Aa

az.

Sandpiper
(t994)
Ahdaf Soueif

Outside, there is a path. A path of beaten white stone bordered by a white wall - low,
but not low enough for me to see over it from here. White sands drift across the path.
From my window, I used to see patterns in their drift. On my way to the beach, I
would try to place my foot, just the ball of my foot, for there never was much room, on
those white spaces that glinted flat and frec of sand. I had an idea that the pattems on
the stone should be made by nature alone; I did not want one grain of sand, blown by
a breeze I could not teel, to change its course because of me. what point would there
be in trying to decipher a pattern that I had caused? It was not easy. Balancing, the
toes of one bare fbot on the hot stone, looking lbr the next clear space to set the other
kxrt down. lt took a long time to reach the end of the path. And then the stretch of
beach. And then the sea.
I used to sit where the water rolled in, rolled in, its frilled white edge nibbling at the
sand, withdrawing to leave great damp half moons of a darker, more brownish-beige. I
would sit inside one of these curves, at the very midpoint, fining my body to its contour,
and wait. The sea unceasingly shifts and stirs and sends out trngers, paws, tongues to
probe the shore. Each wave coming in is different. It separates itself from the vast,
moving blue, rises and surges tbrward with a low growl, lightening as it approaches to
a pale green, then tums over to display the white frill that slides like a thousand snakes
down upon itself, breaks ancl skitters np the sandbank. I used to sit very still. Sometimes
the wave would barely touch.my feet, sometimes it would swirl around me then pull
back, sifting yet another layer of sand from under me, leaving me wet to the waist- My
heels rested in twin hollows that filled, emptied and relilled without a break. And subtle
as the shadow of a passing cloud, my half moon would slip down the bank - only to be
overtaken and swamped by the next leap of foaming white-
I used to sit in the curve and dig my fingers into the grainy, compact sand and feel
it grow wetter as my fingers went deeper and deeper till the next rippling, frothing rush
of white came and smudged the edges of the Iittle burrow I had made. Its walls
collapsed and I removed my hand, covered in wet clay, soon to revert to dry grains that
tr would easily brush away.
 Sandpipr 371

I Ieaa against the wall of my room and count: twelve years ago,
years ago, I married him. Six years ago, gave
I met him. Eight
I birth to his child.
For eight summers we have U.en n"."; to the beach_house west of
Alexandria. The first summer had not been"o-ming
a timl of refleciron; my occupation then had
been to love my husband in this to me
-
walked towards my parasol, shaking the
- new una aime."nt place. To love him as he
water from his blact hair, his feet sinking into
the warm, hospitable sand. To love him u, n"
the seaJh.rew him in, caught him and hoisted ""JJ-t
i, i"ph"* on his shoulders into
il; ;p ;;;;", a colossus besrriding &e
b"",him as he ptayed backgammon with his Fatner in the evening,
l,rlll:_3
ot counters and the clatter of dice resounding the slam
orr the patio while, at tire ainng_room
table, his sister showed me how to draw
theii ornate, circular
-tiveO script. To love this new
him, who had been hinted at but never reveat"a
*fr"n *e-tf,. in my northem land, and
who after a long absence, h1! found his
me along with him. We walked in the sun;er
way back lnto h"* of his country taking
along the-wat".,s edge, kicking at the
spray, my sun-har fallen on ml.!a9k,
my hand, pablronze in ns Uurit i.ow;;-f"*
- Iow, **:-T:"*r
i:,
his: aglow wlh.health.and r."",
ror tlle tnsurance or a two_week break in
y"d"..pt" n a g\tzy commercial
: path. the sun-"
rach, I My second summer here was the sixth summer
of our love _ and the last of our
happiness._ carrying my child
)m, on and roving her father, I sat on th" beach, dug
sand and let my thoughts wander. I tf,orgf,t holes in the
ms on li'f" ,n _y counrry, before we
were married: four years in the cosy "Ului "u,." iop
wn by flaf precarious .f u i,
.oof C"orgi"n
square, him meering me at the bus_siop
I there
it did not rain and we sar in the park with
*t.n t cam";;k;_ work, "
Sundays when
rg, the **.p"p.r.l farc nights at the movies. I
: other thought of those things and missed _"r.brr *id;;;;;r sense of toss. Ir was as
though they were a'there, to be called _them
tch of upon, to b" [*a- *h"n""", we wanted.
I looked out to sea and, now I realise,'I ;* ;yi;;;; "!uin out my
rhought a lot about rhe water and the
i.o.t co_ordinates. I
at the sand u. I .ri drE them me€t and flirt
and touch. I tried to understand that I "-*uictring
:ige. I
the vastness ahead was nothing compared
was ." A" ttJ'u".y of Africa; that
)ntour, to what "agr,tai n"ninO _"."ag" even though
nut
I'd been there and seen for mlself ia* n"u".-"naing
ues to
the big sky, my mind could not grasp
J,1il;; rnrerior, irs mountains,
vast, a world that was not p."""n, to my senses _
hes to could see the beach, the waves,.tie Ui"" I
U"y.ra, una *"jiirg *"_ all, my baby.
rnakes I sat with mv hand on mv bety and *"1 i"r'J" ,iry
that (old me how she lay und *h"r
;;;;""., trre smat flunerings,
:times st. *as f.eting. Cra'A";if,. *" came lo talk ro each
r pull other' She wourd curr inro a tighr nu' in
on" .o?nel'liri ooa, un,ir, Iopsided and
t.My uncomfortable, I coaxed and prodded
her back i* *.*',"*o.d, relaxed position. I
subtle slowly rubbed one corner of my belly until "
the re , ,i_"J ,"rgf,, at my hand, I felt a
to be gentle punch. I tapped and she punched
uguio. l *"" ;"n-ilrne. For seventeen years
my body had waited to conceiv_e, and noi
my heart had caught up with it.
I feel Nature had worked admirabtv: I had
wantei ""J,liro my love
il"-;ili;;"gh
and how I loved her father tiat summer. for her father
; rush My body could _.- ..-' g"t
noi of him. His
walls baby was snug inside me and I wanted
him there ioo. "nougt
s that From where I shnd now' all I can see
is dry, so[J white. The white glare, the white
wall, and the white path, narrowing in the
distance.
 372 Stories of Ourselves

