٢ / 2
She comes down from her high and tries to piece together the details. But how does one tell time in the darkness? The hours stand still without the sun as a reference. The date and time are as much of a mystery to Nour as her whereabouts.
Maybe it is Thursday, she thinks, pulling a handful of cotton around her body. There is a draught. The air feels cold because it is wet. Shivering, Nour peers around the room but faces are lost to the shadows. Covered by fingers or sections of hair the digits and strands act as shields. The few pairs of eyes that stare back look right through her. There is no warmth or emotion, only haunted gazes of the rejected. Girls who are physically present but mentally disconnected.
Nour ignores the rumbling of her stomach and pushes her back against the wall. Damp bedrock scrapes her calves. An ache throbs between her shoulder blades. When she brings her fingers to her temple they make contact with a powdered stain. The blood that has migrated down her forehead forms a crust around her left eye. Further prodding reveals sand on her scalp and sticky clumps of hair, the roots slightly damp. When her fingers move to her lips they are so dry they split on contact. The taste of iron fills her mouth—she must have been chewing the inside of her cheek again. Nour prods the sore. Mama will scold her when she finds out.
The faint echo of the call to prayer rides on the gust of air that blasts inwards when the door at the end of the room opens. A girl is thrust, unceremoniously, into the cavernous space, stumbling forward as the man behind her steps back. There is a pause as air is sucked out of the room and the groan of rusted hinges precedes the inward swing of the door. But before the metal kisses the rocky frame a faint uttering reaches Nour’s ears; the last line of the Morning Prayer. An appeal to worshippers to join the congregational assembly in the afternoon. As-salatu khairum minan naum.
Prayer is better than sleep.
Friday, she thinks. Dawn. More than a day has passed.
The idea that the world, her world, is somewhere motivates Nour to say a prayer. She shifts until she is on her knees and, quietly, recites the phrases Mama taught her. And even if women are not supposed to, Nour raises her hands from her shoulders to her ears, turning her palms and pressing them against the sides of her head. In doing so she can block out the wail of the new arrival, the foam fizzing from the girl’s mouth, her flopping about like a dying fish in middle of the room. Nour squeezes her eyes shut and repeats the phrases until the slap, slap, slap of flesh against concrete fades. If she cannot sleep this reality away then prayers will have to suffice.
#
٣ / 3
Her eyes have adjusted to the dimness in the room, enough to make out the airshafts located a few inches from the ceiling. Like the tombs of the pharaohs, the squares let in just enough air along with slices of light. Thin beams disperse throughout the chambered darkness to leave all occupants in a perpetual twilight.
No longer dazed, Nour maps out the room’s dimensions and takes inventory. She is smart and her memory is good. The room is the size of two classrooms. The ceiling is high, too high for any of them to reach. Mattresses are scattered around the room and soiled sheets are piled next to the door. There are four wooden chairs, one of which is broken. At last count, there were twenty-seven girls, three women and two children.
There is only one exit.
Groups huddle at the edges, banded together in cliques. The dynamics are immediately recognizable. She must find a way to fit in because, like at school, there are good alliances and bad ones too. Nour turns to the girl nearest to her, “I am Nour,” she whispers in colloquial Arabic. The pair sit in the corner, as far from the rust-covered door as possible.
The figure lies on the mattress next to the hole where everyone relieves themselves. Nour ignores the smell and inches closer, enough to see the strong curve of the girl’s back and press of thighs against her chest. This girl holds her legs in place with an arm covered in ferocious and uneven bruises. She is my age, maybe older? Nour thinks looking at the coils of hair and rounded cheeks covered with grime. Pubescent padding fills out her hips and heavy breasts push against the too small abaya. Nour has watched this girl closely because, unlike the others, she seems watchful and not as scattered. More importantly, she has not been dragged out of the room since Nour arrived, which suggests this girl has important information. Things that can help her survive this place.
She reaches out and touches the body part closest to her; a crescent moon of flesh the abaya doesn’t cover. “I am Nour,” she repeats, hand lingering on the exposed hand. “I come from West Cairo.”
The girl grunts and covers her face with the sheet before flipping over to face the toilet. Nour responds to the rejection by biting the inside of her cheek and wringing her hands. Since all they have is time she will try to befriend the girl again tomorrow and, if that doesn’t work, the day after that.
#
٤ / 4
The opening and closing of the door is the marker: Once around dawn and again at night. This is how Nour keeps track of time. The events a part of her mental diary. Something tells her having a basic routine is one way of maintaining her sanity.
Four men arrive as the Morning Prayer ends to add new girls to the cave and subtract others. Two men stand by the door as the exchange takes place, rifles slung across their chests, tall and lean and outfitted in t-shirts, jeans, and boots with thick laces. A mix of confidence and disgust is etched all over their faces. The two in the room wear similar clothes, but are shorter and stockier, and they don’t have guns. Today, they enter swinging pieces of pipe aggressively out in front of them, as if the cylinders were extensions of body parts they wished were bigger. With a hand clasped around a rusty pipe the man with the lazy eye walks around the room and shines a flashlight across clusters of bodies and drooping faces. He sees something he likes against the far wall and grabs the closest limb, hauling the body towards the door. Five girls have been lost this way. Two have returned. Three haven’t come back.
