Djalila
Iknow the punishment for murder of course.
I should pay diyah, blood money, to the family of Faheem and beg for their forgiveness, although they may refuse and ask instead for my death in recompense for their loss.
If they grant me forgiveness then I should complete my atonement by undertaking to free a slave, feeding sixty poor people and keeping sixty fasts.
It does not seem enough. How can any of that be enough for taking Faheem’s innocent life?
How can my reckless desire be atoned for with mere fasting and feeding the poor?
The silver I have amassed from my healing over the years would be enough to pay the diyah, but how can silver pay for the last breath leaving Faheem’s red lips?
It is not enough. None of this would be enough, even if I were to confess—and who would believe me, a great healer of Kairouan, if I said that my desire for Faheem had made his heart pound until it broke? No, they would not believe me and my sin would go unpunished.
And so, as the dawn call to prayer rings out across the city, I kneel to Allah and I make a vow.
I will make amends for what I have done in my own way.
I will serve Faheem’s family until the day I die and still, in my own heart, it will not be enough.
I am cold with certainty and purpose. I claim no reward, I make no bargain, for who am I to bargain?
I state only my decision; I do not ask that it is enough to expiate my sin.
***
My mother shakes her head. “Forever? You are only eighteen. You have your whole life before you. Don’t be ridiculous.”
I continue packing my clothes into a carved wooden chest. “As long as the girl needs me, I will serve her.”
“But why?”
“Because I owe a debt.”
My mother comes close to me, peers into my face. “What debt can you possibly have?”
I shake my head. “I cannot speak of it.”
My mother begs my father to speak with me and he does, but our conversation goes round in circles, with him reminding me that as an eighteen-year-old respected healer I surely owe no debt to anyone and what of my own life, my own future marriage?
To which I only reply that I cannot explain.
My mother tries weeping and for one brief moment I think my father is going to try his fists on me but at last they give up, agreeing between themselves that perhaps once I have helped this sick girl and she recovers (as surely she will in my care), I will put aside this nonsense and return home.
To which I do not respond, only embrace my mother and father and ask for their blessing, which they reluctantly give.
***
The next morning, I walk through the streets while the dawn call to prayer echoes around me, the hood of my robe pulled up over my head.
Behind me come two slaves, carrying the chest that holds all my possessions, such as they are.
My silver I have already given to the poor, keeping only a few coins for myself.
Within a high wall sits the door into Safa’s home.
I do not call for a servant, I push the door with the palm of my hand and it opens onto the large courtyard of the house, a tinkling fountain surrounded by an elaborate tiled floor set all about with ornately carved and painted doors.
This family has money. A servant carrying water pauses at the sight of me: an unexpected visitor at a too-early hour when half the family are still abed.
“Your mistress, Safa, sent for me,” I tell her. “I am to see the daughter of the house, Djalila. Where is she?”
The girl hesitates but the fact that I have two slaves with me, my steady stare and the use of the family’s names seems to convince her that I should be obeyed. “Her rooms are through there,” she tells me. “Upstairs. The green door.”
I dismiss the slaves, telling them to leave the chest in the courtyard.
They begin to bid me farewell but I am already walking up the cold stone steps where I find a green-painted door.
Again, I do not wait to announce myself nor to be invited to enter.
I open the door and approach the bed on which a girl lies sleeping.
I pause. The same red lips as her brother. Her hair as beautiful, but far longer. The same honey-gold skin. For several moments I stand over her and watch her breath rise and fall. At last, I sit by her and turn over her wrist, let my fingertips rest on her pulse. Her eyes open in an instant.
“Who are you?” she demands, snatching her arm away from me and sitting up, gathering her sleeping robes about her in a flurry of movement.
I sit still and look her over. Her arms are mostly bare and they are thinner than I have seen on street children or poorly treated slaves. Her neck is scrawny, her cheekbones stick out too much, giving her the look of a hungry cat.
“Who are you and what are you doing in my room?” she yells at me.
“I am a healer,” I say. “My name is Hela.”
“I don’t need a healer,” she says. “Get out.”
“You look ill,” I say.
“My brother is dead!” she spits at me.
