The Blue Between Sky and Water (11 page)

Nur’s Third-grade report card arrived studded with gold stars. Sam read it aloud. “It says, ‘Nur is a remarkably bright little girl. I am impressed by her reading and writing skills, which exceed her grade level. I would like to propose that she move into the fourth-grade reading class.”

Pride danced on Nur’s face, but then something else immobilized it when her mother reacted. “That’s nice. I was a good student in school, too. So you must get that from me. You don’t need that fancy school anyway. I went to public school and so can you. Won’t that be nice? You can be just like me.”

The thing that lived in Nur’s belly moved.

“Now that the tuition from the trust is coming to me, we can put that money to better use, for things we really need,” her mother added.

Tears rose up and Nur went to her room so no one would call her a crybaby. She remained in her room for hours, listening to the house beyond her door. Her mother’s chatter on the phone. The big-ass television. Sam. The two of them doing what they did in their bedroom. She put her hands over her ears. She thought about the fourth-grade reading class. Of an old man’s voice in her head,
Words are so important, Nur.
She looked around her room, attentive to irregularities in the paint, slight layers of dust settling on the surfaces of furniture, wrinkles in the curtain, smudges on the door, and details in the fabric of her dress. And a while later, she heard her mother leave.

Then, there was quiet. The quiet of a spooned-out hole in the heart. She pulled out her secret book, untied the blue ribbon, and stared at her list. Stared hard. A void meandered and grew in her belly until two large, bold words rose up, and she added them to her list. There, just under “Never Tattle” and “Never Squeal,” Nur wrote “Dirty” and “Bad.”

She put her book away, walked out of her room, and went into her mother’s bedroom, where she knew Sam was waiting for her.

TWENTY-FIVE

History took us away from our rightful destiny. But with Nur, life hurled her so far that nothing around her resembled anything Palestinian, not even the dislocated lives of exiles. So it was ironic that her life reflected the most basic truth of what it means to be Palestinian, dispossessed, disinherited, and exiled. That to be alone in the world without a family or a clan or land or country means that one must live at the mercy of others. There are those who might take pity and those who will exploit and harm. One lives by the whims of the host, rarely treated with the dignity of a person, nearly always put in place.

As the frequency of Nur’s mysterious illness increased, so did her mother’s anger. The school nurse called her once to pick up Nur early because she had a high fever. Her mother arrived shortly afterward, expressing shared concern with the nurse. But as they got to the car, her mother grabbed and squeezed her arm with an unnatural ire.

“There’s nothing you won’t do for attention! Is there?” Her mother burrowed those words with her nails into Nur’s flesh.

“I’m sorry,” Nur shrank.

“Shut up and get in.”

Nur climbed quietly into the car, dragging the heavy furnace of her body. She knew better than to cry, but she couldn’t stop the tears. Her eyes felt heavy and her heart cowered somewhere in a depletion spreading through her.

“I said shush. You’re not fooling me with your tears. On top of everything, now you wanna act like the victim?” Her voice rose and words sprayed a now familiar random rage. “THIS IS MY FUCKING WEDDING. I WILL NOT ALLOW YOU TO MAKE IT ALL ABOUT YOU!”

Nur turned her head to look out the window, sucked in one long breath, and there were no more tears. Just like that. At the age of eight. Nur’s tears dried up and they would not form again until she was an adult standing on Gaza’s shore, the Mediterranean caressing her feet, a folded and refolded letter in her hand.

Later that evening, Nur’s mother came into her room, gently asking if she wanted to eat dinner, but she didn’t wait for an answer. “I know I was hard on you today, but it’s only because I love you. I’m trying to make you a better person. See all the nice things I bought so I can give you a good life? Nobody ever did anything like that for me. I just need you to think about how I feel sometimes. I’m trying to make a good life for all of us, but that means you have to help. Your grandparents and the rest of the family are coming in for the wedding and I’m going to need you to behave and obey, okay? Do you think you can be a good daughter and show everybody what a happy family we are?”

Nur nodded yes.

“Good girl.”

The “big day” fell on June 1, the day before Nur’s ninth birthday. “I did that on purpose so I could give you the best present ever! The gift of a father and soon twin baby brothers,” her mother said.

