The Girls from Alexandria by Carol Cooper

Author:Carol Cooper [Cooper, Carol]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Agora Books

I can’t focus on that now. Didn’t the nurse say Terry would be here soon?

* * *

Energy had drained from me along with the blood. The tall Armenian doctor in Cairo had advised rest. ‘You can tell people you have le foie fatigué.’ It sounded plausible enough. Practically everyone I knew had claimed to suffer at some point from a tired liver. ‘Take iron tablets. And eat nourishing dishes like chicken with rice and white sauce,’ he added.

I wasn’t used to resting. ‘What shall I do with myself?’

‘Try jigsaw puzzles,’ he replied.

While I stayed for a few days at my parents’, waiting for my fatigued liver to recover, I plundered Mother’s cupboards and found a 5,000-piece puzzle that might, days or weeks hence, become a Cunard ship with its many funnels.

‘Ayoo!’ Rashida stroked the box. ‘Pretty, pretty boat.’

‘Yeah. So what?’ I found it hard to summon enthusiasm for putting the pieces together when there was a perfectly good photo on the box.

‘Don’t get angry, my heart,’ Rashida said.

‘Sorry, Rashida.’

Simone would have ordered me to snap out of it with one of her killer lines, and I was equally sure I’d have obeyed. Months now since she had left with only a vague promise to return, and so little information since. I tipped the puzzle out on to the breakfast table and half-heartedly sorted through it. The blue pieces all looked the same, though suppose that the piece in my hand wasn’t part of the sky or the sea, but something more significant that I should be looking for?

‘Simone’s sent another card,’ Mother called out when the postman had been.

Her postcard from Lucerne showed a covered wooden bridge next to a tower growing out of the lake. Rashida fussed about making coffee so we could all study Simone’s message properly.

All’s well here, alhamdul’Illah.

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