Forbidden Love
by
Norma Khouri


ISBN 1-86325-348-::

front t'OO'Vt'r image: zejti

NON-FICTION

Ins hook to tan rights d 9 "781863 "253482" Norma Khouri has had poems
and short stories published in anthologies.  As a result of the events
recounted in Forbidden Love (which was written secretly in an Internet
cafe), she was forced to emigrate to Athens.  She now lives in
Australia.

FORBIDDEN LOVE A BANTAM BOOK

First published in Australia and New Zealand in 2003 by Bantam.

Copyright (c) Norma Khouri, 2003

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system,

transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written
permission of the publisher.

National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-Publication Entry

Khouri, Norma.  Forbidden love: a harrowing tale of love and revenge in
Jordan.

ISBN 1 86325 348 3.

1. Murder Jordan.  2. Women Crimes against Jordan.  3. Love.  4.
Revenge.  5. Honor.  6. Jordan Social life and customs.  I. Title.

364.1523

Transworld Publishers,

a division of Random House Australia Pty Ltd

20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point, NSW 2061

http://www.random house.com.au

Random House New Zealand Limited 18 Poland Road, Glenfield, Auckland

Transworld Publishers,

a division of The Random House Group Ltd

61-63 Uxbridge Road, London W5 5SA

Random House Inc 1540 Broadway, New York, New York 10036

Typeset in 12.5/16 pt Bembo by Falcon Oast Graphic Art Ltd.  Printed
and bound by Griffin Press, Netley, South Australia

10 9 8 7 6 5

FORBIDDEN LOVE

A harrowing true story of love and revenge in Jordan

NORMA KHOURI

BANTAM BOOKS SYDNEY AUCKLAND TORONTO NEW YORK LONDON FORBIDDEN LOVE

PROLOGUE

Jordan is a place where men in sand-coloured business suits hold cell
phones to one ear and, in the other, hear the whispers of harsh and
ancient laws blowing in from the desert.  It is a place where a worldly
young queen argues eloquently on CNN for human rights, while a father
in a middle-class suburb slits his daughter's throat for committing the
most innocent breach of old Bedouin codes of honour.

It is a place of paradox and double standards for men and women, for
liberated and conservative.  Modern on the surface, it is an
unforgiving desert whose oases have blossomed into cities.  But the
desert continues to blow in.  Streets are parched and stripped of
flowers, trees or greenery- except for a rare grapevine in private
patios and new steel and glass corporate towers reflect the tawny
colours of the dunes.  In their shadow, cafes are full of high-tech
chatter, and young men in Jordan's requisite tan jacket and Levis rub
elbows with elders in dish-da shay the ankle-length dress shirt that is
a vestige of the desert.  Young women in veils view with envy the
'modern'

girls sipping espresso, smoking, slim legs exposed to the knee.  Unlike
the Jordan River, no longer strong enough to flow down to Amman, the
desert drifts up to the city's boundaries.  Like the sand that coats
the streets after a wind storm, the Bedouin code is always encroaching
on its urban streets.  It permeates my family's neighbourhood in Amman,
dense-packed and tight-knit as a nomadic camp and filled with
descendants of the original tribes.  Its fierce and primitive code is
always nagging at men's instincts, reminding them that under the
Westernizing veneer, they are all still Arabs.  For most women, Jordan
is a stifling prison, tense with the risk of death at the hands of
loved ones.  It is my home.  I love its stark beauty, its sweep of
history.  And yet it may never be safe for me to return.

But let me set the stage for this story by giving some sense of my
strange, conflicted nation.  Bordered by Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Israel,
Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Kuwait, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan sits
at the beating geographic heart of the Arab world.  A constitutional
monarchy with King Abdullah Bin Hussein and Queen Rania presenting our
modern face to the world, it is a small, predominantly Muslim country.
Its capital, Amman, is home to a third of the nation's people, as well
as to a horde of historical, cultural and social riches.  Beyond Amman,
the Roman Pillars of Jerash, the Nabateen temples of Petra carved from
canyons of pink stone that glow with magical light as the sun strikes
at dawn and sunset, the Byzantine mosaics of Madaba, Mount Nebo, and
Wadi Kharrar, the baptismal site of Christ, continue to lure travellers
and pilgrims.

Jordan swaggers with pride at being a modern, technologically advanced,
and rapidly democratizing nation (or so it would like the world to
believe).  But the process is often awkward and outdated.  Amman did
progress dramatically in the final decade of the twentieth century. New
hotels and banks sprang up on virtually every city street; computers
equipped with the latest technology were installed in offices and homes
everywhere, linking Jordanians to the larger world.  Cell phones,
pagers, and portable faxes are now as common as a pair of sunglasses. 
The government has spent millions annually to attract foreign
investors, improve commerce, and increase tourism.

Yet a few hours' drive from this modern metropolis is a world that
existed before Christ.  Spend a day in Wadi Rum exploring the Nabateen
and Thamudic cave drawings with the Bedouins, barter for their jangling
jewellery or share tea in their goat-hair tents, and you'll feel as if
you've gone back in time.  Jordan is one of a very few countries where
the present and past live in tense and dynamic co-existence.  It is a
country that unfurls banners of welcome to the future, yet holds
tenaciously to its ancient roots and traditions.

For Jordanian women progress has been slower coming than for men.  We
are now allowed to study any subject we want as long as the men in our
families our fathers, brothers, or, if married, husbands give us their
permission.  And, compared with women in most Muslim countries,
particularly Saudi Arabia, women in Jordan have more freedoms and
privileges -access to a full education, the right to drive cars, and,
as of 1989, to vote, provided, of course, the male heads of our
households approve.  Yes, Jordan can claim many women doctors, but
partly because a woman dare not be seen by a male doctor for fear of
the kind of gossip that could threaten her life.  And mostly the women
who have the freedoms and privileges come from very wealthy and modern
families, families that do not pay such attention to neighbourhood
rumours.

In a country that boasts of its modernity, a woman's decisions are
still made by men.  A man must authorize everything in her life, from
the person she marries to her wardrobe.  It's a male-dominated world
with very limited and controlled 'freedoms' for women.

So while men celebrate their country's progress, women still pray that
their silent cries will be heard.  Even for the women who, on the
street, look liberated- like me, in my loose skirts and trousers and my
hair swinging free of the veil- the risks of rebelling are so high
that, while we boil inside, we obey.  We cling to the fading hope that
someday we'll be released from this prison, not really believing that
we can be the agents of our own freedom.  Controlled by the fear
generations of male dominance has instilled in us, a fear reinforced by
our mothers, our only option seems to be to live carefully within the
rules, regulations, and beliefs of the men who govern us.  We absorb
from birth that breaking the code is very, very dangerous.  And yet
there are a few rare women who risk their lives to try.  The whispers
they hear are not from the desert, but from the winds of change.

CHAPTER ONE

The cluttered break

room in the back of ND's Unisex Salon was not much to look at.  Twenty
years of scuff marks marred the once-white walls, and the tile floors,
which had once been warm earth beige, were now a dull yellow-grey.  The
scruffy brown couch to the right of the door looked like a battered old
man, pockmarked by time.  But my best friend, Dalia, and I knew the
room's true value; to us it was a haven, a sanctuary, the only place
where we had the privacy and freedom to share our secrets, hopes,
dreams, fears, and disappointments.

That couch was the same one we'd sat on at the age of thirteen when we
pledged that nothing and no one would ever destroy our friendship.  We
were like sisters, born a couple of months apart in 1970.  Living as
close neighbours in the Jebel Hussein district of Amman, we met at a
neighbourhood park when we were three and, almost instantly, were
inseparable.  We each had four brothers and very strict parents.  And,
despite the fact that we were from different religions- her family was
strict Muslim, while mine was Catholic as we grew up we faced similar
obstacles that only strengthened the sisterly bond between us.

Though Jordan is a nation of rich and poor- the rich living in
million-dollar villas and the poor in refugee camps- our families were
part of the comfortable middle class that lived in houses handed down
through their families for generations, and fathers who worked at
respectable jobs mine had his own contracting business, Dalia's was an
accountant for a large insurance company.  But we were not of the class
that skimmed the cream of opportunities for women the elite who
automatically sent their daughters to universities and abroad to live
and study.  Our parents never showed a hint of ambition for us, beyond
marriage.  By the time we entered our teenage years, we'd decided that
we could forge the best future for ourselves by finding a way to stay
together.  At fifteen, we discovered that Jordanian women were allowed
to own and operate beauty parlours, one of the few careers open to
them.  Higher dreams didn't seem possible.  And Dalia and I believed
that having our own business would guarantee that we could remain
together.  So, armed with a plan, we started taking the necessary steps
to set up our business.

Our first move was to assure our parents that we were not college
material.  We easily maintained "C' averages, convincing them that this
was the best we could do.  In a country where a man's education carries
more weight that a woman's, our lacklustre performance did not worry
either set of parents.  Next, we suggested that we enrol in beauty
school and, given our bleak college prospects, our families did not
object in fact they encouraged us to go.  So, at eighteen, Dalia and I
learned our trade.  And, after finishing school and working at several
places, we were able to complete our final step.  Although we didn't
see it at the time, we were already using one of the few

powers Jordanian women have: to bend their intelligence and imagination
to plotting and planning to outwit men to get what they wanted.  We
would become masters.  It didn't occur to us that the effort we spent
on conspiring and manipulation might have been used to turn us into
doctors or software designers.  Achievement was tricking the men who
controlled our lives; as we saw it, it was survival in an unequal
world.

"If we keep complaining about working at this salon, I'm sure OUR
fathers will agree to let us open our own place, if only to shut us up.
My father seems ready to agree now.  How about yours?"  Dalia asked me
one day, her eyes betraying a hint of conspiratorial glee.

"Mine's getting tired of the complaints.  But we better be careful;
they could decided that we should stop working and stay at home.  I
keep telling them that we love the work, we just hate the working
conditions."  I laughed.

The too, and I think they'll go for it.  Look at it from their point of
view, they'll have an easier time keeping an eye on us this way." Until
we were safely married and under the thumb of our husbands, we'd be
watched every day, every hour, by our fathers and brothers.

In the end, we persuaded our parents to invest a small fortune in our
salon.  Our idea was to renovate a portion of a two-storey building
owned by my father.  The old, stone-fronted structure, which was close
to both of our homes, had not been used for ten years, when it served
as a warehouse for my father's contracting business.  Neglected,
covered with graffiti, and boarded up, it was destined for the wrecking
ball until our plan salvaged it.  In return for the use of the ground
floor and as payment for the construction work my father and brothers
did, we'd pay a monthly rent.  To save some masaree (money), the break
room was the only part of the salon we didn't modernize; it stayed as
dingy as it was.  But, behind its closed doors, it was ours.

We were going to be daring and provide a service no other salon in
Amman seemed to be offering: we would cater for both men and women.  As
long as we were well watched and chaperoned, there was no prohibition
against it.

We held the grand opening of ND's Unisex Salon in May 1990.  The stone
facade had been removed and a glass front put in its place.  To us, the
interior had been transformed into a mini-palace.  A large crystal
chandelier hung from the high, vaulted ceiling and the walls were
mirrored, giving the illusion that the room was double its actual size.
The mirrors reflected the chandelier's many bulbs, bringing light to
every corner of the shop.  A high marble counter ingeniously hid our
desk and separated the reception area from our workstations, each
equipped with all the top styling tools.  To us, this salon was more
than just a dream come true, it made us feel invincible and powerful.
Our modest little enterprise had turned us into professionals,
entrepreneurs- we'd created our own niche.  Though we had to some
extent designed our own cage, it was better that

the one that would have been created for us, and besides, we were never
beyond the ever watchful eyes of our families.  Dalia's brother
Mohammed, assigned as our official watchdog, walked her to work every
morning from the day we opened and kept a sharp eye on us through until
closing time.  Nonetheless, we were convinced there was nothing we
couldn't accomplish as long as we stuck together.

After the opening, we quickly managed to develop a healthy clientele
and were good at turning our referrals into regulars.  Our great
haircuts, we decided, were the secret to our success, along with the
friendly atmosphere, and our quality customer service.  Our competitors
credited the shop's popularity to the fact that it was one of Amman's
few salons owned and operated by women that served a mixed clientele.
Had we known that the decision to open the door to male customers would
bring us such heartbreak, I've wondered whether we would have done it.
I think, yes, we would.  \020Five years down the line, we were still
best friends.  We'd kept the promise we'd made to each other years
before, always stronger together than apart.

CHAPTER TWO

Life in Dalia's home was basically like life in all Muslim homes in
Amman, regardless of class, money, or neighbourhood.  She wasn't
permitted to eat at the same table with, or at the same time as, the
men in her household.  She had to cook the meal and quietly serve it to
them.  Only when they had finished and left the room were she and her
mother allowed to eat the leftovers.  She was not allowed to leave her
house unless she was accompanied by one of the men in her family.  As
if our neighbourhood wasn't restrictive enough.  Houses have been in
the same families for so long that they have achieved landmark status.
It was possible to hail a cab from anywhere in Amman and reach your
destination in Jebel Hussein by giving no more than a family name to
the driver.  Some people might appreciate this kind of closeness and
familiarity, but to Dalia and me it was intrusive and, at times,
suffocating.

Weeks into our first year of business it became clear that our
designated chaperone, Mohammed, hated the early schedule; because he
was always late we began to lose clients.  It took us

II

months of begging and pleading before our fathers finally allowed us to
walk to the salon unaccompanied every morning.  Now, Dalia would leave
home no later than 8 a.m. to pick me up for work.

One morning, in March 1995, Dalia arrived ten minutes late and found me
waiting on the terrace.

"Hey, ya hilweh (our joking slang for pretty or beautiful), are you
ready to go or should I come up?"  she shouted as she positioned
herself beneath our balcony and gestured towards the stairs.

"I'm coming right down, ya gazallae," I yelled.  Ya gazallae is slang
for especially attractive women those with the melting eyes of a baby
deer, like Bambi.  Dalia definitely fitted into that category.  She had
waist-length, thick, wavy tresses, perfect light olive skin, and full
lips.  Most of all, she had these mesmerizing dark brown eyes.  Nature
had put her only roundness in the proper places.  I was a bit shorter
than she was, with long black hair.  My skin is smooth but my
complexion is darker, and alas I always felt cursed with a pear-shaped
body.  An extra twenty or so pounds found their way to my hips when I
was eighteen and refused to go away.

I knew from the time we were young that I could never be as attractive
as she was, but Dalia was more than just physically gorgeous.  She had
a way about her that would make anyone and everyone feel comfortable
and beautiful around her.  She was the only one who couldn't see it.
What completed Dalia's rare qualities was that her beauty was backed by
intelligence and strength.

I bounded off the last stair, wound my arm round Dalia's, and
announced, "Let's go."  We walked arm in arm through the winding
streets of Jebel Hussein, until we reached the salon.  We knew every
block and building in our close

Community, and the pride most families took in their descent from the
original nomadic tribes that settled there.  The lack of green plants
and flowers gave the area the spirit and pervasive dun colour of the
old clusters of goat-hair tents in the desert.

At the salon, we usually worked side by side, handling one client after
the next, from eight thirty until two thirty, with a couple of hours
off for lunch and coffee.  It was a good existence, but it lacked the
exhilaration we thought we'd find when we opened the salon.

That afternoon, I walked the last customer to the exit, leaned my back
against the door, slowly slid to the floor, and exhaled loudly.

"Finally!  Finished.  I'm so tired.  I didn't get much sleep last
night," I said as I sat on the floor with my legs stretched out in
front of me.

Dalia turned towards me with a playfully wicked grin.  "Why not?  What
were you doing?"

"Nothing, I just couldn't sleep.  I had too much on my mind."

"Like what?"

"I don't know.  Maybe I just need a holiday or something.  I think I'm
bored.  I'm going to try to get some rest in the back."

Dalia did not press me.

It took all my strength to stand and drag myself across the room.  I
paused briefly beside Dalia to sigh exaggeratedly and then continued
into the break room.  I sat on the arm of the couch and dumped myself
onto its cushions.  Memories that rose from sleepless nights filled my
brain.  For the past week or so I'd been restless and preoccupied.  I
didn't know why, but I Was analysing every aspect of my life and
craving change.  Every morning, as the cold Rabeey winds beckoned me to
get

up, I secretly hoped they'd brought something different of new with
them.

Dalia came into the break room a few minutes later and found me lying
on the couch, staring at the ceiling.  She slid a cigarette out of her
pack and tossed it to me.  "Here, maybe this will help."  In my mood,
it only reinforced how pathetically shrunken our lives were that a
taboo cigarette

seemed like a great adventure.  But I took it.

"Are you sure we won't get caught?"  I asked as I lit the cigarette.
"Relax.  I locked the doors and, anyway, Mohammed took his friend Raed
to the market.  They should be gone for at least an hour.  I asked them
to pick up some fresh-squeezed carrot juice with our sandwiches.  I
thought that would delay them."

She strolled over to the couch and sat beside me, her face animated.

"Remember where we first did this?"  she asked, looking at the
cigarette.  She was fighting the urge to laugh at the thought of my red
face and wide, tear-filled eyes.

"I should have known then what a bad influence you would be," I
replied.

"You were so scared."

"I was not, I was choking!"

"Everyone chokes their first time," Dalia said before bursting into
uncontrollable laughter.

"Well, you could have warned me," I mumbled.

"Don't tell me you're still holding a grudge.  Anyway, I did warn you
in my own way," she managed to say between bursts of laughter.

"Oh, sure," I said, in a mocking voice.

A few minutes later, our trivial chatting suddenly turned electric.

"Did you see that guy who was in here earlier?"  she asked, leaning
close enough for a whisper.  \020What?  In all the years I'd known
her, she'd never mentioned a specific man, unless she was criticizing
him. She'd always viewed men as the enemy and marriage as the ultimate
defeat, since she knew she'd be forced to forfeit her few liberties,
such as the salon, if she married.

"Which one?"  I asked, snapping my head round to face her.  "The one in
the army uniform, the gorgeous one!"  The gorgeous one!  "I can't
believe this.  You've never called a man gorgeous before."

"I know, I know, but did you see him?"  she asked impatiently, eyes lit
by a strange new excitement.

Of course I'd seen him.  The fact that he was the only client who'd
come in wearing an army uniform made him easy to remember.  "I'm not
blind."

"That's the third time he's been here in the past two weeks."  "What
does he want?  Who is he?"

"Each time he comes in, he says that he wants me to take a little off
the ends.  Then he spends the whole time talking to me.  But I don't
mind.  Just looking at him feels good."

Tall, quite a bit taller than Dalia, I remembered, racking my brain to
recall exactly what he looked like, this man who'd suddenly entered our
intimate space, perhaps to cause trouble for my best friend.  What if
Dalia's brother, Mohammed, had noticed him?  Mohammed was not only our
watchdog, he was our fathers' hired, loyal informant.  What if he
reported it to her father Dalia flirting with a strange man?

"Dalia, you can't let anyone else hear you say that," I said.  Broad
shoulders, thick, short, dark brown hair, black eyes- an image was
coming.

"I know, but I can say it to you.  Anyway, all I'm doing is

looking and talking right now.  But I think he likes me.  I mean, come
on, he's been in for three haircuts in two weeks.  Plus I've caught him
staring at me," she said happily.

His eyes were dark and penetrating, thick eyebrows, and long thick
lashes.

"Do you like him?  Do you think you could like him romantically?  And
WHY haven't you told me about this sooner?  I'm supposed to be your
best friend."  \020Small, straight nose, full lips, square jaw line,
thin moustache.  He'd look better without the moustache, but they
seemed to be an Arab man's fashion statement.  I had my picture of
him.

"Relax, I'll tell you everything," she said.

"Come on, I want all the details."  We may have been twenty-five, but
we were so inexperienced that we were chatting like a pair of
adolescents.  But for me, this was more than girlish gossip.  It felt
urgent, like a police interrogation.  Dalia was being driven by some
inner fire that shone through her eyes.

"Norma, calm down.  There's not much to report.  His name is Michael,
he's thirty-two and a major in the Royal Guard.  He has three sisters
and two brothers.  He's the oldest in his family.  He's intelligent,
handsome, charming, polite, unlike the men in our families."  She
lowered her voice.  "And he's Catholic."

You have to be a Jordanian woman to grasp what a shock, a frightening
explosive shock, those words were.  My response just rushed out.  "Bism
il lah (Oh my God, in the name of God), Dalia!  You have to forget
about him, now.  Nothing but trouble can come from this."  Jordanian
society and law both strictly forbade relationships between people of
different religions.  But what chilled me as I heard this were all the
stories I'd been told about the tragic endings of these relationships.
They seldom reached the papers.  You heard about them

as gossip, in the neighbourhood, in the salon- what award-winning
gossip journalists some of our friends and customers would have made.
Women had died or been sent to prison for life because their families
suspected them of having a secret romantic relationship while they were
single, let alone a relationship with someone of a different
religion.

But it was far more real to us than gossip.  We'd lost a
seventeen-year-old client to an honour killing.  How could Dalia
forget?  This girl was being molested by a close male relative she'd
told us!  And she'd been killed- we had to assume by the men in her
family to keep it quiet.

"All we're doing is talking.  What harm can come from that?  I'm
attracted to him, I admit it, and I think he's attracted to me, but
we've only talked."  She was blinded, oblivious.  "Anyway, you know how
I feel about religion.  We're all born into a religion, but it's
something we have no control over.  If I was born Catholic, then I'd be
Catholic.  But I was born Muslim and so I'm Muslim.  Look at us. You're
Catholic, but that has nothing to do with loving you or anyone more or
less."

Dalia had always made her views about religion clear, but this was
different.  I'd never heard her defend a man, and the passion in her
voice and the look in her eyes told me more than any words.  She was in
love; she just didn't know it yet.

For all her incredible strength, she was now very vulnerable, and I
suddenly felt protective.  "Oh, gazallae, you know I feel the same way
you do about religion, but our families don't see it the way we do. The
whole country is prejudiced against this kind of thing.  I love you too
much to see you get hurt, especially over someone you hardly even
know."

I know, Norma.  I understand that you're worried, but I'm not going to
get hurt.  I've only talked to him three times, but

there's something about him ... I don't know what it is.  I can't
explain it.  When I talk to him, I feel as if nothing else exists or
matters.  I know it sounds stupid, but I feel as if I've known him all
my life," she said ecstatically.  \020"Well, it sounds as if you more
than just like him."  "I don't know.  I've never felt this way before.
It's different, it's exciting and scary and wonderful, all at the same
time.  I can't explain it."

"So I take it you want to continue to talk to this man?"  I asked,
knowing I was falling short of being as wise as I wanted to be.

"Yes!  Definitely.  I know I shouldn't, but it's not something I can
control.  Who knows, maybe it's my destiny."

"Destiny, did you say your destiny?  But you don't believe in destiny.
Anyway, how do you plan to keep talking to him?  Don't you think
Mohammed will get suspicious if he keeps coming in for haircuts?  I
mean, after two more appointments, he'll be bald.  What's he going to
use as an excuse after that?"

"I'll worry about my brother later.  Right now, I need you to help me
find a way to see him again, please.  Together I'm sure we can come up
with something."

"Dalia, is it that important to you?  Do you realize the risk you'll be
taking?  Do you think he's worth the risk?"  This was her chance to
hear me, to open her eyes.  Please, Dalia, please.  "I think so, yes."
She said it with a fervour that frightened me.

"OK, then.  I'm sure I'll regret this, but you know I'll help you.  We
have to be careful.  If we're caught, we'll both be in serious
trouble."  I made one last try.  "Why would you want to pursue this
when you won't be allowed to marry him."

"I know I won't, but I'm not thinking about that right now.  I just
feel as if I have to see him and talk to him again,

even if he only becomes my secret friend and nothing

more."

"OK."  I hugged her and got up from the couch.  "We can talk about this
again tomorrow.  Right now you'd better go and unlock the doors while I
straighten up and clean out the ashtrays.  We don't want Mohammed and
Raed to find the place looking like this.  They'll be here soon."

"Thanks, thanks so much," Dalia said, almost bouncing as she went to
unlock the doors.

As I tidied up the break room, I wondered if I was doing the right
thing by helping Dalia.  I tried to convince myself that Dalia was
right that we two could do anything as long as we did it together.

We had learned girls' rules together.  Now, at twenty-five, for the
first time in our lives, we were specifically thinking of challenging
them.  When we were little, neither society nor our families
distinguished between boys and girls.  It didn't seem to matter where,
how, or with whom we played.  As time went on, our list of rules
steadily grew, until by the age of ten we were no longer allowed to
associate with boys not related to us.  We never questioned the reasons
for this change, since we were at an age when we preferred to play with
girls anyway.  Looking back, it's clear that the foundation of our
future was being built then, but in a way that felt gradual,
incontestable, and unavoidable.

Our mothers, like all mothers of daughters, did their job by training
us to live in an unsympathetic, protected, male-dominated world.  I'm
certain no woman raised in Jordan escaped her childhood and young
adulthood without hearing things like: "A woman's honour, once ruined,
can never be repaired', or "Better to lose your life than lose your
reputation'.  They told us about the woman who chose to kill herself
and

die honourably rather than allow a potential rapist to assault her, and
of the woman who didn't preserve her honour and was raped, only to be
murdered by her own family who were protecting their 'good' name.

Our parents wove into everyday life the idea that all men are superior
to women.  We were not beaten into a state of slavery with whips and
chains, but rather persuaded into it by the words and teaching of
centuries-old traditions.  It was not our faith in those words that
continued to bind us but our fear of the consequences if we ever went
against them.  This was the first time that either of us had even
thought of challenging these conventions.

When we'd finished cleaning up and had hidden our cigarettes, we
unbolted the doors and waited for Dalia's brother and his friend.
Fifteen minutes later we heard a pickup pull up in front of the salon
and Mohammed got out, laughing and talking loudly.  He rushed in and
dropped off our carrot juice and falafel sandwiches.  To our surprise
he only stayed long enough to find out when he should come to take us
home and lock up.  Then, he made a quick phone call to confirm that his
friend still wanted to go to Auto World.  This was a thrilling day for
him; his friend had managed to hunt down the headlamp Mohammed had been
searching for since he'd bought the pickup.  After he'd hung up, he
dashed out of the salon yelling, "Call me on my cell phone if you need
anything," and disappeared into the gloomy afternoon.

Mohammed loved his pickup.  He'd bought it the previous October and saw
it as far more than a means of transport.  It was his hobby, his baby,
his full-time job.  Although he'd bought it loaded with all the
possible options, he was ceaselessly improving it.

For Dalia and me, Mohammed's preoccupation with the

pickup was the answer to our prayers.  It gave us hours of private time
together.

For years the only Mohammed-free moments we'd had were during lunch.
Not much happened during the four and a half years we'd operated the
salon that our fathers didn't know about from Mohammed.  While Dalia
and I didn't appreciate having a spy in our midst, there was nothing we
could do about it.  If we complained, it would only make our families
suspect that we had something to hide.  It would go against everything
we'd been taught.

Like most Jordanian women, Dalia and I were not permitted to argue with
the men in our families.  Even if we were right, the simple fact that
we were female made us wrong in the eyes of society.  We were unable to
challenge the principle.  It was a universal Arab creed, one that cut
across religion and class.

CHAPTER THREE

Dalia had been agitated all morning.  Now, as I was wrapping up a perm
on my five o'clock appointment a few days after the Michael revelation,
she sat at the front counter flipping through a magazine.  She had
forty minutes free before her next client and although she was reading
about new hairstyle trends and fashions, she was obviously preoccupied
with thoughts of Michael.  She rummaged through the piles of papers and
notebooks we'd accumulated over the years, restlessly trying to keep
herself busy.

"You know, we really should clean some of this out," she said as she
pulled out a notebook with the word "Scorebook' written in black across
the cover.  "I think we can stop keeping score it's pretty obvious that
I've won, don't you think?"  she said, holding the notebook up for me
to see.  This was a private joke between us that went over the head of
Lucy, the young girl nervously waiting to see the result of her perm.

Dalia opened the notebook to the first page: 26 July 1990, Written in
bold red letters.  She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. It
had begun innocently enough, with a chat about one of Dalia's regular
clients who'd been in that morning.  Um Suhal was pregnant with her
second child.  During her appointment Dalia asked her whether she was
hoping to have a boy or girl, and her reply- a boy- later led to one of
her diatribes.

"Norma, you know what really gets to me?"  she said.

"What?"  The look in her eyes told me that I was in for a long,
drawn-out lecture on the state of life in Jordan and the plight of
Jordanian women in particular.

"Every time you ask a pregnant woman if she wants a boy or a girl, she
always says a boy."

"Oh, come on, the women who say that probably only do it to make their
husbands happy.  You know all men want a son."

"I think there has to be more to it than that," she announced.  And so
we'd started keeping score.

In the years we'd kept the score book we'd asked 193 women.  Only
fifteen of them said they wanted girls, the remaining 178 wanted boys.
This was all the evidence Dalia needed.  As the numbers increased in
her favour over the years, so did her passion for reform.  She
envisioned a New World for women, a place where we would share equal
rights with men.  A place where we'd have the right to make our own
choices and decisions about all the issues that influenced our lives
-careers, marriage, and family.  Where a pregnant woman would want to
have a girl.  \020"I believe that a lot of women think like us," she
said now.  "And, if that's true, sooner or later things will have to
change."

"Why do you assume that?  There's nothing they can do to change things,
just like there's nothing we can do."

"You're wrong.  Our mother's generation lived like this because they
believed in the Arab way of life, not because they

were afraid to take a stand.  We live like this because we're afraid,
not because we believe in it.  So sooner or later things will have to
change."

"Dalia, I think you need to face reality.  For all the cell phones and
computers and women doctors and activists, what's changed for us?
People in this country have had these customs and beliefs for centuries
and it'll take centuries to change their way of thinking," I
protested.

"I don't think so, not when women keep their place through fear instead
of belief.  Fear can be overcome.  Think about it.  When someone fears
something, there's a chance she may one day find the courage she needs
to force a change.  But if she believes in the status quo, she has no
need to change it.  If our generation doesn't change things, then maybe
the next one will or the one after that, but eventually the fear will
be overcome and changes will be made.  Change always follows, you'll
see."

I, and many of Dalia's other friends, believed the same thing,
treasured the same dreams.  But we were silent dreamers.  Dalia would
be the first person to protest in the streets, while the rest of us
stood by.  We lacked the courage, or the passion, to take it that far.
But despite her leadership, she made other women feel equal to her,
pulling us along to higher levels of courage.  She was always
highlighting the positives about you, making it impossible to feel
inadequate in her presence.  She was a force of nature, driven by an
inner power I can only describe as a gift.  But I understood how
Jordanian men would find a woman like Dalia: as menacing as an
attacking army.

To Middle Eastern men, Dalia's beliefs made her an enemy, a sharmuta,
and they would have only one way to deal with her.  They would silence
her before she had the chance to influence others with her scandalous
views.  The long-established way to

get rid of sharmutas was execution.  There would be no question, no
judge, no jury, and no chance for a defence.  Her death wouldn't
warrant an investigation or cause the filing of any criminal charges.
Her death would be considered justifiable since she was a threat to the
Jordanian quality of life and to the customs, morals, and values
Jordanian society had upheld for thousands of years.

While I envied her spirit, I'd feared for my friend's life for years.
How many times had I warned her, "You're blessed with an angel's face
but cursed with a devil's tongue."  Not because anything she said was
wrong, but because everything she said was critical of ancient laws.
Desert laws.

For buried deep within the history of Jordan was a secret way of life,
with its source in the nomadic Bedouins, the desert dwellers.  Though
they make up less than one per cent of the Jordanian population, they
and their views dominate the country.  Some have opted for city life
and many have settled down to cultivate crops rather than drive their
animals across the desert in search of food.  Approximately forty
thousand, however, choose to continue to live according to the old
ways.  They camp for a few months at a time in one spot and graze their
animals.  Their goat-hair tents (known as belt ash shair) are seen all
over the east and south of Jordan.  The tents are usually segregated a
harem for the women and a section for men, which is where the modern
practice in our homes, mosques and public places comes from.

Most men of the desert continue to wear the traditional long flowing
robes, along with a dagger, which symbolizes a man's dignity.  Women
tend to dress in layer upon layer of more colourful cloth, which covers
them completely.  Unlike some Muslim women, they rarely veil their
faces, opting for intricate patterns of facial tattoos instead. Similar
to their modern counterparts, their heads and hair must always be
veiled when in the presence of men.  Although female infanticide and
female circumcision are extremely rare among Jordan's urban citizens,
it's not unheard of among the desert dwellers.  It is a way of life so
important to, and so idealized by, Arab men that they will not hesitate
to sacrifice women in an attempt to preserve it.

