Moon over Samarqand

1

A distant blue city. Delicate mist covers it in the morning and columns of scorching dust rise from it at noon.

I seem to be the only stranger at the vast taxi station. A throng of drivers surrounds me—white faces seared a burnt red by the sun, eyes the same faded blue as the city, a gold tooth flashing in every mouth. I can smell the scent of their sweat. Each attempts to raise his voice above the others’ but I can’t understand a word they say. I only comprehend the numbers they write on their dusty car windows, one after the other—500, 450, 400. They make sure to draw dollar signs next to each figure.

I know the numbers are exaggerated. Everyone’s warned me about the grueling haggling at the taxi station. I look at the bus preparing for departure to Samarqand, parked a distance away and teeming with humans and animals. I tried to take it before standing here like this, but couldn’t stand its strong mixture of smells or find enough room in it to sit.

One of the drivers approaches and places his hand on my shoulder. He speaks in a tender, intimate tone and I can smell his alcohol-tinted breath. He strikes his chest and swears, or so I imagine, since the Arabic words ‘Allah’ and ‘Qur’an’ are repeated frequently in his speech. He asks for $350, assuring me this is as low as he can go. Before he can convince me, others push him away.

The bus drives off with all of its people and animals. A little girl, sitting next to a goat bigger than she is, waves at me as they look out the window together. The drivers’ faces come closer.

All I want is to reach Samarqand, and yet this simple wish has been made nearly impossible by my ignorance of the language and country. I put my notebook into my bag and hang it on my shoulder, seeking an exit from the ring that has enclosed me.

Massive, strong fingers encircle my wrist. Alarmed, I turn, and find his bulky body planted between me and the sun. Confidently, in clear Arabic, he says, I will take you to Samarqand, God willing. His smooth speech and firm grip on my wrist startle me. The quarreling suddenly stops and everyone falls silent. He pulls me from the haggling ring and, for a few moments, the drivers don’t realize their prey has escaped. Then their clamor resumes as suddenly as it had halted and they wave their hands in protest, but the other driver retains his hold on my wrist. He stops before an ancient Russian car whose windshield is full of cracks and is sure to collapse upon its first impact with wind. In a deep, hoarse voice, in a tone not to be reckoned with, he bellows, Get in.

I hesitate and stand there staring at him, taking him in for the first time. He isn’t tall, as I had fancied for a moment; perhaps his deep voice had given the illusion of height. His body is somewhat square-shaped, like a box full of echoes, and his face is ruddy. He’s an ancient Mamluk inflated with pride despite the shabbiness of his clothes. His bottomless eyes are blue, and his thick beard is a mixture of red and white, so peculiar looking that it seems artificial. He has strange, chiseled features, like an illustration of the ancient forefathers. His appearance combines saintliness and temptation—splashes from an impulsive brush during the first moments of creation. Everything he’s wearing is faded—his pants, his shirt unbuttoned with nothing underneath, his colorful Uzbek cap, and even his sandals with worn straps.

He opens the trunk and extends his hand to take the bag hanging from my shoulder. I grab it and take a step back. Recovered from the shock of his suddenly imposed presence, I point to the vehicle and ask, Can a car like this make such a long trip? Still extending his hand to me, he replies with confidence, It can, God willing.

I glance back; the other drivers are standing ready, but not one dares to approach. I try to glean from their faces what might happen should I reject this imposed deal. The driver grows irritated with my childish hesitance; he steps forward and tears the bag from my shoulder, and I’m incapable of objecting. He places my bag in the trunk, shuts it, opens the front door of the car, and tells me, "Tafathal. Get in." He pronounces it emphatically, turning the heavy Arabic d into a heavy th. I find no escape from doing so. He slams the door roughly behind me, apparently the only way to close it as he shuts his with the same force.

He makes several attempts to start the car’s engine. Its transmission drones weakly, but the engine doesn’t respond. I hope that it won’t, or that it will at least delay a little so I can gather my scattered thoughts, but the car, like me, is unable to resist the persistent pressure of his fingers. It sputters and trembles as though the motor is turning on its sides. Then it lets out a coarse rattle before suddenly leaping forward. "Glory to Him who has subjected this to our use, for never could we have done so," he mumbles.

