AMANA IBRAHIM

Written by Anne Tsoulis

© 2009

Written with the financial assistance of ARTS SA and the

South Australian Film Corporation

Amana! Amana! Amana! He’s going to take you to the other side of the world. Where monsters live, with big googly eyes and hair down to their knees. Three eyes. Yes, where the three-eyed monsters live, that’s where he’s going to take you. For sure.

The sun spread its rays of prophecy into the small mud hut aglow with whitewashed walls lined with traditional hangings depicting emperor’s gardens and words belonging to Allah. There was an element of excitement in the air as mother and daughters busily prepared a banquet of food.

Amana, the little one, sat on a rug terrified searching for an escape while her tormentors encircled her. Guleb, her ten-year-old brother, rolled his eyes displaying two white eyeballs. Amana screamed. Her tormentors, Gulb along with the neighbour’s children, collapsed into a fit of hysterical laughter. She pleaded with them to stop but Guleb persisted,

“…with big eyes and warts all over his face.”

“Three eyes!” added Lila dramatically.

“And when he comes he’s going to take you back with him!” laughed Stefan.

“To the land of the three-eyed monsters! Three eyed monsters that eat children!” Guleb’s white eyeballs peered down at her menacingly.

Amana’s mother, Fatima, came to her rescue, pounced with feline tendons, and in one fowl swoop grabbed the neighbour’s brats by their shirt collars and shoved them out of the hut. She stormed over to Guleb and served him a clout over the head for her troubles.

“Your father will be home soon. What would he say if he heard you speaking this way about his brother?”

Guleb cowered under the enormous stature of his mother.

The little one grabbed her mother’s skirt, pleading with her not to let their uncle come and take her to that place, the other side of the world.

“Silly girl,” her mother tried to reassure her, “you won’t be going anywhere.”

But the child could only cry out, “No mamma, don’t let him come!”

“You’ll see that your uncle Salla is a fine man,” she said trying to ease her daughter’s distress.

Amana took refuge behind a large, earthen water container. She scrunched her eyes tightly shut waiting in fear of the peril that awaited her.

At the painful age of six Amana had learnt that adults could lie, and lie they did willingly. Whole sentences could be cunningly worded to baffle the unsuspecting. Who could she believe? Guleb? Lila? Her mother? If she could only keep her eyes closed, not letting even a speck of light come through, she was certain she’d be saved. She mustn’t move. Keeping the eyes closed for a length of time could be tricky. One could forget and before you knew it somehow your eyes would open on their own accord. This of course would bring disaster, monsters and demons. She had to remember not to forget, especially when her uncle arrived.

Her uncle Salla had been an adventurer in his youth, resentful and fearful of the British colonials who he had to served. These were pasty faced, fat, military officers, that snorted white powder and drank heavily and who revelled at the prospect of giving a good whipping. He walked from his village ten kilometres to the main town to polish their shoes, empty their latrines and fight off their stoned and drunken sexual advances. On the day he turned fourteen, the boy became a man and as he had threatened to do on a number of occasions, Salla did not walk the ten kilometres back to his village. Instead he stowed away on a ship headed to an unknown destination. Six months later, and in the second decade of the twentieth century, the ship land at the other end of the world in a God forsaken, newfound place called Australia, the land of the blackfella and kangaroo. To his horror and disdain, he had come to another nation of people ruled by colonial England.

It was a good ten years before anyone would hear news from him. Now at the age of thirty, Salla had returned to his homeland, Palestine, triumphant. But according to Amana’s brother, Guleb, he had turned into a three-eyed monster, like all the others that live at the other end of the world.

From behind the ewer where she hid, Amana heard the echoing sound of the front door opening. She didn’t forget. She kept her eyes closed. Her eyes may have been closed but her ears were alert, exaggerating every sound. Voices, jubilant, laughing, shouted out greetings to each other. Her father’s voice bellowed loudly.

“My children, except for one. She is waiting to be eaten,” he announced with mocked horror. “You won’t eat your niece, will you Salla?”

Amana listened in disbelief at the traitorous laughter that followed.

A voice responded.

“With all this food, I might save her for later.” The three-eyed monster had spoken.

Amana screamed. But she kept her eyes closed, she didn’t forget. Footsteps crept towards her. Amana held her breath, scrunched her eyes closed even tighter, till every tendon and muscle ached. Two strong hands grabbed her from around the waist. She kicked and pounded with her fists, fighting off her assailant. The laughter in the room and assurances no harm would come to her continued, but she would not open her eyes. Arms flung her high into the air. She screamed even louder burying her face in her hands.

A heavenly voice spoke to her,

“Amana, please, I will surely die if I can not gaze upon your sweet face. I promise I will die,” pleaded her uncle.

Amana contemplated his words. Truth or lies. Would he die? Would she be responsible for his death, the death of the three-eyed monster, her uncle? He didn’t speak like a monster, but monsters could be deceitful. The monster continued to plead with her to open her eyes and she would see everything would be fine.