CHAPTER FOUR

It had been a little over two weeks since Dalia or I had seen or heard
from Michael and we searched for excuses for why he hadn't come in.  He
wasn't interested in her or maybe he cared for her so much he was
protecting her from risk.  He'd been in a terrible accident and was
maimed, perhaps killed.  Dalia began each day hoping he would appear or
at least call, but as the hours crept by, worry would cloud her face.
By closing time, she looked as if she was going to a wake.  She tried
to keep disappointment and bitterness away as the excitement she'd felt
began to turn into a growing fear that she might never see him again.

For the first three or four days after his last visit to the salon, our
conversations had been dominated by Michael.  We conjured up countless
scenarios for how Dalia could see him again, without anyone who knew
her seeing her with him; we came UP with plans.  We knew the risks
involved but we believed we would not be found out.

Sometimes Dalia tried to pretend she didn't care whether or not she saw
him again.  He was only a client like any other.  But she was not
convincing; her anguish showed more each day.

As the third week drew to a close, Dalia dragged herself around the
salon silently cleaning up as I prepared for the final client of the
day.  The client was a referral named Jehan, who had phoned in the
morning and begged me to fit her into today's schedule.  Given the way
Dalia felt, I knew she would have refused to take her, but Jehan
sounded so desperate that I didn't have the heart to turn her away.  I
glanced at my watch and saw that I still had about ten minutes before
she was due to arrive.  I wanted to talk to Dalia about the way she was
feeling but had no idea how to begin.  Neither of us had any experience
of love, so I just decided to avoid the whole subject.  When she was
ready to talk, she would.  But she was descending into deeper
depression.

The minutes stretched as I watched Dalia and waited for Jehan.  I tried
to imagine our future and for the first time I wondered if this salon
was our destiny- if we were destined to remain single all of our lives.
The thought of being married to an Arab man turned my stomach, as it
did Dalia's, but this first realization that I might end up totally
alone disturbed me.  How would I feel if I found myself attracted to a
Muslim man?  I wondered.  The gravity of Dalia's dilemma began to weigh
heavily on my mind.  How would my parents and brothers react to
something like that?  The killing and imprisonment of women who broke
the rules wasn't just Islamic; it crossed religious lines.  Now that
the informal affection of childhood had been replaced with rigid
control over me, I could picture my brothers battling with my father
over who would cast the first stone.

If you learn nothing else growing up in Jordan, you learn two things
very early: the first, that Muslims and Christians

must never intermarry, and the second, which was just as important,
that you must never lose composure in public regardless of how serious
your personal problems were.  I suspect that no other nationality ever
believed so vehemently in that old aphorism, 'never air your dirty
laundry in public'.  Christians and Muslims were perfectly friendly and
hospitable towards one another in public, but they would never, ever
let their children marry.

My brothers had worked very hard over the years to maintain the
'honourable family image' my parents insisted we portray.  If you met
my brothers in public, you'd find four well-educated, professional,
refined young gentlemen.  Ranging from twenty-three to thirty-two, from
average-looking to handsome, they appeared to be modern young Arab men.
But this was a facade that demonstrated none of the dynamic that went
on behind the closed doors of our home.

There, my brothers' true natures were revealed.  While their friends
might have difficulty picturing them reacting with violence if they
found I was romantically interested in a man, it was easy for me to
imagine.  My brothers' fierce natures would not surprise any Arab woman
who knew from birth that what women call brutal, men define as
necessary.  These were the secrets hidden from the street.  All Arab
men are taught that it is their responsibility to discipline the women
in their lives,

and that the best way to do so is through corporal punishment.  My
brothers were no exception.  It was not uncommon to hear of women being
physically abused not only by their husbands or fathers, but also by
their sons and brothers for minor reasons -preparing the wrong food for
dinner, or taking too long with the laundry.  Though my father and
brothers were lenient about such trivial things, I didn't doubt for a
second that they would react violently over more serious matters, such
as relationships.

I dreaded the look of dismay and disdain I knew would come over my
mother's round and lovely face if I ever did something to truly anger
them.  She was nearing fifty-four and was short and pleasantly stocky.
She had creamy white skin, high pink colour in her cheeks, and black
eyes that twinkled like bright stars.  Sometimes when I looked into her
eyes, I sensed that the gleam reflected the tears hidden behind her
cheerful spirit.  There were days I would catch her sitting alone, when
she thought no one could see her, with a distant look in her eyes, as
if picturing herself in another life.  I sensed I was glimpsing ghosts
of lost opportunities tucked away in her heart.  But she forced herself
to live an illusion, rationalizing that if she pretended to be
satisfied long enough she would one day wake up content.

My father, though more threatening in size, would probably be the least
physically explosive of all my family members.  In contrast to his
formidable appearance, he was a very sedate man who, even if profoundly
upset, would never show it.  If I ever formed a romantic relationship
with a Muslim man, he might not lift the fist or knife, but he would be
the driving force behind my brothers' violence.

I was brought out of these thoughts by the front door closing. Standing
nervously in front of the door was a tall, slim young woman with an
impressive mane of sable hair pulled into a thick, silky ponytail that
hung to her hips.  Dalia was nowhere to be seen.  I assumed she had
gone to the break room to rest.  As I stepped towards the front counter
to welcome Jehan, the door opened again and in walked Michael, not
maimed or killed, but it suddenly occurred to me perhaps married. 
Since he was with Jehan, he could only be her husband or a relative;
given the hour, it was more than likely that he was her husband.  My
mind started racing.  Why hadn't he told Dalia?  How could he bring his
wife in here?  What if he wasn't attracted to Dalia at all?  Didn't he
realize that Dalia was attracted to him?  I knew that Michael and Dalia
would never be able to marry, not in Jordan anyway, but there had
seemed to be some chemistry between them.  I prayed it was not just
Dalia's fantasy.  Finding out that Michael was married would send her
into an even deeper depression.

Instinctively, I felt I had to protect my friend and find out what was
going on before alerting her that Michael was here.  At the counter, I
tried not to betray my emotions.

"Hi, can I help you?"

"I'm Jehan.  I have an appointment with Norma," she said, confident and
friendly.

"I'm Norma, it's nice to meet you.  Are you two together?"  I asked,
looking directly at Michael.

"Yes, we are," he said swiftly, leaving me searching for something to
say.

"Come with me," I finally muttered.  Jehan followed me to my station
while Michael remained in the reception area.  An awful thought ran
through my mind: what if he hadn't told her he'd been here before?  I
had to tread very carefully.  But for Dalia's sake I also had to get
some answers.

Once Jehan was seated, I hoped that she would be like most of my
clients, who used the stylist's chair as a psychiatrist's couch,
chatting and spilling the details of their personal lives until they
stood up to leave.

"What would you like done?"  I asked.

Well, he managed to convince me that I'd look better with

shoulder length hair, so here I am," she said with a spectacular smile.
\020He who?"  I asked, trying to pry a whisper of useful information
from her.

"Michael, of course.  He's been recommending this place to me for
weeks.  He said that this is the best salon in Amman, and that Dalia is
great."

"Oh .. . well, I'm glad to hear that.  You must be very close if you
trust his advice about your hair," I said, still fishing.

"Oh yes, we're very close.  He's great and very sweet, unlike most men,
if you know what I mean.  And he's so smart.  His is the only opinion I
value, not just about my hair, but every aspect of my life."

I still didn't know if they were married, so I determined to keep quiet
and hoped that she would lead the conversation where I needed it to go.
I glanced over at Michael still sitting in the reception area.  He'd
picked a seat where he could view the entire salon.  He held a
magazine, partly hiding his face, but I could see he was spending much
more time looking around than reading it.  He was unsettled, appeared
anxious and uncomfortable, which mystified me more.  If Jehan was his
wife and he was worried about bumping into Dalia, why bring her here?

I tried a gentle probe to get Jehan to open up.  "Where do you usually
get your hair done?"

"I normally go to Mary's in the second circle.  Have you heard of
it?"

"Yes.  It's across the street from Abu Ali's Bakery, right?  Do you
live near Mary's?"

"Actually we live an equal distance between here and there.  We live in
Abdoun, next to the fourth circle."

"I know where that is," I said, disheartened at the 'we'.  There was no
mistaking that when she said 'we', she meant herself and Michael.  I
didn't want to show my disappointment, but I knew I had an answer I was
looking for.  She clearly lived with Michael.  She must be his wife.
All I wanted to do was

finish her hair and get them both out of the salon before Dalia

saw them.  \020I thought of Dalia, who was just a wall away in the
break room.  How was I supposed to tell her that he was here?  That he
was married?  That Jehan was a sweet, attractive, pleasant girl,
someone we might have been friends with under different circumstances.
As I suppressed my desire to mangle Jehan's mane (it wasn't her fault,
after all), I wished I could get my hands on what little was left of
Michael's hair.

I heard Mohammed's pick-up thundering up the street just as I steered
Jehan to the front of the salon.  "Well, Michael, what do you think?"
she asked as she twirled her head and ran her fingers through her
hair.

"It looks great," he replied, then stopped cold as he saw Dalia walk
slowly up to the front counter.  Jehan turned to see what he was
staring at.  Dalia looked confused, but before I could speak, Mohammed
burst through the front door.

He found the four of us standing motionless and staring silently at one
another.  The tension was so sharp and the room so silent that all I
could hear was the sound of my heart beating.  Mohammed sliced through
the stillness.  "Are you ready to close up?"

Michael and Jehan took that as their cue to escape.  As they walked
out, Dalia looked at me with a mixture of anguish, ecstasy, and sheer
bewilderment.  I dreaded our lunch tomorrow, the first opportunity we'd
have to talk.

CHAPTER FIVE

Two weeks later, we still hadn't found a moment to be alone.  To our
dismay, Mohammed's social calendar had been blank for the last three
weeks, and he'd spent all of his time with us, taking up residence in
our break room.  So I set out for Dalia's at five thirty one morning,
praying that we would find some time to talk before heading to the
salon.  I had to tell Dalia that I thought Michael was married.

My father and brothers had left the night before to visit my
grandfather, my mother's father, who lived in the farmhouse near Irbid.
So, that morning I was free from my regular chores.  I raced to Dalia's
house, planning to get there after her morning prayers but before she
had to begin her chores.

I arrived at the house and stood for a moment, catching my breath,
before knocking.  The door opened and her mother appeared with a pail
of grimy water.  Obviously not expecting anyone to be standing there,
she jumped back, startled, when she saw me.

"Bism il la (Oh my God)," she exclaimed.  "Sabah al khair

(good morning).  What are you doing here so early?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you.  Sabah al floor, Urn Suhal, I
came to see Dalia."  \020"Of course you did.  Where's my mind?  Go on
in, if she's not in the kitchen she should be in her room."

"Thank you, Um Suhal.  But can I help with that first?"

"No, no, you go on in."

For as long as I could remember, Dalia's mum had been called Um Suhal,
which means 'mother of Suhal'.  With the birth of a woman's first son
she loses her own identity and is referred to as 'mother of..."
Fathers, however, are valued both before and after their child's
arrival.  They are recognized for having created such a worthwhile
child- a son by being give the title "Abu', and they continue to use
their own name.

Um Suhal, whose given name was Rania, was a very fragile-looking
creature, the opposite of my more stocky mother.  She was tall and
slender, with a yellowish-white complexion that must have been like
fresh rose petals once but had now lost its youthful lustre.  Her
small, emerald-green eyes were also marked by time.  Whatever fires
they had contained had burned out years ago, leaving them gloomy and
dim.  She was one of a small cluster of Arabs whose looks testify to
their ancient Greco-Roman genes, a rare group whose women are highly
sought after by Arab men.  Women with fair skin, light hair and eyes
that are neither black nor brown are deemed more than just attractive,
they are believed to produce the most handsome offspring.  Looking at
Dalia and her four brothers, the theory clearly held a lot of truth.

I found Dalia in her room, sitting on her bed, reading the last few
pages of Taher al Edward's The Fact of Time.

"Sabah al khair, ya gazallae.  What are you reading?"  I said.

"Oh my God.  How did you manage to escape so early

morning?"  she asked as she stood up to embrace me.  I got lucky, my
father and brothers have gone to check on Cidi (my grandfather), and I
ran over here so we could finally

talk."

"I'm so glad you did, I feel as if I'm going to burst.  First, let's

make sure the coast is clear," and she bolted out of her room.

I sat on her bed and looked around at her possessions, noting how many
of them reflected our friendship.  Some of the things dated back to our
childhood the fossils we found at the age of seven while playing on my
family's farm, or the sweet dish that housed her collection of sea
shells, bits of coral, and a starfish that we discovered on the coast
of Aqaba.  Others were more recent, including the Samar Hadaddin canvas
we'd bought at Riwak Al Balkaa Art Gallery in Fuheis a few weeks before
and now hung above her headboard.  The artist, a woman, quickly became
a favourite of ours and the painting's mate hung in my room.

Dalia's furnishings and curtains were clearly chosen by her mother, but
everything else reflected her.

She came back holding two small fanageen (small Turkish coffee cups)
brimming with coffee.

"Pull out the folding table from behind the dresser," she said.  After
I positioned the little table near the bed, she set down the coffee and
started rummaging through the bottom drawer of her dresser.

"Close and lock the door," she instructed.  Seconds later she pulled
out a pack of Gauloise Blondes, matches, and a small, handmade
earthenware ashtray.  Then, before sitting on the bed, she grabbed the
radio from her window ledge, switched 11 on, lowered the volume, and
placed it on the floor behind the locked door so no one walking along
the corridor could listen to our conversation.

"Now we can talk," she said as she handed me a cigarette.  I placed the
cigarette on the table next to my coffee and turned to her.

"You're not going to like what I have to say," I started.

"What do you mean?"  She was steeling herself, composing herself.

"Well, I think Michael may be married."

A wild range of emotions played across her face as she tried to stay
poised.  "I don't think so.  I mean, he's not the kind of person who
would hide something like that."

"You remember Jehan, the woman he brought to the salon.  Well, they
came together and left together and it was late in the day."

"That doesn't mean that she's his wife."

"No, but they live together, too."

"That still doesn't mean that she's his wife.  Did she say she was his
wife?"

"No, but she did say that she loves and respects him."

"Well, she can love and respect him if she's his relative."

"I know, but at that hour, Dalia, most single women aren't allowed out.
You know that.  We'd only be allowed to go to a relative's home at that
time."

"I know, but still, she could be a married relative, a cousin, or ...
She lives with him?  Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

"Well then, she's probably one of his sisters.  He has three, you
know."

"I didn't remember that.  I suppose she could have been his sister, but
if she's not his sister, promise me that you won't talk to him
again."

"I can't promise that.  I mean, if she's his wife, then I won't want to
talk to him again."

"Good."

"Did he say anything that night?  Did you talk to him?"  \020"I didn't
get a chance to, I was working on Jehan's hair most

of the time.  If we want to find out who she is, we're going to

have to talk to them again.  Maybe we could call her and say

hat we're having a promotion at the salon and that she was

randomly chosen from a list of new clients to receive a free

facial or something.  If she comes in again, we might be able to

figure out how she and Michael are related."

"That just might work.  Let's call her today."

"OK," I said and I lit my cigarette.

A few minutes later, we were interrupted by a loud knock on the door,
followed by her brother Rafiq's voice bellowing, "Dalia, where's the
coffee?"

"Hiene Jia (I'm coming)," she hollered.  She gave me an exasperated
look.

Rafiq, although the youngest of her four brothers, was one of the most
cruel and argumentative young men I've ever known.  Although he was
gorgeous-looking, his temperament was reflected in his face, making him
ugly, in my opinion.

"Let me help you make breakfast, that way you'll finish faster and
we'll have more time to talk," I said.  \020"OK, that sounds good."

Dalia hid the cigarettes and matches and sprayed air freshener, while I
emptied the ashtray in the bathroom and flushed away the incriminating
butts.  I followed her to the kitchen, where, after preparing a gallon
of mint tea and Turkish coffee, we began to cook breakfast.  First the
eejay eggs, onions, flour and spices, mixed together into a semi-liquid
batter and fried) and then the fried tomatoes.  We arranged the Jaban,
cheese, zayt and zayter, olives, ka'ik, and Arabic bread On the table.
Our job complete, we refilled our coffee cups and

went out to the back patio.  Um Suhal came into the kitchen as we were
leaving and began taking out the tea and coffee cups.  When Dalia's
brothers and father came down, she would serve them before leaving the
kitchen so they could eat.  Dalia normally had to help her mother tidy
the bedrooms and do the laundry as the men ate their food, but since I
was there, she was excused.

We sat on wrought-iron chairs on Dalia's patio, a large cement slab
shaded by a prehistoric grapevine fastened to a metal canopy, and
placed our coffee on the marble top of the wrought-iron table.  The
shade from the ancient grapevine was pleasant and the coffee good.  We
sat in silence for a while, taking pleasure in the morning calm.  Since
the back patio was near the kitchen, we didn't want to resume our
conversation for fear that Dalia's father and brothers would hear us
through the open window.

All of the men in Dalia's family were in the kitchen except for her
brother, Nasar, who was married and had moved out nine months before.
Nasar was an older and, if possible, nastier version of Rafiq.  He was
an agricultural engineer at a government office.  His wife Diana had a
dental degree but had never been allowed to work, either before her
wedding or now.  She wasn't allowed to leave the house without Nasar,
even to take out the rubbish.  The one time she complained, he broke
her nose and sent her back to her family, who told her that he was well
within his rights and that she deserved what she got for trying to defy
him.  Then they sent her back to beg his forgiveness.  In the nine
months of their marriage, she had left the apartment four times, once
when he allowed her to accompany him to the Abai'ala (a supermarket),
once to go to her family's home, and twice to visit Dalia's home.

Dalia's brother, Suhal, dropped us off in front of ND's, and

for us to unlock the door and go into the salon before

1 it

Now' said Dalia, we have to find that Jenah's or Jehan's number and set
something up with her.  Since you worked on her hair you make the
call."

"I knew you were going to say that!"  Then, a dramatic sigh Of
resignation, and "OK, I'll do it."



CHAPTER SIX

The phone rang five times before someone answered it.  As it was
ringing, I almost lost my nerve and hung up, but when I tried to put
the receiver down, Dalia grabbed my arm to prevent me.

Finally I heard a man's voice.  I stiffened, and Dalia knew that
someone had answered.  I couldn't just hang up.  I froze, unable to
speak, until Dalia nudged me and I managed to say the opening words of
my script, but so formally that it must have sounded like a recorded
message.

"Hello, I'm calling from ND's Salon.  May I please speak to Jehan?"  I
asked, and held my breath.

"Dalia, is that you?"  The voice sounded nervous.

"No, it's Norma.  Is this Michael?"  I asked before I realized what I
was saying.  Then I felt my panic starting to mount.

"Yes, it is.  Norma, where's Dalia?  How is she?  Can I speak with
her?"  he asked in one breath, before I cut in, feeling my courage
increasing.

Why should I tell you how she is?  Or where she is?"  I said,

astonished to hear the words coming out of my mouth.  After all, I had
never been so direct, or frank, with a man before.

"Norma, please, I'm begging you, put her on the phone.  I haven't been
able to forget the look she gave me the last time I was at the salon. I
can't sleep.  I can't even work.  I called in sick today, that's why
I'm here.  Don't worry, I'm alone.  My mother went to the supermarket
with my uncle.  If Dalia's there, just let me hear her voice."  Michael
said.  This was the sort of outpouring I could never, before then, have
imagined being spoken by a man.

"What about your wife?"  I asked, bracing myself for his reply.

"My what?  I'm not married.  Who said I was married?"  He sounded
genuinely shocked.

"Well, no one, but if you're not, then who is Jehan?"

"Jehan's my baby sister.  You thought she was my wife?"  He began to
laugh, though it was a relieved and lovely rather than mocking laugh.

"Well, what was I supposed to think?  It was quite late when you came
in and I assumed that your family, like mine, doesn't let your sisters
out at that hour."

"Oh, that is so funny.  She's not my wife.  Now, please, where's
Dalia?"

"She's here next to me.  We don't have any appointments for the next
hour, so I can put her on."

"Please, please do," he urged.

I tried to hand Dalia the phone, but she pushed it away, her face
turning beet red.  I covered the mouthpiece and whispered, "What are
you doing?  It's Michael.  He's home alone and wants to talk to you."

"I can't, Norma.  I want to, but I can't.  You talk to him," she said
and moved out of the cord's reach.  I tried everything, even tossing a
magazine at her from the counter in an attempt to get

her to come to the phone, but she wouldn't budge.  I was trapped.
\020"Michael, Dalia's in the back doing something that really can't
wait.  She should be done soon, though," I said as I narrowed my eyes
and curled my lips at her.  "She asked me to talk to you until she's
finished.  You don't mind, do you?"

"No, of course not.  Norma, does Dalia say anything about me?  I mean,
I know we don't know each very well, but has she ever even mentioned
me?"

"She's mentioned you."

"What does she say?  I mean ... I really like her.  I feel as if I've
known her for a long time.  I just want to talk to her, be with her,
you know what I mean.  It's strange, I've seen thousands of women, but
I've never felt anything like the emotions I felt when I first saw her
three months ago."

Though I had no experience with romantic relationships, his clarity
about his feelings didn't strike me as unusual.  Arab culture is so
structured and formal, that men often choose their partners based on a
glance.  Michael's instant attraction to Dalia seemed normal, even if
this confessional flood did not.  Could my brothers have said these
things so freely?  And it still nagged in my mind that he had waited
three weeks.  Why?  Yet I knew that if Michael and Dalia had shared the
same religion, his next step would have been to ask her father for her
hand in marriage.  They would then have had the opportunity to get to
know each other through chaperoned visits.

"Dalia claims that she felt the same way towards you," I said.

"Oh, that's such a relief.  You have no idea how many nights I've
stayed awake wondering if she felt anything for me."

I plunged on, hardly able to believe my own forwardness.  I think the
three of us had been so bottled up, so ready to explode with tension,
that this chance to talk was like a dam

bursting.  "Well, I don't know exactly what you two plan to do about
it.  She's Muslim and you're Catholic.  If you were Muslim, you could
ask for her hand, but as it is, you can't.  I can tell that you both
want to see each other.  But why would you want to invite all the
problems when nothing can come of it?"  By this point, though, I
already knew I would be playing the go-between as events unfolded,
since the feelings between them were clearly deep, and also mutual. So,
I acknowledged to Michael, "I've promised to do all I can to help
her."

"I know the dangers, but I'm willing to risk it.  Is she?  I don't care
that she's Muslim, she could be Buddhist and it wouldn't matter to me
or change my mind."

"I feel the same way you do about religion, and so does Dalia, but her
parents are more traditional and won't understand.  She's willing to
risk it, though."

"We can worry about that later.  First we need to figure out how we can
see each other.  Do you think I could come to the salon?"  he asked.
\020Looking back, this was the moment when I should have paused and
reflected.  Whatever I answered would be the beginning, the first act,
of a conspiracy I could scarcely imagine being part of.  This was the
moment when I should have been suspicious of his garrulousness, of why
he'd waited three weeks- of why, if he loved her, he could care so
little about the risk he was putting her in.  He was Arab, he knew the
code, the dangers.  We all did.

Yet, with hindsight, I realize that I trusted his confidence.  Coming
from a long line of military men, he was trained from birth to win not
just battles but anything he attempted.  He was not trained to face the
possibility of losing.  I knew he'd probably travelled and been
schooled abroad, lived in freer cultures where women were not crushed,
where honour crimes did not

take place.  Just talking to him made me feel our prison was a little
less inevitable, our risks a little less real, but what if his emotions
had blinded him to some of the dangers?  Or if he was fooling himself
that in his absence Jordan had progressed beyond the primitive codes?

Maybe we were all naive.  But as I talked to Michael, I was sharing
what Dalia had felt from the first; I could feel our dreams, our
stifled rebelliousness, being fanned into fire by his optimism and
strength.  I didn't have it in me to deny either of them this chance to
be together.  And part of me was drawn in by the thought of living this
dream vicariously.

"You, come to the salon?  That's out of the question.  Dalia's brother
Mohammed, the one who walked in as you and Jehan were leaving, is here
every day.  He conics and goes as he pleases so we never know when
we'll be alone."

"Well, what if you and Dalia befriended my sister?  We could see each
other through her.  Jehan and I are very close, and she's willing to
help me.  I've already told her how I feel about Dalia."

"That might work.  It would take time, though, and Mohammed would have
to see her here a lot before he'd trust her to go anywhere with us.  Is
she very busy?"  I asked.

"Don't worry, she can juggle things if she has to.  She's continuing
her studies so my father doesn't force her into an arranged marriage,
as he did my other sisters."

"Really?  Are your other sisters older or younger than you?"

"They're younger and what he did to them is terrible.  Aida is
twenty-eight and has a beautiful two-year-old daughter, Jasmine.  Her
husband's OK, he's not a hakeer (jerk) or anything, it's just that he
wasn't her choice and she's not in love with him.  She loves her little
girl, though; I don't think I've ever seen a more devoted mother.  She
has a nursing degree,

but her husband won't let her work.  Now she feels as if it was all a
waste of time.  My sister Miriam is only twenty-three, and my father
made her marry a forty-six year old/"5 (fart) instead of continuing at
university.  She cried for days when my father forced her to stop
going.  She wanted to become an English professor."

As he rattled on, nonstop, about his family, I could still hear
nervousness in his voice.  I hadn't expected this kind of open,
detailed description of his family but he made it easy to keep the
conversation going while we waited for Dalia to find enough courage to
come to the phone.  I was nervous, too, and thankful that he was doing
most of the talking.  It was rare and refreshing to hear a man being
sensitive to his sisters' lives, and daring to be critical of other
men.

"I'd love to meet Miriam.  I went to English schools but rarely have
the chance to speak English any more," I said.

"No such luck.  The hakeer she's married to hardly lets her visit us,
much less go anywhere else."

"Well, I guess that's life, here at least.  Since Dalia and I are the
only girls in our families, our mothers need us to help out at home and
so we haven't been forced into marriage yet."

"That's the only thing saving Jehan.  That and my mother's failing
health.  She isn't physically ill, or at least no one had diagnosed her
illness.  I think my father's tyranny has worn her down over the years.
He's a very stern and controlling man.  He spent most of his life in
the armed forces and treats my mother like one of his recruits, always
yelling at her and cutting her down.  The whole thing makes me so
angry.  I wish I could get her away from him.  Oh, let's talk about
something else; this is too depressing.  Obviously, I don't come from a
model family, but then who does?"

"Well, every family has its secrets."  By now, I felt brave

enough to lighten the tone of our conversation.  "Hey, I have an idea.
Since you're Catholic and I'm Catholic, maybe you could set me up with
one of your brothers.  Dalia said you have two.  Then we'd be related.
If that happened, you could see Dalia all the time."

Michael took me seriously.  "Oh, you don't want to get involved with
them.  Jerius is younger than me but has been married for four years.
He has two young sons, and sometimes I really think that's he's trying
to raise them to be the next Arab Hitlers.  But instead of targeting
Jews, he's teaching them to target women.  It's a pity, really, because
his wife Samia is so gentle, quiet, and kind.  She never smiles,
though.  I guess I wouldn't smile if I had to deal with Jerius.  She
reminds me of my mum.  I think that's how my mother must have been at
her age."

"What about your other brother?"  I asked, more out of curiosity than
anything else.

"George?  He's twenty-five, and the picture of male beauty -but that's
where his perfection ends.  I hate to say it, but he's very shallow,
vain, and arrogant everything you wouldn't want to spend the rest of
your life with.  He's a typical young Arab man, financially successful
and expects everyone to treat him as if he's a god.  I think he might
actually try to force his wife to give up her religion and worship him.
You wouldn't want to be the lucky woman, would you?"

"No!  I don't want that!  Michael, can you hang on a minute?  I should
go check on Dalia.  You two should talk before we have to hang up. Hold
on."  I put the receiver on the front counter.  Mohammed would be here
soon.  I walked over to Dalia, who'd been listening to my end of the
conversation, and physically dragged her to the phone.  \020"What's
wrong with you, Dalia?  First you can't wait to talk

to him and now he's on the phone you won't even pick it up!  He sounds
really nice and he's dying to talk to you.  He's just as nervous as you
are."  I picked up the receiver, covering the mouthpiece with my hand,
and snapped a loud stage whisper, "Now take this call!"

"All right, all right, just give me a minute," she said.

"You've had at least half an hour to get ready enough!"

At last she took the phone, and I left the room so she could have some
privacy.  I went into the break room and made a fresh pot of coffee,
and only minutes later Mohammed burst in and plopped himself down on
the couch, waiting for us to serve him.  Dalia hung up swiftly when she
saw him, but we'd have no chance to sit and go over our conversations
with Michael.  We could hardly bear it.

"I told the guys I'd meet them at seven tonight, and I need to pick up
Khaldoun before that," he announced, insisting we cancel our seven
o'clock appointment to speed his getaway.

"With our regular customers during the week and wedding parties at the
weekends for the next three weeks, when else will we fit her in?"

But it was futile.  This was Thursday and Mohammed knew we'd cancel our
seven o'clock appointment to accommodate his silly plans.  Thursday
night is men's night out in Amman.  On Friday, the Muslim day of
worship, everything is closed.

"Norma, get me some coffee."  Never any 'please' from this idiot.  I
fumed that I had to kowtow to him, but I'd at least try to seize the
moment to further our secret plans before he left.

"Since we've been so busy, well, Dalia and I have been thinking that it
might be wise to hire a girl, a student or something, to help out a
bit.  You don't think your father would have a problem with that, do
you?  I've discussed it with my father and he doesn't.  We just need a
shampoo girl, or

someone to help with the clean-up a few hours a day," I said.  \020"I
don't see a problem.  I'll ask him tomorrow and see what he says.
Anything else?"

"Actually, yes.  If your father agrees, you should know that we already
have a candidate in mind.  She's a nice girl, a student, about
twenty-one.  She can juggle her schedule to accommodate ours.  If you
let me know tomorrow, then I'll give her a call."

"OK, I'll talk to my father tonight."  He swallowed his last sip of
coffee and left.

Dalia and I stayed in the break room, but we needed to focus on Jehan,
not Michael.

"Why did you tell Mohammed we wanted to hire a shampoo girl?"  she
asked, a bit shocked.

"I'm just setting the stage for Jehan's arrival.  She's his sister, by
the way," I said, not knowing if Michael had told her.

Her shoulders slumped with relief and a smile spread across her face.
"I thought she must be.  Are you sure she can spend that much time
here?"

"According to Michael, she'll rearrange her schedule to help the two of
you."  There were now four of us in on The Plan.  We must start
thinking creatively, and with an espionage agent's attention to detail.
We were terrified of being caught, and must miss nothing.  First, we
must free ourselves more from Mohammed.

"It looks as if Mohammed has got himself out of his rut.  Let's pray
that he'll go back to his regular routine and we'll have our break room
to ourselves again.  I've been going nuts since he started hanging out
here every day.  We should convince him to take up an activity," I
suggested.  "That would keep him out of our hair even longer."

"I don't think there's anything else he could possibly do on

that dumb truck of his.  How about a class or something?"  she
suggested.

Yes.  But what?  Then it came to me weightlifting!  \020"We could
persuade him to take up body-building," I said, 'then tell him how
wonderful he's looking, what a noticeable difference it's making.  Oh,
I can see it now.  He'd live at the gym- if we could convince him to go
there."  We both thought feverishly.  "Let's buy him a membership. Give
it to him as a gift.  And tell him we did it because he's been feeling
so down lately, and wanted to help," I said, completing the plot.

"You're a genius!"

But would it work?

We got on with the day's appointments, not daring to ponder on how
typical and pathetic an example this was of what our lives forced us to
do- serving the whims of this kid like slaves while plotting to
manipulate him so that we could have our tiny taste of freedom and
excitement.

"What do you think they do all night on Thursdays?"  I asked as seven
o'clock approached.

"Well, Selma says they go to secret places where they see women dance
and do other things."

"But no woman is allowed out that late."

"Not Arab women, foreigners!"

"I don't believe it.  You know how Selma is, she hears one little thing
and turns it into headline news.  I think they just sit around and play
backgammon or cards and smoke their argil as and talk."