I should have gone. No longer a seryating thoughr but familiar and dull. I should have c
gone. On that swirl of amazed and wounded anger when, knowing him as I did, I first
A
sensed that he was pulling away from me, I should have gone. I should have tumed.
sl
picked up my child and gone.
I turn. The slatted blinrls are closed against a glaring sun. They calr the wooden
r
blinds sfreesh and tell me it's the persian word for glass. So that which sits next to a
ai
thing is called by its name. I have had this thought many times and feel as though it
fn
should lead me somewhere; as though I should draw some conclusion from it, but so far
ll
I haven't.
I draw my finger along a wooden slat. Um Sabir, my husband's old nanny, does
everything around the house, both here and in the city. I tried, at first, at least io help,
po
bu-t she would rush up and ease the duster or the vacuum cleaner from
my handi. inf
'Shame, shame. What am I here for? Keep your hands nice and sott. Go and rest.
Or sai
why don't you go ro the club? What have you to do with these things?' My husband
in
translated all this for me and said things to her which I came to understand meant
that
tomorrow I would get used to their ways. The meals I planned never worked out. Um
AII
Sabir cooked what was besr in the marker on rhat day. Ii I rried to do the shopping
the airl
prices trebled. I arranged the flowers, smoothed out the preats in rhe curiainJand
bel:
presided over our dinner-parties.
tele
My bed is made. My big bed which a half-asleep Lucy, creeping under rhe
mosquito-net, tumbles into in the middle of every night. She fits henelf into my
I put my arm over her until she shakes it off. In her sleep she makes use of me: mv
body and Ist
pret
breast is sometimcs her pillow, my hip her footstool. I lie content, glad to be of use.
i the
hold her foot in my hand and dread the time so soon to come when it will
- - no lonper coul
be seemly to kiss the dimpled ankle.
wat(
On a black leather sofa in a transit lounge in an airport once, many years ago, I
tow(
watched a Pakistani woman sleep. FIer dress and trousers were a deep, yell,ow
silk and I
on her dress bloomed luscious flowers in purple and green. Her arms were covered in
gold bangles. She had gold in her ears, her left nostril Ld around
Il
her neck. Asainst her
body her small son lay curled. one of his feet was between her knees, her noie was
in on t(
his hair. All her worldly treasure was on that sofa with her, and so she slept.soundly
on. in an
That image, too, I saved up for him.
unbli
I made my bed this moming. I spread my arms out wide and gathered in the soft,
with
billowing mosquito-ner. I twisted it round in a thick coil aacl tied it into a loose
looo that every
dangles gracefully in mid-air.
meat-
_ -Nine years ago, sitting under my first mosquito_net, I had wntren, .Now I know how Th
it feels to be a memsahib.' That was in Kano; deep, deep in the heart of the continent
door r
I_ now sit on the edge of. I had been in love
wlth him for three years and being apart tray a
then was a variant, merely, of being together. When we were separated
there was for my th
each a gnawing lack of the other. we would say that this confirmed our
true, essential rny fa
union. We had parted at Heathrow, and we were to be rejoined in
a fortnight, in Cairo, the wi
where I would meet his family for the first time.
leaves
. I had thought to write a story about those two weeks; about my first trip into Africa: Ip,
about Muhammad al-senusi explaining courteously to me the inferior
status of women, Iong cr
 Sandpiper 373