Amana’s eyes involuntarily opened. Amana went to scream once more but was stopped by the image before her, her uncle Salla, thankfully with only two eyes, the most beautiful fluid brown eyes she had ever seen, dressed in clothes foreign to her…a suit they called it.

“Do I look like a monster?”

She felt the texture of his jacket and shirt, and gazed at him in admiration. What and who to believe would forever be a child’s torment. But this man, her uncle, she fell in love with. Until she married, he would be the one she would compare all men to. He was unlike the men she had become accustomed to in the village. His hands were soft, his face clean shaven and his hair impeccably groomed offering the sweet scent of Californian Poppyseed Oil. But she was compelled to ask the all-important question.

“Do they eat children where you come from?”

“Only kangaroos.” He laughed taking in her charm and innocence while brushing away the locks that surrounded her cherub-like features. She would always be his favourite. Her uncle Salla carried her to his fine new suitcase and lowered her onto the ground.

“I have something for you.”

She eagerly watched while he opened the case, curious at the treasures that were surely buried inside. He unearthed a packaged wrapped in red tissue paper, tied with a pink ribbon and he presented it to her. The paper and ribbon were like none she’d ever seen before. She thanked him.

“Open it” he smiled.

This confused the child. He showed her how to untie the bow, an action that left her aghast – the object was ruined. He laughed again.

“The present is inside.” Uncle Salla spread open the tissue paper revealing a gift like none she had ever seen before. It was a bridal doll exquisitely dressed in white lace so delicate she feared touching it for fear it would disintegrate in her tiny hands. Amana carefully touched the doll’s porcelain face, so pale and finely crafted with blood red lips and flushed cheeks, shiny blue eyes with eye-lids and long eye-lashes that clicked open and shut. She breathed in the scent of the perfumed, laced veil that covered the doll’s long, golden hair. She wrapped her arms around her uncle and promised she would love him forever.

Amana’s gaze swept the room at first looking for dust, then for any object that may be out of place. Although the bedsit was tiny and part of a run down tenement, it was spotless. This alone a woman of her many years could be proud of. She sat on the divan silently waiting. Her hand, a wrinkled and lined testimony of the years passed, stroked the faded white lace on the porcelain bridal doll that sat next to her. The memories brought with them a longing for the country she had left some forty years ago, a country where she could never return, for there was no where to go back to. But lately it was all she could think about; her village and her life in Palestine. Where had it gone? How did it happen? Lately, her mind had kept wandering and for these past few months she had no control of where it would take her, to memories even she didn’t realise she had. She had heard about this. People had warned her about growing old, thoughts for the future ended and the past took over. She was younger then, strong, and too busy rebuilding her life to give it a consideration. Now she was an old woman alone with her thoughts and recollections.

The appearance of the room was a comforting reminder of all that was once familiar to her. Large kilims lined the white walls. The traditional Arabic bedspread that had suckled generations of Ibrahims covered the divan where she sat and slept in. It was a modest room holding only the essential furnishings. In contrast, the mantelpiece buckled with the weight of her life’s memories, cluttered with framed black and white photographs of her family taken many years ago in Palestine; photographs capturing a time when the world was recognisable and safe. A time when Amana would dream about travelling to a foreign land like her uncle Salla had, but always with the belief that she could return. What foolish thoughts these were. Now an old woman, she was certain she had cursed herself in her youth with these thoughts.

When did she first realise she has become unstuck in time and her mind had begun to wander? Was it before or after she was diagnosed with diabetes? Her stupid son had been treating her like an invalid ever since. What would he know? Basim. If she dropped dead tomorrow, she mused, he would be the happiest man at the wake. And he was late as usual. Ten o’clock every Wednesday and never once was he on time.

Amana fumbled with the handkerchief in her dress pocket and untied a corner knot. She spread the handkerchief on her lap and stared down at the number of white pills it held. Perhaps she should just do him a favour and throw them in the bin. But what would little Fahid do without her, without his grandmother. Little Fahid was not to blame. For little Fahid’s sake she slipped a pill into her mouth. The thought of her grandson made her smile and brought a warm glow to her expression. How she loved that little man of hers. She was certain he would grow to be as fine a man as his namesake, his grandfather and her beloved husband. Fahid would always remain her husband. In life and in death and she would continue to hold his scared memory dear to her heart. The mantelpiece was a shrine to this eternal love she had for him. Amana had never shed a doubt that they would be reunited. Allah willing, when her time came, he would be waiting for her. He would be there waiting for her with their children long gone, never having reached full adulthood. Only the good die young. Yes. She yearned for that day when the waiting would end.

Ten minutes past ten and her son had still not arrived. Of course he did it on purpose. One son remained and all he ever knew was how to torment her. And what did she ever do to him but save his butt from being shot to pieces. Every Wednesday was the same. Her eyes glued themselves to the telephone. Would she? Wouldn’t she? After a moment’s hesitation she picked up the receiver and dialled his house.

