Writing · Amr Khater

Chapter 3The Clipboard

The crying starts on the third night. Not in the doctor’s office, not in the car on my way home, not anywhere you’d see a protagonist fall apart in the movies. It starts with something mundane: brushing my teeth. There is no apparent reason. There is one big reason, of course, but no reason to cry about brushing your teeth, unless you’re seven and your mom is making you.

After that, crying becomes a full-time employee, with a shift that starts at 9 p.m. every night. What a great employee he is: always on time, never misses a shift.

Who the fuck goes to an ophthalmologist for a new glasses prescription when he’s about to die? That’s the curse of always doing what you’re supposed to do.

Despite all the nights you’ve spent sobbing into a pillow that smells only of you, the ophthalmologist checks your eyes and tells you they’re dry. You need drops, she says.

Dry? With all these tears? Maybe I’m running out of them, you think.

But even a river can run dry. Even a well goes barren if you keep drawing from it and the rain stops.

You get your eye drops and go home, and then it hits you again, the feeling you’ve been hiding from since that cold room where you sat listening to the doctor: how alone you really are.

You’ve never been any good with anything near your eyes. Even at the eye test, when that strange machine blows its little puff of air, you brace yourself like a scared kid in a war zone listening to the bombs, wondering which one will choose him.

You grab the tiny bottle, tilt your head back and try. You miss. You miss again. Your hands shake, not from the cancer, not yet, just from being an almost-forty-year-old man alone in a bathroom, trying to do something that clearly needs a second person.

When you finally hit the target, you close your eyes. You feel the sticky liquid sliding down your face, and honestly, you can’t tell whether it’s the drops or tonight’s tears, right on schedule.

في وقت متأخر من إحدى ليالي الشتاء استيقظ أهالي البلدة على صوت جيتار حزين يشق سكون إحدى ليالي ديسمبر الباردة، توجه الجميع كلٌ نحو نافذته في محاولة لاكتشاف مصدر الصوت، ولكن كثافة الضباب حالت بينهم وبين المصدر..

استيقظ الناس في صباح اليوم التالي، وظلت أنغام الجيتار الحزين تنبعث من أطراف البلدة ناحية النهر، توجه أهالي البلدة إلى هناك ليجدوا رجلاً عجوزاً رث الثياب طويل اللحية هزيل الجسم، يعزف دون توقف على أوتار جيتاره الخشبي القديم، وتتساقط دموعه في نظام متناغم مع ألحان جيتاره الحزينة، ظل الناس يتوافدون ومكثوا بجواره لساعات وساعات، منتظرين أن يتوقف عن العزف للحظة حتى يتسنى لهم سؤاله... من أنت؟ ومن أين أتيت؟ وما حكايتك؟ ولكنه لم يتوقف كذلك ولم تتوقف دموعه عن الانهمار.. ظلوا صامتين لساعات عديدة منتظرين أن يصيبه التعب ولكن دون فائدة، ذهب إليه حكيم البلدة ليسأله.. قام العجوز من على شاطئ النهر ظن الناس أنه سوف يتوقف عن العزف، ويجيب عن أسئلة الحكيم، ولكنه ظل يواصل العزف ومشى ناحية الطريق..

مضى العجوز في طريقه مستمرًا في عزف نفس اللحن الحزين، وتبعه أهالي البلدة حتى أدركهم المساء، فذهبوا جميعاً إلى منازلهم دعاه البعض ليقضي الليلة عندهم ولكنه لم يكن يجيب لم يكن حتى ينظر إلى أحد، ولم يتوقف عن العزف للحظة واحدة.

ظل العجوز يعزف طوال الليل، كان هناك شيء غريب في عزفه، إنه نفس اللحن لم يتغير منذ ليلة الأمس، يعيده مرارًا وتكرارًا، لحنٌ على قدر ما يحمله من حزن بين أنغامه، على قدر ما يبعث من طمأنينة غريبة في النفوس، فلأول مرة منذ سنوات ينام أهل البلدة نوماً عميقاً على تلك الأنغام، يتوقف الأطفال عن البكاء بمجرد سماع أنغامه، تلتف الطيور حوله في السماء وهي تغرد كأنها تغني على هذا اللحن الحزين.

في صباح اليوم التالي استمرت الأنغام ولكن بصوت خفيض، بحث الناس عن الرجل العجوز وجدوه عند أطراف البلدة في طريقه إلى مغادرتها، حاول أهل البلدة أن يقنعوه بالبقاء، ولكنه لم يرد.. لم يكن يلتفت إليهم.. كانت عيناه الغائرتان في تجويفهما بفعل السن والدموع تنظر نظرة ثابتة نحو شيء ما في الأفق شيء غير مرئي، كانت نظراته ثابتة تجاه نقطة محددة كأن هناك شيئاً لا يراه إلا العجوز في هذا الاتجاه.

Late one winter night, the townspeople woke to the sound of a mournful guitar cutting through the stillness of a cold December night. Each of them went to a window to find where it was coming from, but the fog was too thick to see.

When morning came, the sad melody was still drifting in from the edge of town, down by the river. The townspeople followed it and found an old man, ragged, long-bearded and gaunt, playing an old wooden guitar without pause, his tears falling in time with the music. More and more people came, and they stayed beside him for hours, waiting for him to stop, even for a moment, so they could ask him: Who are you? Where have you come from? What is your story? But he did not stop, and neither did his tears. They waited in silence for hours more, hoping he would tire, but it was no use. The town’s wise man went to question him. The old man rose from the riverbank, and the people thought he would finally stop playing and answer. Instead, still playing, he walked off toward the road.

He went on his way, playing the same sad tune, and the townspeople followed him until evening fell and they went home. Some invited him to spend the night with them, but he did not answer; he did not even look at anyone, and he never stopped playing, not for a moment.

He played all through the night. There was something strange about his playing: it was the same melody, unchanged since the night before, repeated over and over, a tune that brought as much peace as it held sorrow. For the first time in years, the whole town slept deeply to its notes. Children stopped crying the moment they heard it, and the birds circled above him, singing as if to his sad song.

The next morning the music went on, but softer. The people searched for the old man and found him at the edge of town, on his way out. They tried to persuade him to stay, but he did not answer. He did not even turn toward them. His eyes, sunk deep by age and tears, were fixed on something on the horizon, something unseen, a single point, as if there were something out there that only the old man could see.

You’re Not Supposed to Shake It…, From the novel

The Karma Ledger, From the collection

Essays