Abdulillah was away on business for the weekend, so I finally did what I’d been thinking of for some time: I called Soumaya and asked if she would come and stay.
Up to that point, my life had been divided neatly into thirds: first my fifteen years of innocence, which Hamid, the traveling musician, had cut short beside the spring; then those three grinding decades in the brothel, which felt like a bad dream; and then, finally, my beautiful life with Abdulillah and his sons. Buzzing Soumaya in, the feelings that I’d felt with Hamid echoed in my bones—transgression and exhilaration. Never before had I permitted any comingling between these episodes. But, I reminded myself, Soumaya was no mere vestige of the brothel years. She was the reason I was where I was.
“My God!” she exclaimed, hoisting her little suitcase over the threshold. “This is where you live?”
She smelled just as I remembered: vanilla, sandalwood, and labdanum.
“When I’m in Rabat,” I said. “He’s got another in Tangier. And one in Casa. Oh, and one in Marrakesh.”
Didn’t she think me worthy of these luxuries? I wondered vaguely, shutting the door and leading her past the kitchenette, where a servant was fixing drinks, and down the steps into the sunken sitting room. She was the one who’d helped me get them, wasn’t she?
“This husband of yours,” said Soumaya, leaving her suitcase and making a circuit of the living room, examining the potted plants, the hand-stitched covers on the cushions, and the oil paintings on the walls, “is the old man you met in that coffee shop?”
“The very same.”
“What was he doing in a coffee shop, anyway?”
“Why,” I said, “it’s obvious, isn’t it? He was drinking coffee!”
Something was making it rather difficult for me to take her seriously, though what it was, I couldn’t say. She was dressed well enough, in a midnight blue kaftan with elegant gold embroidery along the seams, and her heels were showing off her tightrope walker’s poise, but her usual gravitas was…well…simply missing. Maybe it was all the images swirling in my head, of her in compromising poses, emitting those exquisite little grunts and moans we’d practiced day and night till we’d achieved perfection, suddenly set against a new and less flattering backdrop, where they were no longer proxies for talent, authority, pride—but, of course, she could look at me and call to mind the same.
“Couldn’t he simply have had that coffee made at home?” she wondered aloud, running a finger along a snake plant’s frond. It came away gray. I made a mental note to speak to the maid.
“He doesn’t like to stay cooped up all the time,” I explained. “He likes to be out in the world. He says he learns more about import-export in the coffee shops and hammams than he ever does at conferences. He’s a real man of the people.”
“I see.”
The servant brought the drinks.
“Oh!” she cried, accepting hers. “You remembered!”
It was a Marrakesh Mule. Her favorite. One of her international clients had introduced her to the drink some years ago, and they’d both thought it very funny that he should introduce her to something Moroccan, not the other way around.
“Of course,” I said, taking a seat on a divan. “I’ll never forget you.”
“It’s strange.” She sat across from me, sipping with evident pleasure while studying me carefully over the glass’s rim. “You don’t look ten years older. You look ten years younger.”
“The salon is like a second home to me,” I said. “And he’s always buying me creams.”
“It’s nice to see that one of us is being taken care of. It raises the spirits.”
I couldn’t think of anything to say to that, so I said, “Yes.”
“Your anniversary’s coming up, isn’t it? You must be planning something special.”
“Oh, not really.” I waved the question away. “He’s the one who plans things.”
“But this is your tenth, Siham.”
“You’ve been counting?”
“Of course,” said Soumaya, setting her drink aside as if it didn’t matter anymore. “We’re all keeping count at the brothel. The girls, you know…well, let me put it this way, Siham. They’re not exactly happy for you.”
“Oh?”
“They want to see your marriage fail.”
“What’s the point of that?” I snorted. “It’s not as if they’ll get my husband if I lose him!”
“That’s true,” said Soumaya, “but you remember how tedious life gets to be. It’s a way to pass the time.”
“I suppose.”
