Free Granada by Raḍwá ʻĀshūr Page A

of the many fine qualities of the deceased. They beseeched God for the patience to endure His decree that given by anyone else would not be so lauded. Saleema was the only one who didn't shed a tear nor utter a word to any of the mourners. The women may say that everyone's time must come, but was this Abu Jaafar's time, or was it the book burning that really killed him?
    When the last of the mourners departed and night crept in slowly, when everyone in the house went to sleep, Saleema lay awake staring into the darkness, thinking. She was just as upset as her grandfather by the burning of the books. Naeem had wept bitterly, and Saad and Hasan both looked pale and frightened, but why was it that it was her grandfather who died, suddenly, and without a warning sign, without a previous illness? She had barely reached four when her own father died, but he had been sick and in pain. She used to ask:

    "Why is he moaning?"
    "Because he's sick."
    "When is he going to get better?"
    "When God permits it."
    But what God permitted was something else, and they took him to his grave.
    "Where has he gone?"
    "He died."
    "What does 'die' mean?"
    "That God chose him to be next to Him in heaven."
    She pictured in her mind that God had especially chosen her father to sit right next to Him on a big throne in a heaven more beautiful than all the gardens of Ainadamar, with fountains and water trickling through the towering trees and the brilliantly colorful flowers. She wondered if she should ask God to chose her as well to go to live with Him in that beautiful place or to stay with her grandparents, her mother, and brother. Or should she pray to Him to take all of them together? Then she would think about her playmates and decided it may be best to stay where she was.
    One day a little more than a year after her father died, Saleema found a small lizard in the courtyard. She went toward it and when she noticed that it didn't try to escape from her she picked it up by the tail. It was cold and dead. She brought it to her grandmother: "This lizard is dead, right?" Her grandmother shrieked in disgust and yelled at her to throw it away and go and wash her hands. But Saleema just stood there.
    "When lizards die, do they go to heaven?"
    Her grandmother muttered something under her breath without answering.

    But the question lingered in her mind until more questions began to fill her head: what's the use of having lizards, bats, and scorpions? And why did God create these species only to have them die later on?
    Months later little Saleema asked her grandfather if scorpions and lizards go to heaven just as people do. Her mother pulled her away and scolded her for bothering him with such silly questions, and told her to go outside and play with her friends. But she got no further than the outside door as she stood thinking how absurd it was for dead scorpions and snakes to go to heaven and frighten and bother people. So she ran back to her grandfather.
    "Grandfather, do lizards go to heaven or hell when they die?"
    "To hell."
    "But what did they do to make them go to hell?"
    "Because they cause harm to people, they go to hell."
    She left the house and went out into the neighborhood not entirely convinced of what she had just heard. It's strange to think that scorpions go to heaven, but even stranger that they go to hell. Didn't God create them with their harmful sting? They didn't choose to be born that way, so why should God punish them for something they didn't choose?
    Saleema went back to thinking about her grandfather, about the blazing fire and the piles of smoldering books at Bibarambla Square. She dozed off but soon awoke in a state of fright. She felt a blaze of fire rush through her body, and as she opened her eyes she realized that her whole body was shivering and her teeth were chattering. They covered her with lots of blankets, and in her feverish trance she felt as though she were about to join her grandfather.
    The day Saleema recovered