Her daughter-in-law, Nadia, let the phone ring. It was no surprise to her who the caller was.

Nadia worked four days a week as an office manager with a finance company. Wednesdays were her day off, the same day her husband would collect his mother to take her shopping. Bad timing to take a day off, she thought to herself. Why she had picked a Wednesday was beyond her. She could just let the phone ring out but it would serve little purpose. Her mother-in-law would only try ringing again and again. Nadia had tried it once. It was that time of the month and her nerves were unsteady. Her son had refused to go to school and her husband, Basim, was giving her the shits. She had had enough. When the phone rang, she just let it ring. But it wouldn’t stop ringing. She was certain her mother-in-law knew she was standing there watching it.

Nadia reluctantly answered the phone to deliver the same spiel she was forced to deliver every Wednesday at ten minutes past ten.

“Good morning, mother,” she answered already pre-empting the conversation.

“Nadia, is that you?” asked Amana to be sure. Who knew? It sounded like Nadia but it could have been the neighbour popped over for a visit and just happened to answer. She may have even dialled the wrong number. Best to be sure.

“Yes, of course mother.”

“Basim, the boy, you are all well?” continued Amana.

“Basim is not there yet?” What else could Nadia have said but the bloody obvious?

“Do you think he had an accident?” enquired Amana, as she was accustomed to asking every Wednesday at ten minutes past ten. This was the question more than any other that Nadia dreaded most. Her mother-in-law had an obsession, always certain that her son would plough the taxi he drove like a madman into oblivion.

“No, no. He’s on his way. He must be running late.”

And this he was in his new, shiny, silver, taxi, ripping through a busy suburban shopping centre, lively Arabic music soaring out of the sound system. The passenger in the back seat held on to save his life, thankful when the taxi finally screeched to a halt outside a street lined with a red brick wall of old and worn apartment buildings. Basim threw the young man an apologetic smile as he watched him alight the vehicle while mumbling under his breath that Basim needed to “chill out”. Basim agreed but what could he do? The young man tipped him grateful that at least he didn’t have to engage in another endless conversation about politics or what life as a taxi driver entailed. It was a silent journey, a bit hairy, but at least this one didn’t gabble on all-knowing about what needed to be done to save the country, or the world for that matter.

Basim spied a Meals On Wheels van outside the entrance to his mother’s apartment building. It set him into a panic. An elderly couple, Ralph and Betty, not far off being candidates of the service themselves, unloaded a tray of food. Basim was late. He cursed the day he was born. This day of all days he couldn’t afford to be late. Today he had the old woman, his mother, to reckon with. He was not looking forward to the odious task.

Up ahead was a parking space, but also another car being positioned to reverse into it. Basim seized the opportunity and moved quickly. As the car began to reverse, Basim quickly moved up behind it blocking its passage. The car’s horn bellowed furiously. Basim very calmly, almost enjoying himself, backed into the parking space.

Looking through the rear window Basim could see Ralph and Betty enter the building. He had to get to them before they had a chance of reaching his mother’s apartment. It was imperative that he forewarned her of their arrival. He was a man of many means and a true survivor; he’d get there in time.

Ralph, a tiny man dressed in a dapper sports jacket, boasted a moustache reminiscent of Douglas Fairbanks. At age sixty-five, his first-in-command, Betty, was a much younger woman. Tall and robust, she towered over Ralph in her faded pink tracksuit.

Betty and Ralph told anyone that listened… you can’t imagine what a shock it was when Basim, a total stranger and an Arab at that, rushed up to Betty and grabbed her by the arm. She almost dropped the tray. Ralph was in the army and had been given training in what to do in such circumstances. But fortunately for Basim, the good fellow introduced himself and explained his haste. Apparently, he hadn’t yet informed his mother, she’s Arabic too, that Meals On Wheels would be supplying her food from now on. You see she had a diabetes fit on one of their shopping expeditions together. They had to rush the poor woman to hospital. So now the son thinks she should have her food delivered. Can’t take the risk, you see. The woman’s got diabetes.

Twenty minutes past ten. Amana, still waiting on the divan pent with frustration, was ready to explode. She contemplated the telephone and cursed the day she gave birth to a son who never knew how to be on time. How did his wife put up with him? Her ears pricked. The familiar footsteps were distant at first but gradually grew louder as they approached the landing outside her apartment. Amana gave thanks to Allah, Allah the merciful, Allah the great, and rose quickly in anticipation of her son’s arrival.

She quickly tied her headscarf under her chin and eagerly grabbed her old and worn, black shopping bag.

A key in the lock rattled the front door open. Basim moved sheepishly into the room avoiding eye contact.

“You came at last,” was her terse welcome. She brushed by him to leave.