Soft cries are exhaled as soon as the door closes. Bodies shift position. Nour’s hands shake as she pulls out a piece of bread hidden in the pocket of her dress. She turns to the girl on the mattress and clears her throat before reaching out to tap, tap, tap what might be a leg hidden underneath a sheet that used to be the colour of sunshine.
“I am Nour, she says, I am from West Cairo, Imbaba, and I have extra bread. What about you? Are you hungry?”
There is a long pause. The sheet rustles. The girl pokes out her head and focuses her almond-shaped eyes on Nour, taking in the face with a bone structure similar to her own.
“Qarafa,” she mumbles. “I am from the City of the Dead.”
The pitch of the voice is more harmonious than Nour expected. Hands shaking, she holds out the bread, the mold brushed away.
“It’s Asima,” the girl says, accepting the offering.
The words slip underneath a greased curtain of hair and hover momentarily between them. Asima. Nour lets it fall into her cupped hands and, in one swift movement, places her palms over her heart, holding onto the name as if it were a gift.
#
٥ / 5
Nour and Asima huddle together on the dirty mattress with their heads turned towards one another. They pass a plastic bottle of warm water between them, whispering between bites of food. “I don’t believe you,” Nour says quietly, chewing the bread until it turns to mush and sticks to the roof of her mouth.
“We are in a cave. Look around you!” Asima says, shaking her head.
“I thought we were in a house in the desert, outside the city?”
“A house with no windows? Ekhrasy! You are crazy, Nour. My family is poor, like yours, but even our house has windows.”
Nour bites the inside of her cheek and tries not to cry. “I am not crazy; we might be in a house and someone will rescue us soon.”
Asima takes a sip of water and gives the bottle to Nour, “We didn’t travel that far. I remember how I got here. We are underground, in a cave. Come on! You must have heard of such places?”
A cave in the city? Nour shakes her head. Asima has gone mad.
“Bas habibti,” Asima replies. “There are caves like this everywhere—under buildings and bridges. In the ground where people don’t look. The caves where men keep girls who they think won’t be missed at home.”
Nour stops chewing. Missing? Stolen? She thought the stories were rumors. Her father or brothers would never force a girl to live in a hole.
“It can’t be true. How do you know these things?” she asks her new friend.
Asima bows her head, hair covering her face, “I’ve been in a cave before. Five days, and I was lucky. Others were there for months. The police found us after a bawab tipped them off. He saw a group of men he didn’t know coming and going from abandoned apartments at the end of his street. Hidden places are getting harder to find; when one closes another opens. Men set them up in Cairo to keep and sell things they can make money from.”
“Like drugs and guns?” Nour asks.
Asima narrows her eyes, “Yes, and girls as well.”
#
٦ / 6
Nour asks what happens when they get dragged out of the room, but Asima does not answer. Instead, she speaks about the best way to hide or how avoid feeling anything when everything starts to hurt. One trick Asima taught Nour is how to scramble into position at the sound of the metal lock scraping across the door. Nour packs her body against Asima’s and whips the stained fabric over their bodies, curling her spine so, like twins in a womb, they become fetal. The first lesson Nour has learned about disappearing is the importance of turning inward and shrinking.
The men with the food arrive around the last call to prayer each day. Tonight, one man stands by the door while two others toss in a dozen loaves of stale bread, a bag of boiled potatoes, and bottles of water and Coca-Cola. Before leaving they push in large plastic containers of spoiled ful and crusted-over koshary. Nour and Asima wait for the lock to slide back into place before pitching forward, arms cycling, to grab provisions. Starved, they fight the other girls for whatever they can get. At first, Nour tried to be mindful because trampling another is probably haram. Forbidden. But she forgets about compassion in exchange for quelling the hunger.
“Aiwa habibti, it is us or them,” says Asima when they are back on their mattress. Holding out a potato, she congratulates Nour on their haul.
#
٧ / 7
“How did you get here?” Asima asks, wanting to know if Nour’s story mirrors her own. She suspects it will since most stories are the same in here. Nour pauses and tries to sharpen her recollection before responding with the details she remembers.
