I stand on the tip of the railing. There’s a fire underneath and a tornado behind my back. Cold, crisp air is gnawing mercilessly at my back and shoulders. I dare not look back or down, I only stare at the crimson sky shadowed by clouds and a thousand crystal meteorites. I breathe in the smoky, thick summer air and wonder where the cold is coming from. The skeletal hands get hold of my feet and I am startled, I dare look down and that’s all it takes for me to lose it and fall…

I wake up, feeling groggy and dizzy. My period has started today and my panties are flooded with crimson red. Well, that probably explains the color of the sky in the dream.

I wash my face, brush my teeth and prepare my bag for a boring school day of pure torture. Starting with Mr. Reffat in Arabic class and ending with Mrs. Mary in PE, my day is washed in optimism and liveliness. In other words, shit is all over the place. There’s nothing better than wearing the uniform, tying my long chestnut brown hair in a tight ponytail – I must remember to have a haircut when summer vacation starts – and drinking cappuccino.

“You’re supposed to have breakfast before school,” Dad mumbles without lifting his eyes off the morning paper, Al-Ahram, as usual.

“I never go for the supposed stuff, Baba,” I reply and head towards the door.

“I won’t pick you up today. I’m going to visit your aunt Mahira and I may stay long there. Dinner will be in the oven.”

I go out of the door without looking back, slam it behind me and wait for the elevator.

I never knew a house without a mother will be that bleak!

The road to school is paved with dust and gravel. Everything seems gloomy, bleary and transparent. The school walls are gray with aging, the ceilings are cracked and the teachers seem to be stranded on a permanent timeline without a chance of being released. They look old, soggy and mummified. I almost expect Mr. Nassar to fall dead at any second and Miss Maysa to excuse herself and take a nap in her golden coffin. The weather is unchangeable during school times; either cloudy in winter or humid in summer. Our school knows nothing about the beauty of nature, even on a cloudy day the sky is a block of endless gray and cloud art seems to exist off premises but never when we’re inside. School is simply a machine to suck the life from my lungs, but of course that’s just me.

Jaylan Salah would love to find representation and formal critique and editing for her soon-to-be complete novel, When Lovers are Sinners – which deals with class and cultural issues in modern-day Egypt, but with a supernatural twist. She may be reached at joly16_blackpearl@hotmail.com

 

To many of my friends school is lots of fun, they can gossip, play tricks on teachers or chill the hell out. Even in a firm Catholic school for girls they seem to enjoy some forbidden amusements like sharing old issues of Playgirl, spreading rumors about young male teachers or annoying young male neighbors every time they look out of the windows. These are the kinds of amusements innocent girls brag about and enjoy, thinking by doing that they are breaking the family and society chains tightened around their necks. Not to mention the other kind of fun. Riding in cars with rich boys, smoking in the toilets and flirting with teachers, this is the kind of fun that girls like Nermeen, Farah and Jasmine practice.

What about me? To which group do I belong? Am I the A student who buries herself in books and detaches herself from all kinds of fun? Do I play with idiotic virgins whose main goal is falling in love and going out on a picnic? Do I play dangerously and sneak into a boy’s car to give him a blowjob and then leave feeling like I own the world? Maybe I’m one of those satanic freaks who talk about ruling the world, exorcising demons and sleeping with ghosts? Or am I a moderate person with a B, a large group of friends and an optimism that can swallow the Atlantic?

“You’re not concentrating in anything I’m saying?”

I blink rapidly and stare at Passant’s round, brooding face. Sometimes I feel bad for Passant, she has to be my friend. It’s a disaster if you want my opinion and I’m not sure how long she’ll be able to go on with me on this fake friendship. We barely even talk about things that attract our mutual interests. That’s probably due to the fact that we don’t have any mutual interests.

“I was talking about Jasmine’s birthday party, what do you think I should wear?”

“Anything, I don’t really think it matters.”

“It matters,” she snaps and I press my lips in a firm line feeling stupid. “At least it matters to me, I’m the one invited in case you haven’t noticed.”

My face burns and I reply defensively, “I didn’t mean it that way. I know that you’re happy to go to this party it’s just that I…”

“Save it, I know you’re sad you weren’t invited while I was. It’s not my problem, you know? She just invited me and it was as much a surprise to me as it was to you.”

I swallow and stare at the board feeling detached from everything. Time holds no significance in my mind and strangely I find myself drifting to my own island of solitary confinement. I hear Passant talking non-stop and my lips part attempting to answer her back or ask her to shut up. But as usual I fail to make a proper action and sink into my own world of nothingness. Perfectly still, I succumb to a usual tactic of mine, detachment and separation from the surroundings.

It’s not like the Petit-Mal patients, just a forced phase of trance where thoughts, ideas and senses are all directed to one of my favorite things in life. Things I’ve done, am willing to do or afraid to accomplish, it doesn’t really matter as long as they take me away from anything that bothers me. I know it’s cowardly and leads me to a state of mild depression where social withdrawal is the first symptom, if not the last. But it helps and grabs me away from all the things that bother me, my father, Passant’s never-ending arguments or a boring lesson. I start melting the world around me into a huge ball of cotton candy. Everything bends and twists then merges into the large bowel of melting sugar. I can feel the sweet taste on my mouth and a small smile forms in my heart but never reaches my face.

I turn to face a raging Passant and say quietly, “I suggest you wear your afternoon Apricot satin suit. It’s really good on you.”

