The Ruins of Us (30 page)

It had been a mistake for him to try to deliver the exit visa information to the big house. He should have waited, but he’d wanted to see her again. When he woke up the morning after the episode on the dune, he’d felt a sudden jolt of devotion and protectiveness. Even if circumstances kept them from acting on their feelings for the time being, he would continue to tend the fire. Life was long and strange, indeed. What he did know for certain was that, for the moment, he felt a spark of caring for a woman other than Carolyn, and he was grateful to Rosalie for it.

While perusing the vegetable crates, Dan allowed himself to imagine what a life with Rosalie might be like. Nights, if she decided to stay over at the cabin, they would open the windows and listen to the rush of the river in the ravine below. Together, they would remember Texas, feel the mythology of it all around them. Days, they would occupy themselves with small and undemanding tasks—go to the hardware store for lightbulbs, or the drug store to pick up each other’s prescriptions. They wouldn’t go in for big projects like bathroom renovations or child-rearing. They would have companionable bodies and the politeness that only two people who aren’t entirely in love are capable of. They would age, if not gracefully, then at least not alone. They would not chew the bitter root of memory. They would talk and fuck and make dinner together, a real domestic scene. As the years passed, the Kingdom would become just a place where they had lived once. It would seem as foreign to them as Zanzibar or Timbuktu.

But if they did finally forget, where would all those memories go? Did they even have a chance, or were old lovers always with you, lodged in your body and mind like shards of calcium on arthritic joints?

He checked his watch. Ten minutes to eight and she still wasn’t there. He knew Rosalie was always on time, so her tardiness unsettled him. Dan moved to the neighboring produce refrigerator and turned a lemon over in his hand, inspecting it for abrasions before dropping it into a plastic bag. He preferred to do his grocery shopping at Biltagi Brothers’ even though the Safeway was worthy of any American suburb. Its endless aisles were white and gleaming with wax, stocked to the ceiling with boxes of Muesli and jars of Nescafé. Still, he couldn’t bring himself to give up Biltagi Brothers’, with its smell of paprika and cumin and coriander and its burlap sacks of coffee beans and the lighting that always made him feel as if he were inside a yellow balloon looking out at the brighter world. Hypercolored bags of sweets from Japan and Korea and dusty packages of dried goods from the subcontinent far outnumbered American and European products, and this suited Dan because he did not have to go out of his way to avoid the things that reminded him of his ex-wife: pumpernickel, Coffee-Mate, banana peppers, Kozy Shack pudding cups. He wondered what kind of food Rosalie liked. At this point in her life, she was probably rigid in her tastes. They wouldn’t have the time to carefully acculturate the other person to themselves. That was for the starry-eyed and energetic. Should they just exchange lists detailing preferences and habits? It had been so long since he’d had to explain himself to anyone. What would he even write on his?
Dan Coleman: 2% milk. Folgers not Maxwell House. Cottage cheese. Oatmeal. Number 2 Blade. Size 14 shoe. 36 x 34. Wearer of boat shoes but not an owner of boats. User of fountain pens. Writer of letters. Taker of Paxil. Early riser.

Around him, a couple of women, wide in their abayas, glided from aisle to aisle, avoiding eye contact. So strange, the absence of the women’s faces. It made him sadder than the absence of their bodies, which still found a way to show contour beneath the abaya. But the faces. Dan had a feeling of missing several people at once—all the women in Biltagi Brothers’, all the women in the street, all the women in the car on the way home, all the women preparing the night’s meal, all the working women; all the women, everywhere. He didn’t know them, but still, he missed them, missed the opportunity to know them. Their enforced separation from him made him feel terribly lonely.

It was nearly eight fifteen. The market closed at nine o’clock. The store was starting to empty out, and he’d walked three full circuits around the perimeter, zigzagging through the aisles for extra time. Something had come up. He didn’t want to text, in case she was with Abdullah. He would ring up, then go home and wait to hear from her.

At the register, Kiran, the same thin-boned Indian man who’d been serving him every week for the last two years, smiled at him as he started scanning the goods.

“How are you today, Mr. Dan? You buy curry leaves. Making stew?”

“Yeah. Just something to freeze so I can eat it for the next few weeks or so. Then I’m gone, Kiran. Gone with the wind.”