"I overheard the twins once, when they were getting ready to go out,
say they were going to miss some show called Baywatch that some club
picks up on its TV.  It's an Israeli show or something.  Maybe they
just watch foreign shows all night."

Mohammed's pickup roared up the street and came to an abrupt stop
outside the salon.  He leaned on the horn until Dalia ran out to see
what was wrong.  An instant later she returned with instructions to
close up immediately and get in the car, Mohammed was already late.  We
left everything as it was and ran out to the pickup.  Mohammed was
impatient and irritable.  He yelled at us to hurry and close the doors
and then sped off, almost hitting another driver.  \020Every Thursday,
most of the men in both our families, like most of the men in Amman,
rushed home from work and got ready to go out.  Many went to one of
several sleazy bars downtown that are tucked away in the maze of alleys
around the Cliff and Venetia Hotels.  Amman's only other bars or discos
are inside the larger hotels such as the Marriott or the Hyatt, which
younger night dwellers go to.

At night Amman transforms into a strange world.  When I was around four
or five, my father would take me to the city centre at night.  I had to
wait in the car while he ran to pick up sahlab (a traditional milk
drink served warm with nuts and cinnamon) for me.  I remember that the
streets were full of men, both young and old.  Some were seated at
outdoor cafes, smoking water pipes and drinking mint tea.  Older men
gathered in large groups on the street corners, dressed in the
traditional long dish-da shay  The men of our generation prefer the
"American style', jeans and a dress shirt, or the "English style',
where they replace the jeans with trousers.

Even in their dress, men have varied options open to them, unlike
women.  They can make their own decisions, choose their own careers,
decide whether or not to marry (though they marry when asked to by
their fathers), select their own hobbies and activities, and decide
whether to remain at home or move out.  Men in a Muslim society are
free to

do as they wish within the guidelines laid out by their religion.

It's different, of course, for Muslim women.  If you saw Dalia in the
street and were Jordanian, you'd instantly know that she is subject to
Muslim laws.  Her graceful body is sheathed in the long, loose folds of
a shar'ia, and her hair is hidden by a veil.  Dalia has worn the
shar'ia since she was ten, which for women is the beginning of adult
life.  This is at least as old as Mohammed himself.  Islam's founder
was married to an even younger child, six-year-old Aisha, and
consummated the marriage sexually when she was nine.  Aisha was only
one of Mohammed's many child brides.

Dalia and I became friends at an age when she was not yet required to
follow all of these regulations and customs, and we already loved each
other as sisters before we reached the age when the rules could have
influenced our feelings towards one another and divided us.  Her family
allowed her to continue to associate with me, most likely because we
both lacked sisters and because they never thought it would develop
into such a close friendship.  When she turned ten, together we found
ways to tiptoe around the rules and, temporarily at least, escape some
of the restrictions.  But as a Christian I was bound by my own set of
rules, many of which were the same as hers.

By our early teens, Dalia and I had learned how to navigate this
treacherous religious landscape, even if we hated it.  So far we had
survived.  But, with Michael on the scene, look how we were now being
forced to behave.  How could we be proud of such petty and demeaning
behaviour?  How could two intelligent, middle-class women show such
slavish obedience to a shallow younger brother?  How could we rely on
subterfuge and manipulation to get what we wanted, and let a gossipy
neighbourhood beauty salon define the boundaries of lives that could
have ranged much further?

How could we risk our lives for simply a romance?

It is only now, looking back six years from the beginning of our
dangerous adventure- years of experiencing freedom, travelling across
oceans, continents and cultures that I can see that our actions would
be incomprehensible to women of any liberated culture.  As
incomprehensible as the violent acts against non-Muslims, non-Arabs,
that, since 11 September, have made the Western world suddenly hungry
to understand this alien place.  They read scholars, watch TV pundits.
How much more they would learn if they had lived for a day in our
shoes, in Amman, in our neighbourhood, in our salon.  Then they would
understand the forces that wrote Jordan's history, and our personal
histories.  They would begin to glimpse the laws that dictate the shape
of every moment of every day of the ordinary lives of people like Dalia
and me, and our families.

And don't be deluded by Mohammed's freedom to wear blue jeans and go to
a bar.  Both sexes are bound by the thousands of rules that carpet
Jordan and the Middle East with a dense tapestry of overlapping and
interwoven layers of Muslim, Arab, Christian, and Jewish codes and
traditions, all of it dominated by the pervasive power of the Koran,
Islam's holy book and manifesto.  The difference, of course, is that if
men break any of these rules, they are to be forgiven.  Women's
limitations are harder to list simply because the list is continually
being expanded and edited by both male lawmakers and the men in a
woman's own family.  And if a woman breaks any of the rules she's
required to follow, she is not granted the luxury of forgiveness.  She
must be punished.

\020CHAPTER SEVEN

Violence is embodied in our laws, and in our history.  It applies to
warriors in battle, to perceived enemies of Islam, to Muslims who try
to escape the faith, and, above all, it applies to women.  Listen to
these words from Islam's holy book, the Koran.  This passage is the
basis of the honour killing the legal murder- of women:

Men are in charge of women, because Allah hath made the one of them to
excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the
support of women).  Good women are obedient, guarding in secret that
which Allah hath guarded.  As for those from whom ye fear rebellion,
admonish them and banish them and scourge them.

in the Arabic text, the last portion of this verse, 'scourge

them', is often translated to mean 'kill them'.  Arab men believe

that this verse orders them to 'kill' any female relative who is

not obedient, or who shows any sign of rebellious behaviour.  This act
is called and honour killing, or a crime of honour, because the men
believe that they must kill the offending woman in order to protect
their family's 'honourable' name and reputation.  This kind of killing
rarely makes the papers.  It is kept out of the civil justice system.
It happens routinely, even

today.

Since most Arabic countries have been under Islamic law since AD 644,
honour killing is no longer considered just an Islamic practice.  It
has been incorporated into Arab culture and is practised by both
Christians and Muslims, embracing both Dalia and me (for my blood is
Arab).  And in Arab culture, an entire family's reputation is tied to
the reputations of its female

members.

It is this codified obsession with honour that drove Dalia's brother
Mohammed to guard and watch us like a jailer.  It is what would permit
him, or any of our brothers or fathers, to, literally, drive a dagger
into our hearts if we betrayed whatever I they perceived as honour.

We can lay the violence that has been part of the Islamic' culture for
nearly fourteen hundred years at the feet of another 1 Mohammed.  From
the time Mohammed's followers took Mecca by force, the story of Islam
has been filled with wars and bloody battles.  I've never found it
surprising that a religion founded by vicious warriors, and scarred by
centuries of bloodshed, contains such endorsements of violence, and
then wraps it in the dignity of 'honour' and of law without a qualm.
\020It is safe to say, I believe, that Islam is a totalitarian regime
operating under the guise of a religion.  The Koran is its manifesto,
claimed by Islam to provide guidance for all that is needed for a
person's spiritual and physical well-being It tells Muslims when and
how to have sex and when and how to

refrain from it, what to possess and what to give away, when to sleep
and when to wake, when to speak up and when to remain silent, what and
how to eat, to dress, and how to seek knowledge.  It shows Muslims how
to deal with the world around them; outlines the responsibilities of a
person to himself, to his parents, siblings, offspring, spouses,
neighbours, society, and nation; details what habits to cultivate and
what to avoid.  In short, Islam contains laws and restrictions covering
every aspect of life, controlling you from birth to death.  And, if
born Muslim, there is no escape.  It is against Muslim law to convert
from Islam to any other religion; such a conversion is punishable by
death.

There are six basic daily rules that neither men nor women can escape.
One is the ritual they must follow prior to performing their prayers
washing their hands, arms, feet, head, and neck, then facing Mecca. The
other five are known as the "Five Pillars of Islam'.  Sala is the
obligation of prayer, which should be performed five or six times a
day.  Haj, which is considered the pinnacle of a devout Muslim's life,
is the pilgrimage to the holy sites in and around Mecca, usually
performed in the last month of the Muslim year, Zuul-Hijja.  Zakat, or
giving alms to the poor, is a form of tax that should be paid in
various ways through the years and is a vital part of Islamic social
teaching.

Sawm, fasting, is also known as Ramadan and is celebrated in the ninth
month of the Muslim calendar, and commemorates the revelation of the
Koran to Mohammed.  It is a month that tests human discipline.  During
Ramadan, all Muslims are required to abstain from sex and from letting
anything pass through their lips from dawn to dusk, including water and
cigarettes.  It is against the law to be seen eating or drinking
outdoors during the day, regardless of your religion.

Finally, Shahada is the profession of the faith and is the basic tenet
of Islam: "La ill aha ilia Allah Mohammed rasul Allah' (there is no God
but Allah, and Mohammed is the prophet).

Since Jordan is a Muslim country, it is not surprising that although I
am not a member of that religion, my family and I had to live according
to Muslim law.  In the world of Islam, Christian and Jewish inhabitants
of a Muslim country are referred to as dhimmah (the protected
minority).  We are not an enemy exactly, but closely watched
second-class citizens.  Living protected as a dhimmah does not come
free.  According to Islamic law, non-Muslims must meet five conditions.
First, they must pay the jizyah, a poll tax, in order to protect their
rights.  Next, they must not harm Muslims, have any sexual engagement
with Muslim women, steal the property of Muslims, nor cooperate with
the enemies of Islam.  The list goes on.  We non-Muslims must not be
flagrant with prohibited things, such as intoxication, adultery, and
incest.  We must not build new churches or temples, or sound church
bells.  We must not build any building taller than one belonging to a
Muslim, as this would disgrace our neighbours.

If we break the rules, violence is evoked.  Non-Muslims who break the
conditions of their protection are considered muharib (hostile),
justifying the declaration of a. jihad (holy war) against them. Muslims
are required to fight if they believe that non-Muslims have rebelled
against the law.  They are taught to take up the sword and advance to
the point that non-Muslims, fearing for their lives, say, "We are
Muslims' or "We will retain our own religion, and will carry on our own
way of worship, but we will publicly follow the laws of Islam." If this
happens then the non-Muslims are once again dhimmah and therefore safe.
If, however, they refuse to state this, then Muslims must 'cleanse the
world of (the non-Muslims') existence' in order to

preserve Islamic society and maintain the integrity of the faith.

The Koran, the Muslim holy book, refers to the early prophets of the
Bible and the Torah, but that's where the similarities end.  Muslims
believe that the Koran is the literal word of God as it was
communicated to Mohammed in a series of revelations during the early
seventh century.  Mohammed was born in Mecca in a modern-day Saudi
Arabia in AD 570 and began receiving revelations in AD 610.  he moved
to a nearby town in 622 because the powerful families of Mecca had
grown increasingly outraged by his claims.  This migration, or Hejiri,
marks the beginning of the Islamic calendar.  Mohammed's followers
returned to Mecca in 630 and took it by force, the first jihad in
Muslim history.  By 644, Muslims had taken Jordan, Egypt, Syria, Iraq,
Lebanon, and Israel and spread into North Africa, Spain, and France.  I
know that Christianity's hands also drip with blood.  But from the
first jihad, Islam's history is one of wars and death in the name of
the faith.

The Islamic legal code is divided into two parts: ibadat and mu'amilat.
Ibadat (the intention of intimacy with God) is required of all Muslims.
Hajj, prayer, fasting, alms-giving, good deeds, prevention of evil
deeds, and, finally, jihad are all considered ibadat.  And here again
the call to war and violence is embedded and codified.  There are rules
about how these acts should be performed, and for what reasons. For
example, if a man grabs a sword and sets off to fight non-believers
without doing so for the pleasure of God, he will not be rewarded, but
if he does so with 'divine intention' then he is considered shuhada (a
model) for the entire community and will be rewarded by God.  In the
Koran, whenever there are the commands qatilu (wage war) andjahidu
(struggle), there is also the order

it sabil Allah (strive in the way of God).  Muslims claim that Islam is
the true religion because it has not disregarded the necessity of
warfare.

The other part of the Muslim code, mu'amilat, focuses on interpersonal
relations on private lives and contains laws instructing and regulating
every possible aspect of life, including how to appoint a Mujtahid (a
jurist who must be male and is the equivalent of a judge); restrictions
on what type of water (tap, rain, or well-water) are permissible for
personal use, for cooking, and for washing; which types of soaps or
gels are acceptable, and which are prohibited; and how and when to use
the lavatory, and the correct way to clean yourself afterwards.  It
lists things that are considered najis (evil, unclean) and explains how
to make them pak (acceptable and clean) or warns to avoid them.  It is
this section of the law, which states that a non-Muslim is najis and
should be avoided, that was relevant to Dalia and me as Michael entered
our lives.  If contact is unavoidable, for example if a Muslim is
forced to shake the hand of a non-Muslim in business dealings, it lists
the steps a Muslim must follow to cleanse himself of this taint of
evil.

A woman's every move is well-covered by mu ami lat  There are rules for
marriage, divorce, sex, sleep, food, death, burial, bank transactions,
and the purchase or sale of property and personal items. And, of
course, it states that men are superior to women.

Islamic laws make no distinction between Muslim and non-Muslim women.
The Jordanian government, however, distinguishes between the two.  For
instance, non-Muslim women are expected to dress conservatively,
covering as much of their bodies as they can, and to avoid
tight-fitting clothing.  Muslim women, however, must abide by the
following, much stricter, law:

A woman should conceal her body and hair from a man who is Nah-Mahmm
(unrelated), and as an obligatory precaution she should conceal herself
even from a Na-Baligh boy (young) who is able to discern between good
and evil and could probably be sexually excited, but she can leave her
face and hands (up to her wrists) uncovered in the presence of a
Na-Mahram as long as it does not lead him to cast a sinful evil glance,
or to her doing something forbidden; for in both these cases she must
cover them.

It is from this law that Dalia's shar'ia derives.  The traditional
dress is a loose-fitting garment that comes only in colours accepted by
Islam; no bright colours are allowed.  It can be worn on its own or
over other clothing and has a high collar, long sleeves, and is long
enough, in most cases, to fall just below the ankles.  While I could
grow up to wear modest skirts and trousers, Dalia had been forced to
wear the shar'ia since she was ten.  While I could wear my hair loose
on the street, her veil would cover her head.  But once inside the
salon, she would change it for a small, less shrouding one.

Muslim women are not allowed to use cosmetics or nail polish, except
under certain conditions specified by law, while Christians are allowed
to wear cosmetics as long as our fathers permit it.  A Muslim woman can
use cosmetics when it is for the pleasure of her husband, when she is
among other women, and when she is among men whom she cannot marry,
such as her brother, father, or son.  Dalia and I usually dabbled in
cosmetics, practising make overs on each other, and as long as we did
it in private and she removed all traces of the make-up before
returning home, it was not forbidden.

In itself, nail polish is not hara am forbidden.  However, if it is
used during wudhu (preparation for prayers) and impedes the flow of
water to the fingernails, then it is not allowed.  Moreover, if the
nail polish is alluring to a Na-Mahram, then it becomes hara am

Islam claims that the Koran specifies all that is necessary for a
person's spiritual and physical well-being.  Since we (Christians) were
required to follow their (Muslims') laws, people notice very few
differences between our public behaviour and that of our Muslim
neighbours.  Dress, nail polish and make-up are visible differences.
But they are only on the surface.  The deeper disparities are only
revealed in the privacy of our homes, when we are with our families.

There were differences between my household and Dalia's.  Dalia, for
example, was never allowed to join her father or brothers for a meal.
When they had company, everyone ate at the same time, but the women
were in one room, usually with the young children, and the men in
another.  My family didn't Mow this custom.  Men and women were allowed
to eat together, but the women were expected to serve the men, and
could not begin eating until the oldest male had started.  Dalia and I
were both expected to cook the meals and clean up afterwards, although
our mothers usually prepared the evening

meal.

Also, there were certain rooms in Dalia's home designated for men, and
she was only allowed in them when no men were present, and then only to
clean them, whereas in my house we were all allowed to enter every room
regardless of whether or not there were men in them.  Everyone had to
wake up before sunrise in Dalia's house so they could perform their
morning prayers.  They could return to bed afterwards, but only if they
got up again before noon prayers.  In my home, we were not required to
wake up at a particular time, just early enough to meet the demands of
the day's schedule.

These small differences between Muslims and Christians were barely
noticeable to us, and yet the divide, though not publicly stated, goes
much deeper than this.  It comes from a firmly held prejudice, embedded
in the heart of the Muslim religion.  While the Koran does not
specifically state that you must stay away from Christians, it calls
all non-Muslims unbelievers, or the unfaithful.  Woven into many of its
passages are phrases and comments declaring the superiority of Islam
over Judaism and Christianity in particular,

and suggesting that faithful Muslims should avoid personal
relationships with members of those religions:

Oh ye who believe!  Take not for friends unbelievers rather than
believers.

They desire that you should disbelieve as they have disbelieved, so
that you might be (all) alike; therefore take not from among them
friends till they forsake their homes in the way of Allah, but if they
turn back then seize them and kill them wherever you find them and take
not from among them a friend or helper.

This is the passage that gave rise to the rule that if anyone tries to
leave Islam and convert to another religion, he or she shall be put to
death.

Those who believe do battle in the cause of Allah, and those who
disbelieve do battle for the cause of Evil; so fight ye against the
friends of Satan (minions of the devil).

In this verse we (all non-believers) are referred to as friends of
Satan.  Had Dalia and her family honoured this, we would never have
been friends.

Bigotry, discrimination, and male chauvinism are not just implied in
Islam, they are an integral part of Muslim law.  It is a religion that
caters to men's desires and demands the total submission of women. This
prejudice was at the root of the laws that made a relationship between
Dalia and Michael a

crime.

There is even a stipulation that would have prevented Dalia and Michael
from getting to know each other without secrecy and subterfuge even if
they had both been Muslims.  According to the rules that apply to both
Muslims and Christians, dating is impossible for either religion.
Although it is not specifically banned, you'd have to break several
Koranic laws in order to date.  For example, it is hara am (prohibited)
for a man and women who are not Mahram (related) to be together if no
one else is present, as it could lead to immorality and scandal.  Over
the years, this law has grown to mean that a woman is not allowed
anywhere in public or private with an unrelated male and must always be
accompanied by a male relative.  So, when a woman is seen entering a
public place, people assume that the man escorting her is a relative;
it is rare to see any women around town unaccompanied by a male,
especially in the evening.  If you do spot one or two single women, you
can be sure they are either tourists or modernized Christians, though
most Christian households have yet to advance that far.  Certainly not
mine.

But even if a couple managed to surmount the challenge of getting to
know each other, the old prejudices so infect the laws of marriage that
the barriers could never be overcome.

A spontaneous romance the Western idea of marriage for love defies the
old practice of arranged marriage, another tradition that can be traced
back to the time of Mohammed's Carriage to the child, Aisha, which was
arranged by her grandfather.  The laws governing arranged marriages are
very clear: \020If a person proposing marriage is known for his virtue
and faith, then it is recommended that his proposal should not be
rejected.  The Prophet is reported to have said: "Whenever you receive
a proposal for marriage to your daughter from a man whose virtue and
piety pleases you, then give him her hand in marriage.  For if you do
not do this way, great scandals and lapses will fill the earth."

Arranged marriages can be either temporary or permanent, and can be
arranged by either a grandfather or a father, but not by a brother.
Although most arranged marriages occur in Muslim households, all Arabs
follow this tradition.  Many families claim that they allow a woman to
make the final decision about her marriage, but this is just not so. In
truth, if a woman decides that she doesn't want to marry a certain man,
a verse from the Koran is invoked, which ultimately voids her decision
and leaves the final choice up to her father.  The verse states that
one should fear one's father in the same way one would fear a cruel
king, and that one should give priority to his desires over one's own. 
In essence, a father only has to state that it is his desire for his
daughter to marry a certain man and she is required to oblige.

In Jordan, the laws that apply to marriage were a minefield of dangers
for Dalia and Michael.  For instance, a Muslim

woman cannot marry a non-Muslim man and a Muslim man cannot permanently
marry a non-Muslim woman who is not Ahlul Kitab (Jewish or Christian).
There are certain sects, such as Khawarij, Ghulat and Nawasib, who
claim to be Muslim but who are classified as non-Muslims.  Muslim men
and women cannot contract a permanent or temporary marriage with them.
In essence, a Muslim man can marry a non-Muslim woman, but a Muslim
woman does not have the same privilege.  Muslims believe that children
are the property of the father, since they carry his name.  If a Muslim
male marries a non-Muslim female, his children are Muslim.  However, if
a Muslim woman marries a non-Muslim man, her children would belong to
her non-Muslim husband and so the union is prohibited.

Another set of laws governs a woman's duties as a wife and mother.  It
is hara am for a married woman to go out of the house without her
husband's permission.  She must also submit herself to her husband's
sexual desires and should not prevent him from having intercourse with
her without a justifiable excuse.  As long as she does not fail in her
duties, her husband is required to feed, clothe, and house her.
However, "If the wife does not fulfill her matrimonial duties towards
her husband, she will not be entitled to the food, clothes or housing,
even if she continues to live with him."

These laws place women in a no-win situation.  Most Muslim women cannot
work and so do not have their own income.  Therefore, in order for a
woman to get the things she needs to survive food, clothing, medicines-
she has to obey all of her husband's requests and demands or else he
doesn't have to feed her.  In reality, these laws mean that if a woman
wishes to live, she must

obey.

And so in this stifling climate of laws, a modest beauty salon

in Amman became the stage for an epic struggle between the almost
blinding force of Islam and a fragile hara am forbidden love.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Jehan joined the conspiracy on the twenty-third day of the sixth month,
known as June or AKA by Arabic or Islamic calendars.  That was the day
she began coming to the salon.  She had completed her term of classes
at Jordan University and was now on summer break.

By June, Jordan begins to feel like an airless furnace with
temperatures starting at 86 degrees Fahrenheit and steadily climbing
until they have reached well into the high nineties.  Jordan is an arid
country, with an annual rainfall somewhere below two hundred
millimetres.  The many wild flowers that blanket the fields in the
valley Wadi as-Seer, near Amman, begin to shrivel in the gruelling heat
for lack of water.  All along streets and highways vendors sell roasted
houmous -green chick peas roasted in an open flame while still in their
soft shells and attached to the stem.

By June, the wedding season is in full swing.  This year, as for the
past five years, Dalia and I were run off our feet, and refused most of
our regular appointments to focus on wedding

parties, for a salon hairstyle on the wedding day is a ritual for all
the women in a bridal party.  Arab wedding ceremonies are very
colourful and noisy affairs.  The celebrating begins the night before,
when all the men drive or march down the streets in a convoy, singing
and dancing, while the women, dressed in their best clothes, go to the
bride's home for a night of their own singing and dancing.

That evening the women are allowed to remove their veils, since no men
are present.  It is one of the only times in a woman's life when she
feels comfort, ease, and freedom.

On the morning of the wedding day, the men again gather and begin their
noisy procession to the bride's home to escort her to the mosque or, if
the couple are Christian, church.  This is where the similarities
between Christian and Muslim weddings end.  At a Muslim wedding, men
and women are separated during the wedding reception.  The groom is
allowed to join the women long enough to dance with his bride once,
after which he must return to the room designated for men.  At
Christian receptions, men and women celebrate together.

On her wedding day, the bride-to-be chooses a salon to go to with all
the women in her bridal party, including the flower girl.  They have
their hair styled and their make-up applied.  Most often, wedding
parties would come to our salon, but sometimes we were asked to go to
the bride's home.  As a result, our schedule was often very hectic. The
bridal party usually consisted of at least ten women and we had to
style all of them in a three-to four-hour period.  Our calendar was
booked for the next three months so, since we truly needed Jehan's
help, her arrival at the salon didn't raise any suspicions.  Phase one
of our communication network was now successfully in place.

Through Jehan, Dalia and Michael were able to exchange

letters and have short conversations on the phone.  Dalia and Michael's
letters slowly progressed from one-page "I just met you and don't want
to reveal too much of me yet' notes to ten-page "I'm pouring my heart
and soul out on paper' missives discussing their opinions, beliefs,
likes, dislikes.  I believed that if this friendship lasted, they would
soon know more about each other than most Jordanian couples who had
spent their lives together.

Jehan quickly became a good friend and the three of us discovered that
we had a lot in common.  It turned out that Jehan wasn't as quiet as
I'd originally thought.  She chattered on and on, hopping from one
subject to another without taking time to draw a breath.  Dalia and I
loved her.  It was wonderful to meet another woman who shared our
beliefs, hopes and opinions about women's positions and rights.  But it
would still be months before Mohammed trusted Jehan enough to leave the
three of us unaccompanied outside the salon.  It would be weeks before
Dalia could see Michael again.  For now, though, she survived on the
letters and sporadic calls.

To implement phase two of our plot we had to find a way to get Mohammed
interested in joining a gym so that he would be out of the salon more
often.  This was not easy; we had to be very careful or Mohammed would
suspect that we were up to something and we spent several weeks working
to arouse his interest.  Our concentrated efforts kept our minds a
little off our fear of being caught, but it was always there.

First, Jehan asked Michael to buy magazines and books about exercise
and weight training.  We left them lying around the salon in places we
knew Mohammed would see them.  Once we saw him reading the magazines
and books, Dalia and I started talking, in Mohammed's presence, about
the exercises we'd supposedly begun doing and mentioned that they

increased our strength and energy.  After a week, he began asking us
questions.  We knew we had him hooked.  We gently urged him to try some
of them himself.  Oh, if only we had access to weights and
weightlifting machines, how much better our results would be, we said,
nudging him towards joining a health club.  The place we had in mind
was Sports City, which was minutes from both our homes and the salon.

We phoned the Club to discuss a gift membership for our brother, and,
with Jehan's help, arranged to have Michael drop off the money for fees
and pick up Mohammed's card later that evening.

The next morning we wrapped up all of our workout books and magazines,
along with Mohammed's new Sports City membership card, and presented
him with his gift when he arrived that afternoon.  He was thrilled.

Our plan appeared to have worked perfectly.  Mohammed loved his new
pastime, and managed to make many new friends at the gym; he was out of
our hair from morning until siesta.  He was

happy to drop us off at the salon or a bride's home, and leave.  Dalia
was thrilled to be in touch with Michael.  And we'd found a great
friend in Jehan.

We savoured our first small taste of success at manipulating and
deluding men the only route, for millennia, to any kind of power for
Arab women.  It gave us a little confidence, subdued the fear a bit.
But it was bittersweet; had we lived in a freer world, it would not
have been our strategy of choice.

Eventually, of course, Jehan was going to have to return to university
and wouldn't be able to spend much time at the salon.  We'd miss her
she had become like a sister to us.  Without her here to cover Dalia's
calls to Michael, and deliver long letters to him, we needed a new way
for them to communicate.  We agreed that Dalia would only write to him
on

the days Jehan came in and could courier the letters swiftly home. With
classes and her duties at home, Jehan would be here much less often,
but Dalia and I were sure that we would find a way to persuade
Mohammed to take us to see her.  \020We knew that all this scheming
was dangerous, but we never discussed it.  It was as if we would give
life to the risks if we spoke them aloud.  So they remained thoughts
and fears that we managed to suppress while we hatched our plot.

CHAPTER NINE

We became fixated on Fridays, the holy day, when everything in Amman is
closed- stores, the salon.  Looking out desperately for a way to escape
our daily prison so that Dalia and Michael could have moments together,
Fridays became our target, our only possible window of opportunity.
Dalia and I had always spent Friday evening together, at her home or
mine.  But that had to change; Dalia would explode if she didn't see
Michael soon.

Our first idea was to open the salon on Friday afternoons, making that
our excuse to be out of the house, but both fathers opposed the idea.
We refocused our energy on Friday evenings.  Where could we get
Mohammed or any of our brothers to drop us off and collect us later
without betraying the plan?

The problem with Friday evening was going to be football.  Football is
Jordan's most popular sport; most of the males in the nation are ardent
fans and watch the games religiously every Friday night.  As soon as
the season began, Mohammed stopped

weight training so that he wouldn't miss a game.  The chances of
getting him to drive us anywhere on Friday evenings during the football
season, which lasted from late September to March, were slim to
non-existent.  We searched for another plan.

It was a Thursday night.  I could smell the majalabiyya baking from my
room aromatic biscuits made with rice flour, sugar, milk and rose water
and topped with an almond or pine nut.  Dalia and I were plotting,
plotting.  For years we'd been allowed to have a sihra on Thursday
evenings a night when our parents did not impose our usual curfew, and
we were allowed to stay up late.  We alternated between Dalia's home
and mine.  While the biscuits baked, we'd made tea and locked ourselves
in, playing music while we talked through the urgent issues.

Days earlier, we'd had a breakthrough.  We'd been trying to find an
activity that would require us to be out of the house every Friday
afternoon.  But what activity?  We'd researched for days, and decided
that computer classes were our best hope.  Now we were racking our
brains for ways to get our fathers to agree.

"I don't know if my father will go for something like this," I said.

"Your father would at least consider it, but there's no way my father
is going to agree."

"Maybe one of your brothers might convince him that it's important, and
that one of my brothers will be watching us.  He'll listen to one of
his sons.  I also think we should approach both fathers at the same
time, and make each one believe that the other has already agreed.
That's the only way they'll go for it."  \020"I don't know, Norma. 
All they have to do is call each other and they'll find out we've been
lying."

"But what are the chances they'll actually do that?  I mean, if we can
persuade your brother Suhal to talk to your father, then your father
will think that Suhal has already made sure that my father approves of
the idea."

For hours, we talked back and forth, on and on.  Finally, Dalia said,
discouraged, "Maybe it would be better if you just took the class by
yourself

"That won't solve the problem.  You want to be able to see Michael and
Jehan too, don't you?"

"Of course I do."

We decided we'd call some schools on Monday to find out when their
classes met.  Then talk to Suhal.  If we could lure him to the salon on
his way home .. .

"Do you really think we can pull this off?"  Dalia asked.

"We convinced them that we needed a computer for the salon, so we
should be able to convince them that we need computer classes.  We
already have the computer, and they keep telling us that we wasted our
money on it because we hardly use it."

It was the only solution we could come up with.

"I hope it works."  Dalia was clearly worried.

"It will, you'll see.  Now let's go eat some mahalabiyya before my
brothers gobble it all."  \020On Monday morning Dalia picked me up for
work as usual.  September in Amman is a strange mix of winter and
summer.  The early morning is cold, with occasional bursts of cool
winds, the remnants of the freezing desert nights.  During the day, the
temperatures once again feel as if they are reaching their summer
highs.  It's as if the transition from summer to winter sneaks in
during the night, and the only evidence of its lurking presence is the
one or two degree drop in afternoon

temperatures.  The cool winds are not strong enough to fight the heat
of the summer sun until at least the end of October, leaving September
full of sumptuous summer days.

We bought two newspapers on our way to work that day, through which we
searched for advertisements for computer classes and made a list of all
the possibilities.  We started by listing the ones nearest Abdoun,
where Michael and Jehan lived.

Our first hair appointment was not until ten-thirty.  That gave us
enough time to call these places before we began work.  We hurried into
the break room.  I locked the door and switched off the salon lights so
we wouldn't be interrupted.

"Do we have enough money saved up to pay for this out of the business
account?"  I asked.  Dalia was our business and personal bookkeeper;
she'd always had a better head for numbers than I had.

"When I made the deposit last week, we had 7,253 dinars in the bank.
That should be plenty," she assured me.

I felt urgency to get going on the calls.

"Relax, ya butbouta, we still have time.  Enjoy your coffee and smoke a
cigarette, it'll calm you down a little," she said and tossed a
cigarette my way.  Butbouta literally means duck, but used as slang it
implies that someone is acting hyper in a cute way.  Which I was.  But
we had never planned such a complex violation of the rules, with such
risks.

"I'm just excited, aren't you?  It's a perfect plan.  They'll never
guess what we're really up to, and you'll be able to see Michael. We'll
even learn a little about computers in the process," I said.

"I don't want to get too excited yet; I'll only be disappointed if it
doesn't work," said Dalia, always the more practical of the two of us.
Not that she wasn't given to crazy ideas and fantasies, she was just
more methodical in implementing them

and hid her emotions better than I did.  She was my anchor and kept me
grounded.  I was the only one who ever noticed any slight change in her
during critical times, but then again I was the only one who knew all
her secrets.  \020I ran out to the front desk, the list of numbers
clutched tightly in my fist, to start making the calls.

There were plenty of schools in Shmeisani with beginner classes on
Friday and Saturday early evenings, which would be ideal.  Our brothers
would be watching football when we were supposed to be in class.  The
tuition cost far less than we'd thought it would.  It wouldn't bankrupt
us.