“Wait. We’re not going anywhere.” Basim grabbed her by the arm cutting short her speedy departure and led her back into the room. Amana hadn’t quite absorbed his words. He bent down and kissed Amana on both cheeks, a gesture that, although is a part of their custom, always brought discomfort for both mother and son.

“I’ve been waiting.” Once again she brushed by him to leave the flat and again he stopped her. Can you believe it? Already they had wasted so much time. Then he told her that they would not be going shopping. Not today or next week or the week after. He had made other arrangements. What arrangements? The boy was now a man and he was still unable to communicate like a human being. Amana begged him to make sense and to stop talking in riddles, they were late enough as it was. She searched his face for clues.

Basim still didn’t have the courage to look her in the eyes. Instead he left as quickly as he entered. He left the flat without closing the door behind him. On purpose of course, she thought, just to add to her growing irritation and confusion. She re-seated herself on the divan and stared through the open door waiting not so patiently for his return.

Moments later Amana could hear the sounds of footsteps climbing the stairs, but they belong to more than one person. Amana prayed to Allah to give her strength. Her son was impossible. A torturer. If she died it would be waiting for her son, this she was certain. It seemed strange to her that one could give birth, go through the pain and fear that labour brought to produced a son that was an alien quantity. He had his father’s eyes and complexion but not his brain. What would Fahid think of their son now? What would he think of her? He died too soon, she thought to herself. The boy went for too long without a father to shape his mind and shake some sense into him. A few good slaps around the head may have produced a better man. She prayed to Allah to forgive her for having such thoughts, but they were the truth.

The footsteps reached the landing. Amana held her breath, her curiosity causing her to fidget nervously with the handkerchief she held in her hand.

Basim re-entered the flat. But he was not alone. Following him were Betty and Ralph, “the invaders”, as Amana came to know them.

Betty and Ralph stood in the doorway holding aluminium trays in their hands. They greeted Amana in an overly jovial manner that only added to Amana’s foul and murderous disposition.

“Meals on Wheels! Hello. You must be Mrs Ibrahim?” Betty was always pleased to meet a new client. The foreigners drew her interest the most, always curious at what she would find when she entered their homes. The Italians were her favourite with all their holy pictures of bleeding hearts, blood soaked Jesuses hanging from thorny crosses, and those funny red peppers they hung everywhere for good luck. With all that blood and suffering on their minds, they’d need those peppers she thought. She’d never been to an Arab home before, so this was quite a treat for her. What with all the news about Arabs these days, she never knew what quite to expect. She felt quite daring. This was going to be a real adventure even though her friends had their reservations and told her to be careful. But she was an adventurous spirit. If there were any signs of “Al Keeda” (or whatever they call themselves) she’d spot them. She promised to report back to her friends and tell-all after the visit.

“Amanner, is that right?” Ralph liked to get the names correct. It was only right he thought. He had endured a life of frustration with strangers calling him Rolf. Rolf! What a hideous name. It really did drive him to distraction. If his parents wanted to call him Rolf, they would have. They called him Ralph instead. Ralph had a fascination with the Arabic culture. If anyone asked what his favourite film was, he would respond without a moment’s thought, Lawrence of Arabia. He couldn’t even begin to remember how many times he had watched it. Ralph always thought Peter O’Tool looked so dashing in the white robes he wore while pretending to be an Arab; riding on that horse of his through those magnificent sand dunes. It prompted him to seize the opportunity to visit Gallipoli some ten years ago for the Anzac commemoration. His uncle had died in the Great War. Ralph wore his uncle’s medals next to the ones he received for active duty in WWII, and felt proud standing alongside his countrymen come to bring homage to those that had lost their lives. Ralph was just as excited as Betty in acquiring an Arabic client.

Amana quickly rose off the couch. She was mortified that she had not been notified of visitors. Her head scrambled to think of what she could offer them. A coffee? A cup of tea? She had some biscuits but she couldn’t remember how old they were. Perhaps they were stale. Basim should have forewarned her. She headed to the kitchen to prepare for her guests, scolding Basim in rapid-fire Arabic.

“You should have told me we were going to have guests. I’ll make some refreshments. But what? We haven’t done the shopping. I have nothing in the house to offer them.”

“You don’t have to do anything. They don’t want any refreshments. They’re not guests.” Basim beckoned Betty and Ralph to enter the flat with their trays of offering.

“These people were not guests?” thought Amana. “Well then who were they and what did they want?” Her mood blackened.

Ralph and Betty were too preoccupied with setting the food on the table and absorbing their surroundings to notice the air ever thickening with displeasure, if not malice. Betty rather liked the rugs but thought it a bit strange that Amana would hang them up on the walls. Perhaps Amana was suffering from the early stages of dementia? Betty took Amana’s hand in hers and patted it, reassuring Amana that all the food they provided was diabetes friendly.

Basim quickly turned his head away in witnessing the gesture, anticipating disaster.