“A vacation, Dan sir?”

“Yep. For now. But in a little while, it’ll be for good. And this time it’s going to stick.”

“Good for you, Mr. Dan.” He gestured to his little radio. “Just now, I hear that they are arresting young men for trying to blow up Abqaiq Refinery.”

“No shit. Today?”

“Two hour ago. They try to break the security gate with their truck, and when a guard start firing at them, whole thing explodes! Truck, gate, everything.”

“I’ll tell you what, Kiran, I’ll be glad to get out of here. These guys aren’t screwing around anymore. I try not to give a formal shit, but it’d be nice to keep my ass intact.”

Kiran laughed. It made Dan feel good to crack a joke.

“These jihadis make trouble for everyone.”

“They’re a mystery to me. I’ve never cared enough about any one thing, except maybe my family, to cook myself for it.”

“Be safe, Mr. Dan,” Kiran said, handing him the grocery bags. “Things are not being like they were.”

As Dan took the bags, the bell hooked over the door chimed, and in walked Rosalie, imperial in her black designer robes. The silver embellishments glinted as she walked, little sparks thrown from her moving body.

“Dad gum,” Dan said. “I forgot something for the stew. I’ll be right back.” He hurried back to the canned goods corner, bits of spilled rice and dried insect bodies crunching under his feet.

“No problem,” Kiran said. He turned back to his crumpled copy of the
Saudi Times
.

At the back of the store, Dan waited in front of a row of spices. After a few minutes, he felt the air around him move as she passed by. She settled in by the tahinis.

“Raja’s circling,” Rosalie said. “I told him I’d call him when I got finished.”

“Good work. I’ve got everything you need here in my back pocket. Hey, you hungry? They’ve got good shwarma here.”

She exhaled, shook her head. He liked the idea of nourishing her. He knew he was fantasizing now. Every day, if he and Rosalie made it out, they would build each other up and take each other down, piece by piece, starting new each morning. If one day they decided they were tired of the building up, they could shake hands and move on.

“Dan.”

He looked at her. The store was completely empty except for Kiran, who was still engrossed in his newspaper, or pretending to be. They spoke in low tones even though the radio at the cash register was turned up loud. Dan was nervous. Al Dawoun was a small town, and even on the slow end of long day, you never knew who you could run in to.

“I’m just not sure,” she said.

“About what?”

“The leaving.” She fumbled with the sleeve of her robe.

“Hey, you pulled the KGB move at the barber shop,” he said. “You seemed pretty sure then.” He fixed his eyes on her mouth, which was quivering slightly.

He picked up a jar of paprika, then set it down carefully. He looked toward the window and out to the parking lot, where a couple of men were passing outside, their shadows black and large against the colors of the setting sun.

“I was angry. Haven’t you ever done stupid things in anger?”

“Christ. Why’d you even bother coming, then?” he hissed, so that spittle launched from his mouth and landed in tiny bubbles on a spread of cans.

“I wanted to tell you in person.”

“It’s not like we’re dating. It’s not like what happened meant a goddamn thing.”

But he wanted to ask her,
What about the river? What about the cypress trees and the bass swimming through the roots?

“You should watch how you talk,” he continued. “Because, you know, you say it, and it’s out there. I mean, people build things on it and . . .”

“I can’t leave right now. Faisal’s in trouble, real trouble. Abdullah told me last night. We’re going to fly him to Houston until things blow over. I can’t be going to Corsica now to drink wine all day.”

“That’s what you think of it? You think there’s something wrong in choosing to get up and live? Forget Corsica, then. Just go straight to Houston.
You’re
in real trouble.”

He thought of the moment on the dune, his hand on her wrist in the barber shop, and how good it had all made him feel. Then she’d just thrown a bucket of water on the fire. What foolishness. What a fool he had been, with his dreams for her and himself.

“Believe me, Dan, I want so badly to just say to hell with Abdullah and all of this. To run away. That’s the easy thing, and it’s been calling my name since I learned about Isra. But at some point, you can’t just reset your life and start over. I can’t look at my kids and say, ‘I’d like a do-over, I made the wrong choice. Have a nice life.’ ”

“So you’re doing it for the kids? You’re sticking it out for the kids?” He picked up a can of fava beans, set it down again, loudly. “Honestly, Rosalie, when has that ever worked for anyone? You have to think about yourself, here, too.”