I swallow and steady my voice. It takes me a moment. “I know,” I say. “I would have done anything to save him if I had known of his illness. Now I am here to help you.”
“Did you know him?”
If she had asked me before he died, I would have said yes.
Yes, I knew him. I knew every tiny detail of his face, of his scent.
He was all I thought of, of course I knew him.
Now I know better. I shake my head. “I only saw him from a distance,” I say.
“You look like him,” I cannot help adding.
I do not say your red lips, but I think it.
Slowly she sits down on the other side of the bed from me. “He was my hero,” she says. “My protector. Now I am all alone.” Her eyes brim over with tears.
“You have your mother,” I say. “Your father.”
The tears stop abruptly. She sits very straight. “Get out,” she says. “You know nothing of my life.”
“It is not a happy life,” I say.
She startles. “How do you know?”
I shrug. “You are half starved. You are grieving.” I reach out and touch her lightly on her bare arm and feel a wave of fear course through me. “You are afraid.”
She is defiant. “Of what?”
I shake my head. “I don’t know. Only you know who or what you are afraid of. I feel the fear; I do not know the cause. For now.”
“And if you did know, you would save me?” she spits.
“Yes,” I say.
She half-laughs, a bitter sound. “You wouldn’t know where to start.”
I stand up.
“Where are you going?”
“Downstairs.”
“Don’t leave me,” she says and then looks down as though the words had escaped without her permission.
“I will be staying here,” I tell her.
“For how long?” she challenges me.
“Forever, if I am needed,” I say.
***
When I find Safa, I tell her that I will be living in this house and serving her daughter until she is well.
I do not tell her of my vow. One thing at a time, I think.
When she exclaims at my plan, I fix her with my most commanding stare and tell her that I will not leave this place until her daughter is well again.
She, flustered, orders the servants that I am to be obeyed as though I were their mistress before blessing me and weeping.
Unmoved, I leave her. Her blessings are meaningless, for she would be cursing me if she knew the truth. I return to Djalila’s room.
***
“Get dressed,” I tell her.
“I don’t want to,” she says, still muffled by her blankets.
“Rise,” I say.
Something in my voice makes her struggle to a sitting position.
“I have told the slaves to bring hot water,” I tell her. “Now you will wash.”
“Leave the room,” she says.
I shake my head.
“I will not undress in front of you,” she says.
I stand, waiting.
Slowly, reluctantly, she strips off her sleeping robe and stands before me. She does not meet my eyes.
She is well formed enough, apart from her unnatural thinness. But her hair is lank and uncombed and she stands hunched, protecting herself from some unseen enemy. Near her shoulders and on the upper part of her thighs are bruises.
I kneel before my chest. I had the slaves bring it to the small room adjacent to Djalila’s.
I open the lid and have to take a deep breath.
My mother has placed the red cup on top of the contents, perhaps believing that I would wish to have it and that I had left it behind by mistake.
Carefully, I remove it and set it aside.
I take out a small jar of ointment and smear it onto each bruise.
“Don’t you want to know how I got them?” Djalila demands and I hear her voice tremble with the longing to tell me.
“You will tell me when you wish to,” I say.
“I cannot,” she says quickly.
“Then I will not ask you,” I say. “You will tell me when you wish to.”
She stands uncertain, then washes herself in silence, dresses in a robe too large for her.
“That does not fit you,” I tell her. “I doubt it fitted you even when you were not this thin.”
“I like my robes large,” she says.
I look into her dark eyes and see fear there.
***
She says that she eats only in her own rooms but I make her follow me to the rooftop terrace, where a bright awning billows in the breeze and soft cushions are laid out for our comfort.
Servants bring food and I watch while Djalila drinks tea but only picks at the freshly cooked flatbreads until they are shredded into tiny crumbs, none of which have entered her mouth.
I offer her a sorghum porridge and then boiled eggs but although she makes a great show of stirring the porridge and adding honey to it and then peeling the eggs, still none of the food is eaten.
Her mother arrives while we are eating and fusses and frets until I ask her to leave us, which she does, looking back over her shoulder as though I am about to make a miracle happen.