then did she look over her shoulder at them. “That’s why they call it the habit,
Ommi
Lateefa,” she said. “It’s used to coming for a visit, once every month.”

How Noora had grown to love that voice, a high-pitched brew of innocence and abandon with a sprinkling of stinging sarcasm. Noora wanted to cheer her on, throw in a clever comment, but she wasn’t quick enough.

Lateefa snapped at Yaqoota, “You hold your tongue before I cut it off!” With a force and speed that made her earrings jingle, she grabbed her slipper and hurled it at the slave girl. It slapped Yaqoota’s chin and tumbled off her shoulder. Yaqoota yelped. “And if you continue in this way,” said Lateeefa, “I’ll throw you out to wander the nights in Leema. See if you can survive! See if someone doesn’t pick you up and carry you off to the desert. See if you like being someone else’s slave!”

It was a serious threat and Yaqoota’s biggest fear. She had often told Noora of the Bedouins who came from the deep sands to steal other peoples’ slaves, to sell them somewhere else. Yaqoota was not about to argue. She squeaked and ran out of the room, bumping into Shamsa in the doorway.

“What’s wrong with that silly girl?” said Shamsa.” Always screeching with that rat voice of hers.”

Lateefa did not answer. The pockets under her eyes were quivering with rage, and some other passion expanded the dark in them. Noora lowered her gaze. This was not the moaning
Ommi
Lateefa, not the mother to hope, not the gentle guide she always reminded them she was. This was someone else: an explosive
Ommi
Lateefa, whose patience seemed to have reached a boil.

As if it wasn’t already hot enough. Noora felt the dots of perspiration tickle her upper lip as she dropped the corners of her mouth, tried to look affected by her failure so that Lateefa could return to that familiar, fault-finding grumbler.

“I’ll tell you why the habit came again,” Lateefa said to Noora. “Because you are not pregnant.” She cupped Noora’s
chin and fixed her eyes, pulsing with urgency, to Noora’s. “Jassem is leaving soon. He must plant the seeds before he goes.” The crescents under her eyes slackened and she shut her eyes. For a long time she remained so, breathing deep, as she sifted through a stream of tangled thoughts.

They waited, both she and Shamsa, knowing that Lateefa always blocked her sight when serious matters needed sorting out. Then, with her first twitch, Shamsa was quick to drop to her side. She bent over and hugged the older woman’s shoulders to show that they were united in their distress.

“I think
Ommi
Lateefa is right to be concerned about you, Noora,” she said. “Where is that baby? What is taking you so long?”

Lateefa let out the sigh of the exhausted and reached over to the ankle band of her
serwal
, began fiddling with a thread that had loosened and coiled.

“Well,” Noora said, “I have been completely cooperative. I have never said no.”

“Completely cooperative?” Shamsa raised her hand to her chest. Today, she was wearing a necklace of thick, gold beads hanging on a red cotton cord. She began to twirl them, one bead at a time, as she held Noora in a defiant stare. “As if you have any choice!” she mocked. She was smiling now, waiting for Noora to avert her gaze (as she always did).

How much did they know?
Noora thought, as the wilt washed over her. Her head felt heavy, her eyelids were beginning to close, making her lose focus on that shimmering necklace. Did they know that for over a month now Jassem was spending more time talking to her and teaching her numbers than planting his seeds? He thought her worthy of that. She was valuable to him. Did they know that she was beginning to enjoy his visits?

No! She would not look down. Noora snapped her head back up and stared at Shamsa, at those droopy eyes choked with kohl. Suddenly they were not as attractive as they used to be. They reminded her of a stupid camel. “Why are you always blaming me?” Noora said. “These things are in God’s hands.”

The thread broke and Lateefa looked up.

“And why are you picking on me,” Noora continued, “as if you are so perfect? You haven’t given him a baby, either.”

