A Girl Made of Dust. Nathalie Abi-Ezzi

       Chapter Five

      At first things seemed to be getting better with Uncle Wadih around. A few days after he'd arrived, Papi tucked in his shirt and, sitting at the table, slipped on his shoes. His hair was combed and shining wet, and when he looked up his face was kind. It was a good day, then.

      Kneeling on a chair, I leant over the table. ‘Are you going to open the shop today, Papi?’

      ‘Yes. Don't we want to live?’ Then, in a better tone, ‘And don't you want to have books and go to school?’

      I nodded. His face, although it had just been shaved, still looked sandstone rough. He gave my hair a friendly stroke as he passed into the kitchen, and a clatter came from behind the door as he picked up the ratchet to wind open the shop's metal shutters.

      Mami ran her hand over his shoulder even though his sleeve was already smooth, and talked in a bright voice about nothing. ‘I think there's coffee in the back from last time. Everything will be dusty, but it won't take long to wipe off. Maybe I'll come up later.’

      Naji and I walked with him up the hill. Around us, the morning heat unfolded, thin and quiet as a tendril of vine, and somewhere a cockerel crowed. I was surprised at how light the ratchet seemed to be today. When we got to the shop, Papi slotted it into the hole in the wall, and the metal crumpled as the shutters opened, their wavy sheets bending into a giant roll above the door.

      Inside, the shop with its stone floor and high ceiling was cool. Silver gleamed on shelves that grew all the way up the back wall, and out of which pots and pans sprouted like fruit. To the left, knives glinted, their points hanging downwards, while beyond in the darkness was a mess of shapes: aprons, mops, buckets, glasses, water jugs, doormats, tea-towels and brightly coloured glass ornaments.

      The lights flickered on, forcing the shadows to slither away, and as that other magic place vanished into the cracks and corners, the shop became the shop again.

      Papi stood a moment looking, but we pattered in towards the counter and the shiny black till, our fingers ready to play over the large round numbers that stood up on metal sticks. Naji got there first, and something he pressed made the drawer fly open.

      Papi stepped up. ‘Don't play with that.’

      ‘Why not?’ Naji retorted.

      I pushed it shut. There were only some coins, a few one and five-lira notes inside.

      It was a full half-hour before anyone came in. She was a fat woman with puffed-up orange hair and enormous clip earrings covered with chips of blue and green glass. A small shiny handbag hung from one arm. I counted three chins.

      By the time I had taken her in, Papi was pulling a large pot off the bottom shelf. ‘This one is good – well made.’

      The rings on the fat fingers clicked against the metal as she took the pot in both hands, bouncing it gently up and down like a baby. But her head tilted back. ‘No, not this one. It's too light. No, it's no good.’ The three chins melted into one as she looked up. ‘What about that one up there – the red one?’

      Naji, who had been fussing with a pile of doormats, looked up.

      Papi disappeared to the side of the shop and returned with a ladder. It clacked against the shelves and he started to climb the creaking mountain. He went slowly, never changing his pace or hesitating – so slowly that the painful creaking seemed to come not from the ladder but from him. When his head was bent so that it wouldn't bump the ceiling, he reached out and jigsawed the red pot out from among the others. A thick cloud of dust came off the top when he blew on it.

      ‘Yes, I saw it on TV – I'm sure it was that one.’

      With the pot balanced carefully in one hand, Papi inched his way down. First one foot then the other felt blindly for the next rung, free hand scraping on the flaking navy-blue ladder.

      He was halfway down when the tutting came from below. ‘No, no, it's wrong. It's not what I want, I can see from here. Don't bother bringing it down. Save yourself the trouble.’

      Naji was glowering, his hands clenched in his pockets so they lifted his trousers and made his white socks show.

      Papi said something about it not being a bother, and up he went again, the pot's lid clattering and shivering. His square face expressed nothing as he carried the ladder back to its place.

      Now there was a soft tutting from among the knives, which clicked and flashed as the fat fingers examined them.

      ‘Why doesn't she leave?’ said Naji in an angry whisper. ‘She's not going to buy anything. Why doesn't he tell her?’

      She turned then and started walking towards the door. I watched the fleshy feet bulge over the tops of her heeled shoes at every step like soft, after-party balloons. But then they stopped and came back to the counter.

      ‘Is this your newspaper? Are you selling it?’ She fingered the pages lying open on the countertop. ‘I passed the newsagent already, didn't I? Up that way?’ Her arm rose and fell. ‘And I forgot to buy one.’

      ‘It's mine – but please …’ As Papi closed it, folded it in half and offered it to her, the shiny bag unflapped, a shiny purse came out and a single lira was drawn from inside.

      The breath was coming hard out of Naji's nostrils.

      ‘No, no.’ Papi held out a hand to stop her.

      ‘Why not?’ The brown note waved about as she spoke. ‘It's your paper and I want to buy it. Times are not so easy now. Why be embarrassed?’

      Beside me, Naji's face flushed to a deep red.

      ‘No. Please.’ Papi sank down a little into the counter. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself. Wallaow.’ He clicked his tongue.

      She paused with the note still pinched between her fingers, then nodding, took the paper and left.

      No one moved. We stared at Papi and he stared back at us. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Naji's mouth working as if he wanted to speak, shout, or maybe cry, but he did none of those things.

      Papi continued to stare at us, and his eyes were two deep wells of misery. Then Naji's heel scuffed the floor as he turned and left.

      For the next quarter of an hour Papi paced, frowning and muttering to himself. Then he phoned Mami. ‘I can't bear it any more,’ he said, so she came up to tend the shop for the rest of the morning.

      ‘My legs are hurting again,’ I complained after Papi had left.

      ‘It's only muscle cramps. You're growing up, that's all.’

      I rubbed my calves. ‘Then I don't want to. It's painful being stretched big. Besides, I'll have to be worried all the time like Teta,