We begin moving slowly through Tashkent’s morning crowds. Interlocked concrete housing blocks resemble each other in every way, even in their shattered windows. They are sad, dilapidated remains of those long days of socialism, and of the dream of equality that became a nightmare. They are pushed away by giant towers of steel and concrete, testimony to liberalization and the new era.

The car passes through resplendently green streets shaded by towering trees that nearly conceal the sky, and then suddenly stops at a light as though it hadn’t expected to find one. He points to two blond girls crossing the street before us, wearing skimpy white outfits that reveal creamy thighs, and asks softly, Would you like them to come with us on our journey? I stare at him in shock. The comment doesn’t seem worthy of his stature, as though he were trying to act like any other crass driver. Laughing coarsely, he turns his face to me and I see his gold tooth as he adds, But in that case we wouldn’t dare go to Samarqand or Bukhara.

The light changes and we rush back into the street. A jumble of faces passes in succession before us. A few days in the city have taught me to read a great deal into its people’s features—Uzbeks with contracted faces only half smile; men and women alike are always sure to cap a tooth in gold. Russian women with hair like silver thread and exceedingly skimpy clothes have substituted sex for politics; their years of influence may have passed, but their sensual desires remain aflame. Tatars and Kazakhs, Tajiks and Koreans, a blend of Asian bloods and ethnicities are running through the city’s veins this morning.

We arrive at Timur Square and my breath catches when I glimpse sight of the round park. A statue of the angry emir stares down at us, and his face mingles with that of the ambassador as he speaks to me. He is official and cold; I don’t know what had driven me to meet him. You bear a strong resemblance to your father, he says to me suddenly. Do you know that I worked under his command when I was in the military? Those were the good days. Does he know the purpose of my trip? And does he know that my father doesn’t resemble me, but rather lives under my skin? The ambassador changes the topic and begins to speak of his troubles in the country. God, why did my father depart and they all remain?

Bitterness dissolves within me like the spreading gray of a cloudy day. Suddenly I hear the driver’s voice asking, Should we stop? I turn to him in surprise—has my face betrayed me? Have my eyes filled with tears? I shake my head no, and the car picks up speed as it loops around the square. I catch only a glimpse of the top of the stone statue and the fountain that wet my clothes yesterday as the car moves on and takes the long road leading out of the city. The housing blocks fade away and tin-sheet huts begin to appear, ringing the city like a rusty belt. I hear the driver’s voice asking, What’s your name, brother?

Ali.

May God be pleased with him. My name is Nurallah. You’re from Egypt of course—you look and speak like an Egyptian.

I turn to him, startled. Do you know Egypt well?

Disinterested, he replies, I haven’t been much, maybe two or three times. That was a long time ago, but I ate enough fuul there to last me many years.

He doesn’t look like a businessman, tourist, or diplomat. How did he acquire such fluent Arabic and discerning knowledge?

The car never stops hurtling over the broken asphalt but Tashkent doesn’t get any farther away. The green roads open up from time to time, revealing testimonies in stone—the glory of former socialism in silent statues, boys and girls grasping hands raised to the sky in anticipation of a sun that never rose.

Fields of cotton surround us on all sides and the scent of mud and roots reaches my nose. A distant childhood awakens, a time when my father and I would visit our remote village, a world of fragmented memories that remain kindled in my depths. A question nags me—why this trip? What am I searching for? Or rather, what am I fleeing?

I glance at the car’s meters and everything is at zero. The gas is at zero, the oil is at zero, and even the speed is at zero. Nothing indicates that the car is running, apart from this mad thrust forward. He plunges into a carpet of green the likes of which I’ve never beheld and asks, Have you had breakfast?

Usually I don’t eat anything.

We have a long trip before us and have to begin with something. Now all we need to do is find the Kazakh woman who’s usually here.

