Microstories

An Act and Two People: Micro Story by Munayem Mayenin

He stood by the window, drew the heavy and dirty curtain. The cold showed its face on the window’s dust and dirt having wet them with drops of water. He went to the window to stand and stare and smoke his cigarette. It was way passed midnight and yet he could not sleep. Immigrant eyes could not sleep so easily. Back home and memories came back and haunted him. He sighed, thinking of his wife. He had been waiting for her to join him for four years now!

He works at a take away, takes orders, yes sir, thank you sir, your change sir etc and then having eaten something after midnight he pulls the shutter, puts off the lights and comes upstairs to sleep. The whole village seemed to be deep in sleep. He could, at night, hear his breathing.

The first floor where he stays has a big room, at the middle of which there was a big table full of old magazines, newspapers, ashtrays, an alarm clock covered with dust and a few never read books.

There were two other floors up, empty. At night he could feel the ghosts of silence tiptoeing over these floors as soundlessly as they possibly could, because he could not hear any footsteps. It sometimes scared him to be honest.

He stood there and looked outside for no apparent reasons-an empty and meaningless stare. He wondered as to what time it would be in his own country now and what his wife might be doing”

That twenty year old young girl, Emma was still sitting at the bus stop opposite his room. He knew Emma for at least last four years. Emma and her boyfriend Jacob had been regular customers to his take away.

Last night at about nine Emma walked into the take away. She looked very down and she appeared to have bruised and black eyes. Anil welcomed her as usual, however, Emma seemed to be in a different place all together. She sat near the gas fire and read all the newspapers and magazines including their small prints, Anil reckoned by the time he became little bit freer. That must have been half past ten!
Anil went to her and sat down beside her.
“You alone today! Jacob not around?”
“No.” Emma’s full stop answer. Anil understood the message. He did not think she had any money to buy anything. He felt bad about it. What could he do! Should he offer her a meal on credit or something! Offering a free meal might be offensive to her!

However, he abandoned the idea. About eleven o’clock Emma left the take way.
“Good night!” said Anil. No reply came back.

It was two in the morning. It must be minus twelve in this frozen December night. It rained all night. Chilly wind and occasional thunderstorm came and went. He saw Emma sitting at the bust stop when he came upstairs.

She was now almost half wet. The chilly wind was blowing her hair off. She was shivering badly. She had jeans and a polo shirt on!
Anil thought for a second. What could he do? Or could he do anything at all? He drew the curtain back on. Came back to the table and put off his cigarette and went to bed!

Anil could not sleep! He kept thinking about Emma and how she was shivering. He could hear the thunder storm blowing outside and the shower.
He got up and walked downstairs and went to the door. He opened the door and called, “Emma! Emma!”
To Emma his called seemed an invitation to heaven. She ran like a child to its mother after having a long separation.
Anil let her in and locked the door. He put on the gas fire and asked her to sit down.

“Excuse me, I’ll be back in a sec”. said Anil and he went into the kitchen. Emma was shivering and appeared as though she was trying to get the heat of the heater pushed though her nose and mouth!

Anil came with a plate of rice and some curry.

“You should eat something!”
Emma ate the food without a word and had the coke silently as though no one including her existed in the room.

Anil then said, “What’s the matter Emma? What happened?”
Emma broke into tears like a child. Anil felt awkward as to how to respond. He offered a tissue.
“Listen, it is going to be alright! Trust me, tomorrow this would seem nothing!”
That’s what he could manage to say.
“ The son of a bitch threw me out on Christmas eve! He literally threw me out in such a night! Can you believe it! I lived with him for four years now!”
Emma was furious and sounded very muddled up. Her voice crackled.

Anil did not know how to respond. He did not think and just did what he did. He offered Emma his bad and said, “Look, Emma, I know this is awkward! But how could I leave you at this bus stop like this! You would be dead by morning! I will sleep on that single bed over there.”
“But that bed is full of stuff! How could you sleep there!”
“Don’t worry, I’ll fix it. You go ahead!”
“Thank you so much Anil” Emma said. Then she added shyly, “Can I borrow a fag?” Anil obliged.
Both of them went to their respective beds. It was dark. The storm was getting stronger outside. The rain became heavier. Both of them were smoking in their bed. Two red eyes of storm were forming by their cigarettes when they puffed.

