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Overview
TRIP WIRES travels around the world, with stories, many of children, set against turbulent socio-political backdrops from Afghanistan to Syria to Columbia to America, and examines how the dilemma of isolation is a common human condition. The terrain is different in each story, but all of these young people face the dilemma of being without resources even as they try to find and maintain relationships. Accepting of tragedy and insurmountable challenges, they nonetheless show humanity and grace, and remind us of the best in ourselves.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781935248972 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Leapfrog Press |
| Publication date: | 06/12/2018 |
| Pages: | 176 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x (d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
FIFTEEN MINUTES
A freak summer thunderstorm brings a stirring to the dry, cement, river trough running through Los Angeles, brings the brown stench of rot, brings a grey sheen of sludge to the corpses of tires, car skeletons and, bent across a 1923 Eolan stove, the body of Omar Tariq.
The official from the coroner’s office speaks to Mrs. Leela Tariq through a translator. They determine death by accident. Leela, who speaks perfect English, tells her cousin, Asal, that she doesn’t trust the official in his sweating shirt and tight brown nylon pants.
Leela knows, Asal knows, that Omar jumped; they also know why, but these are private, dangerous griefs, for the climate is sensitive to these people, who wear strange clothes―hijab, burkah—who do strange things—kneeling to pray on a mat.
Omar’s death cannot be discussed with other trivia, like the Sunday papers filled with other momentary tragedies—who can no longer play golf, who lost the election, who died in countries chewed away by their bordering deserts. All of it will pass, all of it will continue. There will be small surges, a tide-pooling of anemone-like outrage that will die with the next incoming wave.
Farid is number three. The first was successful, they say. The second was brought down and brutally resuscitated. He must not think about the others. He must remain quiet and act when he is required to act. It is Sunday, no different from the other days, but he is proud that he can remember. On Sundays, he used to take his wife and son to the science museum, the concert in the park, the story time at Barnes and Noble.
His son. Nima. He feels his eyes prick. This is not the time to show emotion. But there is no other time but now. It is a blasphemy to parcel minutes out until they are gone. His small time will be over, but the rest of it will continue even after this. There is a despairing lurch to the stomach. Perhaps this won’t do anything and it will all go on as before.
There is murmuring around him like a rumbling of agitated bees. But he is separate from them, corrugated iron roof above, wire netting to the sides, bare concrete below. Cell. An infinitesimal thing of no consequence until joined to others. But the others will not be joined to him when it is his turn.
So this is the meaning of time. He has counted two minutes and thirteen seconds of the fifteen minutes left. He stops counting. There must be other things to think about, more than this ten-one-hundred, eleven-one-hundred, twelve-one-hundred business. What are the other things?
Did Omar think like this? Did he curse himself, curse the others, curse the enemy closing in so quickly that flight wasn’t an option? If he hadn’t jumped, would Omar have ended here, too, in a wire cell among wire cells? He shakes his head free of Omar who left a widow and three children to continue their lives, walking through their neighborhood before indifferent eyes. What are our children without their fathers?
What will happen to Nima? He has never questioned before. But he has never had to count fifteen minutes before. Is it not permitted to ask one question? Will he imperil his soul if he does?
Asal wears a long blue skirt and a cream blouse with bluebirds flying down the sleeves. It is her favorite blouse and it must be hand-washed in a delicate soap. If there is a stain, she must carefully rub it out with her fingers. A brush would ruin it. It must be rinsed once in milk, once in lukewarm water. It cannot be left to soak.
Nima, her four year-old, circles her, pulling at the delicate bluebird sleeves. She smiles at him. She thinks, No, please don’t tear it. But she is not thinking of the sleeve, or if she is then it is some other sleeve connected to some other shirt that threatens to unravel forever.
It is Sunday, nothing is planned and there is plenty of time for washing and mending delicate clothing if the need arises.
Nima runs around the house while Asal sits in the kitchen, then the living room; she stands in the doorway, waiting for the phone to jangle syllables into her. Her cell phone has stopped working so she cannot leave the house for fear of missing the phone call that may tell her Farid is well. There has been no such phone call, but she continues to wait since there is nothing else to do. Waiting, with its drawn out vowel, seems like an infinitely long word.
Finally, she picks up the cell phone and buckles Nima into his car seat. The people at the cell phone store must help her. Anything is better than being tethered to the house.