Now, we had only a few more barriers to get through.  First, we had to
lure Suhal to the salon on his way home from work, and make him our
advocate.  Pleading that some urgent matter had come up that she wanted
his guidance on, Dalia would call on his duty as elder brother to
protect and guide her.

An angry mother with a fussy, crying child arrived for a haircut, and
our workday officially began.

We worked side by side all morning, barely saying a word and nodding an
expected reply here and there in response to a customer's question.
Both of us were thinking about what we would say to Suhal.  We were
trying to figure out how much we should tell him about the classes.  We
didn't want to say too much because it would make our plan even
riskier.  The less our families knew, the better.  We didn't want them
calling the school to check up on us.  We knew that in order to be
successful we had to use a mix of careful preparation, great prudence,
and a little audacity.

By two, we were starved after keeping our minds working so hard.  Food!
We hurriedly locked the doors and went to the break room for lunch.  I
grabbed the container of maqlubeh (steamed rice topped with slices of
aubergine, meat, tomato

and roasted pine nuts) and tossed it into the microwave, and then we
started planning our script for Suhal.  We rehearsed, edited, and
recast our strategy a dozen times in the next half-hour.

Suddenly Dalia said, "Norma, let's stop talking about it, it's making
me nervous and I don't want to think about it any more.  The more I
think about it, the greater chance I'll have of messing up.  Let's just
eat our lunch in peace."

This was the first time we'd taken such an elaborate risk; we were
escalating our conspiracy to a new level, dramatically increasing the
chance of being found out.  We finished our lunch in silence, each of
us afraid to say anything more.

Suhal walked in at six fifteen, and as soon as we saw him our insides
froze.  "Salem al laykum (peace unto you)," he said as he entered.
After the greetings, he followed us into the break room where I began
making coffee while he and Dalia sat on the couch.

"What seems to be the problem?"  he asked Dalia.

"Well, Suhal, I chose to come to you with this because I believe that
since you're a teacher you'll understand the importance of this better
than the others.  You know, Norma and I spent a lot of money on our
computer.  And, well, we can't operate it well enough to use it
properly.  Since we've already made the investment in the computer,
Norma and her family have decided that it would be wise for her to take
some classes at a school in Shmeisani.  What do you think?" 
\020"Well, if her family has already agreed to it, then I don't see
anything wrong with it.  I've never thought you needed a computer in
the salon, but now that it's here, she might as well learn how to use
it."

I thought so too.  I was hoping to accompany her to the classes, since
we both need to know how to use the computer.

Do you think it's wise to consider such a thing?  I wanted to get your
opinion first, because if you think it's not wise, then I'd rather not
bother Dad with it."

"When are these classes?  Who will be taking her?  When do they start?"
he asked.  I took that as my cue to join in.  I served him coffee, and
proceeded to lie more blatantly than I had ever lied in my life.  To
me, this seemed the point of no return for Dalia and me.  If we
succeeded with Suhal, the first major physical acts of betrayal would
soon begin.

"Suhal, if I may speak, I'll tell you what I know, but since my father
has arranged all the details, I'm afraid that all I can tell you is
that the classes will be held on Friday and Saturday afternoons.  Of
course, I must abide by the same curfew as Dalia, and I'm certain that
my father has considered that while planning this.  Also, one of my
brothers will be dropping us off and picking us up.  The only time
we'll be unaccompanied is while we're in the classroom.  I'm certain
that my father is placing me in a class of girls.  My father will pay
the tuition, and I believe that Dalia should also know how to run the
computer in case I'm not around.  She can maintain all her client
information on it.  My father thinks it's a shame to let the money we
spent on the computer go to waste."

He pondered, taking his role as guardian very seriously.  "Well, I
don't see any problem with Dalia attending classes with you, and I'll
do what I can to get my father to agree.  I can speak to my father
tonight.  To reassure him, I'll offer to take both of you to the school
on Friday and enrol you myself.  I don't think it'll be a problem."

"Thank you, Suhal.  Thank you so much.  I knew you'd understand, and I
appreciate you talking to Dad on my behalf," Dalia said.

"One down, one to go," she whispered as we tidied up to

leave.  "Are you sure we can convince your dad?  Let's say an

extra prayer."

I don't think either of us slept that night.  I jumped every time the
phone rang, thinking it was Dalia's father calling to confirm what
Suhal had told him.  I felt guilty about the day's deception and hated
the idea of repeating it in the morning.  I knew that Dalia was
struggling with the same emotions.  \020In the morning my father
entered the kitchen at his usual hour.  I served him his coffee, and
began setting the stage for

Dalia's arrival.

"Daddy, Dalia and I have something we need to discuss with you.  Would
it be OK to do it this morning?  Will you have

time?"  I asked.

"Sure, I'll be on the veranda.  Bring my breakfast out there,"

he said and left the kitchen.

When Dalia arrived we locked ourselves in my room and quickly went over
the details of our plan.  We managed to suppress our fears while we
talked to my father, and in the end he agreed to let me enrol.

There was just one more element to the plan.  We didn't want to ask for
an escort because then they might find out that we'd lied to them and
so we decided that on the days we had classes, I would ask to walk to
Dalia's home, and she would ask to walk to mine.  Then we could meet
halfway and take a taxi to school and back.

Suhal enrolled us in school that Friday and we paid the tuition.  The
classes would run for the next nine months.

That Monday, we called Jehan and told her our news, and began planning
our first meeting for the following Friday.  We went over every detail
to ensure that we would not be caught and drew up a list of official
ground rules'.  No one, other than the four of us, could ever know
anything about these meetings.

We must meet at places none of our families went to.  Dalia would
remove her shar'ia attire during the encounters to look like a
Christian girl.  In public places Dalia and Michael would refer to each
other as brother and sister.  Either Jehan or I would always be nearby,
to provide cover if needed.  And, finally, we must attend some of the
classes to show our fathers and brothers that we were learning
something.

We planned to meet at the 1001 Nights restaurant in the Le Meridian
Hotel in Shmeisani for the first outing.

Friday afternoon, at five, we left our homes and headed to our meeting
point.  The moment of truth had arrived and we felt panicked.

We found a taxi quickly, out of sight of all our relatives and nosy
neighbours.  Sitting in the back seat of the cab, we looked in every
direction, double-checking that no one had seen us.  We arrived at the
school, and went into the classroom for attendance.  Ten minutes into
the class, we asked to be excused, saying that we didn't feel well.  In
the restroom, I took the clothes we'd chosen for Dalia out of my gym
bag.  She changed and then we walked out of the school, around the
corner to the Le Meridian Hotel, and up to the 1001 Nights restaurant
to find Michael and Jehan.

They were sitting at one of the back tables and when we arrived they
stood up.  Michael's eyes lit up when he saw Dalia, and he had to
restrain himself from embracing her.  She, on the other hand, blushed,
smiled, and lowered her eyes to the floor.  With the formalities out of
the way, we sat down and began discussing the details of what we still
had to do.  We enjoyed a tray of mixed pastries and coffee while we
talked and laughed like any group of friends would.  For that short
time we forgot all our fears and worries, and focused on the fact that
we Were all together.

During the cab ride home Dalia and I couldn't stop talking about what a
wonderful time we'd had, and how amazing it was that something as
natural and delightful as an afternoon out with friends was forbidden.
As we neared our drop-off point, our anxiety began to build, but this
time it was mixed with the satisfaction of having succeeded better than
we could have dreamed.

With each success, our courage and confidence would grow, with a slight
and parallel dilution of our fear.  It may have been only pastries and
coffee, but this taste of ordinary freedom had been too delicious to
stop now.  We had travelled two miles by taxi, but we had entered a
different world.

CHAPTER TEN

In the two months following that first afternoon with Michael and
Jehan, we managed to arrange six meetings: three at 1001 Nights; two at
La Coquette, where we tried genuine French food; and one at La
Terrasse, where we heard live music as we ate our pastries.  We grew a
little more confident with each successful encounter and were having
loads of fun.  Life was exciting and we were savouring every moment. We
felt freer than we'd ever felt before.  We were like children tasting
chocolate for the first time and we couldn't get enough.  When we met,
Jehan and I chatted, trying to give Dalia and Michael as much privacy
as we could.

Later, Dalia and I would explode with the experience.  "Norma, this is
so incredible.  Did you even think that Amman had such wonderful
restaurants?  They're so beautiful and elegant.  Did you see how many
people were there?  Most of them didn't even speak Arabic.  It was like
being in a different world."

"I know, it's so wonderful.  I'll bet our mothers have never

seen anything like them, or even imagined them.  I wish we could take
them to one of those restaurants."  \020"Our brothers probably don't
even know those places exist.  I mean, most of the Arabic-speaking
people are employed there or are Arabs meeting foreigners for business.
I hope our brothers never go there, but I would like to share it with
our mums."

"And at our first French restaurant, it felt so different, didn't it?
No one was watching us, or noticing how we were dressed.  Everyone was
minding his or her own business.  It was great.  It made me feel
comfortable and free."

"Yeah, although the fact that you were speaking English helped.  They
probably thought you were foreign and we were entertaining you."

"Oh, come on, I don't look foreign, I look Arabic.  I just think that
people are more open-minded in those places, maybe because they're used
to seeing foreigners."

"Could be.  It's not as if you and Michael act like anything more than
brother and sister."

"I can't wait until next week."

We'd told our computer teacher that we could only attend Saturday's
classes, explaining that we were the only girls in houses full of men
and so had too many household responsibilities on Fridays.  Since we'd
told him that we were only taking the classes for our personal use, and
not for our business skills, he didn't mind if we missed the Friday
classes.

I could see that Dalia was falling more and more in love with Michael
and, since the men in our families were busy watching football, we had
no reason to think they would check up on us, at least until March.
Mohammed had been spending his days with his new friends, so we also
had plenty of privacy at the salon.

Things became a little more difficult in November because of the
upcoming holidays.  The fourteenth of November is a public holiday in
Jordan, celebrating King Hussein's birthday, and Bid al Isra Wai
Mi'raj, an Islamic holiday that marks the prophet Mohammed's nocturnal
visit to heaven and the visions God revealed to him, immediately
follows it.  After that, of course, it was Christmas.  Dalia had a lot
to prepare for Bid al Isra Wai Mi'raj.  Every year her extended family
came together at her home for a night of gift-giving and feasting.  She
had to help her mother with everything, from preparing their home to
arranging the menu.  She also had to buy gifts for her family, which
took up most of her free time.  I had to do many of the same things
before Christmas and so the lie we'd told our instructor about Friday
classes became true in November and December.  During these two months,
most of our free time was wasted waiting in checkout lines and fighting
through hordes of pushy bargain hunters.

The entire time, our brothers escorted us.  We didn't see how we would
be able to keep going on our Friday afternoon adventures, but we vowed
to try to find a way.  We hoped to convince our families to let us keep
going to our classes on Fridays and so we closed the salon on Thursdays
in order to give us enough time to do our chores.  It seemed a
reasonable solution, and our fathers let us try it.

After a few weeks, we realized that we'd have to give up some Friday
afternoons so we could get everything done.  But we didn't waste any
time complaining; instead we spent every free second talking about
Michael.  \020"I like a lot of things about Michael," Dalia said one
day when we were sitting on the couch in the break room, drinking a hot
cup of tea, and talking.

"Like what?"  I said.

"Well, for starters, he's absolutely gorgeous, but that's beside the
point.  What I really like is the fact that he's kind, understanding,
and intelligent."

"He does seem to be gentle and kind.  What else have you discovered
while Jehan and I have been talking?"

"He has a law degree and is planning to become an attorney once he
finishes his tour in the Royal Guard.  He loves art, like me, and he
loves to read.  It's so easy to talk to him.  I mean there are times
when I think we can read each other's minds; we're so much alike. Also,
he's travelled, much more than we probably ever will."

"Where's he been?"

"He went to school in London, and travelled to Greece, France, and
Italy while he was there.  He's fluent in French and even speaks a
little Greek and Italian.  He's told me about all the different things
he's seen and he says that he'd love to show them to me.  Apparently
we'd be free in those countries and wouldn't have to sneak around to
see each other.  I would be able to do what I want.  Doesn't that sound
like heaven?"

"Yes, it does.  This whole thing is incredible.  I mean, I never
thought either one of us would feel like this.  Would you marry him if
you could?"

"Well, he's everything I could ever want in a man.  I like him a lot,
but it's still too soon to say that I love him.  I mean, I've never
been in love before.  I know that I have very strong feelings for him
and I think we'd be happy together.  He actually cares about my
opinions, and treats me like an equal."

"That's something he must have learned abroad.  They definitely don't
teach men that here," I said.  "What does caring about him feel like?"
I asked, entering territory neither of us had ever explored.

Even as best friends, we had never talked directly about

love felt like, and never about sexual feelings because we didn't know
what they were.  Sex is not something that is talked about in any
context with a single woman in Jordan; we were never taught specifics
about sex.  For many years Dalia and I thought that if you kissed a man
on the lips you would get pregnant.  Sex, or the possibility of it
happening to a single woman, was thought to be so evil, so horrid, that
we were afraid of it.  It must seem so strange to a sexually liberated
culture; here we were in our twenties, but we didn't feel sexual
frustrations, or have sexual fantasies because we were too afraid and
didn't really know enough about sex to be able to fantasize about it.
In the salon, our married girlfriends would talk to us about it, but
what we learned from them was that it was painful, and that you bleed
on your first time, things that just scared us more.  I had female
cousins and aunts older than me who have never married, and are still
virgins.  That's just the way it is.  I was as curious and innocent as
a child.

"Well, it's hard to describe.  I get butterflies in my stomach when I
think about him.  I'm nervous, excited, and happy every time I know I'm
going to see him.  When I don't see him, I miss him and he's constantly
in my thoughts.  Even on my bad days, all I have to do is think of him
and I start to smile.  I can't imagine my life without him."

"You sound as if you're in love.  Why do you say you aren't?"  "Because
love is something very serious.  There's love and then there's being in
love, you know.  I love you and right now I think that I love him the
way I love you.  But to be in love with him is a totally different
thing, and I don't know if I'm ready for that.  I guess what I'm trying
to say is that before I could say that I'm in love with him, I'd have
to feel sure that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him and
have his children."

"Oh Dalia, I think you're over-analysing again.  You sound confused.
You love him in your heart, but your mind is still trying to evaluate
what you're feeling.  If I ever fall in love, I want it to be something
that I can't analyse but something I just know."

"Norma, you can't decide something this important and serious based on
a passing feeling.  It's much more complicated than that.  You'll know
what I mean when you experience it.  I could be feeling this way now
because I've never disobeyed my parents before.  Maybe I have to make
him a super hero to justify what I've done.  Who knows, maybe I won't
feel like this several months from now.  All I know is that at this
moment he's very, very important to me.  he makes me feel things I've
never felt before, good things, and I don't want to give that up."

"What do you mean, feel things?  What good things?"

Dalia was opening up with a rush of words that reminded me of my first
phone call with Michael.  The dam was bursting.  "He makes me feel
special, beautiful, and smart.  He respects me, and cares about my
wants, needs, and thoughts.  He's not like my brothers or my father.
I've never seen my father ask my mother for her opinion.  He just
orders her around and treats her as if she doesn't matter, as if she's
just there to serve him.  My father treats me the same way.  Michael's
different, he always asks me things and he listens to what I have to
say.  My opinion matters to him.  Last time we met, he asked me to pick
where I want to go the next time.  My brothers have never asked me to
pick anything.  It feels good to be treated as if I'm important."

"My father and brothers are just like yours.  As far as they're
concerned, women don't have brains and we're certainly not allowed to
have opinions.  I hope someday I can find someone

who treats me the way Michael treats you.  It sounds wonderful.  I
can't imagine it."

"Oh, Normie, you will.  You will find someone like him.  You just have
to make sure that he's spent a lot of time outside a Muslim country.
Try to find someone from one of the countries Michael's been to.  He
obviously learned those things there."  \020"Oh, that'll be easy.  I'm
sure men like Michael are just running up and down the streets of
Amman.  All I have to do is pick one.  Come on, Dalia!  You could
probably count the number of men in Jordan who think like Michael on
the fingers of one hand.  If only he was Muslim, you two could get
married."

Then it suddenly hit home, and the euphoria subsided a bit.  This was
deadly serious.  The way this was heading they would have to leave
Jordan.  I took Dalia's hand.

"If you ever decide that he's the one you want to have children with,
maybe we can find a way for the two of you to be together.  I mean,
we've been pretty successful so far.  We make a great team.  Nothing's
impossible."

CHAPTER ELEVEN

We survived that holiday season, but we barely had time to see or talk
to Michael and Jehan.  By now it had been almost one year since Michael
and Dalia had met; yet they had really only known each other for five
months.  We'd spent most of our time figuring out ways for them to
communicate.  It had been a consuming and exhausting process, but we
hoped that as time went on it would become much easier.

Now it was nearing March, and as the last of the Muslim holidays
passed, the football season went with them.  Things were about to get
more complicated, not easier.  Mohammed would start spending more time
at the salon and our brothers wouldn't be watching games on Fridays;
they'd be out in the neighbourhood.  The risk of one of them spotting
us getting in or out of a taxi was much greater.  Michael and Dalia
were desperate to spend more time together and had no interest in
discussing the growing risks.  But even they couldn't ignore them,
since they controlled the frequency of their dates.

And even if Michael's soldierly confidence led him to feel immune to
defeat or damage, surely he loved Dalia enough to keep the terrible
risks to her at the back of his mind.  But

Michael's confidence and worldliness were infectious.  We handled the
details at this stage with a growing sense of invincibility, and I
think we both felt that Michael was capable of making the big things
happen including marriage, and leaving Jordan.

Our objective was clear, and our mission defined: invent and implement
a series of covert operations to make it possible for Michael and Dalia
to date.  We began to feel like military strategists.  We started
charting, on a neighbourhood street map, exactly where we thought our
brothers and fathers would be during the crucial hours of the lovers'
meetings.  Several weeks after the football season ended, we were
nervous wrecks.  After achieving every illicit Friday night date, we
were a bundle of raw nerves.  For the rest of the weekend and the
following week, we'd hold our breath, expecting to hear some comment
from one of our brothers that he'd seen us the previous Friday.  The
joy was turning to despair.  We were going crazy and realized that we
had to search for alternatives.

"I can't sleep for two night after every meeting.  I keep thinking one
of my brothers is going to say something like, "Hey, I thought I saw
you and Norma yesterday afternoon."  I can't take it any more.  But I
can't stop seeing Michael," Dalia said.

"I know what you mean, I feel the same way.  I was thinking that maybe
we should have one of them drive us to the school and drop us off.  At
least that way we wouldn't have to worry about being seen in a taxi," I
said.

"That would help, but they could still spot us going to the
restaurant."

"I know, but at least it would be one less thing to worry about.  I'm
sure if we put our heads together we can think of a way to reduce the
other risks as well."

Exasperated after another endless round of examining the

pros and cons, I suggested, "We should forget the whole Friday classes
thing, and try to get Mohammed to take us to places with Jehan and
leave us there for a couple of hours.  Now that the football season is
over we should be able to get him to do that."

But in the end we decided to keep to our original plan, as nothing else
seemed to work as well.  For months now we'd been careful to stick to
our Thursday schedule in order to avoid making our families suspicious.
Each week, we spent hours in my room or hers, thrashing out ideas and
strategies.  All this worry and planning was draining.  In the
beginning, it had brought its own excitement even when we'd doubted
that we would succeed; now it had become an obsession to keep the
successes going.

Our work at the salon began to suffer as we spent more time on planning
and started seeing fewer customers.  Not that our families would have
disapproved; as far as our fathers and brothers were concerned, the
salon was just a way for us to fritter away our time and be together.
It wasn't a bona fide business.  They never cared about how many
clients we had, or how much money we earned.  Any cash we made was to
be our pocket money, to waste on books and pictures and women's things.
Since we weren't married, our fathers and brothers were responsible for
all of our basic needs.  We quickly discovered, however, that leading a
secret life required money to buy our brothers gifts to keep them sweet
or pay for their activities to get them out of the way.  It was a small
price to pay for peace of mind.  But we'd have to increase our
appointments again.

The money, though, was only a tiny part of the real cost of our
activities.  We spent hours studying and synchronizing our actions.
Since our independence depended on our brothers'

schedules, we were forced to quietly alter their activities, all the
time convincing them that each new idea came from them and not us.  As
we became masters of manipulation, as we grew better and better at
subtly organizing their lives, we felt as if we knew them better than
they knew themselves.  With most extracurricular activities in Jordan
taking place on Fridays and Saturdays, mapping their events to coincide
with our trysts was not very difficult.  But it drained time.  In the
end, each glorious afternoon cost hours, and sometimes days, of effort.
Dalia was in paradise, often absent-minded, so it was my responsibility
to check and re-check all the details so that both of us were
protected.

It was amazing to see how Michael had changed her.  For as long as I
could remember, Dalia had always had a rebellious spirit.  As a child,
the more she was forbidden to do something, the more she was determined
to do it.  As we matured and our restrictions grew, the nonconformist
within her became deeply resentful of the rules governing her life, and
angry with the men who enforced them.  But now, her feelings for
Michael began to transform her pessimism into optimism.  She'd found a
man who encouraged and treasured her free spirit.  This adventure had
reawakened that lively rebellious child, and she revelled in the
excitement.  In fact, we inadvertently reverted to the roles we'd had
in adolescence.  Dalia invented the idea, and I found a way to make it
happen.

It was clear that Dalia was in love with Michael, although she still
refused to admit it.  They had so much in common.  Their ideas,
political principles and religious views were identical.  As a third
party looking in, I could see clearly that her fears refused to allow
her to acknowledge her passion fully.  Although Dalia repeatedly talked
about the depth of her feelings for Michael, I realized that she was
still trying to

understand her emotions.  Knowing Dalia and our culture, this wasn't
surprising; it was expected.  I loved watching her twist out of
admitting that she was in love.  I always knew that Dalia would only
use the word 'love' when and if she became convinced that it was the
only word that could explain what she was feeling.  She was too
analytical to do anything else; it was one of the things I cherished
about her.

But if she ever used the word, there would be no turning back from the
inevitable next step.  I didn't dare think about it.  How remarkable
romance is in an Islamic country, it occurred to me.  All this endless
analysis of the depth and destiny of the relationship, and they'd never
kissed.  Never even held hands.

CHAPTER TWELVE

The name "Aqaba' rings with the romance of Lawrence of Arabia, as he
sweeps into Jordan's strategic (and only) port and, in flowing desert
robes, riding his camel, seizes it from the Turks, winning the day for
the British and their Arab allies, and writing legends for himself.

For Dalia and me Aqaba rang with very different meaning.  For us, it
was the symbol of the battle we lost for our childhoods, a battle that
was all over by the time we were nine or ten.  Too young to know what
was happening, we'd been passive observers to the capture of the
free-running freedom we'd known.  The victors were our fathers and
brothers, and the ancient codes.

It was now May in Amman.  The mildest, and often most beautiful, month
in Jordan.  And Aqaba beckoned as it had every spring since I was a
child- the place where my and Dalia's families had always gone, and
still went, to enjoy Jordan's only seaside resort.  Oh, how Dalia and I
had loved Aqaba.  We believed that the sea held mystical powers and,

each year, we'd beg our families to take us there.  This year, as Dalia
and I searched for a way to avoid joining them, I felt, for a moment, a
flash of memory for the freedoms we'd known there when we were small,
when we were still little princesses That was the brief snatch of time
when everything we did was sweet and everyone wanted to play with us.
How idyllic it looked from the distance of twenty years the time when
my father was affectionate, when we rough-and-tumbled with our
brothers, when we splashed and laughed in the waves at Aqaba, wore a
swimsuit or whatever we wished and felt the sun on our sandy young
bodies.

It was before the distance grew between me and the father who'd hugged
me and held my hand as we hunted for shells.  Before my brothers
stopped being friends, and turned into guard dogs.  From the time I
turned about nine, the affection and playfulness stopped.  I was then,
according to them, turning into a young woman, and young women were
expected to dress and act a certain way.  With Dalia it was the same,
though as a Muslim she had had even stricter rules to live by.
Suddenly, we were no longer allowed to run outside the neighbourhood
with other children; the friendly streets were no longer our
playground.  We were no longer allowed to wear whatever we wished.

It became our job at that time to start serving any guests that came
over, and to clean and cook with our mothers.  Our training and
preening to become mothers and housewives ourselves had begun.  And as
we were taught the domestic skills, we learned, too, the
responsibilities and limitations that all women must accept.  Our
mothers and aunts were teaching us to know the primary boundary of our
lives: the house.  By the time we were eighteen, the emotional distance
between us and the males of our families had grown to an insurmountable
gulf

that we didn't love our brothers and fathers, but we understood their
place as our superiors, as untouchable gods who were not supposed to
step down and mingle with us, the common folk.  Like Sun Kings, they
expected our lives and desires to revolve around them, their needs and
schedules.  I was so young, still years from, adolescence, when reality
slapped me in the face: I was put in my place, second to all males, and
expected to grown up and act as an adult overnight.  \020Now when we
went to Aqaba, we were part of the anonymous huddle of covered women no
longer allowed to enjoy the magic of the sea.  For even on the beaches
Islam shrouded us all.  It is mainly men and small children who are
allowed to enjoy the beaches and water sports.  Women would never dare
be seen in a swimsuit.  They sit on the shore, fully clothed, and tend
to the needs of their men and their children.  They are only allowed to
enter the water and try to swim if they wear their shar'ia.  Sad and
ludicrous- but all too familiaris the sight of a woman struggling to
stay afloat while her voluminous black dress billows up around her
despite her efforts to beat it back into the waves.  It is an act of
frustrating futility that now seems an apt metaphor for the lives of
Jordanian women.

So while our love for the sea never diminished, our interest in Aqaba
did.  By adolescence, I was still allowed to wear a swimsuit, but was
forced to wear baggy shorts to my knees and a big T-shirt.  Dalia, on
the other hand, had to remain in full shar'ia attire.  And in the end,
both of us were forced to leave our love of swimming behind.  Our
families still made their annual visits to these places, and Dalia and
I still obediently went, but we did not enjoy the place.

Our families planned to leave for Aqaba in mid-May.  The lure of water
in a desert nation is powerful, especially in April and May, when the
perfect weather improves Jordanians'

mood; it makes them smile and sends them south from Amman in droves to
reclaim the areas of the country usually filled with tourists.  Joined
by Arabs from the entire Middle East Saudi Arabians, Syrians, Lebanese
they flock to places like Aqaba the hot springs of Hammamat Ma'in, and
the Dead Sea, despite water so salty that it cannot sustain any plant
or animal life.

The Dead Sea, the closest of these spots to Amman, is the first to
become congested.  It's the lowest point on earth (409 metres below sea
level) and is on the border between Jordan and Israel.  Locally, it is
known as Al Bahr Al Mayit or Buhr Lut (Sea of Lot), so named because
the water's incredibly high salt content (30 per cent) is seven times
higher than that of other oceans.  It's high levels of various minerals
are supposed to be wonderful for your health, skin, and stress
levels.

So Arabs flow down to the banks of the Dead Sea, looking like a tribe
of seals, covered from head to toe in Dead Sea mud, enduring it for the
cures it promises for a host of illnesses -arthritis, bronchial
infections, allergies.  Over the years the Jordanian government has
tried to transform the area into a resort spa by allowing hotels to be
built along its shores.  But the small area of shoreline left untouched
and available to the public now quickly become overcrowded.  After the
mud therapy and hours of floating like corks in the buoyant sea, most
people head to the fresh waters of Hammamat Ma'in to rinse off caked
layers of salt in its thermal springs.

Hammamat Ma'in is the most famous of Jordan's sixty thermal springs,
all of them famous for their curative properties and rumoured to have
been visited by Herod the Great and Cleopatra.  The crowds wallow in
water that stays hot at 113 degrees Fahrenheit (45 Celsius), soaking up
more minerals.  After spending a few days at the hot springs, the
crowds then continue down Desert Highway, or Dead Sea Highway, to

Aqaba, which tourists love for its archaeological sites dating from
before Christ.  But that is not what draws Arabs; it is the refreshing
escape from the hot, rose-coloured desert that fills the landscape
south of Amman.  At the very southern tip of our land-locked country,
Aqaba is Jordan's only outlet to the Gulf of Aqaba and the seas beyond,
its only real seaside resort.  For us as children, it was the door to a
rare and exotic world.

But this year, nothing could lure us from Amman.  We had to try and
find a way to avoid going.  We realized that it would be both tricky
and difficult to persuade our families to let us stay behind, to leave
us alone, unguarded, for at least a week.  We had to assure them that
we were trustworthy enough.  Since crimes such as theft are very rare
in Amman, our fathers would mostly be concerned about whether we would
continue to obey their rules in their absence.  We hoped our computer
classes would serve as our excuse for staying home.

It was agreed.  We had permission to stay behind.  But not completely
unchaperoned.  My father arranged for my aunt and her husband, who
lived less than ten minutes away, to keep an eye on us, and amazingly,
Dalia's father, Mahmood, agreed too.  This would be the first time that
we'd ever been alone together, without our fathers and brothers lurking
around every corner.  We were a bit nervous, but mostly thrilled.  Our
fathers agreed that it would be easier for my aunt to check on us if we
stayed in one house during the week, which pleased us even more.

If only they'd stay away for two weeks.  But at least for a week we'd
be roommates and real sisters.  That so delighted us that we were
almost tempted to call off any dates with Michael and just enjoy the
time together.  But of course we didn't.  Maneuvering around my aunt
would not be a problem since she had responsibilities at home.  All
we'd have to deal with

were a few long-winded phone calls from her, and maybe though this was
highly unlikely, a brief visit.  We decided to stay at my house because
my neighbours were younger, busier and not as nosy as Dalia's.  Once
the arrangements were made our excitement mounted until, at last the
glorious day of our families' departure arrived.

Dalia's family left first, dropping her off at my house at seven thirty
that Friday morning.  The were driving straight to Aqaba and planned to
spend the entire week there.  My family ate breakfast, packed their
cars, and finally began their journey to the Dead Sea a few hours
later.  We said our goodbyes, reassured them that all was under
control, and waited until we were sure they'd gone too far to turn
back.  Then we blasted the radio on and danced around the house in
celebration.  When we had tired ourselves out dancing, I picked up the
phone and called Jehan.  For an instant we even thought of inviting her
and Michael over, almost forgetting that we still had neighbours and
the freedom we felt existed only inside my house.  We made plans to
meet every day that week.  We'd already decided to close the salon, so
our time was our own.  Jehan managed to get Michael on the phone and I
went up to my room to pick out our wardrobe for the week.

An hour later, Dalia rushed into my room and flung herself on top of
the piles of clothing on my bed.

"He's so sweet," she said.

"Yes, he is.  What did you talk about?"

"Oh, everything and nothing.  Guess what?"  She sat up.

"What?"  I shot back, eager to hear what she had to say.

"Tonight he wants to take us to a restaurant that has a live band,
dancing, and Greek food."

"Tonight?  I don't know if it's such a good idea to meet him at night.
We still have to go in and out of this house.  What if someone tells
my dad they saw us leaving at night?  What if my aunt calls while we're
gone?  Why can't we go this afternoon?"

"Because they only have music and dancing at night.  I really want to
go."

"It sounds like fun, but it's too risky.  I think we should stick to
afternoons."

"Oh, come on, we can get away with this, you know we can.  They're all
gone.  All we have to do is find a way to sneak in and out of the house
without the neighbours seeing us.  If your aunt calls while we're out,
we'll say we were sleeping and didn't hear the phone."

"I suppose we can do that.  But since it's your idea, smart girl, you
figure out a way to sneak in and out.  Jehan's coming, isn't

she?"

"I don't think so.  We'll be out late and I don't think her father will
let her stay out that late, even with Michael."

"Then why am I going?  Why don't the two of you go alone?  It would be
more romantic.  You could put on some rings and my cross, then you'll
look like a married Christian couple."

"But Norma, I want you to see it too.  I want you to come."

"You can tell me everything when you get back.  And it'll look better
to the neighbours if I stay here, making noise and burning lights.  You
can sneak in and out through the back."

"He's going to meet us on the next corner, behind the pizza place.  I
thought we could just walk over there, it's not that far."

"Well, you figured wrong.  You're going to walk over there by yourself.
You can bring me some Greek food to make up for leaving me behind.
Besides, you and Michael need to spend some time alone."

