Strings - Capstone Amal Al Shamsi (1)

the meat was a bit off, or the curls on the bread were not tight enough. How arbitrary it was, that
they should eat it.
That night. his wife flew to Germany with two coats, holding one in her arms.
Some time later, when he arrived for another visit, he stopped the car next to the empty
lot and called Qasem. It had been a while since he had heard his voice.
“Are you still in your cave?” His older brother had been sheltering himself in Al Ain. He
hadn’t really, he was just working on an operation. He was assigned to the area when he became
a serious police officer, not that he had ever been a traffic cop or a desk jockey. It had crossed
Hamza’s mind that maybe the man selected it, he would be the type to like being far away,
surrounded by hills, just him and his family for miles. Hamza could never tell him.
The voice on the other side was far away but sturdy. Was this voice ever childlike and
afraid? “Is mama there, asking about me?”
“I’m just visiting her.”
“As I’ve heard,” Qasim said. “She was telling me she found things in our old rooms.”
Letters to girls in his class, some letters back. Old photos of a foreign sky. “Yes,” Hamza
chuckled, “I have them at hand. Can make a personal delivery to you, if you want.”
“You crazy guy,” he said, laughing a bit.
“I know. I threw them.”
“Good.”
“I’m joking.”
“Throw them. Make another fire.”
“Did mama tell you about that?”
“I think. It’s ​hasad​.”
Hamza felt himself begin to sweat, it was hot outside. He looked around at the lot, there
was no ash left. Someone had cut down the blackened trees, then covered the stumps with sand.
He felt too lazy to check. “From who? Can you be jealous of palm trees?”
“Everything, Hamza,” the man said, maybe he was smiling. He smiled when he meant to
laugh.
“You’re right. Those trees were about to live forever.”
“They were there before Big Ben.”
Hamza wanted to smile.
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