HWJN (English 2nd Edition) (5 page)

(7)

Cancer and the flower

T
hat night Sawsan invited her friends over—maybe to prove that her house was not haunted. It was a limited-guest event with just a handful of girls. They spent most of their time in Sawsan’s room, avoiding the topic of Jinn for fear of hurting Sawsan’s feelings, or maybe for fear of a Jinni actually showing up. Their curiosity almost gave them away, but Sawsan courageously opened the subject as if she were ending the rumors.

“Girls, I’ve decided to ask the Jinn what upset them on the day of my party.”

Areej understood her objective and wanted to keep Sawsan from any embarrassment, and herself from any terror. “Sawsan, there’s no need for that. Just turn on a recording of verses of the Holy Quran and they will be gone.”

Khulud would not let such a chance pass her by. “If they were good Jinn, they would have enjoyed the DJ with us. There must be a reason. The only solution is to face them! Sawsan, bring a paper from the printer.”

Khulud started drawing the Ouija board. Areej was not happy about it, and the rest of the girls were nervous. I felt a hidden joy regardless of all the tension that was building up. Was it because I was going to talk to Sawsan again? What would I say? Should I seize the moment and confess to her how madly in love with her I was? That would terrify her for sure! Again the girls did not give me the chance to think it through.

“Is someone there? Is someone there?” Khulud called.

I know that if I did not respond they would stop. “M I S S E D… Y O U.”

Oh dear God, what had I done? I could not resist the opportunity! The room went numb until Sawsan brought it back life.

“Hawjan?”

I moved the marker to “Yes.”

Khulud was about to start her question, but I did not give her a chance to interrupt my chat with Sawsan. “F O R G I V E… M E.”

“Why did you do that? Did we harm you in any way?” Sawsan went on.

“N O T… M E.”

Khulud could not contain her curiosity. “Are there other Jinn in the house? Are they Devils?”

I moved the marker to “No.” “G R A N D F A T H E R… S I C K… M O T H E R… U P S E T…   S H E… D I D… N O T… M E A N… I T.”

Sawsan looked relieved. “Forgive us. We’re sorry. And please tell your mother and grandfather we’re sorry too.”

“H O W… A R E… Y O U.”

Areej could not pass up the chance to mock me. “
My oh my! Your Jinni is drowning, Sawsan. How about if we leave the Ouija to give you some privacy?”

She left the plastic piece, making its movement very heavy, but with some effort I returned to its normal movement,
then tried to ease the mood and get closer to Sawsan.

“I… W O R
R I E D… A B O U T… Y O U…   D O N T… B E… S C A R E D…I… A M… H E R E.”

Khulud noticed the smooth movement of the plastic piece. “Here’s a thought. We should try it with one person. Sawsan remove your finger let me try to move it alone.”

Sawsan did so, and the plastic piece stopped like a rock even though I was trying as hard as I could to move it. If this worked I would be able to talk to Sawsan without her friends having to be there.

“Khulud, let me try alone,” Sawsan said. “Since he’s concerned about me, maybe he doesn’t want to talk to anyone else alone.”

She set her finger on the plastic piece and asked, “Are you there, Hawjan? Can you respond?”

I did my best to move my hand over the plastic piece, but nothing happened. I hoped her soul could detect my movement; usually one soul was not enough to detect us. That’s why movement was easier when more Humans participated.

I tried and tried. There was the word—“Yes”—and I was almost there. Sawsan closed her eyes to focus, and finally the piece moved to “Yes”. That astonished everyone.

“Sawsan,” Areej said, “shame on you. You’ve been moving it from the start and making up this love story with a Jinni? And I’ve been about to faint from terror!”

“I swear I didn’t move it. It moved on its own! Are you there, Hawjan”?

I moved the piece to “Yes.” “I…
A M… M O V I N G… I T… I… W A N T… T O… K N O W… Y O U… A R E… O K.”

“Don’t worry. I’m great! I’m glad we cleared this up and that the problem is solved.”

“I… W A N T… T O… T A L K… T O… Y O U… A L L… T H E… T I M E.”

All of a sudden, terrified calm came over the room.