I look around and see nothing. In the distance, peasants are submerged in incandescent fields of cotton. A little girl raises her head among stalks of wheat and waves at us; her clothing is a blend of boisterous, interwoven colors. The driver reveals his gold tooth as he explains, She’s wearing a dress of Atlas silk, and those are its colors . . . . Before finishing his sentence, he swerves the car in a sudden violent movement, as he always does. I tell him to stop driving like this or else I’ll leave him.

The old woman comes into view, sitting next to a tree. Her features are Mongol—her cheeks are small, pointed, and full of fine wrinkles. Her eyes have longish pupils and her black clothing is embroidered with colorful thread. She’s incessantly shaking the water skin in her hands.

Nurallah gets out of the car, paying no heed to my protests. He sits next to her and strikes up an animated conversation, reverting to a language I don’t understand. The old woman laughs exuberantly as she strikes him on the chest. She takes out a small metal cup and pours a liquid from the water skin into it. He holds the cup between his palms and turns to me. Do you want to drink? I peer at the pallid white liquid, drops of yellow fat floating on its surface, and ask, What is it? He smiles and says, Kumiss, mare’s milk.

My stomach contracts in utter disgust. My God, of course not! I shout. He’s holding the cup near my face and I can smell the odor of the horse rising from the floating particles. Pleading, I cry, Get it away from me!

What’s the shame in it? he asks, puzzled. The Ottomans defeated all of Europe with the help of this koumiss. It was the janissaries’ favorite drink!

I turn my face away and hear him sigh in disappointment with me before retreating. I hear the sound of his laughter intermingling with that of the old woman. Turning, I see him sitting right up against her as he drinks the milk and wipes his mustache with the back of his hand. He speaks to her and she looks at me, continuing to laugh—has he said something about me or is he telling her obscene tales?

Every moment a new face of his is revealed. Fluent in Arabic, versed in history, familiar with Egypt, he doesn’t at all seem a typical driver. I would have preferred for him to have been a silent, dispassionate chauffeur who wouldn’t baffle me so.

He rises and gently embraces the woman. He kisses the top of her head, and then throws his massive body into the car seat. He slams the door violently and then plunges swiftly among the roaring cars trying to avoid him. The cows grazing at the side of the road pull back in terror, and the curses of drivers trail us. Yet he doesn’t seem to notice any of this as he leans toward me and says, Don’t be angry. I’ll make it up to you with a real breakfast.

A number of merchants appear among the dense trees. On the roadside they have placed small tables crowded with bottles of spirits, cans of soft drinks, and bars of chocolate, goods that had once been banned now freely displayed with pride. Small children wave cans of oil at the cars, and trucks fill passing vehicles with gas through the aid of small pumps. My mad driver continues to hurtle along the road and never stops talking to me. He looks carefully and attentively at all around him, as though he had not seen these scenes dozens of times before. His entire body becomes two piercing eyes, and beneath the sun, the road looks like melting lead. I wonder what he’s searching for, and why he wants to occupy me with all these words. The road carries us along, and midday arrives.

Everything changes when a blue car appears in the distance. The driver’s face twitches as he unexpectedly turns the steering wheel. I hear the tires scrape the asphalt and the fields slant sharply, meshing with the line of mountains on the horizon. The car turns abruptly and we’re suddenly facing the opposite direction, as though we were about to return to Tashkent. I see panic on the faces of the peasants startled by our swing toward them, and yet he doesn’t slow down, continuing a descent until we reach a dusty side road. Weeds and savanna grass rise around us, almost completely covering the car. I’m incapable of screaming or objecting in any way. The car’s engine roars as it dives into the dry stalks of grass. Through the windows I see butterflies, bees, and grasshoppers taking flight in alarm. The plants shorten and then recede. Terrified, I finally scream, You’re going to kill us, you madman!

We plunge headlong toward a wide, deep river. I grab the steering wheel in alarm as the car continues to skid, and see river birds frozen in the middle of the sky. I close my eyes and prepare for the first rush of cold water, but the engine abruptly stops and there is nothing but silence. I hear water lapping at the sides of the car and the river’s swish coming from a distance. I turn to the driver and he’s sitting quietly, immersed in contemplation of the river, perhaps to avoid looking at me. His massive fingers are holding fast to the steering wheel as though it were a lifebuoy. I want to curse at him, but the expression on his face silences me. His face is tense, and not scared so much as it exudes a sense of impotence. I struggle to catch my breath. Why did you do that?