“It was Wednesday,” she begins, “and I was waiting for my brother, Karim, to pick me up after school because I take an extra math class twice a week. But he sent a text to tell me to catch the bus—he had football. I jingled the handful of piasters Mama had given me that morning and thought about calling Baba, but he works late at the factory and I didn’t call Mama because it would get Karim in trouble. Instead, I walked to the bus stop even though I hate the bus. It’s crowded and there are always men who try to touch you. Is it the same in your part of the city? Anyways, I missed the bus and started to walk home, making a stop to buy a Pepsi and stick of gum with the rainbow on the wrapper; I love the orange flavour. I pulled my hijab forward, pushed my headphones in my ears, and turned up the volume on Myam’s new song. What? Don’t look at me like that, Asima, she makes great music. I had just turned off the main road onto a really quiet street when someone called my name. It was Mo! I know him from school. He’s older but hangs out with guys in lower grades. It was weird because I thought he lived closer to Dokki and hadn’t seen him around for a while. We have talked though and he’s asked me out for soda, like, ten times, but I never went because my parents would be mad if they found out.
“I stopped and waited for him to catch up so we could walk together. We talked about movies and music. He said he liked my outfit and makeup. I was so into our conversation I lost track of time and where we were walking. It was then a van drove up and a guy jumped from the back—cute, like Amir Karaka, you know, the movie star? He said ‘hi’ to Mo who nudged me forward; I thought they were friends and he wanted to introduce me. His friend dropped something and I reached for it, which was when one of them hit me on the head. All I remember after that is a cloth on my face and hearing Mo tell his friend he would see him again in a month.”
Nour leans back on the mattress and waits for Asima’s reprimand. She knows girls from the City of the Dead have a lot of street smarts. Imbaba girls are not known for their grit. But to Nour’s surprise Asima puts down her bread and whispers, “Khalas.” Enough. Why hear more when Nour’s story is all too familiar?
“Every detail,” Asima says, “sounds just about right.”
#
٨ / 8
When Asima thrashes next to her Nour pulls the sheet tighter around her body. She covers her ears with her hands and thinks about the dream where her three brothers scour every inch of the city and, with Mama and Baba’s help, they find her. The dream could be real because Nour is loved as much as the boys in her family. Her mother always says so—her father too. Baba even said he thinks she is smarter than his sons, which is why he works extra hard to send her to school. She can become a teacher, nurse, or even a doctor. Baba believes his only daughter is clever enough to do anything.
Nour keeps her eyes squeezed shut and hangs on to the fading images until the door opens later that day and food arrives. Memories are the only things that make her feel safe.
Asima was taken in the morning. She will return the following day.
#
٩ / 9
The men thrive on force and use drugs to keep the girls compliant. White powder is mixed into the containers containing the runny, orange slop they call ful, but sometimes the men are lazy and don’t mix the powder enough, so it forms visible globs. Asima saw them do it the other day, which is why she slaps the beans from Nour’s hand and makes her wipe the residue on the wall behind them.
“Only eat bread and potatoes,” she cautions as her fingers trace the bruise blooming along her jaw. “And no soda, only water! They sometimes put drugs in the Coca-Cola too.”
Nour tries to find out what happened to her friend, but Asima ignores her and whispers about the ways order is kept, like fostering divisions and pitting girls against each other. In exchange, some are given extra food, clean clothes, or little luxuries like candy and accessories. A few girls have managed to escape by using seduction. “They make special arrangements,” a girl named Intisar says. Intisar is from Shubra and almost three years older than Nour. She joined them at the back of the room two days ago.
“Girls get extras if they offer their bodies and some do it because they think they’ll get cut loose,” Intisar explains as the trio cluster together on the mattress. It has happened before. The men know a girl won’t report them if she gets out. “There is too much shame in telling someone about this place. Besides, who would believe us?”
It doesn’t make sense. “What goes on? Why won’t you tell me?” Nour asks, impatiently. Intisar starts to reply but stops when Asima slaps her across the face and the three go silent. Asima considers the practicalities of a special arrangement while Nour rejects the idea; she doesn’t know how to seduce someone. She’s only had one boyfriend and they never kissed. Nour decides she would rather die in this cave, which is why she considers getting shot. The option seems preferable than engaging in unspeakable things. What happens when she gets out and has to live with the memories? Nour has enough material to haunt her for a lifetime. Ordinary noises that make her jump. Familiar food that makes her stomach turn. Commonplace items that come with connotations their creators probably never envisioned. Nour has been told of four other uses for Coca-Cola bottles aside from drinking.
Who wants to remember that? she thinks, biting her lip until she draws blood.
#
١٠ / 10
The man with the movie star face moves like a desert fox and is wrapped in a cloud of cologne. His smell warns the girls of his approach. He shines his light around the cave until it comes to rest on Nour’s mattress. She is curled up, nearly invisible, save for a cracked heel poking out. The man grabs her foot and pulls her into the middle of the room. He shouts for her to lift her abaya. She cowers, not wanting to show her body, but her hands tremble and lift the cotton anyhow.
Thwack! A collective gasp is heard as Nour gets her first taste of the cane. The rod cuts through the listlessness of the air before finding unblemished skin. The man yells she will get five lashes for planning to escape. Nour has Maysun to thank for the beating. The snout-nosed girl from Ezbet el-Haggana has been in the cave longer than anyone else, Asima’s guess is about thirty days. Thinner than the others, Maysun has chin-length hair and a singular brow. Most of the girls think she looks like an urban rat with her beady eyes and two square teeth poking out above her bottom lip, protruding in such a way one would think there wasn’t enough room for them in Maysun’s crooked mouth.