“D O N T… W O R R Y,” I added. “I… A M… M U S L I M… I… F E A R… G O D… A N D… I… F E A R… F O R… Y O U”

That seemed to calm Sawsan down. “How can I be afraid of my neighbor? I’ll talk to you whenever I find a chance.”

Thoughts filled my head. I couldn’t believe I was talking to Sawsan alone! I moved my finger over the board; thankfully the plastic piece did not show the anxiety I felt. It simply moved with a slow elegance. But I was afraid my thoughts would dissipate before I told them to Sawsan, and that I would never get another chance to talk to her alone.

“Y O U… D O N T… H A V E… C L
A S S E S… T O M O R R O W… T R U E.”

I was sure Areej would intrude as usual, and she did—but this time to my benefit. “No, no, no. This is too much! Let’s leave, girls, before
Hamanjan asks his Efreet friends to kick us out of here.”

Sawsan’s
cheeks went red. “Areej, stop teasing me!”

“My driver has been waiting for me for a while now,” said Khulud, resolving the situation even further to my advantage.

“Hamanjan. Please tell Sawsan how we did on our exams, and I promise I will hook you up with all the Human girls!”

They started to leave, and Sawsan was about to walk them to the door, but Khulud told her with a strict voice, “Don’t you dare remove your finger from that piece without saying goodbye!”

And then they departed. And I was with Sawsan alone in her room. I could talk to her directly, tell her how I felt, even flirt! Some moments of silence passed. Both our hands were on the plastic piece, smiles were on our faces, and anxiety was in our racing heartbeats.

“Hawjan, are you still here?”

“A R E… Y O U… S C A R E D… O F… M E.”

“Why should I be afraid? Can you harm me?”

“I… A M… S C A R E D.”

She laughed. “You, scared of me?”

“S C A R E D… F O R… Y O U.”

“Don’t worry. I’m more of a Jinni than you are.”

She suddenly removed her fingers from the plastic piece. Leaving me alone on the paper, she got her tablet from her desk and lay on her bed. She opened a typing program and put the plastic piece on it. I understood what she wanted before she even called out to me as if I were a flesh-and-blood Human with her in the room.

“Come here, Hawjan. I think the concept should be the same wither on paper or a tablet”

The plastic piece flowed smoothly on the tablet, but it was too big for the letters. Sawsan removed it and said, “Let’s try it without the piece.”

I put my fingers directly on hers and moved them. I felt as if I were controlling them, but they typed all the letters they passed over on the keyboard, not only the ones they touched, creating long strings of illegible words and sentences. Sawsan released a childish laugh, and soon after, Mrs. Raja knocked on her door. This frightened me, and I removed my hands quickly as if she would have been able to see me while Sawsan switched to a
youtube page as Mrs. Raja opened the door asking, “Sawsan? I can hear you out in the hallway. Who are you talking to?”

“I’m watching a new funny YouTube program called
AlaaAltayer.”

“It’s late. Don’t you have classes tomorrow?”

“No, Mom, and I’m not really sleepy.”

“Would you like me to make you something to eat or drink?”

“No. I’ll go to sleep in a bit. Thank you for everything. Love you.”

Mrs. Raja left the room, and Sawsan switched back to the typing app as put my hands back on top of
Sawsan’s on the tablet. Still lying on the bed, she whispered as if she were afraid her mother would hear her.

“We almost got busted!”

I responded in typing: “That was close.”

Sawsan and I were both shocked by how easy it was to type this way. She was so amazing. She talked, and I responded by typing with her fingers. The inventors of the Ouija board, both Humans and Jinn, would have been astonished by her invention. I wasn’t sure if such a method would be useful to others or if our relationship was a special case.

“Sawsan,” I asked, “what is on your mind?”

“I don’t understand.”

“You always cry alone.”

“Do you always watch me when I’m alone?”

“NO NO NO. I leave the moment you enter.”

“Then how do you know I cry?”

“The X-ray. Is your father ill?”

Sawsan was shocked by my question, and when tears started flowing down her cheeks, I regretted
asking it. Her fingers passed through my hands; moments passed and she did not talk. I tried my best to type, but her fingers would not move. I hated myself and how foolish I was.