Do what? he asks without looking at me. I just wanted to show you one of the most important rivers in history. I’m utterly enraged that he would lie without even bothering to try to convince me. You’re trying to hide! Are you on the run from something?

In the same calm manner, he says, You don’t understand what’s before you. This is not your typical Central Asian river. You’re looking at Syr Darya, the father of all rivers. Have you heard of it? Haven’t you read the books of Arab heritage? This is the Sayhun River, which the books of the forefathers say is one of the rivers of paradise. Surely you’ve heard of it? Its counterpart is the Jayhun River, which runs along the border with Turkmenistan. This is why the country is called the land beyond the river. Didn’t you know that?

But you’re definitely on the run from something! I insist. He turns to me, his face flushed, screaming, and I see white spit at the corners of his mouth. What do you see before you? A murderer? A smuggler? A rapist? A baby killer? A counterfeiter? A drug dealer? A blackmailer? An embezzler? A terrorist? Which one of these suits me? Huh?

His anger rattles me. He certainly doesn’t resemble any of these, although he is perplexing and frightening. I open the car door and get out, avoiding slipping into the river. I stand facing the tranquil water lined by green banks that stretch as far as the eye can see. Its flow is broken only by scattered islands, floating forests around which white waterbirds incessantly soar. The current pushes along the remains of broken branches, chunks of melting snow, and particles of moss. The silence is broken by the screech of a bird that has just snatched a fish, and the far-off bleat of a grazing ewe.

Our car is submerged between the grasses and water, hardly visible from the riverbank. He remains seated in his place, his silence leaving me the freedom to choose. Should I leave him, or continue my uncertain path with him, but without objecting or attempting to ask questions? I feel that whatever sympathy there had been between us has been utterly destroyed. I don’t know what crime he’s committed, but I’m sure that the vehicle we hastened to avoid was a police car.

I try to regain my calm and I too sink into contemplation of the river—perhaps its coolness will penetrate my veins. I slip through its waves to my own special time, to when I first dove among the earth’s undulations and cities and got lost among the complicated details of maps. Since my youth I’ve sought refuge in the broken letters of yellowed pages, and from these I know that there are four rivers in the world that swell, bringing prosperity, and recede, causing hunger. Just as they came to the world from the distant gardens, so they will return—the Nile becoming a river of honey in paradise, the Euphrates a river of wine, the Jayhun a river of milk, and the Sayhun remaining as it is, a river of water.

Rivers fill me with the tremor of birth and death. It was a river like this that took my father, who granted me only a short-lived love with no means of holding on to it. I lost my father at a time when I felt that he was close to me. As for my mother, her face has remained distant, on the edge of dream and memory. A necklace of mud and a crown of palm leaves, a journey to the west bank where the moth worms have burrowed through all the wrappings of resurrection.

I was young the first time I descended upon the river’s surface, unaware of the iniquity concealed within the seeds of creation. At that time the Nile was an old man incapable of granting any wisdom and so abandoned us to carry on without warning. I recall Fayza al-Tuhami, dreaming in moments of madness. What do you think about making love in the middle of the river, in a rocking boat? Wouldn’t that rescue us from the drought that’s about to shred our souls? Her words scrape the scab off a wound, and I close my eyes. I reopen them to find myself facing another river lacking that distant, tropical warmness or the deep red that tints the Nile. All that churns within it is cold, gray sadness. I find Nurallah standing beside me; my melancholy seems to be shared by him. Our feelings of anger have dissipated, replaced by the river’s sadness and calm.