“I could have,” Shamsa said, “but he never tried as hard with me as he’s doing with you.” She was stuttering. Her mouth quivered at the edges, and for a moment Noora thought she might cry. She looked forward to that kohl melting with the tears and streaking black the white of her skin. But Shamsa didn’t. Instead, she snorted and slapped the floor. “He eats with you and lets us wait. We have to eat after the two of you are belching your meals away. Is that fair? Is that what Islam says? Doesn’t the prophet say that each wife should be treated equally? Jassem treats you like a princess when all you are is a cat-eyed pauper from the mountains.”

“It’s not true. I come from a tribe, the Al-Salmi tribe,” Noora said. She remembered her father, how proud he was of their tribe, until that Ahmad Al-Salmi led them astray. “It was a strong tribe and honorable. Just because they didn’t live in houses like this one does not mean they weren’t important.”

Shamsa pointed a shaking finger at Noora. “You, you…He visits you every night and ignores the rest of us, as if we were picked off the street.”

“I never told him to ignore you.”

Shamsa scoffed at Noora. “Oh? We have power over the
arbab
, do we?”

Noora watched the corners of Shamsa’s lips twist down, and just like that, Shamsa’s lucid complexion lost its beauty. Instead of the luminous ivory, Noora saw the pasty white of the sick. “No, not power,” she said. “Just sense.”

Shamsa’s jaw clamped and her voice turned into a hiss. “Let me remind you who I am. I am the daughter of the most prominent merchant in Leema, richer than our husband.” She freed a generous sweep of the arm. “I lived in a house two times larger than this one. I was fed milk when I was growing, pure milk from fat cows. I ate dates all my life of the finest quality from Basra.” She rotated her tongue in her mouth and swallowed, mimicking the sugary taste of Basra dates.

“Dates are dates,” said Noora.

“No they’re not.”

“Yes they are.”

“You will never know what the dates I grew up on tasted like,” Shamsa insisted. “All I am going to tell you is that they were nothing like the dates you were fed, full of sand and grit.” She turned up her nose and sniffed. “You know which ones I am talking about, the ones you munched while you were running around with your starved herds.”

Lateefa pulled another loose thread from her
serwal
with a snap and flashed the two women a sharp look. Using her first wife’s privilege, she commanded them to stop.

“It’s not my fault,
Ommi
Lateefa,” Shamsa sang. “You can hear it for yourself. The mountain goat has a voice now. And she plans to use it.”

Noora narrowed her eyes and was about to tell her that Jassem was teaching her numbers when Lateefa interrupted. “Not now!” she scolded. “You can lay blame on each other all day when you are alone. Now I want some peace and quiet.” She
flapped her hands in front of her face, tried to shift some air her way. “Why don’t you two act the way you should, like sisters?”

She could have kept quiet, ended it right there and then, but Noora’s mouth was watering with smugness. The wind of her mountains, so filled with support, was blowing. Jassem made the rules. He held the key to their fates. And right now, she was his favorite. She crossed her arms and let out her demand. “Shamsa should guide me wisely, not throw insults at me. I’m the younger one. It’s not my fault that our husband wants to be with me. He sets the rules.”

Shamsa yawned and stretched her arms. “Nothing stays the same forever. Enjoy what you have.” She pulled her dress up slightly and twiddled her toes. There were her toe rings, sitting flat like shields with dainty loops, on both big toes. “Imagine, when he gets bored of you,” she said, sighing with mock pity. “What will happen then? I can only pray that he does not throw you out. I mean, where would you go?”

“Hah,” said Noora. “He’ll never get bored of me.” Shamsa didn’t understand the intimacy she and Jassem shared. Shamsa did not hear what went on in the black of night, didn’t know that whenever she and Jassem were alone, his feelings expanded like a bloated
wadi
. He whispered his worries and insecurities into her ears. Her ears only! And yet, the vulnerability seeped through. What if he did get bored of her?

J
ust three days was all it took for Shamsa’s prophecy to materialize. Like a thick fog, Shamsa’s warning crawled into Noora’s room and stifled Jassem’s murmurs of intimacy.