Then she said: “That was my X-ray!”

The news was heavy on my heart. I couldn’t think straight. This sweet flower who shined happily on everyone and everything around her had a brain tumor? How strong she was!

“I’m okay with my fate,” she went on. “And I enjoy every moment of my life without worry. I act like I don’t know I’m ill, and I don’t think of telling anyone. Allah is generous. He will take care of me. And by the way, you haven’t told me anything about you. Tell me something about Jinn and your family. I want all the details, please. Don’t leave anything out.”

I swallowed my sorrow and told her everything I knew. She commented sometimes and smiled at others, but before long her fingers got heavier and I could tell she was resisting her body’s call to sleep.

“I can’t keep my eyes open Haw…” she said softly as she gave in to her body’s demands.

I smiled as I watched her, sure that she felt it. I pulled my fingers away slowly, afraid my movement would bother her, then sat on the edge of the bed, adoring the smile that never left her face, not even when she was asleep. And my tears flowed—tears of joy for talking with Sawsan, and of sorrow for her illness.

(8)

Four hundred and twenty years

I
have considered stopping this tale more than once. Why should I waste my time relating my problems and concerns to you? And why would you waste yours reading about them? I guess it’s curiosity—you Humans are full of that. I understand you are by nature worried about what is hidden, about mysteries and the unknown. I guess this insight into my life’s details might somewhat ease your concerns, or it might be an indulgence into your hobby of frightening yourself. I do not understand what you find amusing about terror. You make movies you don’t even watch because you are too busy closing your eyes and screaming! Regardless, I have chosen to go on telling my story.

A few weeks passed. I talked to Sawsan almost every day. We spent hours together, and she never made me feel as if I were a monster from another dimension. She was merely curious about the secrets that joined our two worlds. I never felt that I was more than four times her age; on the contrary,
Sawsan’s maturity always astonished me. I did not expect her to comprehend all the information I gave her about our world, but we talked about everything. Our questions would flood the conversation every time, and we would search for the answers together—agreeing sometimes, disagreeing others, arguing even more. I would have loved to share the intricate details of our interactions, but my story has no room for that here.

I spent the best days of my life with Sawsan. I read her books with her, watched her movies,
listened to her music… I even helped her buy clothes and accessories off the Internet. She would talk, I would move my fingers over the keyboard, and she would type it directly as if the barriers between our worlds had dissolved, and our souls were entwined.

She once asked me about the secret that kept the Jinn world hidden from Humans—the barrier that all of your advanced scientific and technological methods had failed to cross or even detect.

Humans seem so uninterested in any evidence that you are not the only intelligent beings in this universe, and that is your main problem: your vanity. Every time you discover a trivial scientific fact, you think you know the secrets of existence and refute anything your small world cannot comprehend. Life is much deeper and more complicated than the theories and formulas you try to cram everything underneath!

I tried to explain that to Sawsan so many times.

Life has so many intertwined dimensions and layers on top of each other, the smallest of which is
your world. Yes, with everything—all the planets, stars, and galaxies! You call it the material world because you can touch and feel it. But it’s followed by other layers that engulf your world with other worlds you do not feel: our worlds, the world of the Angels, and the worlds of the spirit. Each level feels and experiences the worlds that are beneath its own. However, no one can move between worlds without special abilities that Allah gives to whomever he wishes, or by using pure magic and the secrets of Babylon, or by getting the privileges of the Efreets and Marids.

This is called a multidimensional theory. I watched some of your documentaries on that with Sawsan, and you came close to solving the mystery through the Membrane Theory. However, I think you still need a few decades to prove in a scientific way the existence of other dimensions that are parallel to your own. For now just imagine that we are in similar worlds that are parallel, and that we feel you but you don’t feel us.

The ability to materialize in both worlds is the most powerful weapon of the Efreets and Marids, and varies from simple effects such as making noises or controlling electrical current, heat, and light all the way to materializing fully in your world. Although many claim to have such powers, they are very rare, and a lot of Jinn have died
trying. Not many Humans have survived coming to our side either.