ave courteously because, being foreign, European, on a business trip, I

was an honorary man'
irst A story about travelling the long, straight road to Maiduguri and stopping at roadside
red, shacks to chew on meat that I then swallowed in lumps while Senusi told me how the
meat in Europe had no body and melted like rice pudding in his mouth. About the time
len when I saw the lion in the tall grass. I asked the driver to stop, jumped out of the car,
oa aimed my camera and shot as the lion crouched. Back in the car, unfreezing himself
hir from honor, the driver assured me that the lion had crouched in order to spring at me.
far I still have the photo: a lion crouching in tall grass - close up' I look at it and cannot
make myself believe what could have happened.
oes I never wrote the story although I still have the notes. Right here, in this leather
:lp' portfolio which I rake out of a drawer in my cupboard. My Africa story. I told it to him
rds- inrt"ud - and across the candlelit table of a Cairo restaurant he kissed my hands and
Or said, 'I'm crazy about you.' Under the high windows the Nile flowed by' Eternity was
rnd in our lips, our eyes, our brows - I married him, and I was happy'
hat I leaf through my notes. Each one carries a cornment, a description meant for hirn'
Um All my thoughi weie addressed to him. For his part he wrote that after I left him at the
the airpori he turned round to hold me and tell me how desolate he felt' He could not
rnd believe I was not there to comfort him. He wrote about the sound of my voice on the
telephone and the crease at the top of my arm that he said he loved to kiss'
the Wh"t ,tory can I write? I sit with my notes at my writing-table and wait for Lucy'
and I should havi been sleeping. That is what they think I am doing That is what we
my pretend I do: sleep away the hottest of the midday hours' Out there on the beach' by
her five
?, I ihe pool, Lucy hai no need of me. She has her father, her uncle' her two aunts,
u wealth of playmates and protectors. And Um Sabir, sitting patient and
Eet "ooiin.;
watchful in het black jalabiyyah and tarha' the deck-chairs beside her loaded with
), I towels, sun-cream, sun-hats, sandwiches and icod drinks in Thermos flasks'
rnd I look, and watch, and wait for LucY.
iin In the market in Kaduna the mottled, red carcasses lay on wooden stalls shaded by
her grey plastic canopies. At first I saw the meat and the flies swarming and settling' Then'
rin in iop of the grey plastic sheets, I saw the vultures. They perched as sp:urows would
on, in an English m-k"t sq.r-e, but they were heavy and still and silent' They sat cool and
unblinking as the fierce sun beat down on their bald, wrinkled heads' And hand in hand
rft, with the fear that swept over me was a realisation that fear was misplaced' that
hat everybody else knew they were there and still went about their business; that in the
meat-market in Kaduna, vultures were commonplace'
ow The heat of the sun saturates the house; it seeps out from every pore. I op€n the
door of my room and walk out into the silent hall' In the bathroom I stand in
the shower
ent
tray and tum the tap to let the cool water splash over my feet l tuck my skirt between
'art water' I press wet palrns to
for -y tltigttt and bend to put my hands and wrists under the
una picture grey slate roofs wet with rain' I picture trees; trees that rustle
in
:ial *y fuc,-e
the wind and when the rain has stopped' releasc fresh showers of droplets from their
ro,
leaves.
pad out on wet feet that dry by the time I arrive at the kitchen at the end of
the
ca: I
long corridor. I open the fridge and see the chunls of lamb marinading in a large metal
:n,
 374 Stories of Ourselves