After a year of dates it would be her first time alone with him.  I
could see she was nervous.  But it was settled.

"Now let's pick out the perfect outfit.  You have to look like a
married woman, remember."

"Wait, what time is it?  I have to run to the mosque."  I knew this was
not piousness but attention to detail- the sheikh might tell her father
she wasn't there.

"I completely forgot.  You'd better get going; it's almost time for
services.  I wish you could just miss it."

She jumped up and began getting ready.  "I can't.  My dad specifically
reminded me to go this morning when he dropped me off.  I'm sure he'll
quiz me on it when he gets back."  She buttoned her shar'ia dress over
her other clothing and adjusted her head veil.  "I can't believe I
almost forgot."

She kissed me and ran out of the house, leaving me circled by mountains
of clothes.  I picked out a few outfits for her date tonight, then
rummaged through the overfilled shelves and storage compartments in the
refrigerator looking for leftovers from yesterday's mulukiyyeh (a thick
spinach stew with chicken pieces served over a bed of rice, and topped
with lemon) one of our favourite dishes.  The fridge had been
well-stocked by my father before he left, so we wouldn't have to leave
the house to go shopping.  His attention to detail was as good as ours,
and that scared me a little.

When Dalia returned, she burst out laughing when she found me sitting
in my father's recliner in the living room, smoking and drinking
coffee.  Dalia plopped down on the couch and reached for my coffee and
a cigarette her first ever in my living room.  How delicious these
small, forbidden pleasures were.

"Well, Miss Dalia, I've arranged some outfits upstairs for your
romantic evening with Michael.  But first, you're to join me for lunch
on the terrace.  I've taken the liberty of preparing rice, and warming
up the mulukiyyeh," I said

in the formal voice of the maitre Js we'd been hearing.

Suddenly Dalia looked deflated.  She was apprehensive about meeting
Michael alone.  "I don't know how to act, or what to say or do."

"Oh, come on, Dalia, you know how to act.  I think you're nervous
because you really love him, and you know it.  It just seems that much
more serious to you because Jehan and I won't be there."  \020"Maybe
that's part of it," she said.

"What did you just say?  I can't believe it, you're actually agreeing
with me!"

"I only said maybe, you don't need to make such a big deal over it.
Anyway, I'm starved; let's go and eat."

We'd eaten many thousands of leftover lunches together, but this was a
wholly new experience.  We savoured our freedom as we ate.  We felt
even more liberated than during our secret afternoons with Michael and
Jehan because we weren't worried about being caught.  We took our time,
relishing each morsel, treasuring every second, our sense of
independence increasing with every bite.

After lunch, we ran upstairs to pick out the perfect outfit for Dalia's
evening.  After hours of dressing up, we decided on a long, cotton,
summer dress printed with wild flowers and crimson roses that made her
look magical.  I could never envy her beauty, only admire it, because
she made everyone around her feel beautiful.  We decided that if she
was going to look like a young Christian woman, she had to put on some
make-up.  But it couldn't cover her apprehension.  Time flew as we
chatted about the approaching evening and, before we knew it, it was
time for her to go.

We tiptoed out of the back door and through the yard, making sure we
weren't seen, and ran to the meeting point.  I

III

waited until Michael arrived, wanting to see his reaction when he saw
Dalia.  He pulled the car up to the kerb, got out and walked round to
the passenger side to let her in.  His eyes said it all.  He was
delighted with how she looked, and so clearly in love.  I went home,
confident that Dalia was in loving hands.

Dalia sauntered in around eleven thirty, with a look of contentment and
joy that I'd never seen before.  I immediately decided that she should
see Michael alone for the rest of the week.

We spent most of the night talking about her evening, and nibbling the
Greek food she'd brought back.  For the first time, Dalia told me that
she was in love with Michael.  She actually used the word.  It
terrified as well as thrilled me.  I'd spent months trying to get her
to say it, and thought it would bring me pure joy.  But now, the
reality, the implications of what it meant, hit home: the vast weight
and power of thousands of years of cultural force would be mobilized
against it.  We'd been okaying girlish games until now, caught up in
the intrigue and the test of our ability to outwit our jailers.
Tonight, we'd been giggling adolescents playing Cinderella at the ball.
I'd played the game, conspired, spurred her on, to make her happy- and
to share some of her excitement.  I could hardly bear to ask myself:
has this all been a terrible mistake?  What pain and danger was I
helping to bring down on Dalia?  And on myself?

But I wasn't sure we could stop it.  Or that we wanted to.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The next few weeks and months raced by as Dalia and I continued to live
our double lives.  By the end of the summer we'd been to virtually
every chic restaurant in Amman, or at least every one we were confident
none of our family members went to.  Now we decided it was time to
venture past the borders of the city.  We wanted to go for a picnic
together and started looking for a place that was comfortable, private,
and scenic.  It was August and Jordan was like an inferno, so anywhere
we picked had to shade us from the scorching midday sun.

Jordan has neither wide areas of lush greenery nor much wildlife.  The
country's dominant physical feature is the fertile valley of the Jordan
River.  Forming part of the Great Rift Valley of Africa, it rises just
over the Lebanese border and continues along the entire length of
Jordan from the Syrian border in the north to Aqaba and the Red Sea in
the south.  It is fed by the Sea of Galilee (Lake Tiberias), the
Yarmouk River, and

the valley streams of the high plateaux to the east and west.  The
Jordan now lies stagnant, and the fertile areas surrounding it are in
danger.  Jordan's biggest natural problem is the eternal one of deserts
and the concomitant lack of water, which is worsened now by the
country's growing population, rising living standards in the cities,
heavy exploitation for agriculture and, of course, waste.  Jordan has
lost millions of fertile hectares to desertification over the centuries
and with them has lost a stable environment for wildlife, birds and
flora.

Our candidate for the picnic was one of the six nature reserves
maintained by Jordan's major environmental agency, the Royal Society
for the Conservation of Nature.  There were two nature reserves near
Amman, and my first choice for our picnic was Zai National Park, a
small, dense pine forest, closest of the two to Amman, but Dalia and
Jehan had their hearts set on Dibeen National Park, one of the last
pine forests in Jordan and home to the endangered Persian squirrel.  It
also has great views and restaurants.  So Dibeen it would be.

It was easy enough to come up with the plan, but it was much more
complicated to put it in place.  Our resourcefulness now knew no
bounds.  Jehan asked an old school friend to pose as a bride who wanted
Dalia and me to style her wedding party, with a special request.  Would
we give a demonstration and consultation at her home prior to her
wedding day?  Our job was to make sure that Mohammed believed the
farce, and dropped us off at her house for four hours.  We thought it
would be easy enough to convince Mohammed, but we worried about
involving a fifth person in our conspiracy.  We called Jehan every day
to make sure she'd taken care of all the details.  Each time, she told
us the same thing: "Calm down, don't worry.  I've taken care of it,
it's all set."

On the afternoon of our picnic, we parked ourselves in

Mohammed's pickup, hugging work bags packed with snacks and drinks.
We'd made sure that Mohammed had other plans and so would not want to
sit around and wait for us.  But we were worried about what we would
find when we got to Jehan's friend's house.  We prayed that she would
open the door if Mohammed decided to walk us up to the entrance, as he
usually did.  We didn't want to think about what would happen if her
parents answered the door and we had to tell them, in front of
Mohammed, that we were there for a wedding consultation with their
daughter, who was not even engaged.

As Mohammed parked the car in front of a big, new apartment block,
Dalia and I looked nervously at one another as we got out of the pickup
and Mohammed followed us to the unit on the first floor.  To our
relief, a young woman answered the door and escorted us into her home,
while Mohammed left.  We embraced Jehan, waiting inside, and celebrated
the success of our plan so far.

"Sit down, relax, and have some tea," Jehan said.  "Michael should be
here in about twenty minutes or so.  This is Hanan, my best friend from
school.  Don't worry about anything, her mother passed away two years
ago and her dad's at work so we're all alone."

We sat in Hanan's drawing room, drank some mint tea, ate pastries, and
talked while we waited for Michael.  Soon he arrived, full of
excitement.

"Is everyone ready to go?  Dalia, I have a surprise for you," he said
as he led us to the car.

Dalia sat decorously in the back seat with Jehan and me.

Suddenly the car was vibrating with the sound of Amir Diab's "Habbibi'
song, Dalia's favourite.

"Oh my God, you got it.  I can't believe you got it.  Thank you," she
yelled.

I found it at the Music Box in Fuheis," he told her.

Amir Diab's album had soared to the top of the charts shortly after its
release.  Everyone had raced out to buy it in the first few weeks, and
now it was completely sold out.  Dalia had been trying to get her hands
on a copy for a while.

"How did you remember that I liked this song?  I only told you it was
my favourite once," she said.

"I remember everything you tell me," he replied.

I was impressed.

We arrived at Dibeen National Park, and chatted and giggled as we hiked
through the pine forest, springing along the trails on a spongy carpet
of pine needles, looking for the ideal picnic spot.  We saw no one else
on the trails.  The park was ours.

We chose to sit in a small clearing that had an enchanted mix of shade
and sunlight, circled by an aromatic ring of pine trees.  We spread our
blankets on the ground and sat down, losing ourselves in conversation
and feasting for the next few hours.  At three, reluctantly, we left
the park and went back to Hanan's house, and waited for Mohammed to
pick us up.

Growing bolder, we planned the next picnic at Zai National Park, but
this time Dalia and Michael would go by themselves.  It took Jehan
weeks to arrange.

But Dalia's face when I saw her the next day was worth it.  We sat in
the break room and she told me that for the first time since meeting
Michael, she had kissed him.

"Oh Norma, I can't even begin to tell you how it felt.  It was so
incredible; I've never felt anything like that before.  I felt as if a
spark of electricity was shooting through every inch of my body.  It
was just .. . magic."  She had been afraid, she said, "But it wasn't
awkward.  It felt so natural.  I really wanted to kiss him.  I know
that maybe I shouldn't have, since he's not my

husband, but Norma, I love him so totally and completely.  It
embarrasses me to say this, but he's the husband of my heart and mind,
and that's what counts."

"You know, Dalia, we need to figure out exactly what you and Michael
are going to do about this.  Have you two talked

about it?"

"Well, of course we have.  He's told me that he loves me and I've told
him that I love him.  If it weren't for our religious differences, he'd
ask my father for permission to marry me right now.  But Michael could
never convert to Islam; it would destroy his family, and a thousand
laws would come down on my head if I tried to convert to
Catholicism."

"But if you went to live in a different country, a non-Muslim country,
you could be married."

"I know.  But we're living in Jordan, so we're stuck."

"Only if you stay here, but maybe you could go somewhere else.  Michael
went to school in London and he's travelled a lot, maybe he can find a
way to get you out."

"Norma, do you realize what you're saying?  If he could do something
like that, and I went through with it, then you and I might never see
each other again."

"Dalia, I know exactly what I'm saying.  But think about it, you'd be
free to marry the man you love.  You could live the way you want, and
have children, and raise them the way you want to.  You can have
daughters who would have rights, more rights than women here ever dream
of having."

"I'd love to spend the rest of my life with him and I want to have his
children, but I don't want to be without you."  \020"Who knows what
tomorrow holds, right?  For all you know, I might leave Jordan myself
one day.  But you can't think of me.  I'll always love you, and you
can't run away from your destiny for me.  If you two love each other
the way I

know you do and you can find a way to be together, then you should
go."

"I don't see why we can't all go together."

"We'll talk to Michael and see what he can do, if anything.  If it's
possible for both of us to escape, then I'll come too.  But even if I
can't get out, you have to go.  It's where you belong."

"Norma, if you come that's one thing, but I don't know if I could leave
without you."

"Dalia, even if I don't come now, we'll find ways to stay in touch.
Eventually you'll probably find some way for me to join you.  But right
now, this is about you and Michael, not about you and me."

Tears sprang to her eyes.  "I do love him and I know he feels the same
way.  I'll talk to him and see if he can find a way to get us out of
here He will, I know he will."

For days she was lost in her own romantic universe.  She revelled in
her emotions, and thought only about the man she loved.  I believed
that if paradise could exist on earth, she'd found it.  She was in a
world I couldn't share, but could only hope to experience one day.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

How could we have known that a fistful of pine needles would plant the
first seeds of serious doubt in our minds that our conspiracy would be
anything but successful?  We'd been nervous at first, but with every
new success our confidence had grown.  The doubt, when it came, would
shock Dalia out of the dream world she inhabited, and push aside the
unsettling new emotions I'd been struggling with since I'd realized
that she and Michael really would move away and be married.  It had
never occurred to me, ever, that Dalia's relationship with Michael
could cause us to be separated forever.  I was ecstatic for her, but I
also envied her.  I tried to persuade myself that it wasn't Dalia
herself I envied, but what she had discovered.  I'd always loved Dalia
as if she was my sister and I truly believed that nothing could or
would ever change that.  Now I realized that my jealousy was driven by
both a need to understand what she felt and a feeling that I didn't
want to share her with Michael.  I didn't doubt Michael's affection for
her or his integrity.  I knew that if I lost her to Michael, she'd be
in safe hands.  But

that didn't make me feel much better, and it didn't help me forget the
fact that I might never see her again.  More than anything, I truly did
want her to be happy, and I knew that without Michael she wouldn't be
and that they needed to leave Jordan in order to be together.  As she
blissfully sailed through the days and weeks that followed, swept by
the power of these new emotions, I worked to hide mine.  I was worried
that if she knew what I was feeling, she'd never agree to go away and I
didn't want to stand in her way.  \020Either I was doing an excellent
job or Dalia was so wrapped up in her own thoughts that she never
sensed my conflict.  One Thursday, a few weeks after Dalia's
declaration of love, we were planning to get together to bake and talk
as usual.  Our sihra was to be at Dalia's house, and I had permission
to go directly there after closing the salon.  We'd decided to make
kunafay because it was her brother Nasar's favourite and he and his
wife were coming for a visit.  We didn't particularly enjoy Nasar's
company, but we wanted to encourage him to visit more often for his
wife Diane's sake, since he usually kept her locked up at home.

Dalia had spent that whole week talking to Michael about leaving Jordan
and, as I arrived, I could tell that she had something urgent to
report.  As we prepared the kunafay in her kitchen, she was clearly
bursting to talk.  But she insisted that we finish baking so that she
could spill it out later, uninterrupted, in my room.  Michael must have
found a way to get them out of Jordan, I guessed.  I didn't want to
start sobbing and dissuade her from leaving when she told me but I
hadn't found a way, yet, to stay strong.  I prayed the baking would
drag on.  But the kunafay was ready in record time.

Then Nasar and Diane walked in.  I thanked God for their arrival, as it
postponed our conversation a little longer.  We

could not leave them and lock ourselves in Dalia's room, or expect
Dalia's mother to serve them alone.

Dalia began brewing the coffee and I poured the syrup over the kunafay.
The living room filled with Dalia's family, all watching TV.  Her four
brothers, her mother, her father, and Diane seemed mesmerized by a
Spanish series that had been translated into Arabic.  Jordanian
television only has four channels and all of them go off the air by
midnight.  Most don't broadcast films, and so any programme that was
not news or a Muslim religious show usually had a captivated following.
We served the coffee and kunafay and sat down on the love seat next to
Diane.  Everyone kept their eyes on the television while shovelling
bite-sized pieces of kunafay into their mouths.  No one spoke until the
first commercial break, and then Mohammed, as usual began to tease us
about our cooking.  Since women were not allowed to indulge in banter
with any man outside their families, I enjoyed this weekly sparring
which was only permitted because of my friendship with Dalia had turned
her family into an extension of my own and vice versa.

"Well, their cooking has definitely improved since they decided to
practise every Thursday, although they've made some strange things.  If
I didn't know any better, I'd swear it was a conspiracy to hospitalize
us all," Mohammed joked.

The word 'conspiracy' jolted me.  My shoulders stiffened.

"You, maybe, but what could we possibly have against everyone else?"  I
teased back, nervous that there was an edge to his comment.

"Oh, I'm sure if I took the time to think about it I could come up with
some reason you two would want to hurt me, reasons that would probably
even be believable," he shot back.

I froze.  This didn't feel like innocent teasing any more.

Dalia's father chimed in before I had to respond.

"Yaba, go make some tea," he said.  And with that, Dalia and I
collected the plates and went into the kitchen.

"How long do you think they're going to stay?"  I whispered to Dalia.

She shrugged and carried the tea tray out to the living room.  Everyone
was again glued to the Spanish soap opera.  Mohammed and Nasar quickly
stood to leave.

"Don't you want tea?"  I asked.

"We're going to wash the pickup," Mohammed said and they left.

"Girls, please make some lemonade and take it out to Nasar and
Mohammed," Dalia's mother asked at the next commercial.

They were busy cleaning the truck in the driveway, both with their
heads buried inside the pickup, scrubbing the upholstery and chatting.
As we got nearer, we heard bits of their conversation.

"There are only two places in Amman where you find this," Mohammed was
saying.

"It's probably one of your friends.  You're always lugging them around
town."

We held the glasses out towards them and Mohammed walked round the car
to take his lemonade.  As he stepped up he threw a small fistful of
pine needles to the ground, at my feet, and I felt another charge of
fear.  Dalia saw them too.  The park.  Our picnic.  Needles must have
clung to our blankets -or shoes, work bags  Oh God, oh God.  But we
didn't react.  We gave them their drinks and hurried back into the
kitchen.

"Oh my God, Norma.  Did you see that?"  Dalia said in a panic.

"Yes.  But did you hear what Nasar was saying that one of

Mohammed's friends probably left them.  I'm sure he believed that, so
don't worry," I said, trying to calm myself as well.

"Norma, what do you mean don't worry?  Oh my God, this is horrible,
horrible."

"It's not good, but it's not that bad either.  Mohammed is always
driving his friends around, he'll probably just forget about it."

We sat nervously for the next hour until Nasar and Diane left, waiting
for Mohammed to bring up the pine needles.  He didn't.

Later, in Dalia's room, we laughed about the incident and moved on to
more important things: Michael.

"He said that he thinks he can probably get us visas for London or
Greece.  He has friends in both those countries who will put us up
until we get settled," she announced.

"That's wonderful.  Then you can get married.  You know how much I'll
miss you, but you have to do this," I said, trying to be positive.

"No, you don't understand.  He's going to try to get visas for all
three of us."

"What?  Are you sure?  Did he say that?  Oh my God, I can come with
you?  Dalia, no, that would be too much.  What would his friends say? I
can understand the two of you staying with them, but me too?"

"He's talked to his friends and they're fine with it.  You have to
come.  I don't want to go without you.  Please say you'll come.  We'll
all be free.  We have some money saved, and so does he, so we'll be
fine."

"Dalia, you make it sound so simple.  You're talking about moving to a
foreign country, with a new language, new customs, and new people.
Finding new jobs."

"Come on, Norma, nothing you want badly enough is

ever simple, you know that.  We can do this, you'll see."

I was caught up in her optimism.  Suddenly I was laughing as it sank
in.  Freedom!

"I can't think of anything I'd like better than being homeless and
penniless with you and Michael in a foreign country.  OK, let's do
it!"

"You mean it?"

"Yes!"  I looked into the eyes of my best friend and hugged her.  "You
think I'd let you go alone?  I was so worried that you'd leave and that
I'd never see you again.  Now we can leave together!  This is the best
news of my whole life."

We pushed the pine needles to the back of our minds, where they
couldn't dampen the euphoric sense of hope we were feeling as we talked
through the details.  We were so close to Greece or London that I could
almost see the tickets and visas in our hands.  By the time my father
arrived to pick me up, we were confident that it was all going to work,
and appeared completely calm, though inside I was vibrating with
possibilities.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Towards the end of September, Dalia went to Zai National park with
Michael for one more picnic.  There she told him that I'd agreed to
join them and they shared another kiss.  She was ecstatic for days.

We began to work out what we had to do in order to leave with Michael
and found that it was more difficult than we'd originally thought.
There were hundreds of details to consider and logistical snags we
hadn't expected.  We spent three sleepless nights thinking up plans and
filled our days discussing our ideas.  It was further complicated by
the onset of Ramadan.  While Ramadan is not a public holiday, most
businesses are either closed or have shorter hours during the
month-long holiday.

The problems we were facing, however, had little to do with the rules
of Ramadan; they were caused by the erratic hours most of the
government offices kept during this month.  Michael had lots of
contacts in the embassies and government offices we had to go to in
order to get our visas.  We decided to gather all our paperwork and
have him try to process the papers through his friends, hoping he could
get them without either of us being there.  This was when we came
across our biggest stumbling block.  It was something so obvious that
we should have thought about it the moment we started talking about
leaving Jordan.  Dalia and I needed passports.  Since we'd never been
outside Jordan, we didn't have them.  Before Michael could get us
visas, we had to have passports.  Before we could buy airplane tickets,
we had to have passports.  Passports became our new nightmare.  And it
can be hard to get a passport in Jordan if you don't want your family
to know about it.  Since we were women, we had to produce three pieces
of paper to get one issued: a birth certificate, a photo identification
card, and our family book.  In Jordan, the male head of a family, in
our cases our fathers, is issued with a family book.  It looks a bit
like a passport but is actually a family record that details genealogy,
with references to the family book in which a person was previously
listed.  It enables the government to keep a record of all families and
it ensures that no woman can travel without her parents' consent.  Men
need only a birth certificate and identification cards; the problem was
the family book.  We realized that we would have to find a way to get
them without our fathers' knowledge and pray that the passport office
wouldn't call our parents when we appeared.  In the meantime, Michael
searched for some way to obtain passports without using our family
books.

It was during this time that Dalia's behaviour began to change.  Over
several days, her excitement vanished, replaced by fear and anxiety. At
first I thought it was just nerves, though she insisted it wasn't.
Since the pine needles, she'd been on the alert, watching Mohammed for
signs.  Now she was sure that we'd been discovered.  I was so focused
on trying to arrange our escape that I didn't pay much attention to
Dalia's growing suspicions.

"Norma, I'm positive Mohammed knows something.  He hasn't been himself
lately, not towards me, at least.  I'm really anxious," she said.

"Dalia, that's impossible.  You're just worried that we won't be able
to pull this off and it's getting to you," I replied.

"Of course I'm worried about pulling this off, but that's not what I'm
talking about.  Mohammed is acting very different; he even looks at me
differently."

I went over everything we had planned since she'd met Michael, in an
attempt to convince her that no one suspected anything, but the more I
talked, the more nervous she became.  I tried to tell myself that she
was just feeling emotionally vulnerable because her relationship with
Michael had become so much more serious.  Maybe she was having second
thoughts, or feeling guilty because she'd kissed him, and that was
making her paranoid.  But the more I tried to persuade her that her
fears were unfounded, the more she insisted that I was wrong.

We stopped planning our escape to try to calm her down, but nothing
seemed to work.  Within a few days, she had turned, quite literally,
into a nervous wreck.  She wasn't sleeping or eating properly- I had
never seen her like this.  I searched for ways to ease her anxiety, but
found nothing.  She was obsessed with the pine needles Mohammed had
found in his truck, and insisted that he'd suspected something ever
since, although he'd never said a word to either of us.  I tried to
believe her but couldn't get past the idea that if he suspected us he'd
have said something.  His behaviour towards us in the salon had not
changed, but I knew that this didn't entirely disprove Dalia's theory,
since Mohammed was unlikely to change his public behaviour, regardless
of what he thought in private.

I continued to believe that Dalia's transformation was due to nerves
over the seriousness of what we were about to do, while Dalia remained
convinced that her relationship with Michael had been discovered.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Dalia's mood worsened as the days went by, aggravated by lack of sleep.
In all the years I'd known her, she'd always been able to compose
herself, betraying none of the emotional turmoil she was experiencing,
but this time it was clear that she was losing control.  I grew even
more worried when she refused to come to my home one Sunday afternoon
and my anxiety peaked the following day as we walked to the salon.

"Dalia, you look really tired.  Have you slept at all?"  I asked.

"No, I can't sleep.  Something is really wrong at home, Norma.  I'm so
worried that I can't think straight any more," she replied.

"I think you're worrying about nothing.  I don't know what I need to do
to convince you that you're wrong about this," I said as I unlocked the
door to the salon and went in.  She followed me into the break room
and, as I began brewing coffee, flung herself on the couch.
\020"Norma, I'm not wrong.  Do you know what Mohammed did yesterday?"
she said, sitting up.  "When I was about to walk to your house, he
insisted on taking me.  He wouldn't let me out of the house alone.
Also, he kept asking me about this week's appointments at the salon. He
wanted to know the exact times of the appointments and which clients
were scheduled to come in.  That's why I didn't come over."

"Dalia, he's probably trying to organize something with his friends and
wants to find a way to fit it in.  I think you're reading way too much
into this."  I poured the coffee and joined her on the couch.

She held a cigarette with shaky fingers, brought it up to her lips and
inhaled as though it would give her the ability to go on.

"No, you're wrong.  He's never asked for such specific information
before.  And I've been walking to your house on Sundays for how many
years?"  she said tensely.  "No

he insists that he has to drive me.  Why?  I know why- he knows."

"Relax.  Calm down.  I'm sure there's some other reason.  He was
probably going out and planned to pass my house, so he decided to drop
you off.  You've been so worried that you're seeing everything
differently.  You really need to relax.  Why don't you stay back here
and try to get some rest today?  Sleep a little; I'll take your
appointments or reschedule them for you."

"No, I can't.  I have to find a way to discover what he knows.  I have
to know or I'll go nuts.  I haven't been able to think of anything else
for days.  We have to figure out a way," she said and lit her second
cigarette.

"Dalia, please, stay back here today and get some rest.  Then we'll
figure out a way to get some answers.  I promise."

I left the break room to set up the salon for our first appointment.
All morning, I thought about Dalia in the break room.

Her mood had changed so dramatically in just a few short days.  There
had to be a way to bring her happiness back.

Every so often Dalia would wander out of the break room.  She would
circle the salon disorientated, as if the room was totally unfamiliar
to her.  Each time she appeared, I took her by the arm and gently led
her back to the couch, all the while praying that Mohammed wouldn't
show up and see her like this.  If he did, then he would definitely
start asking questions, which would push her over the edge.  \020I
cancelled most of our appointments that day, hoping to have more time
to talk her out of this paranoid depression.  I could see her being
swept by her fears into a sea of suffering, as I stood powerless on the
shore.  With each day, her phobia was drawing her further and further
out of my reach.  She was so caught up in her terror that I couldn't
get through to her.  She had locked me out.  For the first time in over
twenty years, I felt distanced from her and it really scared me.

I did what I could to comfort her until Mohammed showed up to close the
salon.  I'd repeatedly begged her to stay quiet on the way home, so
Mohammed wouldn't notice her nervousness.  I kept assuring her that we
would find out if he knew anything, and realized that in order to save
her sanity I would have to find a way to convince her that he didn't.

But I did wonder what if she was right?  She knew Mohammed; they share
the same house.  She'd never shown anything like this disabling
paranoia in her life.  But then she had never before put her life on
the line for a forbidden romance.  I didn't dare tell her, but a shadow
of fear was beginning to fall over me, too.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

After months of feeling trapped in an airless oven with daily
temperatures well above 100 degrees Fahrenheit, I woke up in the
pre-dawn hours of that Tuesday to the eerie echo of the muezzins' call
upon the faithful to pray.  "La ill aha ilia Allah Mohammed rasul
Allah' was being broadcast from the loudspeakers of the many mosques
throughout Amman and its surrounding suburbs.

I'd spent most of the night wrestling with both my thoughts and the
sheets, and so I welcomed the cool winds of early morning.  It was a
sure sign that the heat wave was finally loosening its grip on the
city.  The short, cool bursts of air blowing in through my partially
opened bedroom window, along with the memory of my phone conversation
with Dalia the previous night, made me shiver.

As I thought about the hours and months we'd spent planning and
scheming in order to make Dalia's relationship with Michael a reality,
a sudden panic rose from deep inside me, trapping my breath in my
throat.  Maybe her suspicions

weren't paranoid or based on guilt.  Maybe the only reason I didn't
want to acknowledge her fears was that I knew how grave the
consequences would be if her family found out.  Suddenly I was
desperate to talk to her.  Our phone conversation the previous night
had taken on a whole new dimension.  I started analysing every phrase
and struggled to recall the tone of her voice.

"Hello, Norma.  Can you talk for a minute?"  she asked.

"Sure, what's wrong?  You sound upset."

"I'm worried, Norma.  I'm really worried.  Mohammed is getting weirder
by the minute and now my dad is acting strange too."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, he came into my room a while ago to make sure I was keeping the
Sala and performing my nightly prayers.  Then he told me that I
wouldn't have to make breakfast in the morning."  \020"That's strange,
but I'm sure there's some explanation."  "I think they both know
something.  My father hasn't asked me if I was keeping the Sala since I
was sixteen.  And what about Mohammed?  He's been avoiding me for two
days.  When we bump into each other, he gives me a really mean look.
What's all that about?  I mean, we're not really that close, but he's
never treated me like this before."

"Come on, Dalia, relax.  No one knows anything.  Calm down and go to
bed.  You're just paranoid and you haven't slept for a week.  Maybe
Mohammed is upset about something and is taking it out on you and, who
knows, maybe your dad just wanted to give you a break from your regular
morning chores.  I can tell that you're very tired; I'm sure they've
noticed too."

"Norma, please.  I'm not paranoid or crazy.  Something isn't right
here, I feel it."

"Dalia, come on, just relax and get some rest.  You'll see, it'll all
look different in the morning.  We'll talk about it some more
tomorrow."

"Oh, Norma, I'm really scared.  I can't sleep."

"Dalia, you have to sleep.  You're worrying me and you're going to make
yourself ill.  I'm sure it's not what you think it is; there's no way
they could know anything.  Please, just try to relax."

"I hope you're right, Norma, but something just doesn't feel right.  I
can't wait to get out of here."

"Yalta, yagazallae, clear your head and go to bed and I'll see you in
the morning as usual."

"In sha Allah, ya hilweh," she said and reluctantly hung up.

As I went over the conversation, I jumped out of bed.  I dressed
hastily, neglected all of my morning chores, telling my family that I
didn't feel well, grabbed a light jacket and sat on the veranda staring
in the direction of Dalia's house.  Suddenly I was filled with all the
anxiety and dread Dalia had been desperately trying to communicate to
me over the past two days.  I kept looking at my watch, wishing I could
will the next thirty minutes to pass.  In a futile attempt to clear my
mind, I tried to concentrate on the panorama of the city as it began
its transformation from a ghost town to a bustling metropolis.

Amman was built on seven jebels (hills), but today it spreads across
nineteen.  From my house near the highest point of Jebel Hussein, I had
a clear view of most of the streets below and of the surrounding
jebels.  I took in the entire view of the endless, hilly landscape
dotted with hundreds upon hundreds of grey concrete square buildings,
separated only by roads and minarets that towered above the
lifeless-looking dwellings.  The sun had risen a few hours before and
had already begun its struggle to break through the sandy haze that
blanketed the city.  A few

cars were heading towards the entrance ramp of Kings Highway, trying to
beat the morning traffic.  I could see housewives on their roofs,
hanging laundry and shaking out rugs.  Soon schoolchildren would fill
the streets, their loud banter and laughter destroying what was left of
the morning quiet.

I looked at my watch and was filled with anxiety.  She should have been
here by now, I thought, especially since she's not making breakfast
today.  I began to wonder what could be keeping her.  After our last
conversation, I assumed that she'd have been in a hurry to leave the
house and eager to talk.  I became increasingly alarmed.

I began to pace the length of the terrace, stopping only to stare down
Khalid bin al wa lid Road.  Around eight forty-five, I began to think
that every figure on the street, male or female, was Dalia.  By eight
fifty-five, I was frantic and every second felt like an eternity.  I
ran through the house and pounced on the phone as if it was my
lifeline.  I struggled to dial her number and, after two wrong
attempts, I was able to steady my index finger long enough to dial
correctly.  The phone rang six times, with what felt like days dragging
between each ring.  Maybe no one is home and she's on her way here .. .
impossible .. . where would her mother be?  Maybe the whole family went
somewhere together.  She'd have called to let me know that she wasn't
coming.  Maybe she overslept and no one heard the phone.  Unlikely,
since she never misses her morning prayers.  Maybe she's sick; after
all, she hasn't eaten or slept all week.  No, she would have called.
Dalia wouldn't forget to call.  Any reasonable explanation I thought of
dissolved when I realized that she would have called me to explain why
she was late.