Anil could hear Emma breathing and turning left and right, so could Emma Anil’s. They were so self aware that they forgot that the world existed but them.

“Is she scared of me or something!” Anil thought.

Emma did not say anything but Anil could feel how worried she was by the sound of her breathing!

Anil could not sleep. It disturbed him. However, he could understand why Emma was feeling whatever she was feeling.

They both fell asleep without knowing. Anil got up at seven and having completed his bathroom chores of the morning went downstairs into the kitchen to make something to eat.

Anil heard foot steps and came out of the kitchen. He saw Emma leaving. He stood there and looked at her disappearing! He went back to the kitchen!

He never saw her again! He never told about this to anyone, yet occasionally wondered about the way Emma left in the morning without even telling him! Why did she leave the way she did! What did Anil do that was so wrong!

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The Infinite Knives, Iced Statue Girl and
the Blood River

 Muhammad woke up quite early on this spring Sunday morning in his flat by the huge Tesco superstore on the motorway. Every morning Muhammad would get up and walk to the window and could not help but look at this Tesco store! What a scene to be invited into looking at he would think!

 This morning he did not go to the window. He sat on his bed and looked rather bemused. He had a half spread smile on his face! He was talking on the phone to his mother in Ramallah yesterday!

He just remembered he had a strange dream! Yes, he was sure he had this astonishing dream.

Muhammad remembered the dream and tried to re-envision it so that he could understand the whole dream. He was quite moved by the dream.  

Dreams are quite strange in that they have no logic or ration in them! Time and space get mixed up when one is dreaming.

Muhammad was in his living room watching a film on Saturday night! It was Saturday night he just knew in the dream. He saw that the Israeli guy next door was trying to stab him through the wall with an almost infinite knife! The knife was sparkling and shiny and Muhammad’s heart was bleeding! The knife was stabbing him in his heart! Yet Muhammad realised that he was not screaming or feeling any pain or panic.

Instead he realised he could see through the wall the Israeli guy, who was almost his age and Muhammad knew his name was Yitzhak! Muhammad saw each stabbing Yitzhak was putting into his heart he was hurting in his own heart and he was bleeding, too!  

That, even in dream, Muhammad found to be strange! However, he then began to stab Yitzhak back with another infinite knife. Consequently, Yitzhak stopped stabbing Muhammad while Muhammad continued stabbing Yitzhak.

Muhammad now realised that as he stabbed Yitzhak he was himself bleeding at the same time. The unbelievable thought that occurred to him even in dream was that both Yitzhak and Muhammad realised that they had a joined up heart and in effect they were stabbing at their own heart which apparently is shared by both of them!

Muhammad could see their blood forming a live running river in the air and falling like a red hot waterfall on the roof of the huge Tesco superstore! The scene looked horrible to Muhammad!

And then this little girl appeared out of nowhere on the blood river and began to scream: Help! Help! The blood current was taking the four or five year old girl down and she was about to hit the roof of the building.

In an absolute panic both Yitzhak and Muhammad jumped through their windows to reach the girl. They went out to the girl but the window did not break at all.

However, they found themselves standing on the suddenly frozen out blood river where the girl had become a red iced statue!

That was when Muhammad woke up. He suddenly now got up and started to walk towards the door like a hypnotised man! He was not thinking of his PhD thesis on the interconnectedness of all religions for which he had spent so far two years. He opened the door and walked to his next door neighbour, who he had never met or known.

He raised his right arm to knock on the door but before he could do so somebody opened the door!

 “Good morning! How can I help you?” A young man similar age of Muhammad greeted him.
 “Good morning Yitzhak! I am from next door!”
 “I know who you are. Muhammad, right?”
 “Yes, but how do you know!”
“Well, how did you know my name! Anyway tell me, why are you here?”
 “Don’t know. May be, just to see you!”  
“Well, I was going to see you, as well!”
 “Why was that?”
 “I had this strange dream and you were in it!” said Yitzhak.
 “Does the dream has infinite knives, blood river and an iced statue little girl in it!”
 Now both Yitzhak and Muhammad became stunned! They could not speak for a while.
 “Come on in then! Sorry! I don’t know what to say! Come on in please!” Yitzhak invited Muhammad.

