A Word For Love Part 24

"You did?" So had Imad. Once, Nisrine had given me the role of shepherd. I was surprised. All this time, I'd been envying her the role of Leila, and here she was seeming to want what I had. "Why?"

"Because he came and went as he pleased. He stayed beside Qais-I know it wasn't romantic love, but he could take Qais's hand whenever he wanted. Leila couldn't do that."

And then, I had an idea.

I ran to the balcony. Nisrine heard me leave-"What are you doing?" she called, but I didn't answer. I knew if my idea was going to work, we had to act quickly.

The balcony was bright with fresh air and busy streets. I leaned out, feeling the sun on my face, feeling policemen all around- "Adel!" We could not call his cell phone, because mine was broken and the house phone wasn't for policemen.

"Adel, Adel!"

He wasn't on the roof; he had been down by the street like they'd planned, waiting for her. But, the other men heard me; one of them was dispatched, and soon enough a familiar face appeared.

I waved a greeting. We spoke in short sentences; sometimes the wind took them.

"Where's Nisrine?" he called.

"She's locked in."

"Locked in? Tell her to come, it's our day, I've been waiting!"

He was gold as ever, sunlight on treetops. I had not talked to him since Baba's interview, but it didn't matter. What needed to be said had already been thought in his direction. While I'd been locked in the house, my worries about him had fallen away.

And so, when Adel appeared on the rooftop I felt only hope, excitement.

From the children's bedroom, a window opened.

"h.e.l.lo, habibi," Nisrine called, "we're locked in!"

He frowned. "Locked in?"

"Bea can't get to her lesson."

I saw his face fall. I thought, How will we fix this? They seemed destined to always be far away, never to cross the sky between them. Adel's eyes clouded-he had left her in a worse position, and in response, distraction and confusion rose from Nisrine's room.

Still, I had my idea. So, I measured the distance between us with my eyes. It was not far; the street was small, his roof and our balcony close to each other. Close enough, I had once thought, to throw an apple. Or, a man?

I looked around our small s.p.a.ce. There was a clothesline behind me, a firm, thickish rope. I hung on it a moment. It held.

And, my actions seemed to give Adel the same idea. He said, "Bea, is that line loose?"

It was.

"Throw me an end."

I unhooked it carefully, while Nisrine watched from her window. There was blood pumping through us-what we were doing was daring, crazy, but it seemed to me then the worst had already happened.

I threw the rope. It made a straight line like an arrow from our balcony to Adel at the station. He caught his end, held it for a moment, considering. Then, he called his friends over; they stood on one side, I stood on the other, keeping the rope taut between us; my end was tied to the metal laundry hook.

He called to Nisrine, "If you can't get out, I'll come in!"

And with that, Adel did the second thing he had done for love: he swung onto the rope until his feet hung five floors above the garden, and began to slowly make his way, hand over hand, to us.

There is a stillness to life five floors up, there is a slowness to time, when a man hangs, suspended like a small gold leaf, over a city. These were the dangers we faced: That Madame would come home. That the rope would slip-Adel hung far above the world, even though our balcony and the roof were close. That his father would find out. Even if Madame didn't and his father didn't, the neighbors and the other policemen would see.

But, what did we have to lose?

We were already locked in.

Nisrine had already put her trust in this man.

We watched and held our breath. On my end, I felt the rope tense, the weight of it, the distance, as Adel's legs swung out, unhinged. He looked down on a view all his own.

He made his way slowly, sweat running down his face into his eyes and along his neckline. I saw the slippery way his hands gripped the rope. He hung by one arm in pursuit of his lover, who watched from her window and gasped, like I did, when for a moment he slipped, caught himself only with the help of his elbow. His legs traveled across my view of the sun.

But then he gave one last scissoring kick, and it was over, he had reached us.

I leaned down to clasp his hands in mine. He hung just below the rail.

"Help me up."

Earth rushed toward me, but he didn't need my help. He gave another kick and we both fell, one over the other, back onto the balcony.

We lay together for a moment, his legs on my legs, my head against his chest.

Then he stood up, offered me a hand. "Where's Nisrine?"

Her door was the next challenge. I brought him a knife and a hairpin to pick the lock. Neither worked. I brought him olive oil to ease the hinges. Finally, when that also failed, aware of the time and that Madame might come home at any minute, Adel beat on the door. He called longingly to Nisrine on the other side. He tore and jiggled with a lover's strength, until the handle came away altogether, the lock slid loose; the door swung jarringly open, and there she was.

I have never seen a lover of mine locked behind a door, and so I can only imagine what Adel felt. I think he was taken aback; he had dreamed of holding her close, but not under these circ.u.mstances.

Nisrine was beautiful, as always. Her veil had slipped off. It didn't matter what else had happened, when the door opened, she bloomed.

For a moment they leaned toward each other, drawn in the same direction like two flowers toward the sun. Then, Adel became shy, nervous-this was the most private place he had ever encountered her, and it was a bedroom. He turned abruptly, breaking the pulse between them.

"Let's get you out," he said, and ran to the front door, but here even his lover's powers failed him. It was thick wood, not made to be broken.