tray for tonight's barbecue. The rnountain of yeUow grapes dmining in a colander.
I
out a cluster and put it on a white saucer. um Sabir washes all the fruit and veset
in red permanganate. This is for my benefit since Lucy crunches cucumbers
:tr-aiCht gtlt
of the greengrocer's baskets. But then she was born here. And "n,r""*ott
no* she
belongs. If I had taken her away then, when she was eight months
old, she would have
belonged with me. I pour out a tall glass of cold, bottlJd water and
close the fridge.
I_ walk back through rhe corridor. past Um
_ Sabir's room, his room, Lucy,s .Jom.
Back in my room I stand again ar the window, looking out through
the chink in the
shutters at.the white that seems Dow to be rosing the inlensity of iti glare.
If I were to
move to the window iri the opposite wall I would see the gr;en lawn
encircled by the
three wings of the house, the sprinkler at its centre ceaseless-iy twisting,
rwisting. I ;.und
and press my forehead against the warm glass- I breathe on the window_pine
but it
does not mist over.
I turn on the fan. It blows my hair across my face and my notes across the bed. I
kneel on the bed and gather rhem. The top one iays, ,Ningi, his
big teeth stained with
Kola, sits grandry at his desk. By his right hand there is a b-icycle reit
wtricrr he rings to
summon a gofer -', and then again: ,The three things we stop
for on the road sh-ould
be my_ title: "Peeing, Praying and petrol".' Those w-ere light-hearted
times, when the
jokes I made were not bitter.
I lie down on the bed. These four pillows are my innovation. Here they use one long
pillow with two smaller ones on rop of it. The bedrinen comes in
sets. consequentty m|
bed always has two pillows in plain cases and two with embroidery
to match the sheets.
Also, I have one side of a chiffonier which is ful of rong, embroidered pilrowcases.
when I take them out and lrnk at them I find their flowers] shertered for
so rong in the
dark, are unfaded, bright and new.
Lying on the bed, I hold the cluster of grapes above my face, and
bite one off as
Romans do in films. Oh, to play, to play again,-but my only playmate
now is Lucy and
she is out by the pool with her cousrns.
A few weeks ago, back in Cairo, Lucy looked up at the sky and said, .I can
see the
place where we're going to be.'
'Where?' I asked, as we drove through Gabalaya Street.
'In heaven.'
'Oh!' I said. 'And what's it like?'
'It's a circle, Mama, and it has a chimney, and it will always be
winter there.,
I-reached over and patted her knee. ,Thank you, aariing,, t
saia.
. Y3s, I am sick - but not just for home. I am sick for I'time, a tlme that was and
that I can never have again. A lover I had and can never have
agarn.
I watched him vanish - well, not vanish, slip away, recede. He dia not want to go.
He_did not go quietly. He asked me to hold him, but-he
couldn,t tell me how. a faif
godmother, robbed for an instant of our belief in her
magic, tums into a sad old womai,
her wand into a useless stick. I suppose I should have ien
it comrng. My foreignness,
which had been so charming, began to irritate him. My inability
to remember names, to
follow. the minutiae of politics, my struggles with his language,
my need to be protected
from the sun, the mosquito€s, the saladi, the Orioti"g *aie.. ife
was back home. and he
 Sandpiper 375
t pick needed someone he could be at
tables home with, at home. It took perhaps year.
was broken in two, mine was simply a His hean
broken.
AITotS I never see my lover now. So'metimes, as he romps
v she bends over her grazed elboq or with Lucy on the beach, or
sits our long tull,e "-' ." u, a dinner_party, I
f.orn
have ,*.u I could yer
Tln
.across
fall in love with, and I ru_i*uu.
I told him roo abour mv firsr mirage, ,h" *;i'.;;;,
oom. And on the desen road to alexanOria rhat long road to Maiduguri.
n the ttrc first summer, I-'Ju* rt ugurn. ,It,s
believe it isn'r there when I can hard to
see it.o
:re to 'You only think you see it,' he said. "l"u.ly]-il;;;il"a.
y the the same rhing?'r asked. ,My brain
stand ,rr,t#;i,jli: tels me rhere,s warer there. Isn,t
)ut rt and
shrugged. .If all you
,.,^I:::^T.:dO, want ro do is sit in the car and see it.
rl you wanr ro go and pur yoru hands in it *d d,ink, i;;;
But
,ed. I gave me a sidelong glance and irn,t surely?, He
smiled_ "nougr,,
with Soon, I should hear Lucy-s high, clear
voice, chatering to her father as they
gs to i1 the graver drive to the back door. s"h;l walk
rould
fnn{ lr_ana_ug tr,"-
Ul S.Otr. I will go our smiling ,o _"., ,r,"- a,,J'r," *n a"f]# will come the heavv
r the ** 3-|
Lucy rnro my care, and ask if I,m. OK_with a slightly ;;; ffi;
" Lucv into
anxious look. I will take