All rivers are like this, he says. Their tides are testimony to the rise and fall of eras. It was from these banks that the Mamluks came. Here the Tatars camped, the Silk Road caravans set out, and the stars of the Khans rose. And then their eras ended like a dream, and in their wake came the onslaught of the Russians and the Red Bolsheviks, who ruled as though they would never be removed. Praise He who inherits power and sovereignty. He says this in a spontaneous rush, as though his words were part of the river’s flow and the passage of time. The faint, broken smile on his face baffles me, and I ask, Who exactly are you, and what has placed you in my path? Calmly, with the same smile, he replies, Who do you think I could be? I’m a worshiper of God, a creature from the land beyond the river. If time changed, and its tilted balances were adjusted, I too might have been a Mamluk Sultan and ruled your country. It was only bad luck that placed me at the taxi station and made me a driver, lost upon the asphalt.

I look away from his pale blue eyes and sunburned face. Specters form behind my closed eyelids, lines of young Mamluks crossing the river on a cold day. Their faces are pallid, their extremities flushed with bluish blood from the tightness of the ropes. The slave traders walk ahead and hired guards surround the boys on all sides, flailing with whips whoever wavers or dares to fall behind. They traverse steppes and valleys on their way to the slave markets, trailed by birds of death. Those who fall find their final resting place in the stomachs of these predator birds. But those who survive this journey of eternal damnation find the Sultan’s promised paradise on the banks of the Nile. When their lucky star rises, so do these young Mamluks—they wear glimmering crowns, ride thoroughbred horses with pride, voraciously bed beautiful young girls, and arrogantly domineer slaves. They spend their entire lives attempting to compensate for those humiliating moments spent crossing the river. They wear high collars that conceal the traces of the ropes the slave traders had tied around their necks.

Nurallah stretches out his hand and gently touches my shoulder. Let’s go. In childish obstinacy I say, I’m not going with you until I know exactly who you are.

Are you scared? Do you honestly believe that I might be an ancient Mamluk? he asks, laughing. I’m a humble worshiper of God. At any rate, who can express the essence of himself with mere words? Come, our journey remains a long one.

I walk behind him. His words have calmed but not convinced me. I sit beside him and watch his attempts to start the engine, trying to get out of the slimy green trap we’ve slipped into. You know a lot for a driver, I say. At least tell me why you went to Egypt. Were you an ambassador, a minister of state, or a businessman?

Don’t mock me. He’s silent for a while, as though weighing his words. You could say that I went on a number of official occasions. That was some time ago, when everything still had its importance. But times have changed, and everything’s lost its worth, or rather, I’ve lost my worth. Even memories are no longer important. But why do you insist on asking about me? I haven’t asked why you’ve come here, or what you plan on doing in Samarqand. Let’s just enjoy the companionship of the road.

And the police. Why did you avoid them?

Who likes them, and especially us drivers? I’ll bet that drivers in your country do as I did and prefer to hide under bridges. A child once asked his mother, ‘Do women of the night bear children?’ She said, ‘Of course. Where do you think all these traffic cops came from?’ They’re corrupt bribe takers, like they are in all countries. They’d no doubt find some fault in the car and make me pay a fine. Surely you’ve had a similar experience?

His strong words silence me. The car roars as it attempts to emerge, and we begin to gain distance from Syr Darya’s waters, which were about to swallow us. We ascend to the asphalt road by miracle, and Nurallah scans it to make sure there are no blue cars. You remember that I promised you a substantial meal, don’t you? I’m going to keep that promise, he says, and then bursts on to the main road. It seems he’s recovered from the stress of pursuit.

Ahead of us, a line of girls leaving the fields is crossing the road. They’re wearing silk dresses in screeching colors, and atop their heads they’re carrying baskets filled with glowing cotton buds. I watch them intently and wonder how women acquire such strange splendor whenever they descend to the fields. They always leave with something stuck to their hair or clothes—a bit of straw, flower petals, oak leaves shining like lost stars, a few brushes of passion. It’s as though when they dive among the plants, their bodies shed their old skins and gain the splendor of youth. Nurallah drives slowly, leaving me to watch, enchanted. Finally, he bellows, Here’s the restaurant we’ve been heading to!