“We’re going to be seeing a great deal of each other, Amanner,” said Betty sympathetically. “Ralph and I will be delivering your meals to you. It gets a bit difficult as we get older. Doesn’t it dear?” It was always difficult the first time their meals were delivered, thought Betty. But she didn’t seem to be getting through to this one. She continued, “My name is Betty. Betty,” she said very loud and slowly enunciated each letter. She turned to Basim and whispered in his ear. “She a bit deaf?”

“No, no Arabic,” was her son’s reasoning.

Amana responded with a mute silence; shell-shocked. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt such shock. Was it when the army entered their village, or when she saw the prison photographs of a beaten and half-dead Guleb?

The invaders left with as much pomp as they had arrived, very cheery indeed.

The old woman stared down at the tray of covered plates of food left behind by the invaders. The son feeling somewhat foolish but resolute began lifting the lids off the plates. The first dish was neatly arranged with boiled peas, carrots and a pie of some description. Basim took a fork and carefully lifted a corner of the pastry to reveal an undefinable brown mush. Amana moved closer to inspect the meal. He removed another lid uncovering another pie sprinkled with sugar. Basim wet his finger and dabbed it into sugar. Upon tasting it he was satisfied it was artificial. She grabbed the fork from his hand and peeled back the pastry. Red mush. Basim lifted the lid off the last plate. Bread and butter, this they were familiar with.

“Now that you have provided for your old and invalid mother, you can go,” she murmured with displeasure, resided to her fate. The wind was already accumulating in her stomach at the mere sight of the food she was convinced was going to kill her with indigestion.

“I never said you were an invalid.” This may not have been a proud moment for Basim, but it was a necessary one he thought to himself. He would have to stay firm with his decision and prepare himself for the emotional onslaught that he had not the slightest doubt would ensue.

“Then what makes you think I can’t take care of myself? Shop or cook for myself?” The idiot, she screamed out wildly in the recesses of her mind.

Basim cursed the day he was born, and Amana cursed the day she gave birth to him. They stood defiant at one other. His mother appeared small and frail before him. She had aged. She had definitely aged. Gone was the statuesque woman he remembered in his childhood that he adored, but then later as a youth learnt to fear, even hold in contempt. The power she had over him then. That she still did. It was time he made a stand. Moments went by before Basim broke the demoralising silence.

“Nadia doesn’t know about this,” he warned her. What would Nadia think? A pang of guilt swept over him. He collected himself. He promised himself that if the old woman ratted on him to his wife he would have nothing more to do with her. He’d disown her. Then she could shop till she dropped as far as he was concerned. He’d had enough. The thoughts ran through his head as he kept his eyes fixed on her.

“Don’t worry, I won’t mention it. Just go.” Her anger raged silently. The sooner he left the better. If he stayed a moment longer she would slap him across the head. Oh how she would have loved to have slapped him a good one across that thick, brainless head of his.

“It’s for the best.” He could hear her thoughts, feel the torrent of emotion raging inside her, waiting to surface. He began to feel somewhat remorseful. She had this power over him he would never be able to shake. “There will still be the Sunday lunches, of course.” Why did she always have to make his life so difficult? Always filling him with guilt. “It isn’t as if we don’t see each other.” But his words and anything he had to say thereafter would have little more effect than to release the fury in her. He knew this. He knew his mother. It was time for him to back away, retreat. To leave.

Amana tersely agreed. “The less we have to pretend the better. Just go.” And with that she shut the door behind him. She lent against the closed door choking back the tears she refused to surrender to.

Basim headed back to his taxi, deed done, dirty deed done. A sudden sadness overwhelmed him, crushing into his chest. He tried willing himself to overcome the impending depression that consumed him every time he parted company with his mother. But its grip tightened. He gasped for breath. Now in his forties he was a grown man, fit and strong, a father, husband, and yet with his mother he was forever lost in a descent of sadness, forever spiralling down that deep, dark tunnel into the abyss of melancholy madness.

Basim’s thick, black hair, classic good looks and playful energy made him appear much younger than his years. Nadia’s “spunk-rat,” she liked to call him. Nadia new the first time they met that he was the one. Back then he was wild and angry. A wild and angry Palestinian refugee just landed in Australia. Wild because he had never known a life of peace. Angry because he never wanted anything more than to fight for the cause, the Palestinian cause. With the years Nadia watched his temper mellow but not his deep felt sense of shame and guilt that he had deserted his people to live in a safe land. The relentless daily news reports of conflict and carnage in Palestine brought little comfort to these feelings he had of hopelessness and despair.

Basim stole a parting glance at Amana’s window and in doing so witnessed the “Jew,” Joseph, staring down at him next door. Basim ceremoniously spat on the ground and walked to his taxi waiting at the curb.

