Chicago

pretended not to pay attention; perhaps the man would think it through or run away, but the man insisted that the Prophet punish him. The Prophet then asked him: “Have you actually committed zina? Perhaps you just kissed, touched, or your thighs touched.” So all of those were degrees of sexual contact that fell short of zina and there were no canonical punishments for them, but God forgave whomever he willed.

So she was not committing zina with Tariq, and they both had great hopes for God’s forgiveness because he knew their sincere intention to get married. If they could get married right now they wouldn’t hesitate for a moment. But what could they do? They couldn’t marry in Chicago without the families’ approval, and at the same time they couldn’t interrupt their scholarships. They would get married on the first trip that the scholarships’ conditions allow, in two years. Tariq would have his PhD and she would be entitled to a midscholarship furlough. She made him swear on the Holy Qur’an that they would write the marriage contract as soon as they arrived in Egypt. She even made him repeat after her a formula that she improvised: “I marry you, Shaymaa, before God and in the manner sanctioned by the Prophet’s practice and I will conclude the contract with you as soon as we arrive in Egypt and God is my witness.” Thus she was reassured; nightmares no longer oppressed her and she resumed performing her prayers. Now she was a full-fledged legally married wife (except for the red line). The only thing lacking was registering the marriage. And, by the way, registration procedures were not prescribed by the principal legal edicts of Islam; rather, they were a necessity imposed by governments only recently. During the days of the Prophet, peace be upon him, marriage vows were oral: the man and woman said a few words whereupon they were married before God Almighty. And this was exactly what she had done with Tariq. She convinced herself that she was his wife before God and in the manner sanctioned by the Prophet’s practice, and began to read about the duties of a Muslim wife toward her husband in religious books and tried to fulfill them: to protect his honor and property, to cherish him in his presence and absence, and to provide him with comfort and safe refuge.

As for Tariq, his life was turned upside down. It was as if he had discovered a treasure. All this pleasure? All this happiness? Now he could understand the crimes he read about in the newspapers: a man stealing or killing to keep the woman he loved. At one point that pleasure became more important than life itself. How much he regretted not knowing of it earlier. For thirty-five years he’d lived a harsh, hermetic existence, like a hungry man trying to fill himself by imagining food. Now he was a new person; he was different. He no longer resented the world. He no longer treated others provocatively, ready to fight at any moment. He’d become so calm and contented that his face looked different. “I swear by God Almighty that it now looks different,” he would say as he examined his face in the mirror. His complexion looked fresh and clean, his bulging eyes became less so, and his muscles no longer contracted and his mouth did not become crooked when he spoke. More surprising, he was no longer fond of pornographic movies. Even wrestling matches, which he had loved watching ever since he was a child, he rarely desired to watch anymore. The wellbeing that he felt as he surrendered his body to the hot shower after lovemaking could not be described in words. But did he really intend to marry Shaymaa? That was a difficult question that no one, not even Tariq himself, could definitively answer. He was passionately in love with her. He had once read that a man could test his real feelings for a woman after he had slept with her: if he got bored and wanted to leave her company soon after achieving his pleasure, that meant that he didn’t love her and vice versa. And Tariq could never get his fill of Shaymaa. He clung to her in bed. In her bosom he felt so serene, as if she were his mother. Sometimes he became so full of longing that he kissed every part of her body, licked it, wished he could devour it. His relationship with her then was not one of mere lust that he satisfied. He loved her and missed her very much all day long. But did that mean that he would marry her? The answer was an incomprehensible mumbling. He had promised to marry her and had repeated her vow to that intent. He had assured her a thousand times that he still respected her and that he was sure he was to be her first and last man. Had he done that out of conviction or pity, or (oh what an evil thought!) had he gone with her as far as he had from the beginning knowing that by so doing he was excluding her for good from any possibility of marriage? Could it be that, when he felt he was getting attached to her, he had deliberately had sex with her to undermine the thought of marrying her? He didn’t know the answer and did not dwell on it long. Why should he ruin his happiness with unsettling thoughts? Why was he in a hurry to worry? He had two years to face up to the decision. So let him dip into the spring of happiness, then let come what may. That was what he told himself, thereby achieving peace of mind and several months, the sweetest of his life, in heaven.

When did happiness last, and for whom? Yesterday, at about

3:00 p. m., Tariq finished reviewing samples of his research as usual, closed his office, and got ready to leave. But he was surprised to see Dr. Bill Friedman, chairman of the department, standing in front of him. He greeted him with a nod and said in a serious tone of voice, “I’ve come to see you, Tariq. Do you have a few minutes?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, come with me then.”

Chapter 29

It was an elegant three-story building surrounded by a beautiful garden. Dr. Thabit crossed the entryway in a hurry. The office of the counselor was to the right. He knocked on the door and went in. Then he smiled and said, “My name is Ra’fat Thabit. Sorry for being late. I had a hard time finding parking.”

“Don’t worry about it. Please have a seat.”

The counselor looked like a kindhearted grandmother. Her short gray hair covered the sides of her small head. Her smiling face conveyed a sense of familiarity and kindness. By way of introduction she said, “My name is Catherine. I am here to help you.”

“Have you been working here a long time?”

“Actually I don’t work. I am a volunteer, helping addicts and their families.”

“I salute you for your noble sentiment.”

Ra’fat was trying to steer the conversation away from the subject for which he came, perhaps until he decided how he should begin.

“Thank you, but what made me volunteer was not exactly a noble sentiment. My only son, Teddy, died of addiction,” Catherine said calmly, her smile disappearing. “I felt I was primarily responsible for his death. After separating from his father, I gave myself over completely to my work for twenty years. I wanted to prove to myself that I was a successful person. I owned a detergent sales company, to which I gave all my time until it became one of the most important companies in Chicago. Then I woke up when it was too late to save my son.”

Ra’fat listened in silence. She took a sip of water from a glass in front of her and added, “I think you, as a father, can fully feel my shock at his death. I was in therapy for a full year after he died. The first thing I did after coming out of the hospital was to liquidate my company. I began to hate it, as if it were the reason he died. Right now I am living off my bank savings and I spend my time helping addicts and their families. Whenever I help an addict with their recovery, I feel I am doing something for Teddy.”

The room was plunged into profound silence. Ra’fat stared at the wall to escape the gloom. There were many certificates of appreciation for Catherine from various organizations and pictures of her with young men and women whom he supposed were addicts that she had helped. Catherine sighed and smiled gently, as if turning over that page of sorrow, and said, “I’m sorry. I’m here to listen to you, not to talk about myself. Please go ahead. Tell me the story. I’m all ears.”

Ra’fat told her everything about Sarah, as if he were making a confession behind a curtain to a benevolent priest. He told her what he had seen and how he felt then, exerting extraordinary effort to control his features, and finished the story with the words “My life has stopped completely. I can hardly work. I want to do something for her.”

The counselor held a pen between her fingers and began to examine it closely, as if weighing what to say.

“The way you describe it, your daughter is most likely doing cocaine. Treating this kind of addiction is not easy. Young people are enticed to try it because early on it increases the levels of dopamine in the brain, which produces a heightened feeling of delight and comfort.”