“I am thinking about me. That bastard is the love of my life. My happiness is bound up in him. I’d rather have this compromised life with him than be alone up on my moral high ground.” She looked at him. “He’s a good man, Dan. You know that.”

Dan glanced at his watch. Nearly
8
:
40
.

“Yeah, unfortunately, I do,” he said at last. “But he’s damn selfish.”

“Who isn’t? And sadly, I think that this disaster with Faisal might actually mean good things for our family. It will force us to band together for a time.” She paused. “I’m sorry.”

At that moment, Dan wished he had something powerful to throw at her, like
What about us?
But for both of them, those words lay with other people. Had Rosalie pleaded with Abdullah? And had he said “I’m sorry”? These were the humiliations that people kept until death, the stories they never told. There was no redeeming humor in them, so people let the memories of them burn in their hearts, the private stories of heartbreak and endings, the futility of people negotiating failed love. He wanted to sympathize with her, this partner in sorrow, but now he found he had only anger.

“It’s just, you got me thinking. I thought I could finally go back. To the States.”

She turned to look at him. She looked exposed without her makeup on.

“You should move back,” she said. “It’s your home. You don’t need me for that.”

Was it true? That he could choose to return without an invitation from Carolyn? From Rosalie? For so long, he had moved in accordance with, or in reaction against, Carolyn. That was marriage. That was divorce. Could he now live in the world as a singular and mobile force? Could he take steps that were neither toward nor away, but rather just a means of forward motion?

“Dan,” she whispered. “You don’t need to pretend. It’s better if we’re just honest with each other about what this is. You don’t love me, and that’s fine. I don’t love you. I can’t. I can’t love two people at once.”

“I thought we could help each other out. Get out of Saudi. It’s not much of a life here.”

“For you, maybe. You belong elsewhere. It’s more complicated for me. I still love my husband, and I think he still loves me.”

“So he can love two people at once and you can’t?”

“I know you think I’m being naïve.”

“That’s the polite word for it.”

Isra’s pregnant, he thought. He wanted to tell her, but that was a mess Abdullah deserved to sort out.

“Rosalie?” He raised his voice slightly, and she glanced anxiously around the store.

“It’s my choice, and I choose my family. I have nothing without them.”

“He’s not going to change, you know. He’s too old.”

“I know. That’s why I’m going to Houston with Faisal and Mariam. I’ll stay away for a little while. See my brother, put Faisal in school. This is Abdi’s country. It won’t ever be mine.” She said the last part hesitantly, like she was trying to convince herself. “If I decide I need to divorce him, then I will, but I’m not ready. When he comes to the States to see me, it’ll be easier to pretend that it’s just the two of us. It’ll be easier to be two human beings.”

Dan wished that Carolyn had done that, granted them some time to figure things out, even if it meant pretending for a while. But she’d given him no warning; she served those papers up cold on that snow-lorn January morning.

“I don’t regret what happened between you and me,” she said.

She was standing to his right on the other side of the aisle. He looked down at her, saw her smooth her right eyebrow with the butt of her palm as if trying to press the memory back into the darker reaches of her mind. “Abdullah would divorce me in a second if he knew.”

“Yeah, well. After everything you’ve been put through in the last week, you’re giving the man another chance.”

Perhaps he was half in love with her after all, because at that moment, Dan felt the sharp pang of loss. The disappointment of nothing changing, but also the relief. It wasn’t quite joy that he felt, but satisfaction knowing that he would once again be allowed the perverse pleasure of dwelling. It was kind of like falling in the mud and, feeling the warmth, rolling around, and making a good and satisfying mess, but knowing that when you got up you’d be cold and dirty and regretful. That was nostalgia. That was remembrance. He would give himself this last day of immobility, and then tomorrow—tomorrow, he would act. He would make his plans for Corsica, and maybe he wouldn’t even come back. Maybe he’d pack a rucksack and head north for the continent, moving along the rivers of Central Europe, watching the lights of the cliff-top castles on fire from within the thick of the pines.