Part 10 (1/2)
”Who're you going to call, anyway?”
”My husband and my child.”
Pause. Love was trusting.
”I thought you said he was a drunk.”
Adel felt his nose and eyes fill up with pollution. He took out a tissue, but the wind stole it, so he wiped his eyes with his leather jacket; it marked him as a policeman.
”Whatever you want, Nisrine. You want my soul? I'll give you my soul. You want my cell phone, I'll give you my cell phone. You want me to throw myself into the street?”
He made to jump down into the street where the cars were pa.s.sing.
”Adel. Stop playing.”
He stepped back.
”Ah, see? See, you'd miss me.”
Adel left the roof that afternoon to buy a cell phone card for one thousand lire. Nisrine tried to give him money. She wanted to drop one hundred lire down to the garden for him.
He told her, ”Forget it. I don't need your money.” Phone cards cost one thousand. One hundred lire was nothing, it was like not giving him anything. She insisted, he was doing her a favor, she wanted to help. She got out the one hundred lire very carefully and wrapped it in the plastic bag he'd used to send his last poem. She had only two hundred lire total. She didn't go to stores here, she didn't know plain bread cost thirty.
Adel walked one block to the phone card kiosk, which was small and square like a cracker, and overwhelming. Here before him were all the colors that Nisrine might like: purple of the cookies in their cellophane; brown and gold of the American candy wrappers; puffed blue of the chip packages, all in row upon row of s.h.i.+ny color. He would have given her any of these. He'd spend his whole salary pampering her, if she'd let him.
But, she wanted his cell phone. He wondered how many units she would use up. He tried to make as many calls as possible on the way back, out of sight behind the station, before he hid the phone in the garden for her, so not as many units would be wasted. He knew this thinking was wrong, but he had just put on more units recently. It all seemed very expensive, to have to buy another phone card so soon.
Adel went home that night to dinner, and tried not to think about Nisrine. On the table were bulgur and cubed meat and tomatoes. He wanted his mother to pa.s.s the tomatoes. He opened his mouth to ask her- ”Mama, how much does it cost to call Indonesia?”
”Who's in Indonesia, Adel?”
After dinner, Adel helped his mother clear the dishes. He followed her into the living room.
”Mama,” he asked, ”what do you wish for me?”
”I wish you a good life and a good job and a loving woman,” his mother told him.
”A foreign woman?”
”Fine, then. A foreign woman.”
”What kind of foreign?”
”Any kind. London. Paris. Baghdad. The important thing is she's like us, see? Free, like the Europeans. We and the Europeans have a lot in common. We eat well. We read the same books. We can all speak English together. What would we do if we couldn't all speak the same language? For example, if she knew Chinese instead of Arabic. Then where would we be? We'd be mutes!”
”Mama, I'm in love with a foreign girl.”
”You told me, New York.”
”Not New York.”
”It's OK, Adel, don't tell me the specifics, I don't need to know. Let those stay special for you.”
ADEL FOUND HIS PHONE in the garden the next morning. He looked at the dialed numbers; Nisrine had dialed three times, at 6:04 a.m., 6:07 a.m., and 6:36 a.m. He looked at the received calls; they hadn't called her back. He couldn't remember what b.u.t.ton told him the units he had left.
He went up to the roof and found her on the balcony, hanging the laundry. She had a clothespin in her mouth, and Baba's wet pants in her hands dwarfed her. When she saw him, she held the pants with her chin, so they touched the ground, to wave at him. Her nails were painted red so he would notice them.
He shrugged and held up the cell phone.
”Everything OK?”
She nodded.
”That's good, then.”
Adel could be so cheap sometimes. Here he was, hoping she wouldn't ask to call again, at least for a month or two-until she somehow got her hands on another hundred lire-and yet he loved her, and she loved him, and afterwards everything was beautiful between them.
Adel watched her working.
He watched her baby the children.
When Madame took a nap, he called the house phone. She brought it out to the balcony, to talk to him. Across the street, he pointed down at a clothing-store awning. ”Anything you want from here, if there're clothes you like, I'll get them for you.”
She looked out at it. ”Thank you, but you don't have to.”
”I love you. I want you to love me the way I love you.”
”I love from the heart. I don't love for money or clothes.”
”I know, I know. I just want you to know. Do you want more units on my phone?”
”No, thank you, it's OK.”
”I'll get more for you.”
”You don't need to.”