As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow (5)
There is no other explanation. Boiling him down to scientific facts is the only way I’m able to face him.
“Whatever makes you feel better.” He smiles wickedly.
I rub the scar at the back of my head, feeling the callous ridges against my fingers. “Daisies,” I whisper. “Daisies, daisies.”
Khawf brushes his hair out of his eyes and takes a pack of cigarettes out of his breast pocket. The carton is red, always the same shade as the spots on his shoulders. He plucks one long tube and presses it between his lips before lighting it. The nub blazes, eating away at the edges, and he takes a long drag.
“I want to know why you didn’t talk to Am,” he says. “Didn’t you promise yesterday you would? Like you’ve been promising me every night?” His voice is low, but there’s no mistaking the threat poisoning each word.
That’s how it started with him: a snide remark here and there, nudging my thoughts toward leaving Syria, until one day he decided I should ask Am for a boat. And he hasn’t stopped demanding I do so. Sometimes I wonder how my brain could conjure someone like him.
A drop of cold sweat trickles down my neck. “Yes,” I manage to answer.
He taps the cigarette and ash falls to the floor, disappearing just as it should hit the ground. “What happened?”
A five-year-old girl with curly brown hair died from a sniper shot to the heart while I saved her older brother from sepsis. I am needed. “I—I couldn’t.”
His eyes narrow. “You couldn’t,” he repeats dryly. “So I take it you want to be crushed under this house. Alive and broken and bleeding. No one coming to save you because how could they? Muscles as atrophied by malnourishment as yours are can barely lift bodies, let alone concrete. Or maybe you want to be arrested. Taken to where your Baba and Hamza are. Raped and tortured for answers you don’t have. Have the military dangle death as a reward and not a punishment. Is this what you want, Salama?”
My bones shiver. “No.”
He blows out one last trail of smoke before grinding the cigarette under the heel of his oxford shoe. Then he crosses the threshold and stands in front of me. I raise my head to look at him. His eyes are as cold as the Orontes River in December.
“Then couldn’t isn’t going to cut it,” he says. “You promised you would ask Am for a boat today. And three times he passed by and you didn’t.” His lips pull into a thin line, a muscle working in his jaw. “Or do you want me to go back on my deal?”
“No!” I shout. “No.”
One snap of his fingers and he could completely alter my reality, unleashing hallucination upon hallucination, showing everyone that the exterior I’ve put up is nothing more than brittle twigs against a strong wind. Dr. Ziad wouldn’t let me work at the hospital anymore. Not when I could be a danger to the patients. I need the hospital. I need it to forget my pain. To keep my hands busy so my mind doesn’t scream itself hoarse. To save lives.
Worse, I’d be piling more worries and anxieties on Layla, affecting her health and the baby’s. No. I’ll endure it all for her. I’ll drown in my tears and offer my soul to him if I can keep Layla safe in the knowledge I’m all right.
And so, Khawf has promised to keep to himself during the day and confine the terrors he shows me to the night. Far away from anyone else’s eyes.
An unkind smile tilts his lips upward. “This is your last chance, Salama, and I swear to you, if you don’t ask him tomorrow, I will tear your world apart.”
Anger awakens between the heartbeats of fear. My subconscious may have me under its thumb, but it’s my subconscious.
“It’s not that easy, Khawf,” I hiss, shaking away the look on the boy’s face when he held his little sister in his arms, her body small. So small. “Am might not have a boat. And even if he does, the price will be so high we won’t be able to pay it. So then the only way out would be to walk to Turkey. Making us a perfect target for the military. That is, if Layla survives the walking!”
His eyebrows quirk up in amusement. “Why are you choosing to ignore the promise you made to Hamza about getting Layla out? Your conflicted feelings about the hospital are causing chaos in your heart. Point is, you made promises and you’re backing out. All of this babbling is nothing more than excuses to keep your guilt at bay. What price wouldn’t you pay for Layla’s safety?”
I look away and dig my hands into my pockets, sinking into the mattress.
“This memory”—he straightens, smirking—“should solidify your decision.”
Before I can scream, he snaps his fingers.
The rich smell of mint and cinnamon stewing in a broth of yogurt and meat invades my nose and I’m overwhelmed with nostalgia. I hesitate for a second before opening my eyes. When I do, I’m no longer in my musty room but back home. My home.
The kitchen is exactly how I remember it. The marble walls alternate between beige and cedar brown, where hanging frames show Arabic calligraphy and painted golden lemons. The storage space beneath the counters holds our saucepans and pots, neatly stacked. A white satin cloth embroidered with lilies drapes over the kitchen table. Around the table stand four wooden chairs, and on top of it, orchids sprout out of a crystal vase. Blue orchids I bought for a visit that was supposed to happen later that day—today. I always bought blue orchids when we had a social gathering.