To Die For

"It is no way for a girl to live." He looks uncomfortable. "I felt bad, after you left."

"What choice do I have? Should I just lie down and die? I do not want to do this, you know. But I do not see how else to survive."

He blows a breath out through his teeth. "All right. Fine. Where do you live?"

I s.h.i.+ft uncomfortably. "Nowhere. My house got destroyed."

He curses. "There are plenty of abandoned houses around here, girl. Come on. I'll find you something."

He stalks ahead of me, mumbling something to himself. Eventually he finds a house that is empty and in reasonable condition. It is next to a bombed-out mosque. The window has no gla.s.s, the door is broken off its hinges, and the electricity does not work. But there is running water. A real shower. A real toilet. The soldier fidgets around the house. I do not know what he is doing, so I get to work clearing the dirt and debris. The kitchen, living room, and bedroom are all one room. The kitchen part has some cabinets, a stove, an empty refrigerator. I hear a crackle and a hum, and then the single bare light bulb in the ceiling flickers to life.

He comes back, wiping his hands on his pants. I stare at the bulb in awe.

"I was an electrician before the war started," he says by way of explanation.

"Thank you."

He shrugs. He fixes the door, then stares around at the little room. "It is not much, but it is something. The mosque next door is not used, obviously. You could...work there. Sleep here. It helps to have somewhere safe to go."

I laugh. "Safe? What is safe?"

He laughs, too. "True. But it is better than the streets."

The silence is awkward. I do not know what to do. Neither does he.

"Are you serious about this?" he asks. "Once you start, I do not think it will be very easy to stop."

"Do you have a better idea for me?" I say. "I told you, I do not want to do this. It makes me sick to think about. But...I don't have any other choice. I have tried everything else. I have not eaten in a week. I stole a piece of bread a few days ago, and almost got my hand chopped off for it. No one will help me. I do not know what else to do. You...you gave me money and food for-for that. Maybe someone else will, too."

He rubs his face with both hands. "What's your name?"

"Rania."

"Rania, I'm Malik." He takes a step closer. "You are a very pretty girl, Rania. I am not your father or your brother or your husband. I cannot tell you what to do. I am just a soldier. I would not want a girl in my family to do this."

"You would help her, though. If she was desperate."

"Yes, I would."

"There is no one to help me. You have helped me. I do not want to, but I have to, to eat."

"I guess I get that. I wish it did not come to this for you. I like you. You have spirit. You are very beautiful."

He takes another step, and I force myself to hold still. His eyes look me over, head to toes. His hand drifts up to touch my hip. I refuse to shudder. He is nice about it. Not forceful, not moving to make me before I am ready.

"I do not know what to do," I say.

"You will learn, I guess."

I hear it, the sound that will become my life: a belt jingling.

It is not so bad this time. It does not hurt like it did the first time. He is gentler now that he is sober. I close my eyes and hold still. It is over quickly.

He gives me money before he leaves. He stops and looks at me. "Rania, if you are going to make money doing this, you have to pretend to like it. It will go better for you." He rubs his face like he did before. "I will send someone to you, for work. A client."

He turns away.

"Thank you for helping me, Malik."

He shrugs. "I will not be back. I have no conscience left, I thought, but this...it is too strange for me. I did what I could for you. Perhaps Allah will forgive me, perhaps he will not."

"Do you believe in Allah? I do not think I do."

"I do not know," he says. "I want to, but the things I have seen make me wonder. I do not want to think an Allah who loved us would let a nice girl like you have to resort to such things as this."

"That is why I do not believe. I was a good girl. I went to mosque. I prayed facing Mecca. I wore the hijab. I respected my parents. But here I am. A prost.i.tute, now." It hurts to say those words. I say them again to make it hurt less. "I am a wh.o.r.e."

Malik cringes. "Yes, I suppose you are." He looks at his dirty thumbnail rather than me. "There are worse things to be."

I stare at him. "Like what?"

"A soldier. A killer." He pauses, staring at his dirty thumbnail. "It is worse to be dead, too." He is gone, then.

I buy food, blankets. I set up a little nest in a corner of the mosque, in the shadows. It is dark, so I find candles. Malik is true to his word and sends a friend, an officer in the government army. He is not so nice as Malik. He is not so gentle. I try to pretend to like it, although I am pretending to do something I do not know anything about. He does not seem to notice, and he gives me money. As he leaves, he tells me how much I should charge for the next time, since I did not ask, and the amount seems a lot. The next man who comes, another officer, I charge him that amount, and he pays it without complaining.

I am no longer hungry.

Now I only wear the hijab when I go out, so people do not ask me any questions. I feel like everyone who sees me knows what I am. As if it is written on my forehead in bold black ink.

Perhaps it is written on my soul, now, and they can see it in my eyes, those windows to my soul.

I do not see Ha.s.san for a very long time.

I am sitting outside my home, waiting for my next client, as I call them. I have told the clients my name is Sabah. No one has heard the name Rania in a long time now, for there is no one who knows me except as Sabah.