Sawsan felt my existence when I was near her. She knew when I got back from work, and she prepared her tablet and coffee. She offered me some every time knowing I would not taste it, and my heart would melt.

We would talk so long, we would fall asleep, and I would wake to her gentle voice as she fiddled with her tablet: “Hawjan? Are you still here?” As if she
were afraid to bother me.

Once when she slept during our chat, I went to rest in her flower garden at the window. But my dreaming was cut short by Mother’s nervous call. I woke up and went straight to the roof, where I saw Grandfather sitting up straight after spending decades lying in his bed. He pointed to me with his shaking hands, beckoning me to sit next to him, as his eyes searched for something out on the horizon. The silence of the night was only interrupted by Mother’s sobs. Then Grandfather decided to talk, and it was as if I heard him speak for the first time.

“When I was a child, I saw The Battle of Harratain. I know no one else alive who has seen that battle.”

“May Allah extend your life, Grandpa, and keep you well,” I said.

“I was in my youth when the city of Yatmah drowned.”

When someone is about to die, he remembers the past and reminds himself of death, especially when one awakens suddenly from a long sleep. That is the awakening of farewell. Mother was sure this was happening to Grandfather despite my attempts to dismiss the thought.

“Grandpa, you need to rest. In a few days you’ll regain your health, and we can go for a pilgrimage… And…”

Grandfather did not hear a word I said. He turned to me. “Meehal was the most chivalrous, manly, and honorable Jinni I had ever seen in my life. He asked me to take care of you and your mother just before his soul left his body, while he was in my arms.”

Mother sobbed as Grandfather reminded her of my father, but he went on talking to me as if she wasn't there. “Meehal sacrificed himself so we can live. They wanted him to be their king, but he refused. They threatened and tortured him to give us up, but he stood to them until they killed him… Hawjan…”

“Command me, Grandpa.”

“Take care of your mother.”

“Grandpa!”

“And take care of yourself. And those kind Humans. Two Marids have been circling the house for some time now. I know what they want…”

I wondered if he knew what had transpired
between Xanam and me. Did Grandfather know of the shameful position I had put him and Mother in? Did he know that his life was in danger because of my foolish relationship with Sawsan?

“I do not have many days to live,” he continued. “What would they gain from an old man waiting for his time? They are here for you, Hawjan! Do you remember your father?”

Grandfather felt my face with his shaking fingers and smiled. “It is as if I see Meehal in front of me. You got everything from your father—a spitting image! You have no idea how much they’re hoping you will go back to them so they can gain back what they lost with your father. Allah gave him powers their strongest Marids would not even dream of. They want to marry you to your cousin so your father’s offspring will remain amongst them! Beware, Hawjan, of going back to them. Beware!”

His last statement was heavier on my heart than a mountain: “I took this responsibility from your father, and today I hand it over to you, Hawjan.”

He coughed violently, as if he were throwing out the last burdens from his chest. I lay him down in his bed gently. Mother and I did not leave. I slept next to his bed, and every time I opened my eyes I saw her gazing on his face or wiping his forehead, her tears flowing in silence.

As I lay there waiting for the inevitable, I thought about my job. I would probably lose it due
to my repeated absences. Once they had offered me a house near my workplace, far from Humans. I now wished I had accepted the offer before things had gotten so complicated.

Grandfather did not ask me to take care of Dr.
Abdulraheem’s family for nothing. I wondered what Grandfather was hiding. And who were the Marids circling the house?

The house’s vibe had changed in the following days with Grandfather’s illness worsening and Doctor Abdulraheem was always preoccupied with his worries, especially with the illness of his life’s flower, Sawsan. In such circumstances, one should ascend his  trust and connection to God alone while taking real steps for a cure, and one must be aware of any impostors! Such was the dark path that Sawsan’s father had slipped into, his despair had pushed him towards hopelessness. Without any suspicion on his side, it only took him further away from God and complete trust in God’s wisdom, kindness and mercy. This only made Dr. Abdulraheem and his family an easier prey for impostors and devils.