That night, as the house slept, Jassem arrived in high spirits and told her the story about his first trip to India. His father had taken him aboard a British steamer. “Ten days it took. We were booked on deck class, a cost of nine rupiahs. We took our food, pots, and bedding, and slept on deck.” He chuckled. “Every morning the deck cleaner would wake us up, force us to move so that he could clean the deck. Ah.” He sighed. “
British India Steam Navigation
, that’s what it was called.”

“Britishin stim nashun?”

Instead of correcting her, he smiled and leaned toward her. She now knew not to be afraid of him. She giggled and asked, “What’s wrong? What kind of name is that anyway? Can I help it if those
Inglesi
people choose stupid names for their boats?”

Jassem laughed. “You of all people should be able to pronounce it. After all, with all those strange twists and clicks of the tongue, you mountain people should be able to pronounce anything.” He opened his arms and let his warmth gush out as he wrapped her in a hearty hug. How protected she felt! She was sure he had never hugged Shamsa or Lateefa that way. With a hug like that, she was sure no one could force her to leave the house. No one could harm her.

But then he didn’t let go. And the hug of protection began to feel more like restraint. Surely she was imagining it. She tried to slip out of his grip. When that failed, she wriggled, just enough for him to understand that he could now let her go. But Jassem would not. He kept his arms clamped firmly around her.

He began to shiver. It wasn’t the shiver of feeling cold. This was a silent quake that was locked away somewhere deep inside—and it was coming out, vibrating in waves she could not explain.

“Are you feeling sick?” Noora asked, but he didn’t reply, only sucked in the air with a hiss. Noora persisted. “Do you want some water?”

She felt his breath hot on her neck. And then he released her, pushed her away so hard that she bumped her elbow on the bed’s poster.

“What weakness!” he exclaimed, and bounced off the bed. “You are playing with my mind, trying to make sure it melts whenever I am with you.”

Noora rubbed her elbow and looked up at him. He was smoothing out the creases of his dishdasha, his arms zipped along its length in agitated strokes. What had she said? When his dishdasha could not get any neater, he began pacing the
room. Noora watched his spectacles slip down the bridge of his nose with each step, until they clung to the little wings. Those nostrils that had stayed calm for so long now flapped with a blinding speed.

“When the heart takes you away, you do stupid things,” Jassem said. He seemed to be talking to himself as he paced the six steps to one wall and back again. “You talk, say things you don’t want to say.” He stopped in the middle of the room and pointed his finger at Noora. “From now on, when I look at you, I want you to close your eyes. You have got witch’s brew in them.”

“I…” She was about to tell him it wasn’t true, when he yanked off his spectacles. He had never done that before (even when he was performing his duty). She watched him squint and draw closer to her. His shadow loomed high above him. She must have been a blur to him, but to Noora his face was as transparent as the steam of simmering water. The warmth of their nights had evaporated just like that.

“I rescued you from poverty. Never forget that,” he said. “I have given you so much that you should be kissing my feet, not making me speak worthless talk.”

“I don’t. I—”

“That witch said there would be a child. But there is nothing. Lateefa was right. What have you given me? What is your worth in the end?”

The cats were howling once more, and Lateefa scrunched her eyes and sniffed abruptly, as if catching their scent. Then she wiggled her foot away from Noora’s kneading fingers. “You’re useless,” she said. “I can’t feel a thing.” She tapped the bottom of her calf. “Here, press here.”

Noora dug her thumb into a tender spot.

Lateefa yelped. “What’s wrong with you? Either too soft or too hard. Can’t you do anything right?”

That voice! It hovered between the thick whine of a pained dog and the raspy bray of a mule. Lateefa grunted and rose to leave Noora’s room. As she turned, Noora stuck out her tongue at her.

It was her fault! Her security was gone and it was Lateefa’s fault. The only way she could get back at her was to frustrate her by making sure her much-loved rubs felt as torturous as possible. Every day for the past week Noora pretended she had lost her healing touch. She poked butterfly flutters on the hard skin and burrowed her fingers with full strength wherever she thought it would hurt most. And yet the older woman kept coming back.