He stops the car by the side of the road, in front of a small restaurant built of wood and mortar. Seats are scattered before it in the form of small platforms, and it’s encircled by a shallow miniature pond in which water lilies float. We cross the pond via a narrow wooden bridge and sit across from each other on a small platform, waiting for the food to arrive. I know that it will consist of fatty meat.

A stout woman approaches and speaks with Nurallah in a friendly, relaxed manner. She places a wooden table between us and looks closely at me as he speaks. They’re surely talking about me, for I hear the word ‘Egypt’ as it’s said in Arabic.

In the center of the area is a long table lined with chairs. Everyone is busy setting plates and cups on it; it seems they’re expecting a large group of customers. The woman places before us plates of Bukharan rice, yellow like amber, followed by massive loaves of hard bread, and bowls of meat and broth topped with small mounds of parsley. She asks if we need any vodka, but we suffice with tea that looks like muddy water and is drunk without sugar.

A clamor rises from the road. For a moment I notice a shadow of fear on Nurallah’s face, his hand holding on to a huge piece of meat. Three cars stop in front of the restaurant all at once, and young men and women climb out of them. Nurallah devours the meat as he bellows in relief, It’s a wedding!

A young bride in a white gown and short veil gets out of one of the cars, her groom in a black suit beside her. I glance at Nurallah; the fear of pursuit has vanished from his face and been replaced by a strange look. He seems to be soaking in the scene. He watches the girls, fully adorned, leap around the bride and groom. I see his pinched lips, shining with fat, quiver as he follows their small, unrestrained breasts as they tremble and their dresses as they rise above their white legs.

The bride and groom stir up a sensual euphoria that floods the entire place, filling the dirty restaurant with joy. Everyone sits around the long table and the musicians select a spot next to the water. They begin playing clamorously, and the young men and women rise and link arms, their feet skipping over the ground. We leave our food aside and clap along with them. The sun grows hotter, and a sense of youthfulness seeps into my gloomy depths, filling me with a pressing need to leap and dance with them. They sing like an unfettered breeze and dance with the lightness of birds. Nurallah shouts to me, Why don’t you get up and dance with them?

Who says I know how to dance? I shout back.

It doesn’t matter. Get up, leap up off the ground, and imagine that you’re a small bird learning to fly. The important thing is to let joy seep into you. . . . Look at that enticing woman—why don’t you go and ask her to dance? He points to a woman sitting across from the bride and groom. She’s middle-aged but has retained her beauty. Her skin is tender and her body taut; her breasts are high, not sagging. She smiles with composure, revealing a gold tooth. Nurallah goes on speaking, and it’s clear that he’s begun to lose control of himself.

Look at her, at how she moves gently as though her body has grown accustomed to receiving pleasure without resistance. She’s surely taken her full share of it. Her body’s participating in the dancing even as she’s sitting in her place. Don’t you want her?

How? I protest. I don’t know her and she doesn’t know me.

Who cares? he says. This is a wedding. People get to know each other before touching in normal circumstances, but at weddings they touch first and get to know one another later.

I firmly shake my head no. Nurallah wipes his mouth with the edge of his sleeve and stands up. His body looks bulkier than I had expected it to. He approaches the table where everyone is sitting, extends his hand, takes a cup, and swallows its contents in one go. It’s surely filled with vodka for his face turns bright red. He approaches the woman and extends his hand to her, but she doesn’t offer hers and seems taken aback. She glances at the bride and groom, and in particular the bride, who turns her head shyly and buries her face in the groom’s shoulder. Nurallah remains standing there, filling the horizon before her. He’s a colossal hero straight out of a tale of lust. His beard is glowing, his lips are parted in hunger, and his plump stomach nearly bursts the buttons off the shirt covering it.

The woman laughs in embarrassment and tries to ignore the scent of masculinity surely filling her nose. His wild nature is as apparent as can be amid all these people in their stylish clothes and shaved faces, scented with cheap perfume. He says something and everyone laughs, the men guffawing coarsely and the women lowering their heads, their shoulders shaking.