Lashes rain down as Nour cries out. Her appeal goes unheard as the man swings his arm back and the cane whistles through the air. Through her tears Nour sees Intisar hold Asima back. To her left, Maysun rocks back and forth on her heels—the girl smirks while chewing her knuckles.
Much later, after food has arrived, Asima quiets Nour’s whimpers by using dirty water to clean the blistering wounds. When the oozing finally stops Asima puts pieces of bread in Nour’s mouth and instructs her to chew. She also shares the tricks of how to breathe through pain and leave her body entirely.
She tells Nour of all the ways a girl can survive outside herself.
#
١١ / 11
The residue of powder is everywhere: All the food, even the bread, is laced with drugs. Nour learns quickly that hunger hurts more than the crack of the cane.
#
١٢ / 12
The next day, however, she learns of things that cause more distress than hunger, like the disgrace of being dragged out of the cave by one leg or the torment of spending hours with her face pressed against cold concrete.
The imam’s voice is an echo by the time Nour reaches the end of a long hallway. She watches as the man above her knocks on a nondescript grey door. When it opens Nour is thrust into a large room awash in light. This is where the men congregate. Warm and lived in, three crowd around a TV by the entrance and yell at uniformed figures racing across a green pitch. Nour is pushed past them to the back of the room where she is handed off to a fully veiled woman. The sight of the niqab is confusing. What is she doing? Why is she here? The woman sits at a table covered by bags of powder and stacks of money and smells of vinegar and myrrh. She looks Nour up and down, eyes darting within the rectangular opening of her face covering and, after a few seconds, dismisses the man standing behind Nour. Nour determines the room is in the shape of a ‘ن ’ when the woman takes her by the arm and leads her around a corner. The sound of the television fades as they shuffle past an old gas stove and another table filled with empty containers. Around another corner, against the back wall, there is a mattress across from a plastic bright blue basin. Above, a circular metal bar is affixed to the ceiling and from it hangs a white plastic curtain covered in yellow and green flowers.
“Get rid of the filth,” the woman says, instructing Nour to take off her dress and sponge herself down. “Some men have paid good money to see you and if you behave one might take you from here.”
Nour turns her back and starts to breathe heavily. Panic floods her chest as she removes the cloth covering her body. She pauses, considering how far she could make it if she runs, but the woman—who seems to read her mind—slaps her wounds with a hard, unyielding object. Not far, Nour thinks, stepping into the basin and squatting until her thighs touch the water. Using a small, floating bar of soap, Nour splashes her face and arms. She scrubs her skin and hair until layers of dirt lift and the water turns grey. She towels off and reaches for her dress, but the woman snatches it and instead holds out a piece of gum with a red sun on the wrapper. Nour takes it and sniffs. Cherry. The one flavour she hates.
“Good girl,” the woman says, her voice made rough by the fabric covering her face. She steers Nour to the mattress and says, “Wait here while I get your first visitor.” Pedaling back, she raises a gloved hand and motions to someone unseen.
Following a brief moment of possibility, come all the things Nour would rather forget such as the pain of being crushed and stretched, or the savage manner in which men dive into her, the second in particular, so heavy she fights to breathe. As old as her Baba, this man is uglier, his skin is mottled and broken. By the time the third visitor arrives Nour aches so much she can’t stop crying. Her tears distress the slender man who claims to have paid three hundred pounds for half an hour. He tells Nour he will go if she touches him with her hands, so she holds them out and keeps her eyes closed until he finally leaves.
When it is over she takes a breath and thinks about her friends. It was better in the cave. But a fourth man arrives and Nour learns of the kind of fear men instill when high on hash and drunk on power. This one uses his meaty palms to cover her face as a form of erasure. After he leaves Nour notices every time she reaches her hands out they return immediately to her body.
Only hours later does she understand how the rupturing of old wounds is worse than not having enough to eat. What Intisar once said makes sense—the stories about the honor behind the ritual to become a woman were nothing but lies. Having her most intimate parts cut away does not make her pure and does little to keep her safe. The procedure all the local girls do in the name of tradition do not stop a man from taking what he thinks he is owed. This last truth hurts most, which is why Nour thinks of Asima as the final man slams into her—her cheek rubbing against concrete. There, Nour practices escaping, disappearing until she is lost and feels absolutely nothing.
#
١ ٤/ 14
Asima holds Nour and the slow rock—back and forth, back and forth—lulls the latter into a fitful, sporadic sleep. It is only when the wounds start to develop a skin of their own that Nour returns. Asima’s long fingers gently untangle her hair; dark strands that resemble rivers of ink.
“What do you think of when you leave?” Nour winces as Asima’s fingernail scrapes a sore on her scalp.