Five minutes. Farid is anxious until he remembers that it doesn’t matter. He will hear the noise of the others creating a distraction. That will be his signal.
He can see some of the others. They don’t look at him. The guards are busy, monitoring any eye contact, trying to gauge who, if any, will be next.
But he feels them: the one who limps since he was beaten; the child who, at sixteen, is so proud of the faint feathers of his beard, the one with a shriveled stomach, who should be at home, laughing with friends over a dinner of roast lamb and figs, the one who once whispered, Inshallah, my friend, whose black eyes are now milky and opaque from interrogations. All of them are praying for him, willing him strength and he cannot let them down.
Seven minutes. Long ago he relinquished the small corner of hope that he might see his family again. He has learned to keep these things inside where they are safe. Even when they question him, make derogatory comments about his wife and child, holding up the photograph just out of reach, he does not react, does not beg to hold the small colored square in which Nima laughs at something outside the frame and Asal’s long hair, caught in the breeze, unfurls like a banner.
Nima will be five soon. They will have a party and the pink iced cake he so loves, even though his older boy cousins will tease him. Nima can already climb one of the oranges tree in the back garden. He clenches a book between his teeth, struggles for handholds on the trunk, hauls himself up and sits on the lowest branch. He tells the story to the birds, breaking off occasionally to lift the book and show the pictures. For other boys his age, birds are target practice for sling shots.
Nima takes the same book, always, The Runaway Bunny. He can recognize some of the small words. For you are my. Farid’s chest lifts, mouth open, to bring his heart under control.
Asal’s soft skin. He once made a lotion of rose water.
This is for the body?
Just smell it, Asal. It is from roses.
I use this same rosewater in cooking.
It will make your skin even more beautiful.
What if I am allergic to roses?
Asal. Just keep quiet and let me put this here. And here.
He can almost remember how she filled his head with the smell of roses. He breathes in again.
Asal looks at the picture of Farid. He is so handsome, the curve of his smiling mouth makes her heart fill her throat.
She remembers the fortune teller in Teheran.
“You will be a single mother.” The teller lifted one yellowed curved thumbnail and pointed it at the twelve-year old girl. A curse. Asal would not tell her sister what the teller had said.
Four years later, she finally told her new husband. Farid, a modern man, tried to explain. “That’s what our grandparents believed in. When you are sick, when you wish to invest money, when you wish to be married, when you don’t wish to be married, go and see the teller. I can’t see what the big deal is. You can gather the facts scientifically. This is what we must rely on. Science.”
He would know; he is a scientist. But that didn’t help him when he was arrested and thrown into that place with the harsh name. She avoids the hard consonants, the bitter vowels. She can never visit him, never receive a letter from him or hear his voice on the phone. What does it mean that she has no words to explain to Nima? He still tells her that Da is in a meeting, Da is in the lab, Da is buying chocolate for them.
There was a time, she thinks. I was a modern girl. Now she is a married woman, with a child. And another one on the way. After her shower she stands in front of the mirror, looking for the four month-old swelling. But the baby is still too small. What is your name? Come, show yourself to me. And, Why must you come now? And, much later, He doesn’t even know about you.
Cingular’s parking lot is being re-paved. They must park across the road outside See’s Candies. She promises Nima chocolate later, and stands at the traffic signal waiting for the light change so that they can cross safely. She holds his hand, and he wriggles. She gives him a little shake. “We must hold hands.”
“But you are pressing too tight.”
She relaxes her grip. “I’m sorry.”
He smiles up at her and her lungs balloon out with the joy of breathing. Oh, let him always smile at me like this.
The man outside Cingular rotates his arrow sign, flips it, jogs back and forward. He twirls and throws his sign into the air, catching it with one hand, one foot raised. There ought to be applause.
The man’s movements are voluptuous. His arrow swims through the air, pointing up, then down.
The lights change and she walks, trying not to squeeze Nima’s hand too hard. As they reach the other side the phone that doesn’t work warbles a Bollywood ringtone. Asal stares at it.
Nima says, “Mommy? Press the green button.”
She does and lifts the phone to her ear. A voice says, “Mrs. Abaya?”
“Who is this?”
The voice is cut off.
Ten minutes. Farid looks up. The heat radiates up from the floor, down from the ceiling.
