1. 13 Dream Street, Faraj:

Faraj sprawls on his bed, booted feet dripping wet gravel, adding another layer of filth to the already dirty sheets, blowing smoke rings at the ceiling.

He watches the pink curtains grow yellow with the rising light of the sun.

The smoke rises from between his lips to vanish in the room’s air, a drunken dancer swaying to an unheard rhythm.

He thinks of Nancy, the way she used to move, eyes closed and lips parted a little, just like his own are now. A smile, hinted at, never realized.

“You are the man, man.” He remembers the guttural voice of his friends, amidst the bubbling sounds of sheeshas and the queerly similar sound of their laughter that unfailingly followed, and he winces.

The light of the sun, filtered through the pink curtain, seems to grow redder by the second, yellow only at the edges now. Blood red. The way Nancy’s face looked when he slapped her.

“You think you own me!” She had screamed, and not once. She screamed and screamed, tears flowing freely from her eyes, spittle and venom flying into his general direction.

“You should have taken my advice man,” Ghassan, his best friend, has said. “You should have balled her a long time ago, frustrated women do crazy stuff.”

Ghassan wouldn’t have dared say that to him just a week ago. Now everybody knows that he has been played for the fool. Him. Faraj. The Casanova.

He laughs suddenly, a bitter, dry sound, and the smoke in front of him is momentarily disturbed, but quickly settles back into its aimless, drunken dance.

“Why Nancy? Why couldn’t you have waited???” he thinks, biting on his cheek. “Nancy, I wanted so bad, so bad… to make it right.”

He bites harder into his cheek, and the sudden rush of warm blood, when it comes, is salty and metallic.

Smoke, he thinks, is probably not the only one dancing drunkenly tonight.

2. 17 Dream Street, Noha:

Noha sharpens her pencils. Smell of sharpened pencils always feeels like the epitome of freshness to her. She was deep into her third pack of Faber-Castells now.

Her little brother’s softly breathing form lies beside her, on the couch. She had hugged him to sleep last night, telling him repeatedly not to worry, that its all going to be all right. Their mother was in a better place, and God will take care of her now. The last thing her brother had muttered, sleepy and tired from crying all day, was “She loved dad…”

She thinks that that might have been a question.

Her father, that always-strong man, had broken up completely yesterday, crying with tears that seemed to come from the very core of his being. She has ended up hugging and comforting him before taking little Hani to her room, hoping to persuade him to sleep. She was aware of her dad’s smell when she hugged him, his after-shave mingling with his sweat and the smell of his cigarettes, that familiar, sweet smell that always meant a safe haven to her, a place where nothing can harm her, no one can build her castles of sand and crumple them in front of her… But no, she shouldn’t be thinking about such things right now. She has gotten over that.

She sharpens a new pencil. Looking at it’s tip head on, she marvels at how if she keeps it at a straight angle, she can bring it closer and closer to her eyeball and still it would seem to be at the same distance. She smiles. If her mom saw her playing with a sharpened pencil this near to her eye she would have a cow.

Only, her mother is dead.

Suddenly tears of suppressed grief and utter sadness burst from Noha’s eyes. Despair. “I am now an orphan,” she thinks. No mother will scold her anymore. Her mother can’t shout at her again, nor call her a pet name, nor kiss her cheeks ever, ever again. She has become mother-less. And what she would not give to have her mother open the door of this room and slap the pencil from her hand and throw it away, and give her a lecture.

Noha hugs herself, crying and moaning, knowing that nothing will be all right, not ever again.

3. 22 Dream Street, The Dream Factory:

Faraj and Noha.

My neighbors. I take down my Seeing Helmet and grab a pen to jot down some notes on their current situations. But my hand traces circles and stars instead.

Ah, one of His pens.

I throw it away, grab another, and make my hasty notes. After, I take a fresh supply of incense, and close the lights of the room as I exit.

My house is one of the few houses in this part of the city with a basement. An old district, most of the buildings in it are simple two- and three-story affairs. The former tenant wanted to use the basement as a garage, but could never get around to making a vehicle-sized doorway. I am glad that he never did, it would have been… uncomfortable.

As I descend the stairs, a slow painful moaning rises up from the black crypt in the dark corner. He feels me coming.

I light the candles, and burn the incense, careful to utter the correct intonations. I know that these words have no real power, but it is soothing to me, and perhaps to Him also, so I always recite them.

“… Pain … I hurt…” the words a little more than moans themselves. It has been almost always this lately. His pain.

“Patience, cousin, the pain we will remove soon, and the dreams we shall ease. Tell me of Her,” I tell Him, a tone of impatience creeping into my voice, too late for me to take it back.

“… Fire… hurts … hurtsss”, He feebly tries to shout, each letter no doubt a burning pain in his throat.

“Her. Cousin, how close is she?” I don’t try to mask my impatience this time.

“… Close … closer than before…she pursues …but is pursued.” His words are always the same.

I sigh. Better get it over with.

“And the dreams, cousin? What about the dreams?”

“…Blue … so blue …”, and I hold my breath in anticipation, hoping against hope that it would be something useful this time, “… but small… mouse… hurts…”

Mouse.

It would be a mouse. Why not? This was so pathetic it was almost amusing.

I turn around to stare at where I left the incense to burn, and the intelligently dark beady eyes of the mouse stare back at me. It hasn’t been there a moment ago, and neither could it have crawled into a basement that resembles a bank’s vault with all the security I had installed.

Its fur is blue. As blue as a bright summer day sky. I take it into the cup of my hand. So tiny. And start to take it upstairs, to keep it with the others.

Tomorrow will be a new day.

As I ascend the stairs, a feeble, agonized howl follows me.

End of Part 1

© Shadi N. Saber, all rights reserved.