Asima is quiet for a long time before replying. “Depends,” she says, “sometimes a song I like or those sugared coffees you can get for 50 piasters with the pillows of milk on top. A lot of time I don’t think at all.”
“What about your family?”
“Them?” Asima scoffs. “Never. Sometimes I think of my little sister, but then stop because it makes me sad. How do I keep her safe from this?”
Nour closes her eyes and whispers, “I think about my family all the time.”
“Well habibti,” Asima says, unraveling a knot at the nape of Nour’s neck, “we aren’t all lucky to have a family like yours. My uncle gave me up for a thousand pounds the first time so I don’t trust anyone. Family especially.”
#
١٥ / 15
Nour and Asima share their padded refuge with Intisar and Hayat, a new arrival from Bulaq. Asima says it is safer to be bunched together, like bananas, instead of spread out across the room. The girls wear their abayas and share thin sheets between them, fabric sometimes sporting holes so big their arms and legs poke through. Asima eats a mushy potato and looks at the marks Nour has etched on the wall next to the mattress.
“That is torture,” she says.
“It helps me not go crazy,” Nour replies while a voice in her head screams, Fifteen days! She pulls her hand back sharply.
Half a month has passed. It feels like a lifetime.
#
١٨/ 18
Seven new girls are added. Five are subtracted. The children are no longer with them. There are twenty-four girls and one woman. Maysun—who disappeared for a few days—returns, wearing a pink sweater over her abaya. Her heavily bruised hand clutches a small bag of candy.
Nour ignores the newcomers while listening to Asima tell her story for Intisar and Hayat; the one where her mother sent her to buy rice and a cousin offered to drive. The girls talk and eat and, following that, huddle on the mattress and try to sleep. Nour hasn’t slept for days. None of them have. Instead, she lies on her back and gazes at the ceiling. Maybe if she stares for long enough she can find fissures for them to slip through and escape this hell together.
#
١٩ / 19
Nour wakes to the sound of Asima hissing but the warning comes too late—she is hauled towards the exit on her belly, ribs cracking as her body thump, thump, thumps over the threshold. On the other side of the door she curls into a ball and catches her breath. Looking up, Nour sees the man with the movie star face pushing the long metal bar into place. He instructs the other men to go ahead.
Only when the tread of boots have faded does the man look down. He smells different today, his cologne is sweet, less aggressive. Nour feels all her muscles tense as he lifts her to her feet and places his hand, gently, on her shoulder, speaking softly as they walk down the corridor. “You have another chance,” he says, sucking air between his teeth. “Three nice guys have paid to see you today and if you’re good, ya gameela, one will pay more and take you from here.”
As they approach the room at end of the hall Nour is aware of details she missed before, like the track of lights on the walls, the rumbling of engines overhead, and the faint honk, honk, honk of traffic. Nour’s sudden closeness to the outside world makes her slow her step and savour the moment. She only takes leave when she is in the basin at the back of the brightly lit room.
By the time the first man arrives Nour is already long gone.
#
٢١ / 21
Prayer is better than sleep. The imam’s voice echoes as Asima is taken away again. Nour bites her nails until she reaches skin because she started to use them to scratch at her face. Hayat tries to provide comfort, but she is scared like the others. At one point, Nour brings up the idea of taking the men’s weapons or using the drugs against them. Intisar rolls her eyes and tells her to shut up because her plan is full of holes.
When the door opens that evening Nour’s heart thuds against her chest. She keeps her head above the sheet as containers of food are pitched forward and, to everyone’s surprise, Asima is pushed in after. The ensuing commotion allows Nour to rush over and put her arms around her friend’s shoulders. She guides her to the back of the room while Intisar and Hayat fight for the day’s meal.
Nour caresses Asima’s back. Intisar rations out potatoes. Hayat washes away the blood from wounds that cause so much pain Nour tells Asima to stay away for as long as needed. She can return when the time is right but, for now, the safest place is one that cannot be accessed from the outside.
#
٢٥ / 25
Nour completes the last line. The gash on her index finger bleeds.
#
٢٧ / 27
Nour’s pain originates from behind her breastbone to spread across her chest. She feels hot and her skin is damp. The others aren’t sure what is happening, but Hayat knows because her auntie is a nurse. She approaches a lanky girl across the room and trades a bottle of Coca-Cola and shiny barrette for two paracetamols. Hayat crushes the medicine and gives it to Nour before trying to bring the fever down by placing a wet sheet on Nour’s forehead.
Asima is also having trouble. She is sick in a bad way. The lacerations will not close and she’s been throwing up for days. She complains of a soreness all over, her breasts and abdomen in particular.
Everyone knows what Asima’s problem is. Asima included.
#
٢٨ / 28
Afaf is beautiful—they see it and Afaf knows it. Her eyes are bright and her hair gleams as if slathered with almond oil. She’s a flash of colour in this cavernous gloaming. A flower in a desert oasis, Afaf has an innocence the rest lack. Her purity makes the other girls bristle.