By nine, I was a walking time bomb and in no mood to obey any rules.  I
scrambled past my parents to the door, ignoring my father's inquiries
and demands to stop.  On any

other day I would never have dared to do such a thing.  I knew better
than to leave the house without receiving my father's approval first.
It had taken months of constant begging to get his permission to walk
the few blocks to the salon with Dalia in the morning.  Charging out of
the house alone was a first for me.  I think the only reason my father
didn't get up and stop me was because he was so shocked that I would
even consider such a thing that it rendered him immobile.

As I headed down the street in the direction of Dalia's house, the road
seemed to double in length before my eyes.  I could hear the remote
sound of sirens, and the closer I came to her house, the louder they
seemed.  I turned off Nablus Street onto Khalid bin al wa lid Road and
stopped when I saw an ambulance, its lights flashing, in front of
Dalia's house.  My legs began to tremble and I felt as if they'd give
way.  A sick terror shot through my body, and I knew that my heart had
stopped.  My worry about Dalia propelled me forward, while me fear
struggled to pull me back.  "Please God, let her be all right," echoed
in my head, and I tried to convince myself that the emergency vehicles
were at her neighbour's house.  As soon as I got to her house, the
ambulance began to drive away, lights flashing and sirens blazing,
telling me that it had someone inside.

Dalia's front door was open and most of her neighbours were surveying
the scene from their balconies.  I glanced around and saw that none of
the neighbours was visibly distraught.  They looked curious, not
concerned, and I knew that the passenger in the ambulance must have
come from Dalia's house.  I rushed up the steps to her front door,
going up two at a time.  I burst into the family room, and found myself
enveloped by a frightening stillness and a cloud of tension so thick
that I could almost see it.

Her mother and four brothers were sitting there, all a distance apart
from one another.  Her mother glanced up at me and I noticed that her
eyes were swollen and red.  She lowered her head, covered her face with
her hands, and began to sway back and forth, obviously fighting back
tears.  She was the only one who showed any emotion other than anger,
which flashed from the men.  The four young men I'd known all my life
didn't even bother to acknowledge my presence.  Mohammed, who'd spent
hours upon hours with us at the salon over the past six years, didn't
even glance in my direction.  For an instant, I thought that something
must have happened to Mahmood, Dalia's father.  I was about to start
asking questions when Mahmood appeared in the doorway.  As soon as I
saw him and before I could open my mouth, my legs collapsed and I fell
to my knees.  I now knew that it was Dalia in the ambulance.  I took a
moment to gather my strength and absorb the shock.  My mouth was so dry
that I didn't think I could talk, even if I wanted to.  My hands were
trembling and I felt dizzy and light-headed,

but I had to find out what had happened.  Somehow I forced the words
out.

"Where is she?"  I asked.

The only person who responded was her father.  "Where is she?  Where
she belongs, that's where she is!"  he said angrily.  \020"What do you
mean?  What's happened?"  I asked.

I waited a moment and when he didn't reply I asked again, "Where is
she?"

"Don't worry, if I find out you knew, or helped her in any way, you'll
be following her shortly," he snapped.  The dehumanized way he looked
at me and spoke those icy words told me exactly what he meant, but I
had to press on.  Had to know.

"Following her?  Please tell me what's happened.  Tell me where they
took her," I pleaded.

"God's will is what happened!  What did she think?  That my home is a
house of whoredom?"  he shouted.

"What are you talking about?"  I asked.

"About her and that Catholic man, that's what I'm talking about.  How
long did you two think you could hide it from me?  How long has she
been shaming me and dishonouring my good name?"  he yelled.

"I don't know what you're talking about.  You've made a mistake.  Dalia
never shamed you.  She never would.  Please tell me what you've done.
Is she all right?"

"I've cleansed my house, that's what I've done.  I've cut the rotten
part and brought honour back to my family name.  From now on, no one is
allowed to mention that name to me again.  I never had a daughter!
Understood?"  he shouted as he glared, first at me and then at the rest
of his family.

"Please, you've made a terrible mistake.  She never shamed you; she
will never shame you.  Just tell me if she's all right.  Please, let me
see Dalia," I begged.

"There is no Dalia here!  Now leave and don't mention that name to me
again."

It was as if he was speaking a different language, but the words kept
repeating themselves in my head.  I understood that Dalia was dead,
that he'd killed her, but I couldn't accept it.  I tried to be strong.
I really did.  I tried to detach myself from what was happening and
pretend that I was just a spectator and not a participant, but I
couldn't separate myself from the horrifying reality.  Although I knew
this had always been one of the risks, it had been an abstract threat
to us, and the power of our successes had pushed it back.  We'd begun
to feel invincible.  I was not prepared to face the fact of it.  I
didn't know how to handle it.  A storm of anger gathered inside and
broke into a scream.

"NO!  I won't leave!  I want Dalia!  Do you hear me?"  I said Dalia!
She's your daughter!  How can you deny that she exists?  I won't leave
here without Dalia!"  I shouted hysterically.  Tears flooded my eyes
and I began wailing, as so many centuries of grieving Arab women had
before me.

Before I could control my sobbing, my parents arrived.  I didn't see
them come in, but I saw my father standing next to Mahmood, shaking his
hand, and heard my mother repeatedly saying, "Min isnaq ya siddi, min
isnaq," begging his pardon for my behaviour.  I couldn't believe what
was happening- that they did not instantly run to the side of a
distraught daughter.  I was furious.  I stood up and ran between my
father and Mahmood, pulling their hands apart.

"Don't shake his hand!  He killed her!  He's a murderer!  His hands are
stained with innocent blood!"  I yelled.

My parents, as well as everyone else there, were taken aback.  My
mother grabbed me and pulled me to her, apologizing and begging
Mahmood's pardon.

"Please, sir, I beg your pardon, I'm so sorry for her behaviour.  She
doesn't mean it.  She's obviously in shock and doesn't realize the
weight of her words.  Excuse her, please," she kept repeating as she
tried to pull me towards the door.

My father remained where he was and I could hear Dalia's father saying
to him, "I've cleansed my house and I advise you to make sure that your
house is clean too.  I don't know if Norma was involved in any of this,
but I've done my part and told you that she may be."

Before my father could respond, I wrestled free and ran back to
Mahmood.  I wanted to look him right in the eyes as I said what I
needed to say.

"Dalia never shamed you, you shamed yourself.  You've turned your home
into a house of murder.  The spilling of her

innocent blood has stained your name, your hands, and your soul
forever.  I will not rest until her death is avenged.  You'll pay for
this senseless slaughter!  You're a murderer and there's no honour in
that."

My mother ran towards me, all the while repeating her apologies.  My
father grabbed me by my arm, spun me round, and slapped me across the
face.  Then he pushed me into my mother's arms and ordered her to take
me outside.

I fully understood the gravity of what I'd said and I meant every word
of it.  I knew that, as a woman, I didn't have the right to speak to a
man in this manner, that I was inviting my own death.  Hundreds of
women had been killed for lesser of fences  But at that moment my mind
was focused on one thing: avenging the death of my best friend.

Out on the street I began denying that any of this was real.  It had to
be a nightmare.  I would soon wake up.  I had to see Dalia; I had to go
to her.  I tried to think for a moment and realized that the ambulance
must have taken her to Palestine Hospital on Queen Alia Street, since
it was the closest.  I begged my mother to let me go, but she would
not.  She held on to my arm with all her strength and urged me to calm
down.  She kept saying, in a pleading whisper, "You could be killed if
you don't control your mouth."  I could see she was scared of what my
father would do if she let me go, but I had no more patience.  I
refused to waste any more time begging and explaining.  My father would
have plenty of time to reprimand and punish me once I came home from
the hospital.  I knew he would, but right now I had to go.  I tore my
arm from my mother's grip and ran towards Al Istiqlal Road to flag down
a taxi.  \020The taxi came to an abrupt stop in the circular drive in
front of Palestine Hospital and I bolted out of the car, yelling back

to the driver that he would have to wait and drive me home if he wanted
to get paid.  I grabbed the first nurse I could find and asked her
where they took patients who were brought in by ambulance.  I raced to
the emergency room and gave the attendant Dalia's full name, but I
could tell by the grim look on her face that I was too late.  She
called a doctor over to talk to me and I was told that Dalia had been
dead when she'd arrived at the hospital.  There was nothing anyone
could do, he said; Dalia had been stabbed twelve times in the chest.
The image of Mahmood now merged with that of a bloody knife, driven in
again and again, going beyond honour to the most primitive brutality,
and I thought I'd be sick.  Had I known then that, after the stabbing,
he waited before calling the ambulance to make sure that she could not
be saved, I think I would have killed him.

I begged the doctor to let me see her, and he finally agreed.  He
instructed the nurse to take me to the morgue.

When we got into the elevator to go to the basement of the old
hospital, it took all my strength to keep from losing control, but I
couldn't stop the flow of tears down my cheeks.  I found a strange
comfort in the fact that Dalia had been brought to the hospital where
we'd both been born.  In some odd way it seemed as if her life had
somehow come full circle.  In a daze, I followed the nurse down a long,
dimly lit hallway into a large back room.  She reached for the light
switch and I was temporarily blinded by the bright lights overhead.
Their eerie, amplified, humming sound filled the surreal silence.

The morgue had four stainless steel tables.  On three, bodies were
draped with white sheets.  The nurse walked to the nearest table and
gently pulled the blood-soaked sheet back, revealing only Dalia's face.
I thought I was ready to see her, but nothing could have prepared me
for what now lay in front of

me.  The nurse reached out and laid her hand on mine.  I felt a sharp
pain tear through my chest.  All the feelings I'd controlled so that I
could be strong for us both against an enemy whose allies were every
Arab man in Jordan, surfaced.  I started sobbing so hard I couldn't
breathe.  Dalia lay in front of me and, if not for the splatter of
dried blood that stained parts of her beautiful face, she appeared to
be in a deep sleep.  I bent down, kissed her cheek and then pressed my
cheek to hers while my tears spilled onto her cold face.  I whispered
to her, promising that I would not allow her death to be in vain, and
kissed her forehead as I told her that I would always love her.  The
whole morning had seemed to stretch out into an eternity and even stop
several times, but now the few moments I had with Dalia flew by.  My
time with her was over before it had begun, here in the morgue and in
the life we thought we'd share.

When the nurse saw that I had managed to calm down a bit, she asked me
to leave.  I carried a clear image of Dalia's face with me, one I knew
would haunt me for the rest of my life.

Standing outside the hospital, I cursed the cool winds I had welcomed
earlier that morning for bringing this devastation to my life.  In just
a few hours, my world had fallen apart.  I felt as if I'd been thrown
into the desert and left alone to die.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

As I stood in the centre of Palestine Hospital's circular drive, I
knew that the direction of my life had permanently altered.  I'd spent
years supporting Dalia's fantasy of democracy and freedom for women
without saying a word, too timid to add my voice to hers.  I suddenly
saw my whole life as a cowardly lie.  I'd conformed to traditions I
didn't believe in, and hidden my hope for freedom behind a wall of
silence and a smile.  Losing Dalia in this way made vivid to me
something I'd always known but had managed to ignore.  I could no
longer hide my true emotions and beliefs in the hope my silent cries
would be heard.  In memory of Dalia, I vowed to transform my silence
into audible screams for justice and equal rights.

My first barrier was my father and brothers, who were waiting at home.
Even if I managed to survive- and I knew that my life was in clear
danger from the men in both families I would have to climb a
centuries-old mountain before I could hope for any change.  Fuelled by
a lifetime of suppressed anger, sparked now by the rebellious emotions
Dalia's murder had provoked, I was filled with a quiet, determined fire
as I prepared to go home and face whatever came.

My taxi driver appeared from behind a line of oncoming traffic and
began honking.  I dropped myself into the back seat, mumbling my
address, slammed the door, shut my eyes tightly, and began to replay
the last few days in my mind.  Dalia had known something was wrong and
I'd refused to believe her.  She'd felt this coming and I'd tried to
convince her that she was paranoid.  During the last few days of her
life, when she'd needed me the most, I hadn't been there as I should
have been.  I tried to imagine what she'd felt during those last few
days and the pain of her last few hours.  I saw her face and
uncomprehending eyes as her father raised the knife.  I drove myself
crazy going over and over what I might have said or done to prevent
this.  Spontaneously, her face was in front of me again.  In a stroke
in twelve strokes that knife had taken her life, her laugh.  I would
never see or hear them again.

The taxi jerked to a stop in front of my home.  I opened my eyes and
stumbled out, in a trance, telling the driver to come to the house and
collect his fare from my father.  The driver was apprehensive and began
saying, "Khaliha alia Allah ya binty," the ride is free from God.  I
insisted that he escort me, not only to get the fare but to confirm
where I'd been for the past hour.  We marched up to the front door and
I rang the bell.  My father opened the door.  I could tell by the look
on his face that he was shocked to see me

standing beside a man.  I pushed past him without saying a word,
leaving him and the taxi driver to work things out.

Inside, I was disorientated, didn't recognize my surroundings.  My home
suddenly felt very alien and I wandered around, desperately searching
for comfort and privacy.  I finally dragged myself to my room, closed
the door, and collapsed

onto my bed.  I pulled my knees to my chest and lay in a foetal
position.  I tried to brace myself for the wave of emotions I knew
would take over.  Tears flowed down my face, soaking my pillow, as I
gave in and descended into ever deeper despair.

Unexpectedly, my bedroom door flew open with startling force, smashing
into the dresser and knocking over the knickknacks I'd collected over
the years.  I opened my eyes to find my father standing in the doorway,
hands on his hips, eyes burning with fury.  I sat up slowly and waited
for his attack to begin.

"I don't approve of what you did at Mahmood's house.  It was very
disrespectful, and I won't stand for my daughter to be known as
disrespectful," he raged.

I wrapped my arms round my pillow and buried my head in it.

"I've talked to Mahmood and we're both prepared to excuse your earlier
actions since you must have been shocked by Dalia's death.  But first,
I must know if you had anything to do with this dishonourable and
foolish thing Dalia did."

I remained still for a moment, my mind racing, trying to decide on the
path I should take.  Regardless of what happened, I had an obligation
to defend Dalia's actions.  \020"Dalia did nothing wrong," I stated.

That one simple statement enraged him.  He stepped toward me, and his
tone became vile.

"Dalia did everything wrong!  She dishonoured her family by running
around with that man.  She was a whore!  And for that she had fallen to
a whore's fate!  Do you think you know better than her own father? Now,
I want to know if you had anything at all to do with her betrayal of
her family and her home."

"Any respect I may have had for Arab men or for Arab customs died with
Dalia.  I refuse to deny my beliefs any longer!"  I looked up at him
before continuing, then threw submission to the wind.

"I will not be silent.  I will not allow my silence to condemn her.
Dalia did nothing wrong!  I will defend her actions to my dying day. If
you're here in search of an admission of guilt, or to look for
incriminating details to substantiate your beliefs and her father's
actions, you'll be disappointed.  Whatever existed between Dalia and me
will forever remain between us.  She took her secrets to her grave, and
I will do the same.  I'll never agree with you about this, nor will I
ever accept what her father has done.  He's a murderer and you're his
accomplice by justifying what he's done!"  I was almost screaming at
him.

He closed the small distance between us with lightning speed, and
slapped my face hard.

"How dare you use that tone with me!  How dare you call an honourable
and just man like Mahmood a murderer in defence of a whore!  I demand
that you tell me what I want to know."

He raised his hand, prepared to strike me again.  Then, from nowhere,
my mother appeared and grabbed his arm.

"Mishan Allah, for God's sake stop this.  Let her rest.  She's not in
her right mind.  For God's sake, leave her now and after she's rested
talk to her.  I beg you, come with me, please, and give her time.  You
know how she loved Dalia.  They were like sisters.  Ever since they
were young, they've been inseparable.  Let her adjust to this news, I
beg you.  Pardon her words.  It's anger that speaks now, not our Norma.
I beg you, la yumarie, for my life, pardon her and give her time," she
begged.

He snapped his arm round and hurled my mother to the floor, and turned
his spite towards her.

"Let go of me, ya mara (woman).  I warn you to keep your distance from
this matter.  Will you have me believe that she's distraught to the
point of disrespect?  Doesn't she realize that I gave her life and I
can take it from her for her defiant words alone!"  he shouted.

My mother was now fighting for her life as well as mine.  She knew that
only reasoned, respectful words had any hope of reaching my father and
saving me, and she did the best and bravest thing she could do.
\020"Please, at this moment she doesn't realize the consequences of
her words.  I beg you, ya habiby, let's not lose our daughter for some
hastily spoken words I'm sure she will regret once she has regained
control.  She's never disrespected you before.  From that fact alone we
should know that her anger is speaking now, not her heart.  Please come
with me," she said as she rose to her feet and put out her hand to
him.

Angrily he turned on his heel to face the door.  "I will allow her a
few hours of rest.  But I demand an apology, and I demand that she go
and apologize to Mahmood as well."  And he strode out.

My mother sat on the bed and pulled me to her, holding my head on her
chest and caressing my hair.  She kept repeating, "Ya binty, ya binty,
hutie himlk ala Allah, Allah hi hitnlik' (my girl, my girl, put your
troubles in God's hands, he'll carry you through this).  But I found
little comfort in either my mother's arms or her words.

"I don't want God to carry me through this, I want him to take me away
from here," I said.

"Oh Norma, my baby girl, if you had anything at all to do with this,
your father must never know.  I know how much you loved Dalia, I loved
her too, and I can't bear to lose you in the same way," she said.

"I can't keep quiet, Mum, that would make me as guilty as they are.
Don't you see that Dalia did nothing wrong, and they killed her.  They
killed her for nothing."

"Norma, please, you can't go on defending her like this.  Whether what
she did was right or wrong doesn't matter any more.  Think of what
Dalia would want.  She wouldn't want you to die defending what she did.
Please, Norma, you must apologize."

"I can't!  I won't!  If I do that, I'll be just as guilty as they are.
I won't condemn her by agreeing with them.  I didn't condemn her in her
life, and I'll be damned if I'll do it in death!"

"Norma, please think about what you're saying.  If you don't apologize,
it'll be suicide.  What good can you do for Dalia if you're dead?  I'm
not saying that your apology must come from your heart, only from your
lips.  God and Dalia will know what remains in your heart."

"I'm no longer the same person.  I won't give in to fear.  I won't deny
my heart and my beliefs.  It's fear and silence that allows them to do
this.  How many more Dallas will die before someone stands up to them?
Someone's got to fight for Dalia's innocence; it doesn't matter if I'm
killed.  I refuse to continue living this lie."

"Norma, sweetheart, you're not being rational.  You can't do anything
dead!  I'm not asking you to live a lie; I'm asking you to stay alive.
Do you think anything will change if they bury you too?"

"So you would rather have me live a lie?"

"I would rather have you alive under any circumstances!"  \020"Alive
for what?  To live as if I'm dead?  What kind of life is that?  What
kind of life have you had?  I refuse to spend the next twenty or thirty
years with a forced smile on my face while my soul sheds tears of
blood.  I don't want to live longing for the

freedom I will only find in death.  That promise has pacified us you!
too long.  I want to be free to live, really live, and do what I want.
I want to believe what I want.  If I can't have that, I have no
life."

"Don't say that you can't have a wonderful life, you--'

"A wonderful life, you mean like you?  You think I can't see past your
smile to your broken heart?  You think you can fool me into believing
you're happy?  I'm not Dad, I'm not my brothers; they don't see it
because they don't want to, but I'm not blind.  Didn't you ever have
dreams?  Needs?  Goals?"

"Of course I did."  She said it with a special tenderness which, for
just that moment, was for the girl she had been, just like me, with
dreams.  "We all go through that confusing period in our lives but we
quickly learn our place and our responsibilities.  You will too.  This
will pass, it will all pass, and--'

"It will not!  I won't let it!  I have goals and dreams.  Dalia and I
shared those dreams and now she's gone.  My ties to this country and to
these customs die with her!  My dreams are of freedom, and my goal is
to avenge her death.  Nothing you or anyone else says will ever change
that!"

"Norma, habibati (my love), I'm not trying to change what you believe,
I'm only trying to keep you alive.  I've said what I can; your life is
in your own hands now.  Understand that if they think for a moment that
you had something to do with this, I can't save you.  You have to calm
down.  I know it's not easy, and I pray that God gives you the strength
and wisdom to choose your words wisely.  I love you and I don't want to
lose you.  I'm sure Dalia wouldn't want you to commit suicide, which is
exactly what you'd be doing.  Think carefully, my dear child. Apologize
from your lips and save what burns in your heart.  Don't waste your
beliefs and passionate words on deaf ears.  I beg you, say what they
want to hear, and save your life.  I'll let you rest now." Then she
kissed me on the forehead and quietly left the room, leaving me to my
confusion.  My mother would never know the compassion, love and sadness
I felt for her.

I lay back down and thought carefully about everything my mother had
said.  I couldn't deny that she was right.  My death would do no good
to Dalia, and it would ensure that Mahmood got away with murder.  If
anything, my death would only help prove the accusations levelled
against Dalia.  I realized that I had to play by their rules for now. I
tried to clear my head and rest.  My body was rigid with tension, my
muscles ached.

Then, suddenly, I thought of Michael.  I had to warn him.  He'd be next
on their list.  And I had to tell him what had happened that Dalia had
been murdered, that he might be next.  How could I reach him while my
father had me under a microscope?  I remembered that in order for
Dalia's family to have the legal right to kill him, an autopsy had to
be performed on Dalia first.  If the results of the autopsy showed that
she'd had premarital sex, nothing I or anyone else could do would spare
Michael.  If she was found to be a virgin and her family went ahead and
killed him nevertheless, they would be heavily fined by the courts and
risked years of a bloody family feud.  Although some families did
ignore the law and kill the man involved regardless of the autopsy
findings, I didn't believe that Dalia's family would take that route.
I'd known them all my life, and I was sure that all they'd want to do
was find a quick end to this embarrassment.  I didn't doubt, however,
that they'd kill Michael if the results were unfavorable, but I knew
Dalia.  I was sure that she was still a virgin.

I had to find a way to contact Michael and let him know what had
happened.  I hated having to be the bearer of bad news, but he had to
hear it from me, no one else.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

When Dalia died, she was transformed, by the state and by Islam, into a
body, to be handled by Jordan's laws and system of burial.  But I could
only feel her death as a personal thing.

What had happened in the brief minutes, or seconds, of her death?  Did
her brothers join her father in pinning her down as he stabbed her, or
did they stab too?  Did she know she was about to be killed?  Did she
hear furtive sounds and padding feet coming towards her room?  Did her
breath stop in terror?  Or did they creep in as she slept and stab her
in darkness?  I have come to believe that her father, alone, wielded
the knife.  In the code of silence that surrounds an honour killing, I
will never know for sure.  But I will always be haunted by the possible
scenarios, and cannot bear to think of Dalia awake and knowing what was
moving towards her- seeing the face of her father, perhaps of her
brothers, and a knife

flashing towards her chest.

Did he, or they, feel anything for her as they struck?  Or had their
obsession with betrayal of honour turned Dalia into a faceless object
of hate?  Had they so depersonalized her as an enemy of the codes they
lived by that erasing her from the face of the earth was easy?  Did
Mahmood feel any guilt or remorse as he resisted calling an ambulance
until he was sure his daughter was dead?  And even if the brothers did
not raise a knife, their support of the act makes them accomplices;
Mohammed, who clearly betrayed Dalia to her father, is equally a
murderer.

What is almost as hard to bear is the facelessness of her treatment
after death.  When the twelve stabbings were done and the knife pulled
from her chest, her murder became a minor matter to be dispensed with
swiftly in the Islamic courts that ruled on all religious or family
matters.  Hidden away from the light of the civil legal system, there
would be no more punishment for her killer than the inconvenience of
two or three hours before the Sharia courts.  There, male judges and
juries, in their hearts cheering this father for upholding tradition,
always sat with sympathetic ears for male murderers.

The police, no doubt, made their initial report of the incident before
transporting Dalia's body to Palestine Hospital and noted that it was
an honour killing.  I imagine, as is usually the case, that the crime
scene would not be taped off to protect the evidence and no murder
weapons or other evidence would be collected.  All her father would be
required to do was to make a perfunctory appearance at court to testify
that Dalia had dishonoured her family.  If the court agreed that her
actions warranted an honour killing, then he would receive the male
judges' and jurors' respect and support for abiding by the ancient laws
and having the courage to uphold his family's honour.

The laws pertaining to honour killings stem from ancient beliefs that,
by now, have been codified into law.  Because of this, someone charged
with neglecting to wear a seat belt while

driving faces stiffer penalties than the perpetrator of an honour
killing.  While anyone found publicly criticizing the King
automatically faces three years in jail, a man performing an honour
killing spends less than three hours in front of the Sharia courts.

Mahmood's court appearance would no doubt be scheduled for the
following week.  If I went and publicly defended Dalia's actions, I
would certainly be killed.  I wanted desperately to attend, but I knew
that it would be almost impossible to get my father's permission to go.
In the meantime, the hospital would perform the autopsy, and make the
results available to the family and courts.  It was vital that Michael
be warned and remain hidden so he could survive until the autopsy
results proved that Dalia was still a virgin.

I left my room and went into the living room to find my mother serving
my father his tea.  The room reeked of the apple-scented tobacco my
father was steadily stuffing into his ai gila (water pipe).  He sat in
his black recliner, carefully poking and prodding the hot coals with
his large metal pincers, in an effort to keep the argila lit.  My
mother knelt in front of him her head lowered, as she carefully placed
mint tea on the end table nearest him.  Then she turned her attention
to untying his shoes.  He didn't acknowledge my entrance, but I knew he
was waiting for me to go through compulsory formalities.

"Excuse me.  Forgive me for disturbing you.  May I please sit down and
talk to you for a moment?"  I asked.

"Sit," he replied.

"Yabba (father), please forgive me.  You're right, I was very
disrespectful in my actions and my words, both to you and to Dalia's
father."  As I lowered my gaze, I caught my mother's glance and sensed
her relief.

"Yes, you were.  Until you answer my question, I cannot forgive you.
Did you have anything at all to do with this scandal?"  he asked
sternly.

"Please, Father, forgive me for my actions and words.  I was very hurt
and upset at the time and I lost control.  And no, I had nothing to do
with it."  I kept my gaze fixed on the floor.  I didn't think I could
deny my involvement if I had to look at him.  I hated the words I was
forcing out of my lips, and kept thinking, "Please, God, forgive me.
Dalia, forgive me, but I have no other choice."

Paternal feelings were now so deeply buried that there was no sign of
relief in his face, as I'd seen in my mother's.  Just the formal
words.

"I'm glad to hear that you were not involved in this mess.  I'll
forgive you, but I expect you to apologize to Mahmood and his family as
well.  Understood?"

"Yes, Father.  I'll go there right now, if you wish, and apologize."

"No, don't go now, it's getting late.  It can wait till tomorrow.  I'll
take you then."

"As you wish, Father.  May I ask something?"

"What is it?"

"I believe that I should go to the salon and put a notice on the door
to let our .. . the customers know that it will be closed for a few
days.  I'd also like to get the appointment book so I can reschedule
all of the appointments.  If I may, I would like to do that tonight."

"Well, I suppose that's something that can't wait.  I'll drive you once
I've finished my tea."  \020"Thank you, Daddy, but I feel horrible
about what I've done today.  I've troubled you a lot, and I don't want
to trouble you any more.  If it's all right with you, I'll ask one of
my brothers to accompany me, or I can just walk there and do it
quickly."

"No, I will not allow you to walk there alone at this hour.  Amjed is
in his room, have him take you."

"Thank you, Daddy.  Again, I apologize for disturbing you."  I stood up
and slowly left the living room.

I stepped up the two semi-circular white marble steps that led from the
living room to the long hall and went up the wide marble staircase to
Amjed's large and elegant room.  This old house handed down through the
family had touches of grandeur, even if our middle-class life did not.
As I walked, I summoned up the manipulative skills that had been well
honed this past year.  By the time I stood outside Amjed's door, I
believed I could pull it off.

My oldest brother, Amjed, and I were never very close.  Preoccupied
with his own world, he maintained only a distant interest in the events
of my life.  This distance meant that I had some respect and admiration
for him, since he never meddled in my life, and so never compounded
already complicated situations.  I knocked on his door.

"Amjed, Dad said you have to drive me to the salon right now to pick up
the appointment book and place a sign on the door."  I said it
boldly.

There was no answer.

"Did you hear me?"  I called.

"Yes, yes, I hear you.  Just give me a minute to change," he said
through the door.  "I'll be down in a second."

I walked through the house in a daze.  Poured myself a sip of tea in
the kitchen and waited for Amjed.

"Let's get this done quickly, I have plans tonight," he said when he
appeared in the kitchen.

"I'll be quick, I promise.  Thanks for taking me."  I followed him out
into the cold early evening air, and prayed that the short drive would
be silent.

No such luck.  \020"I heard about what happened to Dalia," he said
once we were out of the driveway.  "It's a terrible thing, she should
have known better."  The indifference in his voice angered me.

"It's more than terrible," was all I could say.

"You weren't involved, were you?  You should know better."

"No.  If you don't mind, I'm really not in the mood to talk about it,"
I said, hoping to cut him off before I lost my composure.

"Well, I can understand that.  So how long are you going to be?"  he
asked.

"Just a little while.  You can wait in the car if you want," I replied,
thankful he'd changed the subject.

"OK.  I can make some calls while you're inside," he said, and sat in
silence the rest of the way.

He parked the car in front of the salon, pulled out his cellphone, and
began making calls.

Once inside, I closed and locked the door and drew a shaky breath
before flipping on the lights and going behind the front desk.  I
reached for the phone and realized, frantic, that I couldn't remember
Jehan's number; the same number I'd repeatedly dialled, week after
week, for the past twelve months.  It had vanished from my mind.  I
reached for the appointment book to search for her phone number.  I
have to get hold of Michael, was all I could think as I frantically
flipped through the pages.  If I took too long, Amjed would come to the
door to see what I was doing.

My anxiety and fear must have affected my eyesight.  I was sure her
number was in the appointment book, I remembered writing it down
myself, yet I was flipping through the pages for the fourth time and I
couldn't find it.  I closed the book and shut my eyes tightly.

"Calm down, Norma," I told myself.  "Take your time and you'll find it.
It's in here, just calm down."  I started turning the pages more
slowly.  "Take your time and you'll find it.  It's in here, just calm
down."  Finally, of course, there it was.  I reached for the phone.

As I dialled, I dreaded telling Michael about Dalia.  This call would
alter his life forever, just as it had mine, and I wasn't sure if I
could stay composed long enough to say what needed to be said.  I held
my breath as the phone rang.  A pleasant-sounding, older woman's voice
echoed through the receiver,

"Marhaba," she said.

"May I please speak to Jehan?"  I asked.

"May I ask who's calling?"  she replied.

"It's Norma," I said.

"Hold on a moment."

A few minutes later I heard Jehan's bubbly voice jump through the line.
"Hi, Norma.  Is that you?  How are you?  What a surprise, I wasn't
expecting to hear from you until next week.  Are you OK?"

"Not so good.  Something terrible had happened and I need to talk to
Michael.  Is he there?  Can you quietly get him to the phone?"  I
asked.  My voice started cracking.

"What's happened?  Can I help?"  she asked.

"No.  I'm sorry, Jehan, but I really need to talk to Michael directly
and I'm pressed for time he can explain it to you later."

"OK, I'll get him as fast as I can," she said.

Within seconds Michael came on the line.

"What is it?"  he asked.  I could hear concern and confusion in his
voice, making what I had to say even harder.  \020I started sobbing.
"I, it's .. . they .. . they .. . it's Dalia I managed to say between
sobs.

"Dalia?  What about Dalia?  Norma, what's happened?  They who?  Please,
Norma, calm down and tell me what's happened Is Dalia OK?"

"No, no, she's not OK!  She's gone!  She's gone, Michael.  They took
her away from us.  She's gone," I kept repeating.

"What do you mean, gone?  They who?  Norma, you're not making any
sense.  Gone where?"

"Gone.  She's gone, and you .. . and they're going to want you next!"

"Norma, calm down.  Calm down and tell me what you're talking about.
They who?"

I took a deep breath and forced the words out.

"Michael, listen!  It's Dalia's father, he found out about you.  I
don't know how Mohammed, I think but he did, and he killed her, and I
think they're going to try to kill you too," I blurted out.

"No, Norma.  No, it can't be true.  What do you mean he killed her?  It
can't be.  How?  When?  It can't be true, I don't believe it, it can't
be," he said over and over again.