He tries to think of a cold place. Iceland. He has never been to a cold country. He tries to picture the snow, the curving slopes of ice. He thinks of tinkling bells and black horses breathing clouds of ice-smoke. He thinks, But none of that is true. Iceland cannot be like that. Iceland must be a desert of ice where the wind blows as cold as the hot wind that blows endlessly here. But he cannot summon up this other real Iceland.
He repeats his prayers. He repeats his instructions. There is no difference between the two. Perhaps he should pray more. What if he mistakes the signal? There will be no mistaking the signal. He will have two minutes, maximum, to snare the noose, hoist his body up, and let himself drop. He gasps aloud and turns it into a cough in case anyone is listening.
And the voice of Asal comes. Ah, Farid. You tell such stories. Nima. Nima. Nima.
Nima stares at the man. “Can I do it?”
The man laughs and holds out the sign. Asal tries to pull her son away. She clutches the phone, as if to squeeze a reply out of it. “Hallo? Hallo?”
Nima releases her hand and runs to the man. He hands the sign to Nima who throws it in the air and catches it with both hands. He is delighted. The man laughs. “That’s it. You got it.”
Thirteen minutes. If there is one good thing I did in my life, it was to marry Asal. She was too young; even at sixteen she behaved like a child. Most women that age had done their growing up. But Asal had mischief.
Her bare feet scuffed on the tile as she ran to hide from him. Quieting his own breath, he entered the room where he knew she’d hidden. By the side of the louvered closet, a pair of black shoes neatly placed together. He opened the closet door and received a hard, glittering shock of cold water. She leaned back against the clothes, helpless with laughter, clutching the empty glass, as he dripped onto the new cream colored carpet.
He couldn’t wait to get home from work. Sometimes she would spread a blanket, set plates of apples chunks, sliced nectarines, tomatoes, fresh basil, thick coins of Sopresso sausage, a basket of focaccia, and they would sit on the floor to eat and watch Charlie Chaplin movies. And afterwards, in a great wash of garlic and nectarines, they made love while she complained that they should have brushed their teeth first.
How much time is left? He must finish all the thoughts. He tries to concentrate, not on the memories of the past, but the ones he wishes for their future. Asal safely back in Teheran, among her family and his. Nima graduating from high school, from university. Nima with his own family. Asal with her grandchildren. It is like a comic book with bad sketches. Now this frame, now this, now this. All he wishes for is that they are safe and loved, as they once were with him. I wish for you, for both of you, I wish with all my heart …
A shout, taken up, echoes back. Running feet. Rattling bars. Goodbye. Forgive me.
Nima tries to flip the sign again, but drops it. The man picks it up. “Can’t let the sign fall on the ground. Company policy.” He looks at the silent boy. “You did good.”
Nima turns away and walks next to his mother, who is still holding on to the phone. She is crying.
The Cingular sign man says, “Is there a problem, ma’am?”
“My phone. My phone. It’s not working.”
“It’s okay. Maybe you didn’t press something. These phones are tricky.” He takes it from her and punches the buttons.
She watches him, face running with tears that shine over-bright in the sun.
He says, “Looks like the battery’s dead. That’s the problem.”
She nods. “Yes. Thank you.”
“Now, don’t you worry. You can just go right inside here and they’ll replace it for you.”
“Yes, thank you.”
She holds Nima’s hand, turns, and steps back into the oncoming traffic. Behind them, the man shouts.
The indignant blaring of a horn. She looks up to see a jeep filled with golden-haired teenagers. Words slur past, “—death wish—”
A long, green SUV slows down long enough for the woman driver to shout, “You’ll kill that child.”
Suddenly aware, Asal hauls Nima to the traffic island. Her useless bluebird sleeves flutter against the hot thrust of traffic as it flashes past. Nima is holding her hand too tightly; she grips him back. A bus lumbers past, a stinking animal of blasting exhaust. She covers her nose, unwinds her scarf and arranges it over Nima’s face. He stares at her solemnly through the blue gauze. She looks across the road at the mocking red hand. Are they to die of exhaust poisoning before the light will change?
She turns and sees the Cingular man pressing the pedestrian button. He waves and shouts something. The traffic rushes his words away. He might as well be trying to yell through water.
She smiles uncertainly at him, turns back to face the bi-polar tide. The light will change soon and she and Nima can cross. The light will change soon.