Maysun shouts at the new arrival from her pile of fabric, saying things that would make any mother wash her mouth out with soap. But while everyone hates Maysun because she is cruel, no one says a word because they hate Afaf more. Everyone is envious of the most beautiful girl in the room.
Afaf shuffles to the other side of the makeshift toilet where she begins a slow wilt until she hits the floor. Nour rocks on her tailbone and thinks about offering Afaf the piece of hardened bread tucked under the mattress, but as she reaches for it Asima’s fingers wrap around her upper arm.
“No,” she says. “You don’t want to mess with that.”
Why not? Nour slumps against the wall. “Look at her,” Nour says. “She is like us! Look at her weep.”
Afaf’s hands hide her face as a stream of tears slip through her delicate fingers, glistening in the darkness. Even her distress is beautiful. Nour feels the return of her heart’s ache.
“You can’t help her,” Asima looks down. “She’ll be gone by tomorrow. Beauty like that always fetches a good price.”
Nour’s bottom lip trembles as Asima squeezes her arm. “I know,” she says, “isn’t it sad when even beauty cannot save you? Nothing stays pure in a place like this.”
#
٣٠ / 30
Afaf is taken and another girl is thrown into the room. This one has sallow skin, cropped brown hair, and rings of kohl smeared around pale eyes. She is rabid. Undomesticated. Her febrile yelps echo as she stares groggily at the roof. Feral, this girl has the look of one who has lived underground for too long.
Nour takes a step but is intercepted by Maysun who scuttles across the room to grab a fistful of Nour’s hair. “What are you doing?” she hisses. The breath hitting Nour’s face is rancid like soured milk.
“Keda kifaya! Enough! I’m helping because she’s hurt.”
“Of course she’s hurt. She’s sharmota!” Maysun is so close Nour can see the throbbing cyst on her chin. Nour has the sudden urge to reach out and shake Maysun until her brains come loose. They are all whores down here.
“Leave me,” Nour says as she kneels next to the young woman.
“So foolish!” Maysun seethes. “Always trying to help. Desperate to be liked. Behiima! How have you not figured out, Imbaba girl, we are probably a few blocks from your home? Why haven’t your friends told you how close your family are?”
There is a stirring behind them. Asima growls. Intisar shouts. Nour stands and turns her head towards Maysun. “What did you say?” she asks.
“You heard me, bint-el sharmota,” Maysun laughs. “Our cave is in Imbaba.”
“Tozza feek, kaddaab!” Asima shouts as she hurls herself across the room. She swings her arms and tells Maysun to screw herself, her bitterness is poisoning them all. While Asima delivers enough blows to take the breath from Maysun’s mouth, pieces of the puzzle fall into place for Nour. Pressing her body to the wall, she propels the back of her head against exposed rock trying to jangle the words from between her ears. Done with Maysun, Asima pulls Nour towards their mattress and tries to calm her with no luck. It is only when the sheet flutters over their bodies that Nour issues a howl the others feel ricocheting deep within their chests.
#
٣١ / 31
“I am close to home? The cave is in Imbaba?” Nour’s muttering is so constant it turns into an invocation. A poor girl’s chant.
“Yes,” Asima says, cradling Nour’s head. She has held onto the delicate dome for a day, trying to push a few breadcrumbs past her friend’s broken lips.
I am close to home? I am close to home. “You knew,” Nour says.
Asima looks at the ceiling and nods. She opens and closes her mouth.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“What for? So you could beat your head against the wall until you die?”
“I trusted you,” Nour says. “You could have told me.”
Asima shrugs, “I did what I thought was best. We are looking out for you.”
“Shut up,” Nour sniffles, turning her back on Asima. She stares at the wall and bites the inside of her cheek until pieces break free. Only when the taste of blood becomes too much does Nour close her eyes. She does not sleep.
#
٣٢ / 32
Nour hasn’t eaten for days. Asima and the others pile food and water in front of her, waiting for their Imbaba girl to snap out of her stupor. Asima offers her half of the sheet to Nour, but absolution will take time now that she has fled to the deepest parts of her mind. Physically present but mentally absent, Nour is not in the cave. She is at the Iftar table where the members of her family are seated. They crowd around bowls of food. Her brother laughs. An uncle prays. They load up their plates and break the fast. Together, Nour and her family put their hunger to rest.
The feeling of Asima’s arm jars her awake. Nour tries to twist away but Asima holds on. The two struggle until Nour gives up. Exhausted, she collapses against her friend’s bony frame, wanting to cry but there is nothing left. Nour is all dried up.
#
٣٣ / 33
The day is spent praying, reaching for something good. Nour starts by telling God she is grateful for Asima. She loves her the way she would a saviour, blindly and with desperation. She loves Asima despite hating her for the lies. Deep down, Nour suspects many things can be forgiven. Her friend tried to protect her, even if she failed. The attempt alone makes Nour think they will, together, weather this storm—the first of many since life is nothing but a litany of squalls and bad weather.
