complete.
Pushing a five dollar bill into the eager hand, Gamal Fathi shuts the door without a word of thanks. This gratuity, though it represents a substantial percentage of his capital, is woefully inadequate and embarrassing to him. He is accustomed to flashing much larger denominations; indeed, there was a time when he would not even trouble himself to pick up the change from a hundred dollar bill, preferring instead to handle only those decimally rich
see-notes,
the most visually appealing attempt in the monotone American currency.
Very much alone in the room, he drops his towel in preparation for a shower. In the corner of the room the bolted-down television plays silently, its screen absently graced by an oft rerun episode of Happy Days, but this is not the object of his attention. No, he is inspecting himself, standing naked in front of the mirror; he is inspecting himself and thinking of a woman whose nearness he can sense. Gamal Fathi would like to touch himself, but this is something that he cannot bring himself to do. And he intends to not have to.
“Inshallah,” he says aloud to the mirror.
Klaaaaick……mmmmmMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM,
the refrigerator turns itself on. It sounds happy, secure in the knowledge that it is doing its job; even if no one opens it, the food—or just the empty interior—will still be cold; you can be goddamn sure about that.
Sera rolls over on her couch. A sentence, she thinks, it’s like a fucking sentence: mandatory vacation. The whole thing is irrational and new to her. Traditionally ignorant of the comfort of a real schedule, she’s never before had to face the absence of one. For her it is far too restrictive, too involuntary to enjoy, and she feels no longer in synch with her think. Television amounts only to a series of cruel plays about people with purpose; she even envies characters who are killed on screen or doomed to die during a commercial. If faced with her own imminent death, she could at least release the relentless anxiety of futility. A suicide though, even one portrayed ineptly on a daytime drama, fills her with vexation, makes her feel alien to a species that can produce such options. Rejecting the contradiction, afraid of pursuing the logic, she has never pondered the line that runs between deathand death at one’s own hands. It is a non-question, irrelevant. It is one of those tricks of reasoning that can only be seen on an abstract level, for brought to terms with bread and water, it comes undone.
Barely a whisper, imperceptible movement of the dark lips: “I must still own her… she knows that I am here… she knows that I still own her and she is afraid to admit this to herself,” but still the street, on this, his seventh pass, contains not the one he seeks. “I must have at least this one thing still in my life”—Gamal Fathi does not realize that he is speaking aloud, for these are not words that he would consciously pronounce—“this one thing, this one key to everything that I am, that she is.”
The yellow Mercedes falls away from the Strip and moves in the direction of what he has learned is Sera’s apartment. The clock in this car runs sporadically, on then off. The time it reflects seems always to have changed whenever he enters the car, though he has never seen the hands move. So it stands disadvantageously to even a stopped clock, which is assured of proudly facing the correct time at least twice a day. Gamal Fathi’s determination unflagging, he has not admitted to himself his doubt, the impossible possibility that she has vanished from this city, and that this is the reason he has not seen her in—could it be two?—days. He must stay outside her apartment for longer this time, he resolves, must take a chance, must wait for some movement or a change of lights. She will emerge, he knows. She must work. Sera must work; this has always been her weakness, even at the start.
He has a plan. There is money left. There will be no
Pushing a five dollar bill into the eager hand, Gamal Fathi shuts the door without a word of thanks. This gratuity, though it represents a substantial percentage of his capital, is woefully inadequate and embarrassing to him. He is accustomed to flashing much larger denominations; indeed, there was a time when he would not even trouble himself to pick up the change from a hundred dollar bill, preferring instead to handle only those decimally rich
see-notes,
the most visually appealing attempt in the monotone American currency.
Very much alone in the room, he drops his towel in preparation for a shower. In the corner of the room the bolted-down television plays silently, its screen absently graced by an oft rerun episode of Happy Days, but this is not the object of his attention. No, he is inspecting himself, standing naked in front of the mirror; he is inspecting himself and thinking of a woman whose nearness he can sense. Gamal Fathi would like to touch himself, but this is something that he cannot bring himself to do. And he intends to not have to.
“Inshallah,” he says aloud to the mirror.
Klaaaaick……mmmmmMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM,
the refrigerator turns itself on. It sounds happy, secure in the knowledge that it is doing its job; even if no one opens it, the food—or just the empty interior—will still be cold; you can be goddamn sure about that.
Sera rolls over on her couch. A sentence, she thinks, it’s like a fucking sentence: mandatory vacation. The whole thing is irrational and new to her. Traditionally ignorant of the comfort of a real schedule, she’s never before had to face the absence of one. For her it is far too restrictive, too involuntary to enjoy, and she feels no longer in synch with her think. Television amounts only to a series of cruel plays about people with purpose; she even envies characters who are killed on screen or doomed to die during a commercial. If faced with her own imminent death, she could at least release the relentless anxiety of futility. A suicide though, even one portrayed ineptly on a daytime drama, fills her with vexation, makes her feel alien to a species that can produce such options. Rejecting the contradiction, afraid of pursuing the logic, she has never pondered the line that runs between deathand death at one’s own hands. It is a non-question, irrelevant. It is one of those tricks of reasoning that can only be seen on an abstract level, for brought to terms with bread and water, it comes undone.
Barely a whisper, imperceptible movement of the dark lips: “I must still own her… she knows that I am here… she knows that I still own her and she is afraid to admit this to herself,” but still the street, on this, his seventh pass, contains not the one he seeks. “I must have at least this one thing still in my life”—Gamal Fathi does not realize that he is speaking aloud, for these are not words that he would consciously pronounce—“this one thing, this one key to everything that I am, that she is.”
The yellow Mercedes falls away from the Strip and moves in the direction of what he has learned is Sera’s apartment. The clock in this car runs sporadically, on then off. The time it reflects seems always to have changed whenever he enters the car, though he has never seen the hands move. So it stands disadvantageously to even a stopped clock, which is assured of proudly facing the correct time at least twice a day. Gamal Fathi’s determination unflagging, he has not admitted to himself his doubt, the impossible possibility that she has vanished from this city, and that this is the reason he has not seen her in—could it be two?—days. He must stay outside her apartment for longer this time, he resolves, must take a chance, must wait for some movement or a change of lights. She will emerge, he knows. She must work. Sera must work; this has always been her weakness, even at the start.
He has a plan. There is money left. There will be no
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