Various family members arrived from Texas, and Nur’s grandparents, her abuelo and abuela, flew in from Florida. “Look at you! You’re so pretty!” her abuela exclaimed and continued speaking in Spanish. They seemed happy to see Nur again, and they didn’t call her Nubia. Her tía Martina and tío Umberto even remembered her birthday and brought a wrapped gift with a note that said
To our niece, Nur. Love, Tía and Tío
.

“To be honest, Santiago is the one who reminded us!” Nur overheard Tía Martina tell her mother. Nur perked up at the mention of Tío Santiago. Although she had only met him once before, Tío Santiago had instantly become her favorite relative. He had visited for only a few days, spending most of that time with Nur. He had given her guitar lessons and had taken her to the park. Nur had latched on to the attention with all the force she had, and when Tío Santiago had left, she had fallen ill with the familiar bellyache.

Now, a commotion at the front door pulled Nur to the living room. She saw the guitar case first. It was worn, held together with duct tape and bright stickers. Santiago ignored everyone and came to Nur, lifting her off her feet. “Nur! Look how much you have grown! I’m so happy to see you, my awesome rock-star neice!” Although Nur could no longer see feelings in color, she knew this was a vibrant blue moment. Almost like being lifted off the ground by her jiddo. Almost love. Her face, her eyes, heart, skin, hands, and toes smiled.

She stayed by her tío Santiago’s side for the rest of the day, even though her abuela remarked that he should tell “the little girl” to go play with kids her own age. But she pretended not to understand, especially because Tío Santiago ignored the comment, too.

On one of the rare occasions when Nur was not with her tío Santiago, she saw him across the room chatting with Sam. Desperation suffused her body, and she felt a sudden and intense hatred of Sam. Nur ran to Tío Santiago, pulling him away, taking full and sole ownership of him with such resolve that Santiago went with her outside where they could speak in private.

“Nur, are you okay, darling?” Santiago said.

Tears that formed behind her eyes but refused to fall were gathering in her belly.

“I have a bellyache,” she said.

Santiago crouched to face his niece. “Is there something else, Nurita?”

“I don’t want you to talk to Sam!” Nur blurted those words, unsure where they came from.

“Okay, I won’t talk to him. But can you tell me why?”

The full weight of her secret pressed on her. Her lips quivered, as if her body’s way of coaxing tears that needed to fall. Her breathing quickened and she stiffened. All the words she wanted to say collected in a stagnant cesspool inside her belly. “I don’t know. My stomach really hurts, Tío,” was all she could muster.

“Have you eaten, Nurita?” Santiago asked and she answered with a slight shake of her head.

“Let’s sneak off to the park and get some hot dogs. But we can’t be gone long or your mom will be upset with me,” Santiago said.

They left through the backyard and walked two blocks to the park. While they were eating their hot dogs, Santiago asked gently, “Nurita, has Sam or anyone ever hurt you or asked you to do something you didn’t think was good?”

“No.”

Keeper of Seekrets. Never Tattle. Never Squeal.

“Nurita, this is our family, but no matter what they say to you, only believe that you are wonderful.”

Nur nodded. “Okay, Tío.”

He smiled and added, “And when you’re older, do what I did. Get away from them as quickly and as far as you can.”

Tío Santiago left that night, without saying good-bye to Nur. She heard the big fight and knew that it was at least partly about her. It happened after Tío Santiago tucked her into bed. She could hear loud voices alternating between English and Spanish. Her mother said Santiago didn’t know shit about shit and should stick to being a loser, drug-addict hippie. She said he could talk about her parenting when he became a real man and had kids or at least got a job. Tío Santiago asked her if she knew when was the last time Nur had a meal or even a bath. He said she smelled as if she hadn’t bathed in a while. Nur’s mother told him to fuck off.

“What is wrong with this family?” Santiago yelled, and then he said the words that became solid objects the moment they hit the air. Words that became a fixture in Nur’s life: “She’s not an old shoe you can tuck away or throw out when you feel like it.”

There it was. An old shoe. The lurking thing inside her, always there, ready to be a bellyache, suddenly took form in the shape of a tattered old shoe. It walked up and down Nur’s body as she lay motionless. The old shoe stopped precisely on her belly. There were more voices and then she heard Sam say, “Why is a grown man like you spending time with a pretty little girl, anyway?”

