Free Beirut Blues by Hanan al-Shaykh Page A

the bombing had been lost at sea instead of being killed on land. It only became clear to me now that it was these boys’ passion to be in command of a tank which had induced them to oblige Ali, rather than a concern for our safety. Then I felt desolate as the three of them tried to master their new toy, and longed suddenly for the house. I saw it somehow reduced, its contents without life or color. They used to be animated, eventalkative, and had gradually become an inseparable part of me, witnesses to the slightest changes in my thoughts and feelings. Now they were represented by a bunch of keys in Ali’s pocket and instructions to water the garden. I suddenly felt weary and wanted to lie down on my own bed. Every time I was away from it, I pictured it waiting for me, assuring me that the danger would soon pass, asking why I had abandoned it, and I saw plainly that danger was everywhere, even in this tank. As if my grandmother wanted to rid herself of tension, she said, echoing my own thoughts, “If only we’d told Zakiyya to water the marjoram and basil and watch that the boys didn’t hit the bitter-orange tree.”
    “Here we are about to die and all you can think of is the marjoram and basil,” said Zemzem crossly. Then her features relaxed and she muttered to the plastic bag beside her, “I knew you’d be a credit to me.”
    She’d hidden the quail in the bag and brought it with her. We laughed, and my grandmother commented that she’d heard a noise like someone’s stomach rumbling. Ali laughed too and told the youths in the turret, but then my grandmother seemed to tire of the subject and began to talk about Ali looking after the house. “I’ll order an iron door,” he replied. “Anyway your house is empty. There aren’t any treasures in it. But nobody likes the idea of a stranger getting into their house, even if there isn’t anything valuable there.”
    He winked at me and I realized that he was making sure the boys commanding the tank didn’t get any ideas. Everyone continued chatting amicably and exchanging jokes; Ali wished there was a camera so that he could have his picturetaken in the turret, while my grandmother began reciting the throne verse from the Qur’an and prayers for our safety.
    You’re in my mind now because I’m traveling in a tank, and I feel you in my body because I’m sweating slightly and it reminds me of the times we managed to be together, in spite of the fighting all around.
    The noise the tank makes is a kind of loud whine. What causes it? Contact with the road, or the engine itself? The tank makes me think of a bracelet of my mother’s with thick gold links like its tracks. Now I understand why it’s the tank which is the most important land weapon in wartime. The sound it makes is enough to inspire terror wherever it goes, a giant roaring before it picks up the city like a bowl of fruit. Now I understand why when they’re in a tank, soldiers feel they can crush cars and trees in their path like brambles, because they’re disconnected from everything, their own souls and bodies included, and what’s left is this instrument of steel rolling majestically forward. I feel as if I’ve entered another world. No destruction. No streets, no people, no long years of war; they’ve gone, as if I have been in a submarine the whole time. There is no window where we are, and the feeble light comes from a bulb, or filters through from the small windows in the driver’s area.
    I know you wanted to leave Beirut five years ago in a tank like this, unseen and unseeing, alone with your disappointment, which was like barbed wire unraveling everywhere. Whenever you tried to outsmart it, dispute with it, ignore it, it snagged you and entangled you in its coils, made you aware of its weight bearing down on you with everybreath you took, and so you went beyond it. You tried to exploit its danger, to have your revenge by staying alive. Your body represented freedom now: if it remained