#
٣٤ / 34
The door opens before the evening prayer, causing a frantic rush of bodies around room. Girls seek cover wherever they can. Two men head straight for the mattress next to the toilet. A beam of light passes over blanketed bodies. “Where is Asima?” The man with the lazy eye shouts, trying to sound mean. “She needs to come with us. We will hurt her if she resists.”
Under the sheet Asima’s breath is warm on Nour’s face. She holds her friend’s hand and squeezes. “I have a plan, please trust me.” These are Asima’s last words to Nour before she lets go and slithers from underneath the cover. The man with the lazy eye reaches for her, but Asima slaps him away. She stands and pats down the front of her rags.
“Ma’a nafsee. Lead the way,” she gestures towards the door.
Two of the men are so surprised by the insubordination they wait, but the third surges forward, grabbing Asima by the hair and yanking her towards the exit. Eyes widen as their protector stumbles through the doorway and into the dimly lit hallway. The collective breath is released when the hinges squeak, the door closing with a soft thud.
#
٣٥ / 35
Nour looks at the imprint Asima left behind on the mattress and turns to the wall to add another line.
An old cut on her finger opens again. The pain feels good.
#
٣٧ / 37
Movie Star Man is the first to enter. His jeans are ripped at the knees and red t-shirt has DON’T PANIC scrawled across the front. The scowl on his face eclipses his handsomeness, making him look ugly. A dressing of metal on his knuckles glints in the subterranean twilight.
Maysun doesn’t respond when called for, but he finds her and pulls her into the middle of the room. There, Movie Star Man beats her so hard one eye swells shut and a tooth flies out of her mouth. When she stops moving he takes a cloth from the pocket of his jeans and wipes his hand. Before heading for the door he spins on his heel to deliver a final kick to the ribs. On his way out, he tells the other men to clean up his mess. The shorter of the two closes his mouth and backs towards the exit while the taller one goes over to Maysun and takes ahold of her limp arms. The door closes behind them.
It is the last the girls will see of their cave rat and Nour knows compassion is the appropriate response for such a brutal departure. But she is momentarily confused when she feels relief spread across her chest. With her nails digging into her temples and lips stretched into a smile she looks around the room to see the grin mirrored back. At that point Nour stops reaching for compassion. Clearly, Maysun won’t be missed.
#
٣٩ / 39
Nour resigns herself to the following: She is no one. A (no)body. She is an every-other-girl from one of Cairo’s poorest neighbourhoods and will be stuck underground until some man pays the right price or she finds a way out.
Every day she prays for death and every day those prayers go unanswered. She feigns a smile in the other room, washing her arms and whispering the lyrics of the Myam song she loves. Nour does her best to be good, but it isn’t enough. The traitor woman rushes over after the last man leaves.
“Stupid girl! They paid half because you cried!” The woman’s shouts grow louder with every slap that connects with Nour’s face.
Nour returns to the cave the same day, ashamed for multiple reasons. But the main one being she is horrible at pretending. Of little value to anyone, Nour finally gets it—she isn’t worth a thing.
#
٤٢ / 42
Hayat goes limp when she is dragged through the door. Intisar tells Nour someone in Hayat’s family gave her up for fifteen hundred pounds. If she is bought to be a bride the people who run the cave will earn six times that much for a girl her age.
By the time the food comes Intisar has broken the skin of her wrist with a splintered piece of broken chair. Nour wrestles the wood from her, tossing it down the toilet hole and wrapping Intisar’s superficial slashes with strips of cloth. She then turns her attention to the food she managed to secure, giving a bit of everything to Intisar before eating as much beans as her stomach can hold. The white powder is visible but she stuffs the mess in her mouth anyhow. It is time to vanish as quickly as possible from this good-for-nothing place.
#
٤٤ / 44
It might be evening. The girls can’t be sure. They haven’t heard the call to prayer. None of the men have come since the day Hayat was taken. No longer fearful of a beating, Intisar bangs her fists on the door and yells until she loses her voice. A few others stand beside her and do the same. The sudden absence of the men has made everyone uncomfortable. They were used to the routine. Hungry for food and desperate for water, some shake in the corner while others have already passed out. Of all the ways to leave this cave Nour never contemplated she would starve. What a horrible way to die. She gets up and walks over to the exit and stands next to Intisar, slamming the metal with the palm of her hand until her skin turns red and bones start to ache. Only when her arms tire does Nour let out a scream that originates from deep in her belly. Bereft and arcane, it goes on, and on, and on until she runs out of breath and turns to find everyone staring—eyes full of fear at what has been unleashed. Nour lowers her hands and shuffles over to her corner to brush off a potato hidden in the mattress. She holds out half to Intisar and chews on the rest.
