"Shut-eye" from my short story collection "Eyelash " translated by Robin Moger

"Shut-eye" from my  short story collection "Eyelash "(Kotob Khan, 2014 ) translated by Robin Moger
قصة "غفوة" من مجموعتي القصصية "رمش العين (الكتب خان 2014) ترجمة روبن موجر
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Shut-eye

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Suddenly he stopped. We sleep here, he said.

– In the street?

On a concrete bench he set down his bag, rested his head atop it and stretched out. I stayed standing. I looked at the sea: a mass of darkness. The pavement: empty. The cold digging insistently beneath my clothes.

– Ten minutes then you wake me up and you sleep, and I wake you, and so on.

And he laid his head back and slept.

I stood in the yellow-tinged darkness. Peered up. No stars, like a second sea. I looked back at him, the sound of his snores vying with the waves, then drowsiness clamped down on me with its full weight and my knees buckled.

I lit one of my two remaining cigarettes. I started moving about and puffing, counting in my head and growing drowsier, circling the concrete bench and checking my watch—two minutes, two and a half—shaking my wrist as if I could make the hands turn faster, and going back to gaze at the sleeper.

I’d involved him in my mission, insisted until he’d given in. We’d come from the other end of the country, and between travel and drinks the money had run out, what was left only enough for the trip back on the early morning train. So we decided to wander down to the station and sit there, but the road was long and we’d run out of puff and he’d said, We sleep here.

I’m freezing cold, but mum comes with the hot tea and I clap with joy and she laughs and I get to my feet and take it from her and I stub my toe and I’m moaning and I find myself sitting on the sidewalk and it’s still night.

I looked about then looked at my watch: twelve minutes. I pulled myself together, got up and woke him. Slowly he raised his head, sat up, then rose. I stretched out in his place.

– Ten minutes, he warned me.

I nodded my head and was gone.

The sun woke me.

For a couple of seconds I stayed there on my back, trying to take it in. I sat up. A few pedestrians about but no sign of him. I rose up, shouting, You son of a…

Then I saw his bag. It had shifted along a few centimetres. I took it and opened it. At the bottom were the remains of sandwiches he’d brought with him the morning before, a physics textbook, revision notes, blank sheets of paper and a pen, and yesterday’s paper.

I set the bag beside me. Looked at the watch, realizing with a jolt that we’d missed the cheap train. Waited. Waited.

– He never came? Heba asks.

– He never came.

I look at her. She’s sitting facing the sea and I have my back to it. She gets to her feet and holds out her hand and I pass the cup of hot chickpea and tomato broth over the cart. She sits back down. I tell her: That’s the bench we slept on.

She looks down as though she can see us. Shifts, as though giving us some room, and her thigh beneath the black trousers is a perfect circle.

– He didn’t answer his mobile? she asks me.

I look at her young face and I smile: It was twenty years ago.

– Twenty?

– Seventeen.

She stirs the spoon in the cup. She blows. She tastes.

– I sat here till evening. I was worried that he’d come and wouldn’t find me. In the evening I called his family at home, but they asked me about him, so I put the phone down.

– And you never went back?

– I never went back.

– Lucky you.

I gaze into her playful eyes and I smile: How old are you?

– Guess.

– Seventeen?

– Twenty.

A moment, then she adds: And four kids.

My jaw drops and I stare at the slender waist, the fingers…

She closes her palm and winks: I put the ring on when I go home.

Then she points to the market: And to the the shop.

Then her finger shifts to point still further off: And to my father’s place.

Then she points it at me: You run away and come to us and we’ve got no way out.

I gesture to the sea at my back.

She shakes her head regretfully. Cups her hand to her mouth as though whispering: Problem is, I don’t cry.

– What, never?

– Never.

And she stares at me, eyes wide, as though emphasizing what she’s said.

I lean on the cart and watch the road. The cars had speeded up.

Two days later they came, the father, the brother and, stumbling in their wake, the mother in her robe. Came here. I saw them and backed away. I hid. They stood talking. The mother sat down on the same concrete bench and suddenly she started slapping her cheeks. The father yanked at her hand and shouted. The brother pushed them apart. They stayed there, arguing, shouting, silent, until the sun went down, then they got into an ancient taxi and left.

– Peace.

I look at Heba.

– I’ll be off to work.

– They aren’t your kids.

She looks at me.

– The four kids. Your brothers, right?

She is silent for a moment. Then she says: Sort of. Then, in a challenging tone: And he’s not your friend.

She points at the bench.

– He was your brother, wasn’t he?

And she aims her finger back at me: I’m not an idiot.

– Was my brother?

– Well, after seventeen years… she says, flustered.

She gets up, says softly: Who knows? Maybe he’s fine.

I incline my head, smiling, and she moves off. Then, suddenly, she stops. She turns to me and covers her hand with her mouth and her eyes open as wide as they can go.

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Mohamed kheir.

Translated by Robin moger

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