“They’re all hoping that ten years will do it,” she said. “They’re even placing bets. Oh, no, don’t worry—it doesn’t mean anything. Half of them had to change theirs after five. I’m just letting you know.”
“That’s disgusting.”
“Don’t let it get under your skin,” said Soumaya. “It’s all just projection, if you ask me. None of them can imagine a man sticking with them for ten years. Or even five. You remember how it is. We’re judged by our beauty, but beauty fades. We’re judged by our charm, but charm wears off. We’re judged by the quality of our deceptions, but now and then, a little truth slips through.”
“That’s in the brothel,” I pointed out.
“Some of them have experience with life, too. But,” she added hastily, “you’re right to say it’s nonsense. None of them knows a thing about your Abdulillah.”
* * *
That night, Soumaya slept in the guest room, while I lay awake in the king-size bed that I share with my husband. Even with the servants in their quarters and my old friend snoring soundly down the hall, the house felt uncannily empty. Abdulillah’s sons had been small children when we’d married. Whenever he’d gone away on business, I’d looked after them. Now they were in Tunis with him, old enough to join his meetings with the multinationals and learn the tricks of his trade—and here I was, at home, left alone with my thoughts, remembering the tricks of another trade.
I’d never really given the matter much thought, but suddenly it occurred to me that if my husband left me, I would have no way to support myself. My former clients wouldn’t take me back. Neither would my former colleagues. I would be helpless and alone.
There, in the darkness, I resolved to do anything, everything, whatever it took, to keep my husband. To prove those jealous gossips wrong.
* * *
In the morning, over a spread of hard-boiled eggs and baghrir and olives and jben cheese at one of my favorite restaurants, I asked Soumaya’s advice.
“This anniversary should be really special,” I said. “He always treats me. I want to treat him for a change. I just don’t know what to do. I’ve been thinking all night, but I can’t seem to come up with anything. Maybe there’s something wrong with my imagination.”
“Well,” said Soumaya, putting a corner of bread in her mouth and gnawing thoughtfully, “there’s always what you did last time.”
“What last time?”
“When you got married.”
My cheeks must’ve gone red. “I can’t do that!” I said. “Are you kidding?”
“Why not?”
“Because he’ll know it’s Chinese this time.”
“Really, Siham.” Soumaya snorted. “Twenty years in the brothel, and you still don’t know men.”
“He might even guess that it was Chinese last time,” I said. “The last thing I want is to go and put those questions in his head. It’s a risk I can’t afford.”
“You don’t understand,” said Soumaya. “You don’t know how common it’s becoming these days. Remember how we had to come all the way here, to Rabat, just to find you a doctor? Well, now they’ve got those doctors on every corner in Kenitra. I’m not saying you should go to Kenitra. People will know you in Kenitra. And I wouldn’t have it done here, either. I’m just saying, there are options.”
“I won’t do it,” I said. “Options or no options.”
“You’re missing the point, Siham. It’s simple economics. Supply and demand. Ask your husband. There are more doctors offering it nowadays because there are more women wanting it. Not just desperate teenagers anymore. I’m telling you, even married women are having it done. Widows! Half of us at the brothel are having it done every month. Do you think those guys don’t know it’s fake? Sometimes, one of them will take the same girl’s virginity five or six times in a row and pay her extra for it every single time.”
“That’s not true,” I said.
“It is! You can ask anyone. You’ve got to understand the psychology behind it, not just the facts of the operation. It’s not about what’s real. It’s about what a man believes. Men care more about their fantasies than about reality. They experience the world through their senses. If his senses are telling him that you’re a virgin, why not believe them?”
“You’re the one who doesn’t understand,” I said. “You weren’t there to see how happy he was the night he deflowered me. Afterward, he went around telling everyone, ‘I’ve found the only chaste woman in the country! Forty-five, and still a virgin! It’s a miracle, you wouldn’t believe.’”