Amana scraped the contents of the last dish into the small rubbish bin. She washed the plates, carefully lathering each one in turn until she could hear them squeak under her finger-tips. She rinsed them just as carefully under the running water while meditating on the day’s events and the humiliating outcome. That was what she felt, humiliated. There was no dignity in old age she thought. She was no longer living but slowly dying. Old age, slow death. Too slow for her liking. Every beat of her heart was fooling itself in its futile occupation of keeping her alive.

A tapping sound came through the wall that separated her from the adjoining flat, summonsing her. It was her neighbour of twenty years, Ruth, a good woman, a Jewish woman, but a good and honest woman. The couple were her only surviving friends, noble friends. They understood, they knew like she and Basim. They understood what it was to suffer; what it was to live a life in exile, in a foreign land; what it was to have no home to go back to; what it was to have your family, friends, neighbours, children, oh yes, the children, butchered and the life you once knew taken from you. Old age and cruel memories. Basim had confused Ruth and Joseph with others. She remembered a time when she was very young, and before the conflict began, it was not unusual for Arabs to be of the Jewish faith, just as they were also Christian. No-one thought anything of it back then. Back then, before the madness descended.

Ruth greeted Amana with her warm, laughing eyes that belied her age. Although eighty-some years of age and of medium height, Ruth stood tall, with a masculine, thick shaped body. Her short cropped, silvery hair thinned and balding in patches through countless years of perms and hair dyes. In defiance of her masculine appearance, Ruth’s face was always powdered and rouged. Two thick pencilled lines defined where her eyebrows once were. She could forget that she wore slippers, but she could never possibly forget to leave the house without wearing lipstick no matter how urgent her departure. Joseph, her husband, the same height as his wife, appeared dwarfed by her side. The two had been married for over sixty years. With every passing year their love for one another strengthened, bonding them together until they appeared to the naked eye as a solitary unit sharing the singular name of “Ruthandjoseph.”

Ruth beckoned Amana to enter quickly. Joseph had a surprise to show her. Amana followed her through their tiny one bedroom flat tightly packed with a lifetime of clutter and furnishings. Cluttered but spotless. There’s a difference any good woman could distinguish, thought Amana as she manoeuvred in and around the countless objects she encountered in her path.

Ruth and Joseph were hoarders. Bygone years had seen all they had taken leaving them with nothing. Times when simple objects like a needle and a reel of cotton were worth a barter for an evening’s meal. Times when old newspapers were an enviable commodity that placed under their clothing could keep them warm; protect the naked soles of the feet in worn-out shoes; could be used as filler for mattresses and, when soaked and packed, clog up the cracks to keep out the cold night air. Needless to say, the tiny flat shrunk even further with the towers of old newspapers it held. Ruth and Joseph understood the potential worth of every object. To their minds, nothing had a use-by-date. Who could predict what the future held?

Amana could empathise with their logic. And as cluttered Ruth and Joseph’s flat was, Amana’s was kept sparse. Unlike Ruth and Joseph who had gone without, Amana’s life was spent fleeing, first her village then one refugee camp after another. There was no point accumulating matter for who knew where one would find themselves tomorrow? She would need to travel light with only the bare essentials. She understood how old habits arising from dire circumstances could never be entirely abandoned. One couldn’t take the risk. But it was the sense of space that she desired most. She had spent too many years crammed in the small environs of refugee camps with hundreds of families all vying for a small measure of ground.

Amana would do anything for her two beloved friends. In all the years they lived as neighbours, there was only one occasion that there was ever any discontent between them. Joseph had appeared at her door. He had found an old, worn and battered shipping trunk in the street. It reminded him of something in his past that he could not quite remember, but that the trunk had monumental significance he was sure of. He heaved it up the two flights of stairs, but try as he did, he couldn’t fit it into his already bulging flat. Instead he dragged it cheerily to his neighbour’s door. Amana, knowing full well that Joseph viewed the streets as a treasure trove of discarded wealth, could see that the trunk would be followed by numerous other newfound items. Joseph begged and pleaded with his friend. It was no ordinary trunk, this he was sure of, this he tried to convince her. But just as her neighbours revelled in the clutter of objects, she needed the sparsity in her flat to breathe. Joseph was mortified by her unyielding response. He placed the old trunk at the end of the hallway where it remained. As time progressed that too began to bulge from the contents it was fed. What could no longer store inside was stacked on top of the trunk, and then to its sides, slowly creeping down the hallway, until gradually the trunk became hidden from view.

Amana stepped out onto the balcony where Joseph’s frail body was bent over a small makeshift vegetable garden. He had built the garden bed lovingly from old wooden crates he had found outside the fruit and vegetable shop. They were a terrific find. He couldn’t believe that anyone would want to throw them away. Lucky for him. Much better than the modern cardboard boxes that had replaced them. He had lined the crates with newspapers and filled them with rich soil. His trembling, aged hands tied the stems of tomato seedlings onto supporting posts. A stubby of beer by his side helped his concentration, or so he claimed.

He was excited to see his friend.