"Michael, it's true.  He killed her this morning.  They took her to
Palestine Hospital.  I saw her.  I'm so sorry to have to be the one to
tell you, but it's true."

"NO!  God, no.  Why, God, why?  Oh Dalia, no!"  he cried into the
phone, and the pain in his voice was almost more than I could bear.
Please, God, I prayed, don't let Amjed come to the door right now.

"Michael, listen, you have to stay at the army base for a couple of
days.  You'll be safe there, in case they come after you."

"Norma, I can't believe what you're saying.  There's nothing more they
can do to me, they've taken my heart and my soul.  If they want to
collect my body, let them come," he said, sobbing into the phone.

"Michael, no, please, you have to stay at the base.  Do it for Dalia,
please, I can't lose you too.  Please, Michael.  We'll make them pay, I
swear to you we will, but you have to make it through this, we both do.
I need your help, please, Michael, I can't do this alone, please."

"I don't think I can live without her, I don't want to live without
her.  My Dalia, oh my God, why?"

"Michael, please, we'll make it through this together.  I promise you."
Amjed began honking and I knew my time was running out.  Soon he'd come
to the door.  I had to hang up.

"Michael, Amjed's honking outside, I have to go, I have to hang up.
Promise me, swear to me on Dalia, that you'll stay at the base for at
least three days, please."

"Where did you say they'd taken her?"  he asked.

"No, Michael, please, you can't go there, promise me."  Before I could
finish Amjed was banging on the door.

"Promise me, Michael, please.  I'll keep in touch with you through
Jehan.  I'll let you know what's going on."

"I promise I'll stay at the base."

I hung up and ran to unlock the door.

"What's taking so long?  Who were you talking to on the phone?"  Amjed
asked as he entered.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to ... I was just calling tomorrow's
appointments to cancel," I said, wiping tears with the back of my
hands.

"Look, Norma, I realize that being in the salon is hard for you right
now, but you'll get through this, and you'll soon realize that she
brought it on herself

I wanted to scream, but I knew I must keep quiet for now.  I nodded,
afraid to open my mouth.  \020"Well then, is there anything else you
need to do before we leave?"

"Actually, if you could just write out a sign that says the salon will
be closed until further notice and hang it on the door, I would
appreciate it.  In the meantime, I'll just grab the few things I need
and then we can go."

"Yeah, sure, I can do that."

I walked back behind the counter, closed the appointment book and
handed him a blank piece of paper and a marker pen.  Searching through
the piles of notebooks and magazines on the desk, I set aside the
appointment book, our score book and unlocked the bottom drawer to take
out our daily journal.  This was the only thing that could prove Dalia
even knew of Michael's existence.  We'd spent years writing down our
dreams, hopes, and fears, and through the diary Dalia would speak to me
forever.  I glanced in the direction of her workstation and remembered
the day before our grand opening six years ago.  She'd sat on the chair
and I'd stood behind her, resting my head on top of hers, and we looked
at each other in the mirror.

"Coffee?"  I'd said.

"Cigarette," she shot back with a sly and brilliant smile.

The memory was so real, so alive, that I found myself smiling.  I knew
that ND's would be closing permanently This place had been our first
timid step towards freedom, though it had felt bold at the time.  What
turn would my life take now?

I grabbed my small pile of books and walked towards Amjed, who was
taping the sign on the front door.  I handed him the keys and walked
outside, took a deep breath as the cool wind slapped my face, then went
to wait in the car as he turned off the lights and locked up.

From the passenger seat I watched as night began to descend on the
city, blanketing the buildings, swallowing the streets,

the darkness only broken by the occasional streetlight.  It would be a
long and sleepless night.  Tomorrow, I must restrain myself at least
long enough to apologize to the one person I wanted to rip apart with
my bare hands, Mahmood.  That morning he had become my mortal enemy.
Although I'd never felt the power of love that Dalia had felt, I had
believed that it was the strongest of all emotions.  Now I was
convinced that there existed another emotion that, once roused,
surpassed the power of love, and could be, if not channelled properly,
a totally destructive force: hate.  I only hoped that I would have the
wisdom to turn my hatred for Mahmood into something useful and not
allow it to consume and destroy me.  But I needed this surge of hate to
somehow give me the strength to get through the next few weeks.  Then I
could begin looking for a way to avenge Dalia's death, and give her the
peace she deserved.

As Amjed drove us home, I hugged the books to my chest, relieved that
I'd been able to warn Michael.  But my relief was a drop of water in an
ocean of grief.  I prayed that God would give me the strength, wisdom,
and patience to get through this day, this tragedy.  But not even God
could ever make me believe her loss was justified.  My mind began to
waver between the reality of her death and the fantasy of her return.
Although I knew that I'd never see Dalia again, I also knew that I
would never be able to let her go.  Suddenly, my mind began to
entertain a thought that somehow, for no particular reason, offered me
a tiny bit of comfort and made me feel less alone.  Dalia would
continue to live.  While physically the finality of death is
unquestionable, I believe I understood at that moment that death itself
need not be final.  After twenty-two years of friendship, I was left
with a few photographs (taken secretly since Islam does not allow women
to have their pictures taken), and an endless film of memories.  They
would let me continue to touch and feel her vitality.  Like millions
before her, she would continue to live in the hearts and minds of all
who loved her.  I was strangely comforted knowing that, years from now,
when I drank my morning coffee, she would come to me in my memories.
She would bring me a smile, a tear, a moment, and continue to confirm
her existence.

CHAPTER TWENTY

As the blackness of night fell, at last, over the day of Dalia's
murder the longest day, I know, of my entire life I curled up on my bed
as I had that morning, knees pulled tight to my chest, while memories
and images washed over me.  I was trapped in the past, frozen on my
bed, compelled by some mysterious energy to relive events as they
replayed through my mind like a movie.  Each memory ended with an image
of Dalia deposited on that stainless steel table, sheathed by the
blood-spattered sheet.  She was so tranquil and striking, like a
resting seraph.  Perfectly still.  I slowly began to accept that she
would never wake up.

When my sorrow became too great to handle without some kind of physical
release, I forced myself to get up and walk round my room.  I tried to
clear my thoughts, but got tired looking for answers that didn't exist
to questions that shouldn't have to be asked.  I lay back down and the
cycle began again.  By daybreak, I was psychologically, spiritually and
physically drained.  I forced myself to get out of bed, threw on some
clothes, and went to the kitchen, hoping that caffeine would give me
the energy I needed to get through the day.  As I slumped over the
kitchen counter sucking down my fifth cup of coffee, my father came
in.

"Sabah Al Khair Yaba' I mumbled.

"Sabah Al Noor," he replied.

"Would you like some coffee?"  I asked.

"Of course.  Be ready around three thirty this afternoon.  I'll take
you to Mahmood's then and you can apologize to him and his family."

"Yes, Father, as you wish," I managed to reply.

"I'll have my coffee on the veranda," he said and turned and left the
kitchen.

I put my head down on the counter, hoping that the caffeine would kick
in.  Then I hauled myself to the stove and began making my father's
coffee.

I waited on him silently and swiftly and went back into the kitchen,
eager for him to leave.  When all the men had gone to work, I moped
around the house, lost in my thoughts and careful to avoid my mother.
By ten, it became impossible to dodge her any longer.  She followed me
from room to room, finally managing to trap me in the kitchen as I was
brewing yet another pot of coffee.

"How do you feel today, habibatiT she asked, using the term of
affectionate word that means 'my love'.  \020"Like the living dead."

"You look as if you haven't slept at all."

"I didn't.  I think sleep is a thing of the past."

"It'll get better.  You'll see, time heals all wounds."

"This isn't a wound, it's a provocation.  My life here died with Dalia.
I'm going to find a way out of this hell."

"Norma, my love, you're upset.  I'm not saying that the pain

you feel now will disappear, but day by day it'll become easier to live
with.  I'm very proud of you for apologizing to your father."

"I said I was sorry because I knew I had no choice, but I have to tell
you something, something I'm sure you already suspect.  I was involved.
I knew about it from the start and I helped her.  That's why I'm so
sure she did nothing wrong.  I mean, according to all of you what she
did was wrong, but all she did was follow her heart.  She loved him,
and loving him made her happier than I'd ever seen her.  How can that
be so wrong?  She didn't hurt anyone."

"But she did.  She hurt her family's reputation by being out with him,
by even talking to him."

"That's ridiculous!  I was there; I saw what happened.  They were
pulled to each other.  I don't think either one of them could have
escaped whatever force it was that brought them together.  I saw it in
their eyes.  If their relationship was so wrong, then why did God allow
them to meet in the first place?  Do you know that she actually told me
that she believed Michael was her destiny and that she couldn't live
without talking to him?  And she paid for loving him with her life."

"Norma, she was a big girl and she knew the risk she was taking.  You
should never have got involved.  Anyway, we can't change anything now.
The only thing we can do is make sure the same thing doesn't happen to
you, and you've taken the first step by apologizing to your father and
denying any involvement in this affair, and for that I'm proud of
you."

"Proud of me for what?  I'm not proud of myself, I feel as if I've
betrayed Dalia.  I feel like a coward.  And today, I have to do it
again by apologizing to the beast that murdered her.  God, how I wish I
could tell him what I really think of him, but I Won't.  I've realized
that you were right about one thing: I can't do anything for Dalia if
I'm dead.  I don't know exactly when or how I'm going to avenge her
death, but I now that no matter how long it takes or how hard it may
be, I'll find a way even if I die doing it.  I owe her that much, and I
know that she'd have done the same for me."

"Sweetheart, you need to watch what you're saying.  Your anger is
speaking now.  Dalia is only one of thousands of women this happens to
every year.  I'm sure the others had mothers, sisters, and friends who
were just as upset as you are now, but they realized, as you will in
time, that nothing can be done about it.  They suffer the loss in
silence and then find a way to move on, as you will."

"No, I won't.  I'm not like the rest, and neither was Dalia.  But you
don't have to convince me to suffer silently; I know it has to be that
way for now.  Look, Mum, I'm sorry, I don't mean to be rude or
disrespectful, and I certainly don't want to take my anger out on you.
I'm just an emotional wreck, I'm sorry.  I love you and I understand
that you're trying to help me, believe me I do.  But this is something
you can't help me with."

"Just be careful.  Whatever you decide to do, do it carefully.  Promise
me that much."

"Don't worry, I'll be careful.  Now, can I ask a favour?"

"Sure, what is it?"

"Can you call Dalia's mother and find out what they are planning to do
next?  Please, Mum, it's important to me.  I have to know."

"OK, I'll call her."

"Thank you so much.  By the way, I need to confess one more thing.  I
smoke and I really need a cigarette.  I have some hidden in my room.
I'll just go and grab one and be right back."

"You what?"  she yelled.

Before she could continue, I bolted out of the kitchen and into my
room.  When I returned with the cigarettes, she stared at me and then
at the pack of cigarettes before attempting to

speak.

"I can't believe you smoke!  How long have you been smoking?  What else
am I going to find out?  You'd better not let your father find out,
he'll kill us both."

"Oh, Mum, come on, it's no big deal.  I've been doing it for years now.
It's not that important.  Just please make the call."

"For years!  How could I have not known?  Oh my God, why?  How did you
start?"

"Mum, please forget it now.  Please make the call," I begged as I lit a
cigarette and refilled my cup of coffee.

"All right, all right, but first lock the door and put the chain on in
case your father or one of your brothers comes home early.  I don't
want one of them to catch you with that filthy thing sticking out of
your mouth."

Thanks, Mum," I said and kissed her cheek before running off to lock
the doors.  She followed me into the living room, carrying the coffee
and an ashtray.  We sat on the love seat next to the phone.  She
dialled the number and I sat and listed to every word she said, my mind
imagining what Dalia's mother was saying on the other end.

After my mother said goodbye and before she could put the receiver
down, I was already asking questions.

"What's happening?  What are they doing?"

"She said they're waiting for the report from the hospital."

"And then?  What are they going to do then?"

"Well, if Dalia is not intact, they'll go after the young Catholic
man."  \020"Do they know him?  Do they know who he is?  Are they going
to try anything before the report is ready?"

"Apparently Mohammed followed him home the day he saw the two of them
together, and he knows where he lives.  It doesn't sound like they know
him personally."

"Where's her father?  Are you sure they're waiting for the autopsy?"

"She said they were and will only do something if the results are
negative."

"But are you sure?  Where's Mahmood today?  Is he home?"  I asked, my
fear mounting.

"No, habibati, he wasn't home.  You know I can't ask her where her
husband is."

"I know.  What about the funeral?  Are they going to have one?  Can I
go?"

"No, they're going to bury her in an unmarked grave.  Her mother's very
upset about that.  They won't have any kind of service, so no one will
be going."

"Oh my God!  How could they?  Oh Dalia.  How could they?"  I began
sobbing.  The thought of Dalia being buried all alone with no one to
say goodbye appalled me.  "Where?  Where will they be burying her?  I
have to go.  They can't just bury her like that.  No service, no people
.. . Oh my God, I can't believe they're going to do this."

"Calm down, my love.  There's nothing we can do.  That's what Mahmood
wants, there's nothing anyone can do.  I'm sure it'll be in the big
cemetery just outside the city."

"When?  What day?"

"Well, the coroner will move her body there once the hospital has
completed the autopsy.  The earliest it could be is the day after
tomorrow."  \020"The hospital should know, shouldn't they?  I have to
know,

I 7)

I have to be there.  She can't be buried alone, please, I have to find
out.  Can I call the hospital?"

"Sweetheart, even if you call the hospital and find out, I don't think
your father will allow you to go."

"He has to.  Please, Mum, I have to be there.  Please, you have to help
me, I'm begging you."

"Yes, yes, all right.  Just calm down.  Go ahead and call the hospital.
I'll let you go, but we must be careful that your father doesn't find
out."

"I know.  Thank you.  And please understand, I don't want to do what
I'm about to do behind your back, so I'm going to tell you.  I have to
call Jehan, Michael's sister.  Michael is the Catholic man.  I have to
let her know that Mahmood may be on his way there."

"Oh, Norma, I don't know if that's such a good idea.  I don't want you
to get involved in this any further.  What if your father finds out?"

"Mahmood has already killed Dalia and I won't sit by and watch him kill
Michael too.  They didn't do anything, and you'll see that I'm telling
you the truth once the autopsy results are out.  Would you rather I
stay quiet and let them kill him?  He's the same age as Amjed.  How
would you feel if something like this happened to him and he was killed
for nothing?"

"OK, I'll let you make this one call, but that's it.  Warn him and
that's it.  Do you hear me?  If your father ever finds out about this,
we're both dead.  Don't you dare speak to him on the phone, only his
sister, and lose that number after today," she commanded.

"Thank you.  Thank you.  You've helped me save an innocent man's
life."

First I called the hospital to get the update I needed, and that I knew
Michael would want.

"Palestine Hospital, how may I direct your call?"  The receptionist's
high-pitched, nasal voice jangled, abrasive, into my brain.  I wasn't
sure whether my sensitivity was due to lack of sleep and an overdose of
coffee, or just a normal response to an irritating voice.  I held the
earpiece away from my head as I spoke into the mouthpiece.

"I need some information, please.  My sister is in your hospital.  She
passed away yesterday morning, and my family and I were wondering when
the hospital would complete the post mortem and release the body."

"Well, miss, you'll have to speak to the morgue.  Hold on a moment
while I transfer you.  I'm sorry for your loss.  One moment," she said
routinely.

I heard a few clicking sounds, and a man's voice.

"Morgue, how can I help you?"

"My sister died yesterday, and she's there now.  I was wondering .. .
We're waiting for a post mortem examination to be completed.  When will
that be done and when will the hospital release the body for burial?" I
asked.

"Oh yes, I remember her.  Hold on a minute, let me check .. . she's
your sister, you said?"

"Yes, yes, my sister."

"I'm sorry for your loss, hold on a minute.  OK, here it is.  Let's
see, we were told the body would go directly to the cemetery in Rajib
after the autopsy, which is scheduled for tomorrow.  It looks like
we'll be taking her the following day as it'll be too late to take her
after the post mortem."

"Do you know what time of day you'll be transporting her?"

"I think she'll be at the cemetery around nine in the morning.  I
really am sorry for your loss, miss.  My condolences."

"Yes, thank you.  Thank you so much, you've been very helpful."

I sat staring at the phone after hanging up.

"Well, what did they say?"  my mother asked, breaking my trance.

"They said that she'll be at the cemetery in Rajib the day after
tomorrow.  So that's .. . wait, what day is it today, it's

"It's Thursday."

"So Saturday at nine.  I have to be there, Mum.  I have to find a way
to be there."

"Well, you can worry about that later.  If you want to make that other
call, you'd better do it quickly."

I watched my mother out of the corner of my eye as I reached for the
phone.  I wondered what she'd experienced to make her so understanding
now.  I knew that this wonderful woman had spent her life doing her
best to portray an image of happiness, yet I wondered if she'd ever
felt genuine joy.  I tried to picture my mother at my age and decided
that at some point she must have entertained the same hopes I did.  I
wondered if she'd suffered a loss like mine.  Surely she'd had a life
before becoming a wife and mother, though she never shared many details
of it.  It was as if parts of that existence had vanished, and others
were filed away in the secret compartments of her memory.  As a child,
I'd spent countless hours watching her, trying to translate my mother's
private expressions.  Yet I remained baffled.

I realized that I was as close to my mother as she'd ever allow anyone
to be.  She maintained an emotional distance as a form of
self-preservation, it seemed, a barrier she built to protect her soul
and perhaps any surviving shred of the unique and independent person
who had been suppressed at the age of ten- from the harshness of
reality.  I wondered what kind of pain she had endured to make her
build her fortress, and I ached at the thought of her suffering, as I
knew she was aching

as she watched mine.  I felt sure it must have been pain that bound her
and constrained her life.  I wondered whether the grief I was feeling
now would force me to do the same.

"You'd better hurry and make that call," she said again, her voice
bringing me back from my thoughts.  Seconds later, I had Jehan on the
phone.  "Norma?  Hold on a second."  Her muffled voice called out,
"It's for me, Mum.  Can you please do me a favour and get the notebooks
I left on the desk in my room?"  There was a pause, then, "Norma?
Sorry, I had to get her out of here.  My God, Michael told me what
happened.  I can't believe it!  It's so terrible, so unbelievable.  I'm
so sorry.  How are you holding up?"  "Not so great.  How's Michael?"

"Not good.  He's still in his room; he didn't even want to get up this
morning.  This has really hit him hard, he loved her so much."  \020"I
know he did, so did I, but Jehan, you have to get him out of there.
Dalia's father knows where you live.  He could be on his way to your
house now.  You have to get Michael out of there.  Especially if your
father's not home."

"My dad's gone.  He leaves before seven.  I'll do my best to get
Michael out of here."

"Please, do whatever you have to.  Tell your mother, call your father,
I don't care.  If you don't get him out of there you could lose a
brother, and I'll lose another friend to Mahmood's insanity.  And
Jehan, tell him to stay at the base for the next three days or so."
He'd been obviously too distraught yesterday to care about safety and
had ignored my previous urgings.

"I will, I promise.  I love him so much and I don't want anything to
happen to him.  Have you heard anything else?"

"All I know is that she'll be taken to the cemetery in Rajib on
Saturday morning.  The bastard isn't even going to give her

a service and, according to her mother, none of her family is allowed
to go.  I'm determined to go, but I'm worried that her father will show
up.  Don't tell Michael about the funeral yet, at least not until I
figure out a safe way to be there, I'll be in touch.  I have to hang up
now.  Take care of Michael, Jehan.  He's going to need your help.  He
loves you and I know he'll listen to you.  I'll call you if I find out
anything else."

"Take care of yourself too.  Be careful.  Thanks for calling.
Goodbye."

I hung up the phone and lit another cigarette before turning to face my
mother.

"I didn't hear you tell her about Dalia.  How does she know that
Dalia's been killed?  Did you call them before?"  she asked.

"Yes, I did.  I wanted to be the one to tell Michael about Dalia and I
had to warn him of the danger."

"But how?  From where?  When?"

"Last night from the salon."

"Does Amjed know about this?"

"No, he was in the car.  Don't worry, I was careful."

"Norma, this is a dangerous game you're playing.  I don't think you
should contact him again.  You've done all you can, he's been told and
warned, now you must walk away."

"I can't back away, not now, not until this is over.  I can't talk
about it any more.  I really need to go and lie down for a while, I
feel as if I'm about to pass out."

"Try to get some rest and I'll wake you when your father comes home."

"Could you wake me up at three?  I have to be ready to leave with Dad.
He's going to take me to apologize to Mahmood today."

"Well then, at least eat something.  Remember, you have to control
yourself over there."

"I'm not hungry.  My stomach feels as if it's turning summersaults.  I
just need some rest, that's all."

"You didn't eat yesterday either .. . just let me make you a--."

"No, Mum, but thanks.  Thanks for all your help, and for understanding.
I love you."  I embraced her and turned to leave.

"I love you too," she said.  "Don't ever forget that.  You're my
precious, my only daughter.  I'm just so worried about you."  She tried
to look stern.  "By the way, we'll be discussing your smoking when this
is all over."

"I know, believe me I know.  Thanks for waiting," I shot back as I left
the room.  \020I lay on my bed, but there was no escape.  My mind and
body felt like battered casualties of war.  I was too exhausted to
think clearly, and would have welcomed amnesia.  But I had to remain
focused on what I had to do.

A little while later, my mother roused me, I dressed quickly and
followed her downstairs to find my father in the living room.

"I finished early, so we'll go to Mahmood's now.  Let's go," he
ordered.

In a few minutes we were walking up to Dalia's door and her mother,
eyes still swollen and red, was escorting us into the living room.  My
father busied himself making all the formal greetings, shaking hands,
and kissing everyone on the cheek.  I just walked in and planted myself
on a seat in the corner.  I sat in a daze, my eyes refusing to blink. I
kept expecting Dalia to walk in and begin her greetings, as she had for
twenty years.  Then I heard my father's voice as if it came from an
echo chamber, and my name,

"Norma, Norma, don't you have something you'd like to say to Mahmood
and his family?"  I remained still.

"Norma .. ."  he repeated.

"Yes, yes I do," I heard myself say.  My voice sounded alien.  I looked
around the room and saw that everyone was staring at me.  I caught
sight of Dalia's mother and her eyes begged me to tread cautiously.
Mahmood, the object of my loathing, was sitting on the couch across
from my chair, his beloved hunting trophies above him the stuffed birds
and small animals on the all staring at me.  I sensed that Mahmood
wanted me to make a mistake and say something that would jeopardize my
life.  I could feel the anger he still felt towards Dalia now directed
at me.  His stared ignited a spark of fear that risked overtaking the
emotions I was trying so desperately to control.  I shut my eyes
tightly, running through the speech in my mind.

"Well, Norma, we're waiting.  What do you have to say?"  my father
broke in, commanding me to speak.

"Yes ... I ... Yes, I have something to say regarding my behaviour
yesterday.  I was truly shocked and very hurt.  Regardless of the fact
that I couldn't and wouldn't, and probably never will, believe that
Dalia deserved such a fate, I had no right to disrespect you or your
family, and I apologize.  I didn't mean in any way to doubt your
decision or judgement."  I paused and looked at Mahmood before
continuing on to more dangerous ground.

"And I suppose I owe you an apology for loving your daughter like a
sister, and finding her loss unbearable and your apathy over her loss
infuriating.  If so, I apologize for being human.  I'm afraid that our
God has created me with a very low threshold for pain and I lost
control.  I envy your strength, Mahmood, for upholding your family's
honour.  After all, what is a life in the face of honour?  I suppose
that because I'm not a man, I can't comprehend such apathy, such
disregard for human life.  I'm sure you must be right.  I mean, what
can a woman know or understand about a man's honour?  After all it's a
man's place to control and maintain the code we must live by.  And I
suppose Dalia, in your eyes and in your mind, stepped outside the
boundaries.  You had the strength to do what needed to be done and
there's no room for emotion in honour."

I was stunned by the strength and clarity I had managed to find.  It
seemed to be coming from somewhere beyond me.  As if Dalia was
squeezing my arm, urging me on.  I was nearly done.

"So you see, I truly envy your indifference, because I'd love to be
free of the crippling pain I feel.  I'd love to be able to say that I
feel nothing, but I'd be lying.  The truth is that my world was
shattered the moment you took her life, but I know that's my problem.
Again, I apologize because, regardless of the fact that you tore my
heart from my chest, I didn't have the right to disrespect you or your
family in your home.  The simple truth remains that she was your
daughter before she became my friend, and who am I to defy your wishes?
I'm nothing more than a grieving friend and I ask for your forgiveness
for my loss of control."  \020Everyone sat silently for what seemed
like an eternity, each with a baffled look on his of her face.  Dalia's
mother was the only one who shared in the tears I couldn't hold back
when I'd finished.  Mahmood was clearly trying to assess my words and
decide whether I'd made an adequate apology or a series of criticisms
with a mock apologetic tone.  My father was the first to break the
silence.

"Well, as you can see, she's truly sorry and I can assure you that she
had nothing to do with Dalia's betrayals."  I knew that my father was
in a difficult position, since the purpose of this visit was to show
that he had control over me.  He

had no choice but to insist that he did, or he'd look a fool.

"Yes, well, that was quite an apology," commented Mahmood.

"It's obvious that she's still mourning the sudden loss," replied my
father.

"In light of that fact, I'll forgive her for her actions yesterday and
I hope that our families can remain close."

As soon as I heard these words, I jumped into the conversation before
my father had a chance to say anything else.  Mahmood's words enraged
me.  How dared he suggest that our families remain close?  I wasn't
authorized to respond as a representative of my family, but I could
speak for myself and I would be damned if I would ever say a word to
this murderer after today.

"With all due respect, I believe that my only tie to your family was
Dalia.  As far as I am concerned, the only thing we have left to
discuss is the salon.  I've reached a decision about that.  I do not
wish to work there any longer, so I suppose that gives you and my
father something to discuss.  I would only say, with my father's
permission, that I'd like to go there and pick up my personal
belongings tonight," I said, looking at my

father.

"We can discuss that later," my father replied with disapproval.  I
realized that he was upset that I'd voiced my decision about the salon
publicly, before discussing it with him.  But since I'd mentioned only
'my' connection to Dalia's family, he had no cause to be angry.  I
waited a few moments before speaking again.

"That completes all I came for."  Then I turned to my father, "If you
don't mind, Father, may I wait for you in the car?"

Dalia's mother stood up.  "No, no, let me bring some coffee, you didn't
even drink anything, please, sit down."  \020I politely refused the
coffee, and turned to my father once again, my eyes pleading for a
release.

"Yala, imsha, go ahead, I'll be out shortly," he said finally.

I started towards the door, but before I left the living room, Mahmood
called out, "Actually, I have some questions that I would like you to
answer before you leave."

"I'm sorry, Mahmood, but as I've already pointed out, I no longer have
any ties to you or your family, and so I'm in a rather difficult
position.  I'm not allowed to speak to men who are not related to me.
I'm sure you can understand that, as I'm only living by the same laws
you used to condemn Dalia.  I'm afraid any questions you have will have
to be directed to my father."

"The questions I have cannot be answered by your father, they must be
answered by you," he insisted.

"Well, forgive me, Mahmood, but it seems as if you've placed yourself
in an awkward position.  I have no answers for you.  Your daughter
should have answered your questions before she died.  You'll have to
bury any remaining questions along with her.  Now, if you'll excuse
me," I said and continued towards the door at a slow pace.

"Abu Amjed, I must insist that you tell her to answer my questions," he
commanded.

I stopped walking and waited for my father.  If he forced me to answer
Mahmood's questions, it would look as if he wasn't sure of my
innocence, which again would make him appear a fool.  Behind this cool
and formal exchange these two Arab men were sparring fiercely for their
honour.

"I'm sorry, Mahmood, but I believe my daughter is absolutely correct. I
have already guaranteed that she was not involved, and so I can't
imagine what questions she could answer.  Therefore I must insist that
you direct any inquiries to me.  Norma, go and wait in the car."

"Abu Amjed, am I to believe that you are protecting your daughter,
helping her to hide the truth?"

"I've nothing to protect her from.  I'm only insisting that she abide
by my rules."

"But I'm not convinced that she had nothing to do with this and I think
she should answer some questions to prove her innocence.  I'd imagine
that you would want the same thing."  \020"I'm not the one who doubts
her, Mahmood.  Your behaviour makes me question whether it's my
daughter's innocence you doubt or your daughter's guilt."

As soon as I heard these words, I stepped outside.  I knew that I'd won
the first battle, but I also knew that the war was far from over.

I ran out and waited for my father in the car.  I was positive that my
father had protected me for his own sake, not mine.  If he agreed with
Mahmood, it would look as if he couldn't handle his own daughter.  My
father was always the image of politeness when he was in public, and
I'd never heard him use the tone he'd used this afternoon except in our
own home.  I assumed that he'd been insulted by Mahmood's requests.
Whatever his motive, I loved it.

At home, I locked myself in my room and tried to think of a way to go
to Dalia's funeral with Michael.  I knew that I could rely on some help
from my mother.  Together I trusted we'd pull it off.

That evening, my mother came into my room carrying a tray of food and
juice.

"You have to eat something.  Why don't you come downstairs?"  she
said.

"I can't, Mum.  I'm thinking of Dalia's funeral, of how I can go
and--'

"Stop now, I told you I'd help you.  I've told your father I'm taking
you to al Khather for the day, that I think it may help you to deal
with Dalia's death."  Al Khather is a religious site a short distance
from Amman.  My mother knew my father would never object to such a
visit, in fact he encouraged them.  "Forget it now and rest.  Rest your
mind before you're too sick to go anywhere."

"Thank you, Mum, but please do me a favour?  Don't say anything at all
to Dad about the funeral."

"I won't.  Just eat something," she said and left the room.

I slept through the night, and most of Friday, getting up only to call
Jehan and tell her that my mother had found a way for me to be at the
funeral, and to warn her that it would be wiser if Michael and I didn't
appear together in case Mahmood was watching from afar.

On Saturday, I rose with the sun and dressed in black.  Believing that
my mother was taking me to al Khather, my father and brothers left the
house at the usual time.  They would return home at 3 p.m. I kissed my
mother goodbye, reassuring her that all would go well, and left for my
final appointment with Dalia.  \020Rajib is a tiny village in the
outskirts of Amman, just off the road to Sabah.  The village is so tiny
that it can't be found on any maps.  The only reason it's know to
anyone beyond its inhabitants is because of an ancient legend
associated with the place.  The legend is mentioned in both the Bible
and the Koran.  Seven Christian boys were being persecuted, and escaped
to a cave where they slept for over three hundred years.  This 'cave of
seven sleepers', or AM Al Kahf(cave of the people), is next to the main
mosque in Rajib.  Dalia would be laid to rest between the mosque and an
old Byzantine cemetery five hundred metres to the east.

The place, as a whole, is bizarre.  The two burial grounds,

one Christian and one Muslim, are next to a site both religions
consider holy.  I always thought that it was odd that Muslims, who
spent most of their lives trying to avoid deep personal relationships
with Christians, considered it acceptable to lie next to them for all
eternity.  I determined to see it as a sign of future unity between the
two faiths, a time of religious accord.  Holding on to that theory, I
hoped, would make the desolation of the place easier to tolerate.

I arrived at the cemetery and watched Dalia's burial from a distance.
She would have no coffin- part of the harsh end for honour crime
victims.  Her body was placed into a freshly-dug hole by workmen, who
shovelled the brownish red earth over her and then placed a crude
cement slab on top.  These grunting men were the only witnesses at her
graveside.  No flowers or tears were left on the unmarked grave, only
the aura of shame.

When the workmen left, I walked to the site and stood beside her grave.
Michael appeared out of nowhere and stood next to me.

"We shouldn't be seen here together."  I said, looking around.

"I didn't want to wait.  And besides, I think she would want both of us
at her side, don't you?"  he replied.

"Yes, but what if someone sees us?"

"Don't worry, Jehan is looking out for us."

But looking at Dalia's grave, it didn't seem to matter if Mahmood saw
us or not.  I stopped caring about what might happen and focused on
Dalia.

I knelt beside her gave, my knees pressing into the sharp gravel, and
reached out to touch the unmarked cement rectangle that covered the
spot.  Clumps of the red earth had spilled over the edges of her grave
onto the cold grey stones.  It was the only evidence that this grave
was new.  Michael and I

knelt by her side, silently saying our goodbyes, mourning our loss,
sharing our sorrow.  We sat there for a long while, undisturbed, until
he broke the stillness.