“Exactly,” said Soumaya, laying down her fork and reaching for the tea. “You’re proving my point. It’s not about what has or hasn’t been between your legs. It’s about the story that he gets to tell.”
My expression must’ve been skeptical, or maybe I just looked stubborn.
“You asked my advice,” said Soumaya. “You don’t have to take it. I’m just saying, if I were you, I would give him an experience. Not just the same-old, same-old. Something special to bring back good memories.”
It was true that I’d asked her advice’s, not once, but twice, and both times, she’d given it freely. Without her, I never would’ve escaped the brothel, much less been happily married for a decade. Why shouldn’t I trust her?
“If I do it,” I said, seizing her hand as she reached for the butter dish, “will you go with me?”
“What?”
“Like last time,” I said. “Only this time, we won’t have to be ashamed. Right? This time there’s nothing to hide.”
“You’d still better keep a low profile,” she said. “Just because it’s becoming more normal doesn’t mean it’s something you should go around advertising.”
“Yes, yes, I know. I just mean that we can have an adventure together. Like last time, only not like last time. Don’t you see, Soumaya? It’s not just my anniversary with Abdulillah. It’s also ours.”
“That was a month ago.”
“But will you go with me?”
“You want to go…when? Today?”
“Why not?”
“Not here,” she said. “Not in Rabat. You might run into someone. That nurse may still be there. Remember?”
“Good thinking,” I agreed, suppressing a twinge of shame. “But where, then?”
“We’ll have to go at least to Fez.”
“That’s all right,” I said. “My schedule’s open.”
“You really want to up and catch the train to Fez?” Soumaya gawked at me across the breakfast spread. “Today?”
“What? Is there a waiting list or something?”
“There may be.”
“Then I’ll pay,” I said. “Whatever it costs, I’ll get to the front of that line.”
It felt good to say that and mean it.
“You’re something,” said Soumaya. “When your mind is made up, you don’t let anyone change it, do you?”
“Why would I?” I smiled. “My life is my own.”
* * *
In the same way that Soumaya’s perfume had brought back memories of the brothel, the rocking motion of the train brought back long-forgotten sensations from an earlier time, when I’d been helpless, and my nerves had failed me, and I’d vomited sludge onto a train car’s floor, and Soumaya had held me like a mother in her arms.
There are no memories of my mother in my head. My grandmother raised me until I was fifteen, when Hamid tore through my life like a bullet. Soumaya is the only mother, sister, and friend I’ve ever known.
Without her, I wouldn’t have lasted a week in the brothel. She taught me everything: how to know what each man liked and didn’t like, and which ones could be reasoned with, and which could only be submitted to. Whenever I’d been sick, she’d taken me to see the doctors; and when I’d come down with a bad case of another kind of sickness after my chance encounter with Abdulillah in the café, which had left me unable to forget the quiet way he’d looked at me, as if I were a human being, and how that look had rendered me incapable of selling what I’d been there to sell, or even letting on that I was selling, she’d taken me to see another kind of doctor.
Of course, I’d heard people call all sorts of things “Chinese,” from jewels and clothes to cars and phones, and I knew they didn’t always mean that they were made in China. Usually, they just meant that these items were knock-offs, like the Chinese-made Goucci Bags and Ban-Ray sunglasses that vendors hock on every corner. Still, when Soumaya announced that I needed a Chinese virginity, I’d had no idea what she was saying. I’d taken it to mean that I should try and find a Chinese virgin—that such a man would, for some reason, be more accepting.
Because I’d wanted her to think me capable and worthy of respect, I’d pretended to know exactly what she meant. Now, for the same reason, I tried to hide my rising apprehension. Luckily for me, Soumaya herself was finally getting into the spirit of our adventure. Every time a vendor came by our compartment, she insisted on buying. We did, with my money. We gorged ourselves on hard-boiled eggs, and cakes, and fruits, and tea. We crunched sunflower seeds between our teeth, spat their spent shells out the window, and laughed like madwomen when they were blown back into our laps, as if we hadn’t a care in the world. We were like schoolgirls. We were like thieves, pickpocketing youth from time’s cruel jaws. We were like actresses, both auditioning for the same role in the play.