At one point a car stopped out front; it was Abu Attiyah, Dr. Abdulraheem’s friend, and with him was Shaikh Mussa Takkaw, an African sorcerer who claimed to be religious but his marked rings give him away. Xanam followed, and another Marid who never left Mussa’s side. Now I knew why Dr. Abdulraheem had not gone to work this day!

I quickly went down without anyone noticing me. I slipped in through the kitchen window and went into the dining room, which was separated from the living room by a shade. I held my breath and listened to what was going on without anyone knowing I was there.

Abu Attiyah spoke. “Abu Hattan, I swear to God, I only insisted on bringing Shaikh Mussa because I cherish you. He is a blessing and can see the unseen.”

In Arabian culture a man is usually called by a reference to his elder son, such as Abu (which means “father of”) Hattan in the case of Dr. Abdulraheem.

Shaikh Mussa clearly could not contain his vain smile. He was uttering sounds that would make those around him believe he was engulfed in prayers to Allah.

Abu Attiyah went on. “Ever since the day you told me about what happened in your house, he immediately knew: your house is haunted with protector Marids.”

Dr. Abdulraheem cut him off. “But this event had happened months ago, and nothing has come of it. We say our protection prayers every day and verses of the Quran.”

“You must know this entire real-estate project was built on a Jinn village! And their king’s treasure is directly beneath your house!”

Making sure not to give Dr. Abdulraheem a chance to denounce that thought, Mussa talked for the first time. He had an African accent. “These are treasures God brought to you from above seven skies. Who would reject what God brings to their doorstep?”

Abu Attiyah tried to play on Dr.
Abdulraheem’s weaknesses. “Abu Hattan, Shaikh Mussa, God willing, can convince the Marids to leave the house and reveal the treasure that has been legally yours since the day you bought the house and the land it is on. This is not an easy matter! But seriously, why would you reject such opportunity? Can you tell me what you’re leaving your kids with after your time here has passed?”

Abu Attiyah, knowing he had successfully manipulating Dr.
Abdulraheem’s emotions, went on enthusiastically. “Will you leave them with the mortgage payments? How will you pay for Hattan’s wedding? How will you provide them with housing? Do you want them to go through the hardships you went through? Life is not as easy as it used to be, Doctor! This is a chance God has given you! And your kids are a responsibility you must take seriously. God will not forgive you if you take this chance away from them.”

Mussa saw how Dr. Abdulraheem reacted to this and went in for the kill. “As God my witness, Doctor, I only seek His favor. I only came because Abu Attiyah, who is very dear to me, has praised you and asked me to help. I do not like to unveil these things. It takes a lot of effort and involves huge risks. But we will ask God for strength, and no Marid or Devil will stand in our way if it is God’s will! I’m willing to prove to you that we will rely only on the Quran and righteous Jinn servants. If you give me a chance I can find out the size of the treasure and get the Marids to show it to us so you will see it for yourself. In the end the decision is up to you.”

Xanam and a second marid -Shnan- clearly looked bored, as if they were so fed up with this repeated scenario and were just waiting their part of the show. Mussa went on to pull a red, velvet cloth out of his pocket that held an incense paste with a strong scent.

“This, Doctor,” he said, “is a paste over which we have read versus of the Quran. I will now ask the righteous servant
Mekayel to appear in front of you so you will believe me.”

Mussa put some of the paste in an ashtray and lit it, and thick, white smoke came out of it. Abu Attiyah whispered into Dr.
Abdulraheem’s ear: “Righteous servants always produce white smoke. You will now hear him yourself. Don’t get nervous.”

The smoke was getting thicker, and
Mussa’s uttering got faster. His eyes were closed and he waved his hands above the smoke.

Shnan sat in front of the ashtray and said in a theatrical voice, “Peace
be upon you, owner of the house.”

Dr. Abdulraheem trembled. He did not really comprehend what was going on, so he responded, “Peace
be upon you.”

“It saddens us that you do not want the help of your righteous Jinn brothers,” Shnan went on. “Your house is haunted by a family of protector Marids who watch over a treasure of a Jinn King. By God’s will we can convince them to hand over your treasure, or at least to move it away and go from—”