There was a long silence, then a thud and the sound of things breaking before Nur heard her mother scream, “Get the fuck out of my house!”

Doors were slammed and anger seeped into Nur’s room from the space under the door and through the keyhole, crawling along the walls, curling her body on itself, and painting her sleep with dread of “the big day” tomorrow.

In the morning, she walked slowly into the hair-raising silence of the house, where she was first greeted by Sam. He was pouring juice into a glass; his left eye was swollen and bruised. The rest of the family was sitting around the table and they all turned to look at Nur.

“Where’s Tío Santiago?” Nur asked, her words tiptoeing amid the stillness.

Her mother turned away. Nur didn’t know if she should sit down or retreat. Her heart beat faster and harder in her chest. Sam did not speak. She had messed everything up with Sam, and now Tío Santiago was gone. What had she done? Her body trembled.

“I’m sorry, Mommy,” Nur said.

“Go back to your room. You were determined to ruin this day from the start and now you got what you wanted.” The words clawed at Nur and thickened the air as she sat on her bed, hungry, then lay down, then sat again. The old shoe walked around in her stomach and everything began to hurt. But she stayed in her room, until Sam came hours later with a sandwich, chips, juice, and cookies. She stared at him apologetically, sorry for turning on him. Sorry for hating him.

“I’m sorry, Sam,” she said.

“It’s okay, my princess. It’s good this happened so you can see for yourself who really loves you and who is going to stick by you,” Sam said, and Nur flung her arms around him.

“I’ve missed you,” he continued, but Nur did not react. “They’re leaving for the rehearsal in a little while and you and I can join them late, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Good girl.”

He left. Nur ate in her room, happy to ignore the commotion downstairs until there was the sound of a front door opening and closing, followed by car doors opening and closing, car engines starting and fading. Then, there was a silence cracking with the creak of stairs under the weight of someone’s feet. She put her book on the bedside stand,
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
by Mildred Taylor. She steadied her fists in her lap, staring at them as the footsteps reached the top step, which creaked the loudest.

Sam walked into her room, “Hey, princess,” he said.

Nur was ill throughout the wedding but didn’t dare mention the pains in her belly or the fire in her pee, and the next day, she was immobilized by fever. Sam brought her soup and kept checking on her.

“I love you, Nur, you know that, right?”

“I love you, too.” Even at the young age of nine, Nur wondered how love could occupy the same space as hatred.

“You remember that lady from the DSS?” Sam asked.

“Yeah.”

“She came to the house earlier. Your uncle Santiago is trying to cause trouble between us. He’s jealous of what you and I have.”

“No he’s not!” Nur mustered as much defiance as her limp body would allow.

“Well, you saw how he abandoned you. Who is the person who always stands by you and sticks up for you, Nur? No one will love you like I do, and you have to make sure that you don’t say anything that is going to break up our family,” Sam said.

“Where’s Mom?”

“She’s jealous that I love you so much.”

“Sam, my stomach really hurts and the walls are moving.”

“I’ll go get you some ginger ale. That usually helps.”

A while later, it could have been minutes or hours, Nur awoke to shouts downstairs. She could hear her mother, Sam, and other strange voices, but she didn’t have the strength to get up. The voices came nearer and began up the stairs. She thought she recognized the voice insisting, “Sir, we have a court order. If you don’t get out of my way, you will be arrested.”

The source of those words came into Nur’s room. “Nzinga!” Nur yelled her name, but no sound came out. Nzinga rushed to her bedside, “Jesus lord! Nur?” Then she turned and yelled in her wonderful accent, “Call an ambulance. She’s burning up.”

Nur blinked, feeling the warmth of her lids slide over her eyes.

“Jesus lord, she’s soaking in sweat and urine. What’s wrong with you people!” Nzinga panted as someone lifted Nur from the bed.

“I’m really cold,” Nur whispered. As she was carried down the stairs, she glimpsed Sam, tears in his eyes. Outside, she caught sight of a policewoman holding her mother’s arms. Her mother was screaming at someone. It was Tío Santiago.

Nur closed her heavy eyelids again, returning to the dream that had been interrupted by the commotion. There was a river. A girl named Mariam and a boy named Khaled with a streak of white hair who was teaching Mariam to read. She knew them well from her jiddo’s stories long ago. “Nur, it’s good to see you again!” Mariam said.