From Tel Aviv and Ramallah Yitzhak and Muhammad sat face to face looking at each other in a very embarrassed look as if they got caught red handed in an act of silly childish adventure.

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Shorter Than A Simple Sentence

Life is so short! It seems shorter than a simple sentence. Yet we can’t walk straight to the end. We stumble and we startle and we hit and we fall and we fail to love and we hate a lot before we could reach the full stop of this tiny little simple sentence that I feel our human life is! This came to me when I came out of the second hand book shop in Blackheath. I was walking a few thousand steps away from the Greenwich meridian line. Is that where time began! Not really!  

The thought stayed with me for a while. I walked in that early evening that came to walk into the Greenwich green in that early delicate autumn. The evening was inviting and I went out for a walk. I did have quite a long walk and I felt rather good inside me. 

When I approached the market square I came by a second hand book shop, for which I always had a fascination. I always, without a miss, pop into these second hand book shops. I bought so many wonderful books from them. You find all sorts of beautiful books in these shops. The books, that are out of print or very much unlikely to be reprinted you are likely to find them in these shops. Philosophy, poetry and old classics!  

Thus, I responded to the urge to pop in. It was a small shop. A very small shop indeed! It was about 8 by 30 feet. There were a few people already crowding the shop. It was as quiet as the dusts on some of the books on the upper shelves. The gentleman in front of me holding a collection of Pablo Neruda, gave me a smile making it a question. 

“Shall I take it?”

 I replied with another smile, which possibly said,”If you did not, I would”.  

That possibly encouraged him to make up his mind in favour of Neruda and he walked to the counter and paid. He looked at me from the door and smiled at me goodbye. I smiled back and bade my smiley goodbye. I felt really good inside, very connected and rather warm.  

I started to look at books and I found quite many books I would like to buy. However, suddenly I realised that I did not have my wallet with me.  

Hence, I was a bit embarrassed to myself and carried on walking and looking at more books. I felt really stupid that I did not have my wallet with me!  

As I came near the door and was preparing to leave the shop a tall gentleman in his mid sixties, who I saw at the counter came to me and stopped me 

“Yes? Can I help you at all?” I asked him before he could speak.

“You are taking one of our books!” The gentleman’s voice was very annoyed and stern. 

I felt a rush of hot blood came up to my throat and I felt really angry, violated and humiliated. Literally I was shaking! I found it difficult for a few seconds to respond to his accusation. 

“What book!” 

“The one you are holding!” 

“Oh! This one?” I held up a small old collection of poems by T. S. Eliot that I suddenly saw in my hand! 

“Yes, the one you are holding!” 

There were four other customers still in the shop. I was the sudden subject of their intense attentions. I felt like disappearing from the earth. 

However, I regained my composure rather quickly and handed the book to him.

“Have a look! Is it yours?” 

He took the book and looked observantly and turned the cover and looked at all the pages to see whether it was his book. Apparently it was my book and I was holding it when I walked into the shop. 

“Well, I am…” the shopkeeper stammered. 

I snatched the book from him and said, “Well!” 

“I am so…” he could not say what he was trying to say. 

“Save it for later. For everybody’s benefit it is my book, isn’t it? 

I said these worlds rather loudly and stormed out of the shop. 

I was still shaking. I felt a bitter and poison-like distaste in my tongue! The shopkeeper looked at me and thought to himself this brown guy must be a thief! 

I did not even think that he was white and so were all the rest of the customers including the gentleman who had bought Neruda’s collection. I did not at all think that I was brown. I was there like any other book lovers trying to find books that are rare and beautiful. In front of all these other people the shopkeeper accused me of steeling his book while that little Eliot collection was one of my most treasured poetry collections that I carry with me most of the time! 

I felt small. I felt violated like a flower under somebody’s disrespectful, angry and violent feet! I felt small to think that I am a human being! I did not feel small because of me instead I felt small because of the fact that I was related to such idiots, who look like humans and disgrace humanity. 

May be that was why this thought of a sentence resembling life came to me! We can’t walk strait to the full stop of this little simple sentence. We fail to love and hate prejudice. Instead we hate. We live in hatred and in our prison of dark, smelly and rotten ignorance.

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