Chicago by Alaa Al Aswany

Author:Alaa Al Aswany
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins

We drank and talked. Wendy told me about her family. Her mother was a social worker and her father a dentist. She lived with them in New York until she got the job at the Chicago Stock Exchange. She was living by herself in a studio near Rush Street. She said that she loved Chicago but that sometimes she felt lonely and depressed. She thought sometimes that her life had no meaning. She asked me, “Do you think I should see a psychiatrist?”

“I don’t think so. These are normal sad moods that all people have at one time or another, especially since you’re living by yourself. Don’t you have a boyfriend?”

“I found true love once, and it was wonderful, but unfortunately it ended last summer.”

I took comfort in her answer and began to tell her about myself and about my love of poetry. She said, somewhat diffidently, “Unfortunately I don’t read literature; I don’t have the time.”

“You yourself are a beautiful poem.”

“Thank you.”

She picked up her purse and said, “I must go. I have work in the morning.”

“Would it bother you if I called you?”

“Not at all.”

I called her twice during the week and then I invited her on Friday to coffee at the school cafeteria (to minimize expenses). On the subsequent Saturday, following the instructions of the sage Graham, I invited her to dinner. This time she seemed to have paid more attention to her appearance. She wore black silk pants, a sleeveless white blouse, and a red jacket with a red flower pin on the lapel. Her simple attempt at dressing elegantly was touching and sincere. We had dinner in an Italian restaurant downtown. We talked and laughed as if we were old intimate friends. I actually felt very comfortable in her company. I told her everything, about my mother and my sister, my problem at Cairo University and my love of poetry. She asked me, “Do you dream of becoming a famous poet one day?”

“Fame is not a measure of a poet’s success. There are famous poets whose work has no value and great poets that people don’t know about.”

“So, why do you write?”

“I write because I have something to say. What matters to me is not fame but appreciation, that what I write reaches a number of people, no matter how few, and changes their thoughts and feelings.”

“Ever since I was a child, I’ve dreamed of meeting a real poet.”

“You are sitting with one.”

I held her hands across the table. I raised them slowly to my lips and kissed them. She looked at me with a captivating smile. We went out to the street, tipsy from the wine. The sound of her footfalls next to me gave me joy. She asked me suddenly, “Where are we going now?”

My heart raced and I said, “I have a great documentary about Egypt. Would you like to watch it with me?”

“Of course. Where is it?”

“In my apartment.”

“Okay.”

We walked to the L station. I hurried my steps, as if I were afraid she might change her mind.

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