My hair is down, now. Long black waves hiding my face. I see the man striding down the street, a young man, youthful, skinny, confident. I do not look at him, but take his hand in mine and lead him to the mosque. Something about the feel of his hand in mine seems strangely familiar. I turn to peek at him and my heart stops.

We are at

Ha.s.san curses, eyes wide. "Rania? What the-what the f.u.c.k is this? I thought-Sabah..."

I tilt my head up, refusing to be ashamed. "I am Sabah."

"No. No. You...you cannot be. I have heard the officers talking about Sabah. How...what they did with you." He seems about to vomit.

"And you thought you would try her for yourself." I push past him and walk back toward my home next door. "Go away, Ha.s.san. Forget you saw me."

He follows me. "How could you do this? Rania, this is wrong, you are my sister, you should not be-I cannot let-"

I spin around and slap him across the face. Rage is boiling in me. "You turned your back on me, Ha.s.san. You chose to be a soldier. I was starving. I had to survive somehow. This is how. Go away."

"No, Rania. I cannot believe..."

"There is nothing to believe. Can you afford to keep me alive? Can you give me enough money to let me stop?"

He frowns, seems about to cry. He is still only fifteen, after all. "No...no. I cannot."

"Then go away. Do not tell anyone you know me, or my name. Do not come back." I keep walking. "I am not Rania, anymore. I am Sabah."

He turns and stumbles away. He looks back at me over his shoulder, confusion and horror and pain and a welter of emotions too many to name cross his face. I watch him, hiding my shame behind impa.s.sive eyes.

When he is gone, I let a tear slide down, for Ha.s.san. For the family that I had. I know I will not see my brother again.

Rania...she is no more. She did not die; she just does not exist anymore. I am Sabah now. Sabah is strong. Sabah knows what men like and how to give it to them.

I have money enough, now. Enough to eat, to have clothes. I buy some hair dye and turn my hair yellow, like an American girl. When I am done, I do not recognize myself. I have found a broken mirror and taped the sharpened edges, fixed it to the wall. Men pay more if I wear makeup, so I wear makeup. Men pay more if I wear clothes that show my flesh, so I wear a harlot's garb.

In the mirror now, I see only Sabah, the prost.i.tute. Slender waist, full b.r.e.a.s.t.s shown by a sleeveless s.h.i.+rt, hips flaring and legs long and bare beneath a tiny American-style miniskirt. No panties, because wh.o.r.es do not need them. I am not a Muslim girl anymore. I am not an Arab girl anymore. I am only a prost.i.tute, without religion, without any G.o.d but money. It is to survive, I tell myself.

It is not because I enjoy what I do. I hate it. I mask my utter disgust every time I draw an officer or soldier into my work nest. My skin crawls when they touch me. My heart shrivels into a smaller, harder knot of callous hate every time they leave and I must clean myself and pretend to smile for the next one.

They love me. Sabah...Sabah. She is confident, smiling a seductive smile. It is a game. An act. I hate them all. I would as soon kill them as do what I do. I cannot think the words. I do it, but I cannot speak of it, think of it.

I am paid for s.e.x. Ugh. My stomach clenches as I think the words, sitting at my gla.s.sless window, waiting. I am Sabah, the prost.i.tute. Flaxen-haired, naked on the nest of blankets, surrounded by candles, a scruff-bearded officer kneeling above me, soft, fleshy body touching mine, his flabby belly on my thighs, his slimy hands on my b.r.e.a.s.t.s, his rough manhood striking into my soft, dry womanhood. I am Sabah, near to vomiting as he finishes and tosses a sweat-wet wad of money on the bed next to me, striding away with an arrogant, satisfied swagger. Grinning. Laughing, clapping his companion on the back as the next enters, fumbles with his buckle.

That motion, that moment, it is always the worst. I feel always the surge of disgust and fear when the client first fumbles with his belt, hating the jangle of metal on metal, forcing my writhe of disgust into a sensuous, seductive pose.

Operation Iraqi Freedom; Iraq, 2003 War is coming once more. Many years have pa.s.sed.

I hate still and even more vehemently than ever what I do to survive, but Malik was right...all too right. It is impossible to stop now. Even if I wear the hijab to hide my blonde hair, they seem to know, as if I do indeed have "wh.o.r.e" tattooed on my forehead. They know and turn me away, unless it is to spend my wh.o.r.e money in their store. Never to work. Never to earn "honest" money. I have tried, a thousand times. Begged for work. Explained how desperate I am to find another trade, another job. No one will employ me, so I am forced to entertain clients to eat.

War is coming. I feel it. Another war. More death. More soldiers.

I venture out less frequently now. Fighting has come, ambushes, American soldiers, and some from other countries. Car bombs detonate. Bombs go off and men scream, curse in half a dozen languages, but mostly English. Sudden bursts of gunfire break the silence of night and the cacophony of day.

With the return of war comes the return of fear.

I am afraid. I refuse to show it, but it is there.

Like a boy, fear makes me angry.