Noora shuffled to the far corner of her room and began raking the wall, peeling away large sections of the gypsum till she reached the shells lodged in the coral-stone base. There was nothing else to do since Jassem had taken away her slate and chalk, so she tackled a plump shell with faded pink stripes that reminded her of the pebbles her brother used to collect for her.

“You will be living like a princess.” That’s what Sager had said. She grunted and dug at the wall with her fingers. Other shells, looking more like old toenails, tumbled to the ground, but the shells she wanted would not budge. Sager was convinced she’d be better off with the rich pearl merchant, far from the hardship and deprivation of their lives. How little he knew!

Her resentment toward Sager turned to bitterness, and soon she was lashing at the wall with such intensity that every poke and scrape was turning into an attack on her brother. How
could he sell her off to some stranger like that? They were poor in the mountains, but all their worries were to do with things they could touch—food, water. Here, the worries were different and so complicated. She was always on her guard. In this house of rich people, you never knew what the next day might bring. Two of her fingernails tore. She yelped and shoved them into her mouth.

“There’ll be nothing left of that wall if you keep on like that.”

Yaqoota’s voice at the doorway just irritated her, and she turned her attention back to the wall. “I’m going to use them to practice numbers,” Noora said, ignoring the mess she was making.

“What for?”

“It will keep me thinking.”

“Thinking? What’s the use of that?”

“What is the use of anything?”

“Well, if that’s your fun, soon there’ll be no house for us to live in.” Yaqoota snickered and hopped toward her. “You will have picked the walls down. No privacy for you and the
arbab
. And then what?” Yaqoota leaned over Noora and gaped at her. Her upside-down face was full of mischief. “As if there’s any privacy now.” She plugged her ears with her fingers. “He is making so much noise I can’t sleep at night.”

Noora pushed Yaqoota’s face away. The slave girl never knew what to say and when to say it. It was true, though. Jassem was taking his duty more seriously. Every night he would order her to close her eyes (so that she couldn’t bewitch him into talking), and he would liberate passionate grunts that competed with the yowls of the cats outside. So loud they were! It was as if he wanted the household to know that he was trying his best.

Noora pursed her lips and stared at the toenail shells around her. She did not want to talk about it. She feared she might weep if she did, so when Yaqoota did not pursue the subject, suggesting instead that they go and watch the village, Noora was so relieved that she jumped up and pulled the slave girl out of the room.

These were not ordinary days. There was the dash and hurry, an urgency that wrapped Wadeema as the divers and their families prepared for the Big Dive. Noora and Yaqoota peeped through the entrance of the house and watched children poke sticks at a sack they had filled with sand to become a make-believe shark in a make-believe sea. From behind the palm-frond walls of the homes, they heard the pressing voices of women as they prepared their husbands’ belongings for the three-month-long voyage.

In the afternoon, those same women would come to visit Lateefa, as they did every day, to talk about the coming Big Dive. They would list heroic tales of accomplishment: whose husband had plucked the largest pearl, whose father had stayed down the longest, whose son had dodged an aggressive shark, whose brother had survived the most jellyfish stings. They were tales of glory, released in an excited flurry of words. Then the women would fall silent, sigh, and shake their heads. Every woman knew that her husband, father, son, or brother might not come back, might die in the sea. Every woman knew that if he did come back, he would arrive home sick and starved.

“It’s the same every year,” said Yaqoota. “They go and their women wait. And then, when the boat comes back, either it’s good news or bad news.”

Yaqoota’s words made Noora’s heart sink further. She sighed. “How much hope those women carry in their hearts.
How much hope is crushed in the end?”

“Nothing to be sad about!” Yaqoota slapped Noora’s arm. “It’s God’s will. It is what He has written for them, and they have to accept it.”

“You are heartless,” said Noora.

“Look, pretty one, if we sit and wait, we will never get what we want. We have to do what we can to survive.”