She seems taken aback by my sudden change in reaction and she huffs, mildly content that she gave me a well-deserved scolding, “It’s not good enough. The girls will all wear their best and they’re by far richer and more stylish than I am.”

“They’re not,” I reassure her and she laughs sarcastically.

“Are you an idiot or can’t you see how the world goes round? Jasmine and her gang are by far the finest girls of our class. She’s even invited the richest and most elite book biters to her party, something she’s never done before. I think she’s inviting people like me and Angie only to show us how miserable we are and how exciting and brilliant her life is.”

“Or maybe to win a bet she’s made with her new boyfriend,” I joke and she smiles a little.

“It’ll pass, besides if you don’t wanna go, nobody forced you to,” I shrug and stare at my extended palms on the desk. So strange Passant’s interests, so strange and so different from mine.

 The bell rings, Passant storms from the seat next to me and I sigh heavily feeling desolate and melancholy. It’s so sad that I suck at making friends and that the only person interested in knowing me is Passant. It’s so sad that she thinks the same or so I suppose.

I walk off school premises and feel the world getting a tad bit better. The sky is blizzard blue with crispy clouds swaying slowly above my head, almost hiding the sunrays yet revealing a tinge of heavenly light. I smile a little and look ahead only to be shoved into the arms of an extremely giggly, hyperventilating and enthusiastic girl.

“Hayam, it’s me Kariman. Did you miss me?”

I blink twice and stare at the girl in front of me. It takes a moment before I gasp in surprise and yell, “Kariman, what are you doing here, girl?”

She hugs me violently and swirls me around jumping enthusiastically and giggling, “Oh man, I’m so excited to meet you, girl. I can’t believe that after all this time I come to see you.”

“I’m thrilled to see you too,” I am not a liar, that’s half of the truth. I miss Kariman but I’m not that happy to see her. We don’t have fond memories of each others and we share a secret that still gives us nightmares every now and then. I wonder how she’s -apparently- come to forget all about the dreadful past.

“Shit, you look damn pretty even with this fashion faux pa!”

I look down at my oversized, baggy pants and shift my legs uncomfortably. If there’s any description to fit our school uniform then hideous shall be the perfect term.

“I can do nothing about it, Kariman. It’s the school uniform.”

“We don’t have a school uniform,” she states incredulously.

“It’s a brave new world, baby,” I mutter, a bit irritated by her criticism. I know Kariman is one of the best dressed girls I’ve ever met and I’m probably the opposite. The fact that I don’t care to change my clothing style surprises me and frustrates me at the same time especially that every time someone scolds for my clothing style, I get so bent about it.

“So are you free tonight?” I stare at her dumbfounded and ask, “Come again?”

“What? I haven’t seen you in a long time, girl. We should bond together, soon. I really need you to do something for me.”

If you do a small favor for someone in the past, remember to try and avoid seeing that person again. Gratitude and sincerity aren’t the only things you’ll get but also more and more favors to be done.

“Why me this time? Where’s your group of pretty airheads?”

“Don’t you wanna go out with me?” Her expression falters and I sigh impatiently, “It’s not like that, damn it! I don’t wanna find myself plunged into some stupid meeting with some idiots I know nothing about.”

“They’re not idiots!” She screams and I slap my forehead subconsciously. I know it! She wants me to go out with her and meet some douche bags she probably doesn’t want to tell her friends about because they’ll be jealous or they’ll steal the cutest guy for themselves or because they’ll make fun of her or anything of the sort. Ever since I stood by Kariman in that time of turmoil she has been feeling like I’m her guardian angel or secret savior. The missions I help her –in the past– with usually involve meeting a group of new friends or allowing her to copy the Math homework from me. There was nothing harmless with these things in the past but now, as we’ve gone into our separate ways I find everything she says annoying and extremely embarrassing. I don’t know what she wants from me yet but I have already figured out most of the request. I must play the role of a wallflower while she shines amidst a group of nerds she just met online. Ugh!

“Who is the one you have your eyes on this time?”

“Well I don’t have a particular person in mind but unfortunately I learned that most of the boys of the group are taken,” she pouts. I cross my arms in front of my chest and ask her, “Why are you going then if this is not your typical manhunt?”

“There’s a guy that a friend of mine recommended,” she states in a serious tone and I resist the urge to laugh. “She was his girlfriend for a long time and they split up because she found a better guy…”

“…a richer guy,” I suggest knowing how easily bothered she is by my view of the high class society.

“No, the reasons weren’t connected to finance at all. She says the guy is insanely rich and reasonably attractive. She said the reason she dumped him was because…”

“Okay, I get it.” All I want from life is for Kariman to shut up. I enjoy gossip to a certain degree but she has the ability to make me loathe it. There’s nothing worse than gossiping complete strangers that I give no shit about.

“So I’ll pick you up at six?” she smiles hopefully and I can’t help but smile back. I really like Kariman and I miss her silliness. There are times when I go as far as believing that she misses my depression, too.

“I’ll be ready by then. But please tell me they’re better than the people we met last time, that guy who tried to flirt with me was totally a junkie,” I plead and  she laughs,

“Don’t ya worry. They’re so much better. All of them are artists and one of them loves poetry like you do. Maybe you can read them your poems. I still remember that one you wrote about Jeanine,”

My mind floats to Jeanine and my slightly uplifted spirits sink to the bottom. I close my eyes, send away the image of Jeanine and breathe in a heap full of air. Sometimes I feel like missing my mother’s womb. I wonder why I left it in the first place.