Then the unthinkable happens: I am on the way home from buying food when I see Ha.s.san. He is with a group of rebels, rifle on his shoulder. He sees me. Then one of them in the front lurches to the side, drops to his knee, jerks his gun to his shoulder, and fires at something I cannot see. Shouts echo, gunfire rattles, deafens. I kneel beside a door, watching Ha.s.san scramble for cover, firing. I peer out and see a file of American soldiers, a patrol, accompanied by an armored car of some kind. The Americans are outnumbered, although I do not think they realize it yet. There are about twenty Americans that I see, and Ha.s.san's troop is at least fifty, spread out. I watch them find positions, waiting for the patrol of Americans.

The American soldiers advance, doorway by doorway. Each motion is precise, each man covered by several others. My brother's men, by contrast, operate more as a group of individuals, no cohesion, no teamwork, no real leader. They find their own cover, fire in wild, undisciplined bursts. The Americans fire three shots, pause, shoot three more. They pick targets and aim. Ha.s.san and his men fire almost randomly. Some come close to their targets, but most miss by a large margin.

I watch as one American falls. Then another. Ha.s.san's men-I think of them as his men, although he is but one of many rather than any kind of leader-are dropping, dropping, dropping.

I hear the harsh voice of an AK-47 near me, hackhackhackhachack-then the crisper sound of an American rifle, the name of which I do not know, answering, crackcrackcrack. Bullets patter and spatter in the dirt, and against the wall inches from my head. I suppress a scream, huddle closer to the ground.

I peer out, the need to watch winning over terror: Ha.s.san is out there.

The AK speaks again, the sound moving closer, and then I see him, Ha.s.san, crouching in the doorway, rifle kicking at his thin shoulder, one eye closed to aim. He glances at me, grins a lopsided, too-casual smile, then goes back to shooting.

Time slows. My stomach coils into a knot, my blood freezes, and I know what will happen. I want to scream, but cannot. A gasp is all that comes out. A tear trickles down, even though he is still firing, firing, and I cannot breathe. It happens. He jerks backward, twisting sideways, red blossoms blooming on his chest and a wide blotch on his back, shapeless and spreading. He is gasping, now, cursing.

I scramble to kneel over him, but he pushes me aside, struggles impossibly to his feet.

"Ha.s.san!" His name finally escapes my lips, but it is too late.

My brother digs in his pocket, coughing, bleeding, wheezing, stumbles out, pulls a dark round thing from his pocket, jerks at it, throws, falls.

I watch the black dot, the grenade, float lazily through the air, fall at the feet of an American soldier kneeling beside the body of a wounded comrade. The unwounded soldier shouts, throws himself over his friend's body and rolls away, clutching his friend. The explosion is deafening, shakes the whole earth, cracks the sky. Dust billows, fire flickers.

There are screams.

The dust clears, and I see a mess of blood and bodies and bleeding limbs where the grenade had been, and I vomit. The limbs wriggle and rise, and a red-bathed American in tan camouflage lurches to his feet, sways, drags his friend away by the hand. He presses a palm to his side, drags his friend with other hand. Blood stains the mud.

Something tugs at my heart, watching the scene unfold. Ha.s.san lies motionless in the road. Gunfire rips apart the silence, an AK, and puffs of dirt mark where the bullets walk toward the Americans, both wounded.

Somehow, I am out in the road. I step over Ha.s.san. Someone shouts in Arabic, "Get away, woman!" I don't know what I am doing. Something hot buzzes past my ear. The American collapses to his knees, picks up his rifle, holds it at his hip, and fires. A curse, a shout, silence, something thumps wetly in the distance. More gunfire. The American jerks again, falls back and to his side.

I am in another doorway, watching it all. Two bodies, but only one breathes, I think. Sporadic bursts of gunfire, moving away. An American soldier inches toward his friends, firing. A grenade explodes, throwing him to the side. He gets up, seemingly unhurt but dazed, and backs away. He shouts, shouts, but the two on the ground do not answer. The pain in his eyes as he leaves his friends is visible and awful. Bullets ricochet, ding, zing, buzz. He turns and runs, and then there is no one. The fight has moved on.

I leave my hiding place. What am I doing? The thought floats through my mind, but I have no answer. The one who still breathes is collapsed on top of his friend. I push him over so he flops to his back. He groans, cracks his eyelids to peer at me.

Vivid, arresting blue eyes stare at me, and suddenly I am thirteen again, watching another American die. I am just a girl again, helpless. Ha.s.san is dead. I know this. Mother is dead, Father is dead, Aunt and Uncle are dead. Americans are dead. Iraqis are dead. Everyone is dead, I think. Except this man. He struggles for breath, whispers something to me in English, and his voice is a breathy gasp. He wrenches himself over, each motion obviously excruciating, and pokes his friend. He says something, his friend's name, I think. His voice breaks. A tear falls. He looks at me.

I can see the death on his friend. I lean over him anyway, touch his neck, feel no pulse. I shake my head, and the American sobs, collapses, saying the same thing over and over again.

I know no English, but it sounds like, "Derek, Derek." A name.

The American goes silent, and I know he has pa.s.sed out from the pain, from the blood loss.

What do I do? I cannot let him die. There has been too much death.

I drag him to my home, several blocks away. I am exhausted by the time I get him there.

I cannot help wondering once more, What am I doing?

CHAPTER FOUR.