"Damn him for taking her from me."

"I know," was all I could reply.

"We have to do something about this.  There has to be something we can
do."

"We will, Michael.  I promise, we will," I whispered.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

The blistering midday sun beat against the rooftOpS of the city as I
sat on the veranda, slowly sipping endless cups of coffee, alternately
buried in a book and gazing in the direction of Dalia's home.  In the
months since Dalia's death, this was how I'd spent my days.  Time
seemed to have stopped.  I hadn't returned to the salon since the day
Mohammed had picked up Dalia's things and left me there to sort through
mine.  The rooms had looked so bare without Dalia's possessions, and
her presence.  I had gathered my belongings quickly and left, locking
the door one final time, cutting my link to the dreams and plans we'd
shared there.

I was now a hermit, leaving the house only against my will or out of
absolute necessity.  I'd lost interest in everything but books, the
only physical objects that seemed powerful enough to transport me to
some other place and time.  I hungered to escape, to visit different
worlds, see other ways of life, and go to places where Dalia could have
lived safely with Michael, or where I could more happily keep her alive
in my mind.  No

one here truly understood me, or my pain, though my mother tried.  But
a generation separated us.  Seeing her less visibly upset than I was
made her seem worlds apart.

The one person who understood and shared my grief was Michael.  I knew,
though, that it was growing increasingly dangerous to stay in touch
with either him or Jehan.  It was only a matter of time before Dalia's
father and brothers found out that Jehan was Michael's sister.  Once
they made that connection, they'd assume that, since I'd hired her to
work at the salon, I was involved in the conspiracy.  Dalia's father
had started dropping by our house at least once a week.  I could tell
by his words and the tone of his voice that he was now determined to
prove that I'd been involved.  I knew I'd brought this on myself: he
hadn't liked my apology speech and was angry that my father had
questioned Dalia's guilt.  I had to be particularly careful, but that
was easy, for depression was pulling me further and further down and I
was no longer interested in seeing my friends.  \020But Michael and
Jehan were not willing to go away.  Michael made Jehan call me almost
every day, just to make sure I was still alive.  After losing Dalia, he
became obsessed with the safety of all the women he knew, and was
particularly worried about me since he knew I was fully capable of
speaking my mind.  He constantly asked Jehan to warn me to keep my
mouth shut.  He felt it his duty to protect the one other person Dalia
had loved as much as she had loved him.

In the first few weeks after her death I tried to support Michael and,
for a while, I worried that he was the one with the death wish.  The
tables seemed to have turned now and he was supporting me.  All his
warnings and encouragement's were wasted.  The only thing that might
have lifted me from my depression was a plan for revenge, or a report
that

Mahmood had been the victim of a fatal or crippling tragedy.  Nothing
of the kind happened.  Mahmood, I learned, had been released on bail
after turning himself in to police.  At his so-called trial, he was
found guilty of a misdemeanour and sentenced to three months in jail,
but immediately released because of the time he'd served out on bail-
in the comfort of his own home- awaiting trial.

This particular Monday morning had started routinely enough.  Cleaning
the house, sitting on the veranda.  I was lying on my bed reading a
book about the ancient history of Greece when the phone rang.  As I
dragged myself down the stairs, thinking it was Jehan, I heard my
mother answer, extend the customary formal greetings and wishes of good
health, and ask the caller to hold on.

"Jehan's on the phone, dear."

"Norma, we need to talk," a man's voice burst through the

phone.

"Michael!  What are you doing on the phone?  If my mother finds out
that we're talking, she'll kill me," I whispered.

"Don't worry, you don't have to talk, just listen.  I've found a way to
get you out of Jordan.  I can get your paperwork done passport, visas,
and everything else.  I can get you a visa for either England or
Greece.  Before you start to object, listen to what I have to say.  You
must leave Jordan!  Your life is in danger here!  I know that you're
not fighting the way you did in the beginning, but your grief will turn
to anger again, and when it does, they'll kill you!  They won't excuse
you this time.  They won't wait for an apology.  They'll kill you.  Do
you understand me?  I don't want to lose you too.  You have to leave. I
promise that I'll keep trying to change things here.  I'm working with
the head of a women's group, and we'll continue to do all we can to
change the laws.  But I'll feel much better

if you're out of the country.  All I need you to say is yes or no."
Michael knew that I'd vowed to work for Dalia's dream of equal rights
and freedom for women in Jordan and so he assumed that I'd refuse to
leave the country.  I thought about all the things he'd said and
instantly knew he was right.  The moment I defended Dalia publicly,
spoke out in her defence, I'd be considered guilty enough to warrant an
honour killing.  I knew that to make any kind of difference, I would
have to do it from thousands of miles away.  I wouldn't survive long
enough in Jordan to be heard.  I had to leave in order to be free to
speak, and to be heard.  He was right, the only solution was to leave
Jordan.

Yes, I'll do it.  But how?  I mean I think my answer is yes, but we
have to discuss all of the details.  I can't say much now, meet me
tomorrow at the Books Cafe at six," I whispered into the phone while
looking around to make sure my mother wasn't listening, and then hung
up.  I went back to my room, carefully avoiding my mother, afraid that
she'd see that I was up to something.  \020I spent that night perched
on the edge of my bed, reviewing Michael's words.  They had resurrected
the anger my grief and depression had been masking for the past few
months.  I'd done nothing to keep my promise to Dalia, while Mahmood
had got away with murder.  I'd promised she wouldn't die in vain.  I
hew that Michael was right; I had to leave before I lashed out at
either Mahmood or my father.  I didn't care where I went -anywhere by
Jordan.  But what would I do once I got there?  I would be alone, with
no Dalia, Michael, mother, relatives, or friends, no hope of returning
to Jordan, ever.  I was afraid of leaving the only world I knew. Afraid
of the unknown.  The months I'd spent living like a hermit had been in
my

father's and brothers' estimation a kind of penance proof that I had
nothing to hide, had no secretive contacts with anybody.  Getting one
of my brothers to leave me at the bookshop for a few hours would not be
a problem.  Amjed had already agreed to drive me as soon as he came
home from work.  When I heard his car outside, I bolted out of the
front door and jumped in.

"Are you sure you have everything you need?  Do you have enough money?"
he asked.  He drew a 50 dinar note from his wallet and handed it to me.
"Take this in case."  How sad that my response to a generous gesture
from my brother was only suspicion.

At Books Cafe, I found Michael lurking among the shelves.  We walked
around the store for two hours, picking up books and flipping through
them as we talked.  He explained how he would get my passport and visa
issued, using my ID, which I gave him.  He suggested that I go to
Greece, because he was closer to his friends there than his friends in
London.  He spent the remainder of the time trying to reassure me that
all would go well.  If everything went as planned, he predicted that
I'd be in Greece the following month.  He even offered to pay all my
expenses.  I hesitantly agreed because I knew that my savings were
running low and I wouldn't be able to scrape much more together before
my departure.  By the time Amjed pulled up to the kerb, I'd agreed to
go ahead with the plan, given Michael my ID, and bought a pile of six
books.

"Did you find everything you were looking for?"  Amjed asked as I
closed the door and positioned myself in the car.

"I did," I replied.

For the rest of the month I got updates on Michael's progress from
Jehan.  In the meantime, I distanced myself even further from my
family, worried that they'd somehow discover

my secret.  My feelings about leaving changed daily.  I was excited and
couldn't wait to see another country and experience another way of
life.  I was also angry because I felt as if I was being exiled from my
homeland simply because I didn't condone honour killing.  It seemed
ridiculous that in order to try to make a difference in Jordan, I had
to leave, and although I knew I had no other choice, I constantly
questioned my decision.

Finally Jehan gave me a date, time, and flight number, and told me that
Michael would meet me at the airport, posing as my eldest brother.  Now
the only thing left to do was arrange a way to be at the airport on
time.  I would be flying to Athens in a few days.  My flight was
scheduled for eleven on the morning of 10 May.

That morning, I dressed, threw a few things in a gym bag, and ran down
to my mother after my father and brothers had left for work.

"I have to get something from the salon and drop a few things off.  Can
I go?"  I asked.  "Why don't you wait until your father gets home?  I
don't even have the keys," she replied.

"This really can't wait and it may take me a while.  I just want to go
through the things I left there.  I still have a set of keys."

"Just have some breakfast first."

"Will you have some breakfast with me?  We can eat on the veranda."

She brightened.  "It's nice to see you starting to become active
again."

"You go and sit on the veranda and I'll serve you breakfast, please. It
would make me happy."

"Well, all right," she agreed.

I struggled to keep from crying as I cooked and carried the

food out to her.  This was the last time we'd sit having breakfast
together, perhaps ever.  I sat staring at her, trying to create a
permanent memory of this moment.  Oh, how I wished I could take her
with me, or tell her that I was leaving, but she would become too
emotional.  And it would put her life at risk; my father would kill her
if he thought she'd known anything about my escape.  After breakfast, I
hugged her tightly and kissed her repeatedly on both cheeks.

"What's all that for?  You're acting as if I'm never going to see you
again," she said.

I could scarcely speak.  "I love you, Mother.  I want to thank you for
everything."

"Well, I love you too, and I'm so glad you're feeling better."  I left
my father's house and walked towards the salon, as I had so many
mornings before, with Dalia by my side.  This time I noticed every
pebble, every tree, every detail.  It would be the last time I'd ever
walk down these streets.  Or see my mother.

I was a little girl again, ready to run back to the safety of my
mother's skirts and arms.  I realized that it was my mother I couldn't
bear to leave.  If only a generation could fall away, and she could run
from the house and join me, arm in arm, as we walked to freedom.

I arrived at the airport to find Michael waiting outside.  He ran
towards me as I stepped from the taxi.

"Thank God you made it.  I was worried you'd change your mind," he
said.

"I gave you my word.  I'm ready to leave."  He checked me in and waited
with me until my flight to Athens began boarding.

"This is it.  You're going to be safe now, and you'll be free.  Don't
worry about anything.  When you get there, take a taxi

to the address I gave you, they're expecting you.  God be with you," he
said.

"Thank you, Michael, thank you for everything.  In a few days or so
will you please contact my mother and tell her that I'm all right?
Don't tell her anything else, just that I'm OK.  Please?"

"I will.  I promise.  Don't worry."

I boarded the plane and, as it took off, I wept.  I cried out of joy
and fear.  I cried for my mother, and for the empty seats that should
have been Dalia's and Michael's.  I cried for the stark rose beauty of
the desert, the mystique of Aqaba, even the gossips in the salon who
had no hope of ever having anything bigger or better to do.  I cried
for my father, as trapped in his prison of laws, pride, and obligations
as my mother.

And I thanked God that I was lucky enough to be escaping.  I had no
idea what would happen to me.  Only that whatever I found would be
better than what I had left, a place where- for how many generations
more?  -exuberant, idealistic innocents like Dalia faced the daily
possibility of death.

AFTERWORD

Honour killings have been an accepted part of Jordanian culture since
the beginning of human record.  These crimes are committed in other
countries as well, but it is difficult to say how frequently since most
countries don't keep statistics about the number of deaths caused by
this barbaric ritual.  The idea of murder as a way to cleanse family
honour is said to be most common in Jordan and among Palestinians,
where it is firmly rooted in ethnic Bedouin tradition, which is still
as pervasive as a desert sandstorm in even urbanized Arab families.
Using just the published figures, each week one Jordanian woman is
murdered for losing her chastity, whether she's a victim of rumour or a
victim of rape.  As with Dalia, the mere suspicion that she has lost
her virginity can lead to a girl's, or woman's, murder.  Many honour
killings, however, are later classified as suicides or accidental
deaths and so the published figures are very unreliable.  The most
frequent, and mistaken, claim is that these murders are born of Islamic
faith, when in fact the murders are a cultural hangover of tribal life
that pre-dates both

Islam and Christianity.  True, Islamic law subjugates women and calls
for the 'scourging' of rule breakers, but the code of honour killings
has its roots in the Hammurabi and Assyrian laws from 1200 BE, which
declared a woman's chastity to be her family's property.  These laws
evolved in an unforgiving desert and are common to all Arabs of the
region, of whatever faith.  These days, Christian women are just as
likely to be killed as Muslim women for 'dishonouring' their
families.

There are two reasons why Jordan has gone to great lengths to keep the
true extent of the problem tucked away from public view.  First, it
damages the image Jordan is promoting to the world of a modern
democratic state.  To Westerners, honour killings are seen as an
anachronistic, scarcely believable, anthropological phenomenon that
continues only in a few rare, isolated, still-primitive pockets like
head-hunting in New Guinea.  While writing these words (on 17 May
2002), I spotted a large story in the New York Times and on the web
about a woman from a primitive village in 'the barren northwest' of
Pakistan near the Afghanistan border who had been condemned to death by
stoning for being forcibly raped by her brother-in-law.  She was a
victim, said the Times, of "Pakistan's strict Islamic laws."  Jordan
does not want to be linked in the media mind with these backward,
desolate cultures.

Second, there is real fear that the issue is a time bomb whose fuse
could be lit by fanning public sentiment against the practice.  And so
the government of Jordan discourages any stories in the media about
honour killings.  Hints of the subjugation of woman do appear; on the
same day that the story about the Pakistani woman appeared, the New
York Times printed a tiny piece about Toujan Faisal, the only woman
ever elected to Jordan's parliament, who was being sent to prison for
speaking out against government corruption.  The fact that

she was the first and only woman in that all-male body is a revealing
story of repression in itself.

And so Jordan continues to be reluctant to discuss this issue and its
officials are unwilling to provide accurate statistics and information
about today's honour crimes.  Some government officials claim that
twenty-five per cent of all murders each year are honour crimes, while
others try to say that only about twenty-five women in total are
murdered annually for reasons of honour.  The Public Security Director,
Major General Thaher Fawaz, said that in 1999 there were a total of
61,523 crimes in Jordan, of these, 5,173 were classified as felonies
(since honour crimes are categorized as misdemeanours they are not
included in this number), 2,248 were drug related, and the remaining
54,102 were burglary (depending on the nature of the offence this is
sometimes considered a felony), or assault and battery (usually
domestic violence where the victim is female), or immoral acts.  Honour
crimes, rape, molestation, and any other charges filed against a
woman's honour are listed as

immoral acts.

Based on these statistics it is easy to see that far more than
twenty-five women are murdered each year for reasons of honour.  It is
also obvious that the official numbers report only a small percentage
of honour crimes.  The government has chosen secrecy rather than face
the embarrassment of the scale of the problem.  Also, if the real
numbers were known and published, the government would be under greater
pressure from Western governments and human rights organizations to
stop these crimes.  As it stands, the Jordanian government can pretend
it hardly ever happens and so can Western governments reluctant to
intervene in other nations' cultural practices.  In 1998, the UN
conservatively estimated that over 5,000 women are killed for reasons
of honour every year, 1,000 of

those in Pakistan and Afghanistan, around 400 in Yemen, 50 in Lebanon,
1,000 in Egypt, and the rest, about 2,550, in the West Bank, Gaza, and
Jordan.  Considering the fact that Jordan's population is larger than
the populations of the West Bank and Gaza combined, it is reasonable to
conclude that the majority of these 2,550 lived in Jordan.  \020Two
articles in Jordan's penal code allow these murders and protect the
murderers.  Article 340 exempts from punishment those who kill female
relatives found committing adultery, and reduces the penalty for those
who kill female relatives found in a situation of adultery (such as
talking to a stranger).  Article 98 reduces the penalty for the
perpetrator of a crime when he acts 'in a fit of fury' in response to a
wrongful and serious act on the part of the victim.  The mere rumour or
suspicion that a woman has acted immorally is considered a wrongful and
serious act on the part of the woman, and all perpetrators of honour
crimes claim to have acted 'in a fit of fury'.  These laws give men the
freedom to kill their female relatives even when they only suspect
immoral behaviour.  Most men turn themselves in to the police
immediately after killing a female relative and are bailed out by
family members while awaiting trial, and the time they spend out on
bail counts as time served once they're convicted.  Since honour
killing is considered a misdemeanour, the offenders receive only short
sentences, ranging from three months to two years, and they are treated
as heroes in prison.

But activism is beginning to unsettle things in Jordan.  Some women's
and human rights activists in the country are foreigners, but most come
from the class of modern, educated Jordanians who have studied abroad.
The ones who have found a means to 'speak out' come mainly from very
wealthy or powerful families.  The issue is also getting the attention
of

many young university students.  Most of the signatures on petitions to
abolish laws protecting honour killings were those of university
students, a promising sign that many of the younger educated Jordanians
want to see this practice outlawed.

According to activists currently struggling to abolish Article 340, the
majority of victims are innocent.  Most of the honour killings are
based on suspicion and rumour and are often committed for financial
reasons to secure an inheritance.  Activists have called these crimes a
basic violation of human rights and have been trying to abolish the
laws that permit their practice since 1998.  Officials and medical
examiners have confirmed that approximately ninety per cent of honour
crime victims had not engaged in any sexual activity, or were innocent
of the acts they were rumoured to have committed.  These crimes do not
receive international attention, though one woman reporter at the
Jordan Times, an English-language weekly paper printed in Jordan, took
a brave stance against these primitive customs, in the face of threats
on her life, and began reporting on the crimes in the early nineties.
Her reports have been chilling, and reveal that honour crimes are on
the

rise.

In August 1997, His Royal Highness Crown Prince Hassan drew attention
to the situation by publicly stating that honour crimes top the list of
murders committed in Jordan.  Originally it was believed that if the
crimes were published it would cause them to decrease in number by
frightening women into submission.  Since these crimes have started to
be publicized, there have been several reactions.  Many women, as well
as some men, have been outraged, though not shocked, and have begun to
demand either the abolition or amendment of Articles 340 and 98.  The
issue created a prolonged period

of public debate in 1998 and a draft calling for the abolition was
finally submitted to the National Assembly.  Royalty joined this
abolition effort when, that year, the Jordanian National Commissioner
for Women, chaired by HRH Princess Basma, proposed to parliament a
draft law which would cancel and replace the articles.  Parallel to
that proposal was a campaign organized by a group of eleven Jordanians
who gathered over fifteen thousand signatures on 713 petitions calling
for the abolition of the articles, as well as any other legislation
found to discriminate against women.

King Abdullah stood as an ally of women, publicly announcing that
women's groups and women's rights organizations had his full support in
the matter, and he urged Prime Minister Abdur Ra-uf S. Rawabdeh to
amend all laws that 'discriminate against women and inflict injustice
on them'.  The National Assembly opposed the draft, not once but
twice.

The defeat of the draft was inevitable because the Islamic Action Front
(IAF) holds the majority of the seats in the Lower House and they
publicly opposed either abolishing or amending both Article 340 and
Article 98, claiming that the Council of Ministers was seeking to
corrupt public morals and impose Western values on Jordan's
conservative culture in order to appease international human rights
organizations.  The Secretary General of the IAF, Abdul Latif Arabiyat,
charged that the people leading these reform campaigns were trying to
demoralize Jordanian society, and that the West was using the women's
issue to push Arab women to abandon their honour and values and to
start acting like animals.

So much for reasoned public debate in 'modern, democratic' Jordan or
for the decent efforts of the royal family.  The King and Queen are
mainly public showpieces.  Their job is to portray an image of
modernity for the country, and they do

their job quite brilliantly.  Both Queen Rania and the Queen Mother,
Queen Noor, have shown leadership; Queen Noor has sponsored several
handicraft trading centres and shops, to help bring some financial
independence to women.  But the impact on women's rights is very
limited.  The royal family really have no effect on the laws in the
country.  It is parliament that controls legislation, and the majority
of parliament members are firm Muslims, strict believers in the
ancient

codes.

In August 1999, the same year that the draft to cancel Article 340 was
rejected by the National Assembly for the second time, it was Arabiyat
who called for change when the issue concerned economic reform.  He
accused the 'influential forces in Jordan' of being hostile to
democracy and freedom and of trying to protect their own interests.  So
while any change to the laws that govern women or to the laws that
restrain women's rights would, in his view, be detrimental to the moral
fabric of Jordanian society, change in every other area of government
would be a step in the right direction.

The history of women's rights in Jordan is far richer than in many
other Arab countries, but then most other Arab countries are not
promoting themselves as democracies.  The Jordanian National Assembly
tried to ignore the fact that in order to achieve a democratic society,
it must promote and protect the rights of all sections of that society.
Though the royal family, including King Abdullah, have publicly voiced
their disapproval and disgust for crimes of honour, the National
Assembly, which claims to be the voice of the people but is actually
the voice of men, continues to oppose any amendments to Jordan's penal
code that would protect women.

In November 2000, twenty countries, including Jordan, abstained from
signing a United Nations draft resolution

condemning crimes of honour.  The UN General Assembly had called for
the elimination of all forms of violence and crimes against women, and
the draft resolution reaffirms that all forms of violence against women
constitute grave violations of their rights.  Distressingly, the
permanent representative of Jordan, His Highness Prince Zeid Ben Raad,
tried to have the word 'premeditated' inserted before the words 'crimes
of honour'.  This would have defeated the entire purpose of the
resolution since most 'crimes of honour' are supposedly committed 'in a
fit of fury'.  Had he succeeded in modifying the wording, Jordan would
have signed the draft, knowing that it would not curb the practice it
was meant to stop.

In its efforts to attract foreign aid, foreign business investment, and
tourism, Jordan has struggled over the past fifteen years to present
itself as a modern, liberal, and democratic society by publicly
granting women certain freedoms.  Jordan is known as one of the least
oppressive Muslim countries and was among the first to give women the
right to vote.  Women are, by law, permitted to receive an education,
drive, and work, and the National Assembly is now considering allowing
them to obtain passports and travel without written permission from the
most senior male of the family.  But for most Jordanian women, little
has changed.  The 'law' of the male members of their families does not
allow them to enjoy many of these freedoms, and so all these 'changes'
and 'modernizations' are purely cosmetic.

Injustices towards women are apparent in all spheres of Jordanian life,
including its citizenship laws, child custody laws, family inheritance
laws, and divorce laws.  Women in Jordan live under an umbrella of fear
since the daily possibility of violent death hangs, literally, as a
sword over their heads.  Yet these injustices continue to go unnoticed
by the international

community.  Generations of women, both young and old, continue to
suffer in silence.

Paradoxically, one reason why the number of honour crimes in Jordan is
on the rise is precisely because of the increase in freedom women have
been allowed by the government.  For as women begin to exercise their
right to express their views, to work, to drive, and to receive an
education, they come into conflict with their families' wishes and way
of thinking.  With unemployment high, many women are forced to find
jobs, which sounds like a good thing.  But even taking up one of the
acceptable types of jobs is risky; nurses, for example, are attacked as
'whores' for touching or seeing men who are not fully dressed.  With a
penal code that protects and encourages men to commit honour crimes,
many innocent women led to the death by promises of freedom are killed
by men who are still hailed as heroes for upholding their family's
honour.

The struggle to achieve women's rights and freedoms in Jordan may take
a generation or

more, for women have to overcome centuries of male domination.  Even as
the world enters a new century, Jordan's National Assembly, along with
the governments of most Arab countries, still celebrate and uphold a
stubborn, outdated, patriarchal attitude towards women and women's
rights.  As recently as August 2001, the Jordanian Minister of Justice,
Abdul Karim Dughmi, responded to a question about honour killings in
the case of rape with a smile and the statement: "All women killed in
cases of honour are prostitutes.  I believe prostitutes deserve to
die."

FAREWELL

From the distance of many thousands of miles and of different cultures,
I can now see how long it will take to change such old beliefs.  I feel
the imprint of the past in my own mind and body as I struggle to live
the liberated life I'm now free to enjoy.  As I speak out from abroad,
adding my voice to the fight for Jordanian women, I am still,
personally, fighting the taboos taught to all of us from birth in an
Arabic culture.

I still hear the same whispers from the desert that my brothers hear.
The voices of my mother and aunts still haunt me, saying over and over
as they did throughout my childhood, "A woman is like a cup; if someone
drinks from it, no one will want it ... A woman is like a sheet of
glass; once it is broken it can never be fixed."  When I see people on
the street free and open with their affections, holding hands, hugging
and kissing, I catch myself thinking it is wrong and shameful.  And yet
I yearn to be that free, and to feel comfortable with it.  The man in
my life tells me that it is sad that I was taught to have such negative
feelings about something so beautiful, but

in the Arabic culture love is not associated with anything beautiful;
it is a means of control.  It is part of the cultural and emotional
baggage I will carry for a long time.

In retrospect, also, it seems so easy to see the mistakes you've made,
all the details you were blind to as you were actually living through
them.  Now I sit for hours thinking of such moments, saying, 'if only
we had', 'we should have', or 'we could have', and wondering if Dalia
would still be alive if we'd done things differently.  I can now see
that our naivety, our emotions, our idealism led us on a doomed path.
After years of punishing myself for her loss, I believe that even if
we'd made different choices, the chances are very high that our secret
world would eventually have been discovered.  I've realized, too, that
as long as honour killing is allowed in Jordan, no woman is safe.

Thousands of women are being legally murdered every year, for reasons
that would be unheard of in Western countries.  Losing my soul sister
to such a barbaric practice angered me and hurt me, but eventually it
fuelled me with the courage to put pen to paper and expose these
archaic traditions.  During the preparation of this manuscript, I have
relived all of these moments, and I know that I will continue to
remember, love, and cherish the short time that Dalia was part of my
life.  She was a truly remarkable woman, more courageous than I could
ever hope to be.  She had the courage to follow her heart, and live her
beliefs.  She paid for chasing her hope of freedom with her life.  She
was murdered for the most innocent and universal impulse wanting to
love and be loved.

I had always believed that we would spend our lives together; I
imagined us as neighbours and best friends, raising our children
together, cooking our dinners together.  I never dreamed that my time
with her would be cut short, or that my life would journey down this
path, but I realize that she left me

with a mission.  It's a task I must undertake, a goal I pray to

reach.  I must find a way to expose honour crimes for what they

truly are: legalized murder.  To break through the official

I Jordanian code of silence and find a way to make all Arab

women's silent cries for justice and freedom heard around the

world.

My fight will have to continue being waged far away from Jordan.  I
still have a Jordanian passport, so, officially, I could return.  I
long to see my mother.  But if I went home, I fully believe my father
and brothers would have no hesitation in carrying out my honour
killing.  They repeated their mantra to me, over and over, after
Dalia's death: "If you have a rotten apple in the bunch, take it out
before it infects the rest."  Dalia, to them, was a rotten apple, and
they took her out before she could tarnish their reputations.  Even if
I were to return to Jordan a virgin, I have disgraced my family by
running away.  I have shown disrespect for them, and their rules.  They
would have to kill me to preserve their self-respect; they would have
to take out the rotten apple in their own family.

As a dissident emigre, I made Greece my home for several years, and
today- in another country I cannot divulge most of my friends are
Greeks, not Jordanians, for I am still afraid to have Arab friends who
may oppose what I'm doing.  It has been difficult to make my way; in
Greece I worked odd and hard jobs for very little pay, most of what I
earned going to pay my expenses at an internet cafe so that I could use
a computer to write this book.  I've set new goals, and would like to
study law, something I had always wanted to do, and it would now give
me a better tool to avenge Dalia, as I vowed to do the day

she died.

This book is my start.  I realize that my words alone will not

change what is happening, but I hope that they will bring light to
what has been shrouded in darkness for centuries.  I hope, by expanding
the work of activists in Jordan who are constantly frustrated and
suppressed, it can be a positive next step towards abolishing these
crimes.  Michael, who has left the military but is still in Jordan, is
active in this work, helping other women, putting himself at great
risk.  He will always remain my ally in this struggle, and I owe him
more than

I can say in words.  And I pray that whoever reads this book, and hears
the words I have been able to find, will voice their outrage, as I have
here.

The following are just a handful of the honour killings that were
recently committed in Jordan.  They were all reported in the Jordan
Times by the highly credible woman journalist who has courageously made
this her cause.  I've listed a few stories to show that honour crimes
are not restricted to a specific age group, religious sect, or
geographic region of the country.  Honour crime victims include women
and young girls from all walks of life.  The only thing that unites
these women is the fact that a male family member murdered all of
them.

One day in May 1994, Kifaya, a sixteen-year-old Jordanian girl, was
strapped to a chair by her 32-year-old brother, who gave her a glass of
water, told her to recite an Islamic prayer, and slashed her throat. He
then ran out into the street waving the bloodied knife and shouting, "I
have killed my sister to cleanse my honour."  His sister had been raped
by one of her other brothers.

In October 1998, Khadijeh, a twenty-year-old Jordanian woman, ran away
from home and was reported missing by her family.  The police found her
a week later and sent her for an examination to determine whether she
was still a virgin, a standard procedure in missing person cases.  She
was found to

be a virgin and released into her father's custody.  He took her to a
deserted area, stabbed her four times in the chest and slit her throat.
He then turned himself in to the police, still holding the knife, which
he said he had used to kill his daughter and cleanse his honour.

Lina, a twenty-year-old Jordanian girl, became pregnant after being
raped by her neighbour.  When her pregnancy became apparent to her
family, they decided to kill her.  On 24 September, her brother drove
her to a nearby football field owned by the Jordan Phosphate Mines
Company, parked the car and asked her to get out.  He then repeatedly
struck her on the head with a rock, drew a knife, slashed her throat
and stomach, left her by the side of the road, and went to turn himself
in.  His family treated him like a hero and later posted bail for him,
bringing a white stallion for him to ride home.  He was sentenced to
three months in jail, but was instantly released because he'd served
that amount of time waiting for the trial, even though he was out on
bail the entire

time.

That same month, a 43-year-old man killed two of his sisters.  Kifaya,
23, was shot twice in the back of the head, and Nadia, 32, was shot
five times in the head and chest.  Both were killed in their home in
Amman because their brother suspected them of immoral behaviour.
According to a woman in the neighbourhood, who wanted to remain
anonymous, Nadia and Kifaya had good reputations, while their brother
had a criminal record.  Another neighbour reported that he might have
killed his sisters because he didn't want them to inherit any property
or money.

In June 1996, a 27-year-old man spotted his 25-year-old sister, Nofah,
with two female friends in the Liayali Zaman restaurant and Nightclub.
He forcibly dragged her from the

table and shot her seven times in the head and chest, causing a panic
in the restaurant.  Then he waited for the police to arrive and gave
himself in, claiming he had killed her to cleanse his family's
honour.

In March 1997, a man killed his fifteen-year-old daughter by crushing
her head with a large stone because he suspected her of having had
relations with a neighbour.  He told the police that when he questioned
her about the matter, she denied having an immoral relationship with
anyone, but he later killed her because he didn't believe her.  The
forensic examination concluded that she'd never had sexual relations.

Also in March of that same year, a 25-year-old, married, pregnant woman
living in Irbid was shot to death by her brother.  The family had
discovered that she'd had relations with her husband prior to their
wedding and urged their son to kill his married sister to cleanse their
honour.  She'd been married for three months and was two months
pregnant.

In June 1997, a 34-year-old Egyptian national raped an
eighteen-year-old Jordanian girl.  As is the law, both parties were
placed in detention at Qafqafa prison to protect their lives.  The
governor forced the man to marry his victim, which was his punishment
for the rape.  Two weeks after the incident they were released from the
detention facility.  Later her father gunned them down, claiming that
he had killed them to cleanse his family's honour and because he and
his family blamed her for the rape since she knew the Egyptian, who was
a worker in the neighbourhood.

In September 1995, eighteen-year-old Subhieh defied her uncle's wishes
and married 21-year-old Mohammed, the man she loved.  Two weeks after
they married, her fifteen-year-old brother, under instructions from her
uncle, went to her home after her husband left for work and shot her
five times in the

head and chest.  He immediately turned himself in, claiming to have
cleansed his family's honour.

A fourteen-year-old girl was at home, talking on the phone, one day in
February 2000, when her thirteen-year-old brother strangled her with
the phone cord.  The youth confessed to murdering her and told police
that it was a crime of honour because she was talking to men on the
phone.

Dalia's death never reached the newspapers.

DEDICATION

My dear Dalia, in your life you made me laugh and made me cry.  You
managed to touch my soul and become part of me forever, and in your
death you've become my purpose for living.  I write this book in loving
memory of you, and I pray that God keeps you safe and happy until we
meet again.  Till then, ya gazallae, know your spirit strengthens me,
and your memory comforts me, and you will always remain a special part
of my life.