Free Bone Ash Sky by Katerina Cosgrove Page B

flight safety manual. Brace for landing. Do not panic. Breathe. Neither of my grandmothers had felt safe enough to come and see me off.
    When the plane took flight I caught a flash of the city in a carmine sunset, before cloud cover obscured it from view. From such a height, I could see exactly how destroyed west Beirut was. There were few public buildings left standing: no roads, no telegraph poles, no traffic lights, no colour. Only blue of sea and grey of destruction, the refugee camps a splotch of huddled black. As the plane dipped down once before ascending, I saw east Beirut intact and gleaming white: new high-rises, pools, beaches, resorts fanning out on the coastline toward Jounieh. As the plane ascended, my city, my country, my childhood home became abstract, theory, mere lines on a map. I didn’t feel resentful that I’d been sent away; after all, my grandmothers loved me – it was only a matter of time before Beirut would become more dangerous. For now, the Armenian quarter was still intact, Lilit and Siran safe. And my father? I was uneasy, in my stomach if not my head.
    I sit now in the Cafe de Paris, head in hands. Behind the counter, raised voices and the slap of a pan on the stove. I’m so tired. It must be jetlag, the traffic, this yellowish strengthening smog. My bed in the hotel room beckons, dark curtains drawn, the noise of the streets neutered. The notes I’ve typed, these surmises about my grandparents’ past, seem childish now, useless.
    I unfold a map of Van, inexpertly drawn by Minas as a gift for Lilit before he died. It’s soft and limp from being carried in my back pocket. I peer at the ghostly markers he’s left behind, the imprint of wet ink on paper. There, the little Pakradounian house nestled in a spring-flushed orchard. Here, the Garden City church, its quince-shaped domes coloured a brilliant red. The ancient citadel, long since reduced to rubble at the end of the Great War, looms over the whole town. Houses becoming larger and more elaborate the closer they are to the centre of Van. The main square, some way in the distance, flanked by tiny shops where Minas has written baker , bookshop , tailor , then the town hall and its tree-shaded courtyard, scene of killing.
    I’ve managed to take a few bites of my warm bread. I shut my laptop. The Lebanese woman and her companion wave goodbye, put their sunglasses on in one fluid movement and exit into the teeming street. A uniformed beggar with a withered stump sits at the front door whining, and they step over him. He’s old and blind, probably a veteran of the civil war. Nails dirt-rimmed, patched trousers settling in sad folds at the backs of his knees. He babbles, stops mid-sentence to wipe his sightless eyes in an impatient, furious gesture. He’s speaking in French. What’s he saying? He still hates the Arabs. Demon Muslims, sons of goats; their bombs made him blind. Slashing light, he fell to the ground, all was black. There is no solution. Raze this city and start all over again.
    I stay long enough to see the waiter shoo him away, remembering the thin white ribbons attached to landmines, the buzzing of the mosques all day, everyday, those pink and green and ash-yellow edifices of rotting rubble, all the erotica of a fallen city. My father.
    I run to catch up with the blind man as he lurches across the street, leaving my glass of tea untouched, knowing as I run that I’m being stupid and sentimental. He slows down when he hears me, puts out a restraining hand. I let him touch my head, stroke my arms, up and down, exploring my closeness. A shudder of revulsion courses through me. If my father lived, would he be like this? The old man parrots his name, age and rank as if saluting a superior, then holds out his palm. I drop some liras into his hand, watch him finger the medals on his chest with tenderness, as if caressing a child’s face.

BEIRUT, 1982
    S elim walked home to his apartment