Then we arrived in Fez. Men stood on the corners, dirty and dazed, tracking us with their eyes as Soumaya led me from alley to alley. One man squatted on a doorstep, presumably not his, hands pressed together as if in prayer, peacefully shitting. Another was ambling in a zigzag down an alley, knocking his fist against his forehead, muttering oaths.
In the middle of one street, a dozen men seemed to be trying to resolve a dispute. They were all shouting over each other, sounding like a pack of seagulls. Their eyes flashing like teeth. Their teeth flashed like knives. Their knives flashing like…well…knives.
Suddenly, one of them spotted us. He broke away from the group and came shambling toward us, dragging a damaged leg behind him as indifferently as if it were a suitcase.
“Marwan!” said Soumaya, sounding pleasantly surprised. “It’s been a long time, hasn’t it!” She drew something out of her purse: twenty dirhams. “Go and buy yourself something nice,” she whispered encouragingly, pressing it into his.
“You’re something,” I said from behind her, where I’d taken refuge, once the ragged man had finally finished his elaborate series of groveling genuflections and gone on his way. “Weren’t you frightened?”
“Frightened?” She let out an astonished laugh. “Of Marwan? Why should I be frightened?”
Her tone left me entirely without rejoinders.
“Come,” she said sharply, taking me by the arm—the upper arm, as if I were a child—and steering me along the street and toward a large, brick building. “Let’s get out of the sun.”
Had the streets always been this this? I found myself wondering, stumbling along. Had I simply failed to notice? Was that how numb I’d been?
Or was life on the streets really deteriorating?
The edifice to which Soumaya led the way was one of those buildings that looked very small from the outside, but nonetheless contained an endless labyrinth of cavernous rooms. Twenty-five years ago, it would’ve been old. Its occupants would’ve been squatters, including, most likely, a band of schuwaffas, who’d been in high demand those days, when people relied on witchcraft for everything, even for what I was going to do. Now, the building had been taken over by a clinic. We have entered a scientific age.
Soumaya had been telling the truth, I discovered as we entered the waiting room. Some of the women were dressed like me, others like her. Some were even in full hijab. There were young girls and middle-aged matrons. One was even old. They sat about haphazardly on metal chairs, each with the air of someone anxiously guarding something—perhaps the empty patches of wall and floor on which they fixed their eyes. If an expert mathematician had been recruited to devise a formula showing where each woman would have to sit to maximize her distance from the others, he couldn’t have been able to do a better job than they had done themselves.
With my head held high, I crossed the waiting room and spoke to the nurse, an old, gap-toothed woman who looked just like a grape left too long in the sun: “Monday is my tenth anniversary. I’d like to give a special gift to my husband.”
Her eyes grew wide. For a fleeting moment, another nurse’s face was superimposed over hers: eyes wide with a mixture of uncertainty and pity as she’d accepted my three hundred dirhams—“But this isn’t even a tenth of the cost”—and the childlike trust in her face when I’d clasped her hand and told her, fervently, “Sister, I’ll make it up to you. I promise. Just give me a few months to pay.”
I’ve never returned to that clinic. I’d never paid.
“This is to cover the cost of the operation,” I said now, to the old woman, folding my ten thousand dirhams into her wizened hands. “And this is to hurry things along. I’ve got a full calendar. I need to be next in line.”
I gave her another thousand.
Quickly, she counted the money, nodded with satisfaction, then slipped through a door and was gone. Perhaps I’d given her too much, I thought ruefully. Had the price come down since last time? It was possible.
It didn’t matter, I reminded myself. I could afford it these days.
Moments later, she returned. “The doctor is ready for you.”
Glancing back over my shoulder, I met Soumaya’s eyes. She was still standing by the door where we’d entered. She flashed an encouraging smile.