“Come. Quick! Quick Amana. Look!” He proudly displayed the four inches of growth that had emanated from the seeds he had planted.

Amana leant down next to him.

“See! Tomatoes,” he proudly told her. In Poland all they ever grew were cabbages and cauliflower. All stinky stuff, never tomatoes. The weather was too cold for tomatoes. It was Amana’s idea that he should grow them and take full advantage of the sunlight that hit their balcony. Tomatoes were more versatile. There were so many things they could make from the tomatoes, like sauce and chutneys. This was his first attempt at growing them and he couldn’t have been more overjoyed with the some twenty small stalks displayed for the entire world to see.

Amana felt the thickness of the leaves between her fingers sprouting from the stems. Joseph guzzled the last of the beer waiting in anticipation for her verdict. Ruth took the empty stubby from his hand.

“Very good,” she announced at last. Amana was genuinely impressed.

Joseph clapped his hands with enthusiasm. He searched for the stubby but it was now empty and in his wife’s hand.

“Bring me another one, woman!”

“No more!” Ruth shouted back at him, patting his protruding stomach. “Sit, Amana.”

Amana seated herself in the old deck chair pleased to be in their company.

“You not go shopping?” enquired Joseph. “I see Basim leave?”

“Not today,” she responded wearily. She watched Joseph water the plants while offering him instructions.

“Not many water. No good. Little bit,” was her advice and she would know. Her family were once growers. She adored that part of her childhood when back in the village the women would come together every summer loaded with large baskets of ripe red tomatoes, sweet and juicy ready to be pulped and turn into sauce produce for the markets. They would line their tables next to each in the village square and work the pulp, laugh, talk, gossip.

Amana’s warning rang alarm bells. Joseph feared he had drowned the plants.

“Ruth! Ruth! Nudda beer or I divorce you!” He turned to his friend and spoke to her in a conspiratorial tone of voice. “I divorce her. I mean it. I marry you instead, Amana. I don’t care you are Muslim.” They both chuckled. Joseph may have been in his late eighties but he still knew how to charm a woman and Amana could still appreciate this quality in a man.

Ruth reappeared with a tray holding a tea service and a plate holding slices of poppyseed cake. Of course it also held another stubby of beer. Joseph grabbed it victoriously.

“Drink yourself to death,” she started in mock indignation. “Better for me. Eh, what you think, Amana? You very lucky. No old man to drive you crazy!”

Joseph announced that he had already died a hundred deaths, one more or less meant nothing to him.

But Ruth and Joseph knew their old friend well and could sense Amana was troubled. Usually she would join in on their crazy digs at each other. Today she was more pensive and reserved.

“You have problem, Amana?” Ruth sat down in the deck chair next to her.

“No.” Amana shifted awkwardly in her seat.

“That Basim have bad chop on his shoulder.” Joseph gesticulated his words. “I see him leave and no even say hello.” He threw his hands up in the air. “So many years we live next door, never once say hello.” Joseph returned to scrape the soil around the tomatoes, his appearance shrunken and old. “I dunno, maybe this boy have too many silly thoughts,” he added with sadness. What have they ever done to him? Nothing, and this was the truth, he thought. Joseph had Ruth. Ruth had Joseph. Poor Amana had a son with one big chop on his shoulder. Enough, they had each other, Joseph, Ruth and Amana. He didn’t want to upset Amana with his thoughts but they tore at his heart. The world had once again gone crazy and these were dark times for all.

He watched his friend as she stared out into the dazzling blue sky before her. Amana was “zonking out” as he called it and when Amana “zonked out” you may as well be talking to a brick wall – gone, kaput. He, the only man they had, returned to focus his attention on his garden, serenading the two women with an old Yiddish love song.

Palestine 1947

At eighteen with sultry, dark, penetrating eyes and olive complexion, Amana had grown into a beautiful young woman. Her long black hair stretched down to the bottom most tip of her spine standing her proud and strong. She lowered the bucket laughing and chatting with a group of girls her age gathered around the communal well in the village square. They filled their large earthenware containers with water, fantasising about the men they would marry and those they would most certainly refuse. Like the baker’s son, Habibi, otherwise known as Bibi, the village idiot. Fell off a tree and landed on his head, so his mother said. Must be, how else would he be the way he was, certainly not from his father’s sperm or his mother’s womb. Must have happened while they weren’t looking, falling off the tree that is, so his mother was fond of telling anyone who would listen. Bibi, guffawing, plashed the girls with water. Never mind the protests, they should be so lucky; he’s too good for them all he shouted out over and over again to their fits of laughter.

At first it appeared on the horizon as a dust storm rising from the desert plains. The drone of engines revealed it as something more. The girls and Bibi now silent, watched in anticipation. A vision entered their village, one that would always remain with Amana. Buses, one after another, carrying the dispossessed, wretched, hollow-eyed men, women and children, skin and bone, mere shadows of beings, Jewish settlers, ejected from Europe and literally driven to the Promised Land. Their life’s possessions, tied to the bus, the Star of David heralding at the forefront; one after another the buses moved through the village square and disappeared once again into the dust.