The groom says something as Nurallah stands there with his hand extended. Finally, the woman hesitantly offers the tips of her fingers and he grabs on to them firmly, powerfully pulling her to the center of the space. He shouts to the musicians and they change the tune to something more boisterous still. He holds the woman and turns with her, a bear who has conquered his prey. The woman begins laughing as she discovers how light she is, barely touching the ground. She moves in rapture, the forces of gravity bearing no effect on her. I assume she’ll quickly grow exhausted, but her energy continues to rise, as though all her years were flowing backward. The rest of the dancers stop and form a circle around them, clapping exuberantly. Even the bride forgets her shyness and rises to clap with them.

A hand extends a glass, and I see a pretty face looking at me. Perhaps it’s one of the bride’s friends. She’s wearing a colored headpiece from which drops of pearl hang, and her gown is embroidered with gold and silver thread. A belt around her waist accentuates her body’s fine proportions, and as she smiles, her lips reveal a gold tooth that lights up her face. Her eyes are wide like a cat’s. I take the glass she’s offered, and she indicates that I should drink it in one gulp. I do as she tells me, and feel that instead of sinking to my stomach the drink rises directly to my head. She laughs, and I am filled with warmth.

She pulls me by the hand and I let her lead me. Nurallah is stomping the ground like a frenzied bear, and the woman in his arms is growing as light as a feather. I grab the girl’s hand and some of her youthful radiance enters my body. I begin to leap about too. The music resounds and everyone joins us, even the bride and her groom. The women’s and men’s bodies collide in eagerness and exuberance. I hold my companion by the waist and lean against her, smelling the chamomile and lavender scent of her tender body. One of them gives me a glass and I swallow its contents, food, and I eat it, still dancing. I dance with another girl, and then with the bride, and then return to the first girl and hold on to her, refusing to let anyone take her from me. They surround me with their panting, red faces, and ask me with gestures, Who are you? I tell them, A Muslim, and they shout in joy, May God bless you! We keep on dancing and leaping.

The music suddenly stops, and the girl brushes my cheek with her lips like a sparrow and leaves. An old man stands and begins speaking in a moving voice. I don’t understand the words, but I can feel their music. It’s a lengthy poem, and they clap and laugh, exchanging toasts between each section. I too shout with them, intoxicated by the rhythm of the words. I raise my glass with them, not even sure what I’m drinking— vodka, fruit juice, or mare’s milk? The girl returns, takes my hand, and pulls me away a little from the crowd. In faltering English she whispers into my ear, Your friend . . . . Where . . . . This is wrong.

I turn all around, panicked. Nurallah’s really not here. I scan the faces, and the woman he was dancing with isn’t here either. I look at the girl, confused, and pointing toward the groom she says, She’s his mother.

The groom too realizes what’s happened. He moves away a little from his bride and turns about, perplexed, searching the entire place. He goes to two other young men and speaks tensely with them, the bride’s eyes following him with concern. The two young men are strongly built, with strapping muscles, and closely resemble the groom. Nurallah is threatened with imminent danger, but just where is he?

I leave the girl and stagger in a rush behind the shelter, entering the kitchen. Steam rises from massive pots and a fatty aroma fills the air. The entire place is covered in soot.

The restaurant owner smiles at me, and in vain I try to explain that I’m looking for the friend I came with. I use English and Arabic to no avail; she laughs loudly and uncovers the pots of broth and Bukharan rice, insisting that I taste them.

I rush out and the sounds of the wedding dwindle. I go behind the shelter, entering a jungle of weeds and trees. A fence separates it from expansive fields.

I’m afraid to call his name lest everyone hear me. The clamor is diminishing, and I have to find him before everything goes silent. I turn my head in all directions and I stumble. I hear a soft cry from behind the weeds and cautiously venture, For God’s sake, Nurallah, come out before a disaster takes place!

I hear a stalk of grass snap—is it due to my footfall, or some other cause? There’s a hoarse sound like an animal growling, and the moaning of a woman in rapure. I pull aside the stalks of savanna grass and find them before me—the groom’s mother lying on the ground and Nurallah sprawled upon her. Her white legs are raised high and he’s moaning between them.