Nisrine and I stood to one side, watching. She reached out a hand to touch him on his back, then his chest as he worked, but it wouldn't budge. Finally, she said. "Leave it. It doesn't matter."

He cleared his throat. "How will you escape?"

It was clear Nisrine would not escape, today. She must face Madame and this family. But, there was still something she and Adel could do, another way to break the spell of faraway love. She took his hand.

"Come," and she tugged on him. He had been intent on the door, intent on his strength. There was not much time, Madame might be home any minute.

"Come, Adel!" she said again, and so he let himself be pulled by her; down the hall, through the living room, he left his tools. Two young lovers, they ran like light before me into the children's bedroom, where she turned, winked once, used both hands like birds on the unstable door, there was a sc.r.a.pe of wood, she pulled it shut.

For a moment, I felt bereft. Even though it had been my idea, they had gone and taken the excitement with them. I poured myself another cup of juice and sat in the kitchen, trying not to listen. Outside, light glinted off the buildings where Adel had come from. Who had seen him suspended on a laundry rope like that, a straight line to our bedroom? The neighbors?

But then I glanced where Nisrine and Adel had gone; happiness spilled from their room, where, even though I wasn't listening, after a while I heard one soft giggle, like a perfect word.

AFTER LOVE.

ADEL LEFT THE WAY HE HAD COME.

At the last second, Nisrine grew worried. "You must help Baba," she said. "Promise, he's signed a doc.u.ment. If he's in trouble now, you must help him."

He promised.

"And you must come for me." Madame would find out. When he swung over, the antic.i.p.ation of love had kept them buoyant. Now, on the way back, they faced a precarious situation. What would happen to her? Madame would return her; she'd lock her in the closet.

"I'll come for you, Nisrine. I'll come for you tonight, tomorrow at the latest. I'll find you a new house."

He promised, too, that if he heard Baba was in trouble, he would send a warning.

She squeezed his hand, nodded.

He wanted her to go with him now; he wanted to swing her like a princess across the rope. She refused. It seemed flimsy, dangerous. She would rather he get her at the door; until then, take her chances.

"I'll wait for you. But, Adel"-she looked for the birds-"I won't be locked in again."

On his way back he kicked out wrong, and there was a sudden sag of the railing. He let out a small cry, felt a sudden pain where his foot hit it, but it was only a moment. He swung hand over hand, with a full, expanded feeling. His head had grown to the size of a mountain, his heart burst in his chest. She was on every part of him: under his fingers, imprinted on the backs of his eyeb.a.l.l.s.

At the station, he had missed his hour for questioning, so he had missed an interview with Imad. Another policeman had done it in his place. He went down to the bas.e.m.e.nt, to read over what this policeman had written. As he read, his brow furrowed. There was troubling information.

Nisrine had told him, You must help Baba, and he had promised.

Adel paced back and forth. He was only one man, who had much to do that day-finish his s.h.i.+ft, find a way to help Nisrine, find her a new family, come back for her. At the same time, his legs and arms felt soft as silk.

Police stations are like small towns, news travels quickly through them. The neighbors who might have seen Adel on the rope were not friends with Madame because they were on the side of the president, but they were loyal to the police. Adel's father was an important man, and so when they came to him, he did not waste time.

Adel was still in the bas.e.m.e.nt. He looked up when his father entered.

"Who was your grandfather, Adel?" his father asked him.

"A general, may he rest in peace."

"Who is your father?"

"A general, may he live a long life."

"Who do you want to be?"

Adel had been asked this question many times. Before, he had always answered, A general, G.o.d willing, like my father. Now, he stopped to think.

His father didn't wait for an answer. "You were guarding foreign women."

"Baba, I'm in love."

"You rode a rope to see them."

"Baba, I've changed. Would you accept an Indonesian?"

"In this family, we don't change. When we do, it's for the better, we only change for the better."

Wasn't love better?

Adel's father hit him once, hard, across the face, the way Adel had hit Baba.

Adel stood up. "I'm a man. I love, and I'm a man."

Adel's father hit him again. Adel sat down hard, as if the hit hurt him.

"You know your grandfather was tortured? It was war, and foreign soldiers came to him. They wanted him to foreswear the president; they said, Change your words, change the president and the country you love. He said, I can't. So they hit him, until he was bleeding. From his head, he was bleeding. They said, Change your words. He said, What I speak is who I am. What I speak is right. Who are you, Adel?"

He was the grandson of a general.

"Who are you, Adel?"

He was the son of a general.

"Who will you be, Adel?"

There is a letter in Arabic that stands for silence. It is called the hamza; its shape is a half-moon, or a teardrop, and like a teardrop it asks you to pause a moment, and breathe. It opens up s.p.a.ce.

Fighters will tell you that when they are in the middle of a fight, sometimes a strange thing happens. They cease to notice their pain and instead, they feel their souls open within them; they levitate. Some say it feels like love; others say this is the closest they have come to G.o.d.

Adel's father continued to hit him. Adel tried to stand. His face hurt. His side hurt. But his mind was a hamza, his arms open. His limbs from Nisrine were the softest flower- "Who are you, Adel?" And his father wanted to hear, A policeman.