Noora raised her eyes questioningly. They were vague words but seemed full of the weight and value of gold. They were not words to come out of the mouth of a woman, and a slave at that. Was there some wisdom she had not seen in Yaqoota? “What do you mean?”

“Does it matter what I mean? A woman must do what she can for her peace of mind, that’s all.”

Peace of mind? Certainly Noora had none.

“She must find ways to make the passing hours tolerable.”

Yes, Noora had many slow and miserable hours. “How?”

“You want me to show you how?”

Noora’s pulse quickened and she nodded. Was there a secret that Yaqoota had discovered that could eliminate the dejection she consistently felt?

“You ready to start right now?”

Noora nodded again.

They set out straight away without too much thought on whether they would be missed. Covered from head to toe, they stepped over the mangled remains of the make-believe shark, which the children had abandoned. At first, Noora followed Yaqoota with nervous steps, turning her head this way and that, unsure as to whether anyone could identify her. She knew that as a re
spectable wife she should not be wandering aimlessly with the house slave in Wadeema’s streets.

“Don’t worry,” Yaqoota assured her, guessing her fears. “No one will be able to recognize you, and we won’t be gone for long, anyway.” She paused, before adding, “Even if they look for you and don’t find you, it won’t matter. After all, you’re not the favored one anymore.”

The truth in Yaqoota’s words stung, but Noora took in a deep breath and willed the nervousness to lift as Yaqoota led her along the edge of the village, where it was quieter. They entered a long and narrow street, lined on each side by
barasti
huts. Noora picked up bits of the conversations that were taking place within. Through the palm-frond walls, she heard a man assure his wife that he would come back safely, in a hoarse yet intense voice. The wife was quietly heroic, responding with a voice filled with dignity, telling him that she would accept whatever fate this journey would bring. Noora stared at the ground and slowed her walk, as if she were in a trance, listening to the somber mood, surrendering faith, and choked sobs that floated out from within the
barastis
along the length of the empty street. It was Yaqoota’s shrill voice that shook her back to the moment.

“Women passing through!”

Noora looked up and spotted a man who had entered at the far end of the street and was walking toward them. In an instant, the man stopped, averted his gaze, and paused to the side. He pulled in his limbs so that she and Yaqoota could pass by without his touching them.

Yaqoota grabbed Noora’s hand and pulled her along, and just as they drew close to him, Yaqoota yelled again, “Coming through!” with such force that he stumbled back into the
wall of the
barasti
. His
ghitra
got stuck in the rough fronds and he jerked his head to the side. It slipped off, revealing an egg-shaped scalp.

Just as they hurried past him, Yaqoota bent her arms at her sides and flapped them. She bobbed her head back and forth and released a series of guttural clucks. From under her
shayla
and
abaya
Noora giggled, but the man could not see the funny side of Yaqoota’s chicken dance. Worse, Yaqoota’s foolishness revealed her identity.

“It’s you! Yaqoota!” he said, as he fumbled with the
ghitra
, trying to pull it out of the fronds without ripping it.

Yaqoota laughed and rushed to the other end of the street, pulling Noora along.

“And who is the other one?” the man called after them.

They were running now.

“I’m sure you are a respectable woman,” he continued, addressing Noora. “Listen to my advice. Don’t go walking with that slave. She will spoil your manners, you hear? Her black blood will lead you to shame.”

They kept running, past the mosque and the small shop at the end of the village, leaving Wadeema behind, until they reached a long and empty stretch of beach. “How did he know it was you?” said Noora, once her heart slowed and she could breathe steadily again.

“I am famous,” said Yaqoota.

It was hot. Under the near midday sun, the water was luminous and the sand shone a fierce white. They removed their
shaylas
and
abayas
and bent over to unbutton the ankle bands. With
serwals
secured in tight folds at the knees, they lifted up their dresses and hopped over the scalding sand and into the shallows of the sea. The warm waves slapped their legs,
and they began splashing each other and jumping over every breaking wave, laughing and giggling, giddy with frivolity. It was not long before their energy ran out and they flopped onto the sand to catch their breath.