I can’t even hear my own voice for all the noise they’re making. Stunned, I halt, incapable of moving. All the sounds behind me evaporate, leaving nothing but the burning breath of desire. The woman’s red hair is mixed with the yellow of the grass, and her ten fingers are sunk into his back, trying to extract every particle of pleasure in the man’s massive body.

I don’t understand how she manages to enclose him like that, or how he was able to take her with such speed and from such a crowd. Is Nurallah truly human, or is he a legendary Minotaur in disguise who has descended to earth for the pleasure of eternal seduction? His back rises and falls before me. He’s still wearing his clothes, but they’re no longer mere garments. They’re more like a pelt stuck to his body, an enticement to which any woman would abandon herself, seeking in it warmth and satiation.

Oh merciful Lord, how can pleasure mix with pain to such a degree? He presses her into the ground and dozens of invisible sparks fly from their bodies. A strange glow emanates from the woman’s raised legs. Have I ever in my life felt a warm pleasure like this, or have I always stopped at its gray edges? Have I held an untamable force like this within me and not let it free? Or have the cells of my body, since the moment of their creation, always suffered from the frailty of old age?

Impotently, I mutter between my teeth, For God’s sake, Nurallah, stop, but I don’t really want him to. It’s as though he were bedding all the gray women who have passed through my life, and performing, on my behalf, a delayed service. The wind stops and the birds freeze in the middle of the sky. The woman’s single gold tooth glimmers in the sunlight. It’s as though she had not reached the true height of her maturity until this moment.

I come to upon hearing their voices; it’s as though they were approaching from another world. They surround me, the women sucking in their breath in alarm and the men muttering in fury. The woman also comes to. She lowers her legs and tries to push Nurallah off her. In seconds, the expression on her face changes; the rapture and desire disappear and she’s transformed, in the span of a moment, into a helpless, ravaged woman futilely attempting to resist the bull lying upon her. She gives them all the impression they need, while Nurallah remains—either through the influence of alcohol or the proximity of his climax—unaware that her cries of pleasure have turned into screams of resistance and pleas for help.

Slowly, he turns, as the woman struggles to extract herself from under him. The groom approaches, followed by the two other young men, who push me aside to rain blows upon Nurallah’s face and kick him in the side. He roars like a bear and tries to adjust his clothes. He wants to get up and face them, but they don’t give him a chance. I try to block them, and one of them kicks me hard. I feel pain flooding my entire body and scream. Nurallah stands upright despite the blows and attempts to pull up his pants. The woman runs off, free at last. He pushes them away, roaring like a bull, and they circle around him, beating him. I rise and break through their ring to stand beside him. Get away! he shouts, They’ll hurt you! But I don’t leave him. I suddenly feel I’m not able to.

I don’t feel the blows coming at me from all directions. Nurallah keeps spinning around, trying to protect me. They increase in number around us, and their anger swells. The sky shudders and grows farther away. I see their fists and then their faces before I fall, trying in vain to grab on to their legs or the savanna grass. The taste of dirt in my mouth is moist and stinging. Where is the sky? Where is Nurallah? To where have the moments of ecstasy dissipated?

2

There is no end to the darkness that engulfs me, no limit to the faces formed of its particles. They are faces I thought I had forgotten, wounds I thought had healed over. That trembling child is still there. Nothing dies. Everything is preserved upon the shelves of darkness.

I open my eyes to find myself covered in water. Nurallah is standing before me, still holding the pitcher whose contents he has emptied over my head. I try to get up but my body is in unbearable pain. Finding myself in a pool of water and mud, I curse him in all the languages I know. Get up! he shouts at me. You can’t stay out forever.

He extends his hand to help me rise, but I refuse to give him mine. I brace myself to stand, and feel dizzy. I glance at my filthy clothes and torn shirt, and he smiles as he looks at me. He’s also in a pitiful state; his pants and shirt are torn and muddy, and even the cap still on his head is soiled. He ignores the anger and resentment on my face, saying as he readies to go, Come on! We’ve been lying here a long time.

I stagger behind him. His steady steps show no indication that he received most of the beating. The restaurant owner comes