long
my bathroom while he eoes into his.
back and showered anJ changed,
Later, *nJ tft;;;i il il;ffi;;ieiH
everyone *iU sit the barbecue and eat and
r/ my drink and talk politics and r ".orrO irony
jokes of. hopeless, helpless
rake.n ernhr^i,r-.., and laugh. I should
reets. take up em "-, s^.::l"f
broidery and rart- on" th. A ;;;; ;;;'|;pX;;
' '-""""' J' ;J ;fi::,;
fif; :
ases. imagine will be necessary for Lucy,s " "
,. r#J,1r"r*l# t oura"ur-."- "1i:
l the
.. ,"r minor and asked Iio"o;:yl:1"l:1.,1",:n:yer
my for a french.plair. r *t
u"r,i"a r,",
she.examrned herself intentry in

ff as
*'_:iT-"1=,:.::Tq'lffo rt..wr,"i';;;"*,,'#,n
pruil"g "i;;;;ffi1:1i*":,3;;
um Sabir covered arithi
His sister said, .Thev say if a baby looks'in
,,frirrors.
and
the ;ir;;?*";".""'i?"1t"ff
*rave.' We laughed bur we dii nor remove the covers; they stayed in place
xyr till she was
I looked at Lucy's serious t""" *";rrrro: I had seen my grave once, or rhought
T rhe. prane
* H::l**,?:Tl-j3"l :.ry.
times r heard the randing-gear "* "iivigJ.ii'"i."red cairo airport.
come down, ana tr'ee imes iiffi #;Xffi.
when the announcement came rhar
;"ij ::"T:,-,"j",,,:i..:T::r"*:lT:T"l
re re-routing to Luxor they shook rheir heads uJ;.;;';-;;;; ffi;.Ti
:*::,::::::y:::jll;* tord there ,,", ;;;i; iiin"i-" uno"."oi"g"
te pilot was going ro aftemDt a crashJanding.
I rhoughr,;*Jr"*i;",iliff:l: "na
discreetiy and not ctog Aa,-
!:*",".^ly::
at belts, rake off our shoes and warches; put
the""p.i.
u;" i""." to fasten
"rr"c
cushions ,.J;:t:#;il:l
*ith ou.;;;;;;;", heads r srung
ffiJiT
l.yith Tj *:.^:":g^".:":_T"_
my passport, tickets and money around my neck _0.n.,iil;r'*i#
things. M^y Finnish neighbours formally
stroot each o,f,"r;.'ilo.. O, ,f,"
re was perfect silence as we dropped
out of the ,ty. Aia tn.n a terrible,
machinery as we hit trre ta.mac. enJ in
::"f:j"i::l::*ngof
my ttut _o*"nt,
head, but all of me, my whole being,
seemed .
,;i; il";;il"k,'#ffi;
 376 Stories of Ourselves

radiance, but lucid. Then three giant thoughts. One was of him - his name, over and
over again. The other was of the children I would never have. The third was that the
pattern was now complete: this is what my life arnounted to.
When we did not die, that first thought: his name, his name, his name became a
talisman, for in extremity, hadn't all that was not him been wiped out of my life? My
life, which once again stretched out before me, shimmering with possibilities, was meant
to merge with his.
I finished'the french plait and Lucy chose a blue clasp to secure its end. Before I let
her run out I smoothed some after-sun on her face. Her skin is nut-brown, except just
next to her ears where it fades to a pale cream gleaming with golden down. I put my
lips to her neck. 'My Lucy, Lucia, Lambah,' I murmured as I kissed her and let her
go. Lucy. My treasure, my trap.
Now, when I walk to the sea, to the edge of this continent where I live, where I
almost died, where I wait for my daughter to grow away from me, I see different things
from those I saw that summer six years ago. The last of the foam is swallowed
bubbling into the sand, to sink down and rejoin the sea at an invisible subterranean level.
With each ebb of green water the sand loses part of itself to the sea, with each flow
another part is flung back to be reclaimed once again by the beach. That narrow
stretch of sand knows nothing in the world better than it does the white waves that
whip it, caress it, collapse onto it, vanish into it. The white foam knows nothing better
than those sands which wait for it, rise to it and suck it in. But what do the waves
know of the massed, hot, still sands of the desert just twenty, no, ten feet beyond the
scalloped edge? And what does the beach know of the depths, the cold, the currents
just there, there - do you see it? - where the water turns a deeper blue.
I