The End of the Road (A Story)

"A Story"

Are they letters and the blackness of ink, or lights and dances of light? Is it a page to be folded and opened, or a flood of fragrance to be breathed and embraced? A tear welled in his eye and shut out his sight for a moment; he plucked it away, heart pounding, hand trembling, and set his gaze running breathlessly along the lines:

★

To you — everything about everything, from beginning to end... I remember, and I shall begin from where I remember, from the first thing of everything... My mother said to me — I was lying with my small head in her lap, contemplating the night and gazing at the stars: "Do you see that lone star in the corner of the sky? She is the friend of good children. Gather your wishes in the clasp of your hand and lift them up to her, and she will grant them to you."

I looked at my wishes to gather them, and found them one great wish with no partner and no like; so I clasped it in my hand and lifted it to the corner of the sky and whispered: "O my star, keep Wasi for me, make him happy, and keep him with me, for he is mad about me, as my father loved me before — so much, so much..." And my mother laughed and laughed aloud; but I did not laugh until the star's light shone on my face and I knew that she had heard and had bowed her head... That was in the calm, translucent summer...

And my mother fell ill on that stormy day, the day the pale yellow autumn leaves were scattered. I would weep upon her breast one moment and run to the garden the next, gathering the dying leaves that rolled along the ground and flinging them far away in fury and spite, and coming back to see the earth wrap itself in others — and to see my mother's face outdo the earth's coverlet in yellowness...

And in the night the thunder roared and my mother died. I shrieked in terror and ran panic-stricken toward the night, searching in it for my star; the wind slapped me and the rain pricked me, and when the night wept I knew that I had lost my mother and lost my star — and both were lost to me forever.

And yet my happiness stayed with me, because you were with me...

We grew up together; you became a young man and I a young woman, and you were I and I was you...

We drew our plans and spread out our hopes, and we dreamed and were intoxicated, and we walked and walked — until one day a stranger, an intruder, stood before my uncle and asked for my hand. I looked into his eyes, frightened and timid, and found them admiring and content. And before I could hurl a resounding "No," my uncle said: "Congratulations." There we stopped, and there the road came to its end!...

I brought you the news. I said nothing; I only looked long into your eyes, and you cried: "What is it — are you ill?" And the answer came to you from the direction of our house: a loud ululation that struck your ears without mercy...

You were stunned at first, then you understood, and a yellow film fell over your face like the pallor of grave illness, and you cried out as you clasped me to you: "No, no, you are..." And I did not know what to say, and I said to myself: "O God, will these hammers pounding my head not be silent a little, that I may see and hear?" Suddenly everything fell silent except your muffled sobbing; and pain stung me — a sting so sharp that it made me draw my hand from your hands and run...

Then you wrote; and I carried your letter and went about my room with it, pressing it gently and tenderly, as a mother presses her child! I armed myself with its lines and ran to my uncle, saying with fervor: "Uncle, my heart recoils from this suitor; spare me marriage to him." He answered me with a terrible look that snuffed me out, and I went back, overpowered, to your letter, kissing it as though it were you, standing and speaking...

And I stayed in the house, prisoner of my bed, a week, never leaving it. And when I was able to stand in the garden and stretch my gaze toward you, I saw your windows shut, as though they were saying: "A last letter came to me from him, for you: he has departed"...

So — two words only, and they were everything...

And I became the wife of that stranger who had cut off our road...

An iron stubbornness governed my life — a silent revolt my soul could not suppress.

I would be silent when he asked and speak when he was silent; I accompanied him only rarely, and if I did accompany him I forgot his existence... He met my revolt with palms of patience and forbearance. One evening the pain bore hard upon me, and I laid my head on his shoulder and wept... Then I looked at him, and looked; and he smiled, and I smiled... The stubbornness went, and grief remained, crouching, watching... And one day he said, all at once: "What would you say to a long journey, on which you would be wherever I shall be?" And I said: "Of course; I am wherever you are." So — four words only, and they were everything...

And I set out to buy things and make ready for the journey. That was the day before yesterday — the day I saw you walking within a few arms' lengths of me, on the same road! I drew near you, then reached you; you looked to the right, and found me!

Did I really collide with that blind beggar and give him a lira, thinking it ten piasters? Were people really moving around us — was there truly a street, and human beings, and clamor?

And we walked, and I said: "Is it you?" and you answered: "Is it you?" — and you were I and I was you! Time had changed nothing, and circumstances had not altered a truth that is the truth of our existence... And again I asked: "And how are you?" and you answered: "And how are you?" My answer is your question and your question is my answer — and so always! You are I and I am you...

We walked on, and suddenly you drew away from me and slipped your right hand into your pocket. I thought you meant to take something out, and I waited... but it stayed there. So I said faintly: "It is time for me to go back." Your eyes pleaded, protesting it — but you did not utter a letter; so I turned and walked alone...

In my room I opened my drawer and took from my little box a yellowed, perfumed paper, and went about with it, pressing it gently and tenderly, as a mother presses her child... And I stood at the window, gazing into the night and into the corner of the sky. A light shone upon my face, and I knew it for the light of a strange star that had taken my star's place; so I shut the window and sobbed...

And yesterday my feet led me on and I let them; and my eyes knew, before they saw you, that you were there, in the same place. And we walked along the same road, and we knew what would come, and what came, came. We stopped as we had stopped the day before yesterday, and I held out to you my hand with the yellowed, perfumed paper. You hesitated at first; then you stretched out your hand — and I saw it. And I had known that I would see it: a ring yellow as the paper! I stepped back a little and said: "Congratulations." You heard that — and I heard what my heart cried: "No! No! You are mine!" You smiled at what my tongue had said, as though you were a stranger returning courtesy for courtesy; then you smiled at what my heart had said, and it was a smile of another kind, one I know better than anything else...

And a dreadful fear gripped my heart with a hand of iron, and I said, before I drew back: "There is a last letter I want you to read." You understood, and pointed with your hand to a shop nearby and said: "Leave it here and I shall take it." And when I saw your lips trembling I said faintly: "It is time for me to go back." You passed your hand over your hair, bit your lip, and moved away from me... I stood watching and saying: "His foot must be paining him, no doubt — his gait is heavy"... An impertinent curiosity stared at me, so I turned and walked... alone. This is what was — and I know what will be!

I shall go far, far away... Perhaps I shall come back to my land, and perhaps I shall not; and if I come back, I shall glimpse you walking within a few arms' lengths of me on the same road, and I shall quicken my steps until I reach you, and you will look to the right and cry: "You!" and I shall say: "You!" — and so always: you are I and I am you... Six words only, and they are everything about everything...

*

And smoke rose, and perfume rose, and the perfume overwhelmed the smoke — and he wept...

And the smoke passed and the perfume remained — and he remembered.

He remembered a night when he waited for the answer to a perfumed letter, and waited; and the pain drove him wild, so he set off climbing the tree that leaned over her window, and from there he saw her... pale-faced, beating her hand upon her breast in her sickness... And his hand reached out, wanting to take her hand — and he fell...

On the ground his mother found him, his blood running over his lip, gathering into it the pain of his broken leg! In silence she carried him home; and in silence she departed, taking him and his pain away from the house...

And he remembered how he came back months later, limping; and how he stood dumbfounded, dazed, before her house, while the earth buried that half of his soul which fate had torn out and carried away from him...

Yes: she is he and he is she — the truth of her existence!

And he breathed in perfume and inhaled fragrance... and let scented blossom and fragrance be enough for him.