#
٤٥ / 45
Tap, tap, tap, is the sound. It is followed by the patter of feet and slow scrape of metal. The door opens and beams of light flicker around the room. Matronly murmurings are heard as a cluster of women in long dresses enter the cave and disperse. There are five, ten, or maybe more. The women whisper urgently to each other as they fan out. There is agency in their voices.
“What is your name?” The woman approaching the corner has an accent that is warm and familiar. She reaches out to the two bodies on a dirty mattress. “I am Marwa,” she says. Nour pokes her head out from under the sheet. The room is filled with so much light she thinks has died. Maybe she is on her way to heaven right now.
“Heaven?” Marwa chuckles sadly. “No, you’re alive. We have flashlights because we had no idea how many of you we would find.”
Marwa helps the girls sit upright and places clean blankets over their shoulders. She brushes the hair from Intisar’s face and asks, “Are you Nour?” Intisar shakes her head and points. “That is Nour,” she mumbles. Another woman rushes over to Intisar while Marwa reaches for Nour. Womanly flesh wraps embraces an adolescent body. Nour flinches as Marwa uses her weight to pull Nour up and guide her towards the door. “I am from Imbaba, like you,” Marwa says as she takes Nour to the end of the long hallway where a large black door is propped open. “You are safe,” she whispers, helping Nour over another threshold.
They step outside and sunlight bounces off everything into Nour’s eyes. She squints and looks around, noticing the wall of concrete running over their heads. The blast of horns is deafening. Black puffs of exhaust float horizontally in the sky before turning grey and merging with cloud cover. Policemen in white uniforms race between a patrol van and ambulance. Two women with bejeweled abayas enter the cave holding a stretcher between them. A young doctor leans over a girl and examines the gash on her face. When Nour looks at Marwa she notices the hijab she wears has the same trim as her mother’s.
“I work at a place that…” Marwa stops to help Nour into the large passenger van idling under the overpass, “well, we follow tips and, thankfully, it did not take long to find you.”
Nour tries to unclench her fists as Marwa uses a wet cloth to wipe the grime from her face. “I know you are tired and hungry, and—” the older woman’s voice falters, “but we have to take you to the station so you can tell us what happened. Don’t worry though, I won’t leave you. We are here to keep you safe.”
Help? Worried? Nour looks out the window and digs her nails into her palms. She has experienced everything. There is nothing left to fear.
Marwa explains that after the station they will be taken somewhere to rest. “You will stay with us, ya gameela, until we reach your Mama and Baba. I have a list of parents who look for their girls and yours might be on it.”
Tears begin to stream down Nour’s face. She hasn’t thought about her parents, brothers, or friends for ages. “Asima,” she whispers. Nour wonders about the girl who is probably lost to her forever.
“Asima?” Marwa pats Nour’s hand. “Ya gameela, she waits for you with clothes and a toothbrush. She came to our office after escaping from the man who bought her. Asima told us exactly where we could find you.”
It seems impossible but Nour’s mood shifts slightly. She leans her head against the window and tears skirt the corners of her mouth, bitter. She wipes them away while watching the abundance of grace women in motion have. When she tries to bite the inside of her cheek she stops before teeth cut flesh. Instead, she pictures Asima on the outside. Are we ruined? How will we live? Who will love us? The questions disperse when Intisar takes Nour’s hand and whispers something only she can hear. The two lean their heads towards each other as the wheels of the van turn. Nour clasps her hand’s friend tightly to stop the shockwaves of remembrance from returning. Intisar puts an arm around the younger girl and holds on since both their lives depend on it.
When they pull up to the station Asima stands on the front steps with others. Weeping parents. Weeping sisters. Brothers who weep currents of rage from behind their eyes. Nour follows Intisar and thinks they might find a way to reassemble the pieces. Everything looks different in the light. Brighter. Softer. Asima wears skinny jeans, a long-sleeved shirt, and orange hijab with white spirals. She looks like a girl Nour once knew. Shifting her weight from one foot to the other, Asima smiles nervously at the girls climbing the stairs to the station. In her hand, she clutches a denim bag filled with soap, trinkets, and clothes in just the right sizes.
Intisar is the first to hug Asima. Arms wrap around bodies as whispers turn into cries. Nour gives them space, wiping her tears while pressing her arms against her chest. She is about to take a seat on the stairs, tired, when she feels a familiar touch on her shoulder. “I don’t make promises I can’t keep,” Asima says, reaching for Nour and pulling her into their embrace.
Former athlete and relapsed student, Kolena Jones Kayembe is a Caribbean-Canadian writer, editor, and photographer. Forever on the move—from the Americas to Europe, Asia, Middle East and Africa—she is currently based in Paris, France, where she reads too much about existentialism and tries to find a sustainable work/life balance in an increasingly remote and fast-changing world. Her writing and photography have appeared in The Meadow (forthcoming), The/tƐmz/Review, Spellbinder Magazine, Typishly, Kunstraum Retz, and Art Forum.