The girls hurriedly dispersed carrying their water containers on their shoulders, eager to return home to tell of what they had just witnessed.

Fahid, at twenty, was in his physical prime, a mixture of hormones gone wild with lust for the one he desired. He watched Amana as she walked, he keeping his distance on the other side of the street. He knew she was aware he was following her but both pretended otherwise. Careful to go unnoticed, he gained on her. She entered a narrow street and from the corner of her eye checked to see that no one else was watching.

Unabashed, he grabbed her by the arm. As modesty demanded, Amana feigned shock, followed by fear. He held her against the wall and moved his face up close to her, delighted by her reaction. The young woman could no longer contain herself, nor pretend, and burst into laughter.

“Amana. Have you no shame, woman,” he playfully scolded her. He grabbed her around the waist pulling her close to him, surprising them both with this spontaneous action.

“Let me go, Fahid.” Amana had never been held by a man and this time her fear was real, fear at the emotions she now felt and found difficult to control.

“No! Not until you kiss me.” He faltered for a brief moment in disbelief that he actually went so far as to say the words he’d practised in his head so many times in his fantasies.

She seemed to gain strength from his nervousness.

“What are you doing following me? I saw you,” she teased.

“Kiss me,” he demanded.

Amana grabbed the water container and attempted to escape. He tightened his grip around her waist. She struggled to free herself, laughing at his bravado.

“Stop! If any one sees us, my father will string you up by the ears from the tallest tree.”

“You care about me.” He stared comically up into the heavens, “Allah, she loves me!” then gently turned to her. “It will be worth it, for just one kiss,” he said softly. Fahid struggled with his words. “Tomorrow I will ask your father…”

“What, Fahid, what will you ask?” she said slowly, unsure of herself.

His spirit lifted and responded in a commanding voice.

“I will tell him. I won’t ask him. I want the most beautiful woman in the village for my wife.”

She had known Fahid all her life. Their families worked and ate together. He and her brother Guleb, being of the same age, were inseparable. Amana was the little sister that tagged along. She idolised Fahid, always the most daring in the pack, and called him brother. Fahid, an only child, adopted her as his sister and even though Guleb would protest Amana’s presence, it was always Fahid who allowed her to join them in their adventures and protected her from harms-way.

And then when it happened, he can’t exactly remember, but Amana had grown into a strikingly beautiful young woman, and his feelings for her were not those that one should have towards a sister. They were much deeper feelings. Feelings that came with a certain pain and confusion and that led him to perform unnatural acts to relieve himself of these emotions he now felt towards her. Sinful, shameful acts that he would yield him to pray to Allah for forgiveness.

At first she didn’t understand why Fahid would behave so cold and detached towards her. She was no longer allowed to accompany Guleb and Fahid and the others. There were nights she cried herself to sleep fearing she had wronged him somehow. The more he desired her the greater the rejection and her anguish. As time wore on Amana sensed that the other young men in the village, those same youths she had played with as a child, began making fools of themselves in her presence. She didn’t quite understand. And then one day Amana awoke to sheets soaked in blood. She feared she was dying, that she was being punished for her sins. Panicked, she called out to her mother, a hysterical cry. Her mother and sisters came rushing in. But when they saw the sheets, and to Amana’s amazement, all they could do was laugh, bestow a thousand blessings on Allah and accuse her of being a dimwit.

Amana’s life from then changed forever and she began her lessons in womanhood. Her mother and sisters along with all the other women in the village would have their say in teaching her life’s lessons. Lesson number one; it would be all downhill from here, they told her. No more mucking around. Life now would be one hard slog, housework, children, a woman’s suffering and toil. Lesson number two, modesty and subservience. Lesson number three and the most important lesson, all men want is one thing, so beware. Be constantly on the alert. No one wants a used woman, better to be dead than bring shame on the family.

It was then that she gradually understood the power she had over the young men in the village and the desire she could evoke in them. She came to understand Fahid’s feigned indifference and began tormenting him till the poor youth thought he was losing his senses, even contemplated a life in the priesthood. Anything to stop the sinful acts he found himself now performing, sometimes two three times, on a daily basis. She was determined that she would marry him and he was easy game.

“One kiss, Amana,” pleaded the fool in love.

Amana drew on all her powers of restraint to disguise her enthusiasm. She ceased to resist his hold and whispered in his ear, “one kiss.” In an act of daring coupled with lust, she brushed her lips against his cheek and just as quickly grabbed the water container and moved briskly down the street. Her pace accelerated into a run.

Jubilant, Fahid called out to her, “I am in heaven!”

The sound of roaring motors brought her to a stop. She watched the convoy of some ten more busloads of Jewish refugees drive through the village. Angst consumed her as one bus after another sped out into the distance.