Shivering with unexpected joy, I turned and let myself be led through the swinging door and toward the operating room.
* * *
How can I describe the feeling? It’s not comfort, exactly—really, there’s nothing comfortable about it, not if you’re considering just the physical sensations—but sometimes the psychological sensations overwhelm the physical ones.
Renewed. I felt renewed.
I was renewed.
The first time, I’d been full of fear. On my back, beneath the cold fluorescence, I’d been possessed by awful certainties: that he would know, that he wouldn’t accept me, that he wouldn’t believe that I’d been chaste, that someone would gossip, that he would find out that I’d worked in a brothel, that the doctor would send someone after me to collect the money that I owed, that I would get an infection…so many things could go wrong. Just being there, breathing in bleach and despair and knowing that I was worse-off even than the others in the waiting room, who at least could pay the full ten thousand, had put me on edge.
This time, everything was different. It was no act of calculated need or desperation that had brought me here. It was a gift freely given—to the man I loved, and also to me, by the woman I loved. My first and only friend.
In that hospital bed, knees hugged to my chest like a newborn, I sobbed.
* * *
Late on Monday, Abdulillah returned. I was waiting for him. There were crimson petals on the bed and a bottle of champagne on the nightstand. I’d lit scented candles.
“What’s all this?” he asked, surprised, coming to a halt in the bedroom doorway.
“It’s our tenth anniversary,” I said from the bed, where I stretched like a cat beneath the covers. “I’ve prepared something special for you.”
“I didn’t expect this!”
“Of course not,” I said. “You haven’t even gotten to the surprise!”
It took no time at all before he was on top of me. Though pushing eighty, he’s still an energetic man. He shed his pants, but not his Western blazer. His swinging tie tickled my nose as he mounted me, causing me to sniffle and laugh and turn my head aside.
He began to push into me.
Then he hesitated.
My pulse quickened.
“What’s this?” he asked. “You’re still getting your period?”
“Oh, no,” I said. “That’s been over for years! No, my dear. Tonight, just tonight, I’m a virgin all over again. Just for you.”
Until that moment, I’d had my eyes closed. This was a habit I’d developed in the brothel, and since then, I’d turned what had once been a coping mechanism into a game, drawing on all my past experiences whenever I was with my husband and stitching together a pleasing collage. What mattered was motion. As long as he was moving, the identity and nature of the man above me couldn’t be pinned down. He was like a lover in a dream, for whom it was impossible to lose respect, of whom I would never grow tired.
Now, though, all at once, there was no motion.
My eyes fluttered open.
There was Abdulillah’s face, all right—but it wasn’t the one that I knew. The familiar palimpsest of expressions that made him who he was—the tenderness, the hunger, the urgency—had gone with the motion, and what was left…I can’t describe. I haven’t words.
All I can say is this: I’ve never seen anything even half as terrible as my husband’s understanding.
“You never were…” he began.
Then he gave up on words.
Somehow, though I couldn’t shut my eyes, I found that I was spared the trial of gazing at my husband’s understanding—though there still was a face in the dim light above me, and it was no less terrible than his.
On that face—Soumaya’s—was a rictus of triumph: a sight that I’ll never unsee.
END
Itto and Mekiya Outini write about America, Morocco, and all those caught in between. They’ve published in The North American Review, Modern Literature, Fourth Genre, The Good River Review, MQR, Chautauqua, CommuterLit, The Stonecoast Review, New Contrast, Eunoia Review, DarkWinter, Expat Review, Lotus-Eater, Gargoyle Magazine, and elsewhere. Their work has earned support from the MacDowell Foundation, the Steinbeck Fellowship Program, the Edward F. Albee Foundation, the New York Mills Cultural Center, and the Fulbright Program. They’re collaborating on several books, running The DateKeepers, an author support platform, and co-hosting a podcast and YouTube channel, Let’s Have a Renaissance.
