Cockroach (21 page)

Sylvie talked to Reza in her broken English with a heavy French accent,
apologizing for her poor pronunciation. Reza smiled, assuring her that her English was
perfect. He even laid his palm on her arm to reassure her. Their bodies moved closer and
Sylvie asked him to play again, and he did. She told him that she loved his music, and
that she would introduce him to a composer she had worked with on her own recording. She
was very impressed when he told her that the instrument he played was a few hundred
years old, that it was handed down from master to student. And that the seventy-two
strings stood for the grandson of the Muslim prophet who was killed in battle with his
entourage of seventy-two. Reza gave Sylvie the history of the instrument, and she was so
intrigued that she asked him if she could touch it. He politely told her that he would
rather not allow it, apologizing repeatedly.

Ah,
je comprends, je comprends
, she replied, I understand
ça doit être tellement délicat
.

Spirituel
, I shouted from the kitchen, like a salesman closing
the deal.

Ah, oui, spirituel. Mais, bien sûr, spirituel
.
Comment
j'ai pas pensé à ça?
Then Sylvie sat at the piano. As
always, her long, silky robe dangled behind her, falling from the chair and touching the
stage like an opera curtain. She played some of her own music for us, and her dramatic
facial expressions made me
sick. I remembered why I had felt I had
to leave her and her lucrative
la gang
. But Reza stood beside the piano with a
baby smile on his face, checking out the rich surroundings just like I had once upon a
time. As her notes filled the space I went back to the kitchen, opened the fridge,
pulled out goat cheese, ham, pâté, lettuce, tomatoes, olives, mustard, and
mayonnaise, and made myself a duplex of a sandwich. Sylvie's cat rubbed its
whiskers against my feet. I hate pets. I have nightmares about them chasing me, leading
me down sewers, into deep gutters, sticking me with their claws and flashing their fangs
behind me. Creatures like this only have respect for what is above them.

When I was on my last bite, Sylvie stood in the kitchen doorway. I see you
found your way to the food as usual, she said. Eat what you want, but do not steal
anything today, please. Your friend looks decent. Do not embarrass him.

Maybe I should be going, I said, still chewing.

Reza didn't want to leave; he gave me a “wait a little”
wink. But Sylvie said she had an engagement and that settled it. On the way down the
stairs Reza gave me the thumbs-up. We passed the entrance to the building but continued
down the stairs, all the way to the laundry room. Reza poured the contents of a
minuscule plastic bag onto the laundry counter and cut the powder with his bank card,
and we both sucked it up like two loose vacuum cleaners. When we were warm, dry, and
fluffy, we went back upstairs and walked the streets without feeling fear or the cold. A
kind of grandiose assurance came over me and I felt confident and energetic.

Here is the deal, I said.

What deal? The deal is done. The deal is up your
nose, man.

The deal has just started. You will make good with her friends. They
don't trust me anymore, but you they will trust. You are in. You have skills, you
can perform, you do art. You naturally belong with the corrupt rulers, my friend. It
must be because you come from a long line of Persian rulers. Six thousand years of
civilization is finally paying off.

So, how did you belong? You have nothing to offer, no culture, no shit
whatsoever. He laughed.

Do not be so sure about the latter, O grand heir of Xerxes. But okay.
Listen. Let's cut the shit. They are loaded. I bluffed my way. You know, I was
l'aventurier
. I gave them a sense of the real.

Real? You! Reza laughed.

The fuckable, exotic, dangerous foreigner, I said. Play it right and they
will toss you from one party to another. I want a cut.

What cut?

I will get you the shit from Big Derrick. You just tell them it is the
real stuff. Those guys will snort anything. And we will split the difference. You
won't forget your friend who is walking beside you. I know you won't.

How do you know that?

Because. Just like I put you in, I can pull you back out.

Pretty confident, aren't you? Let's see what happens
first.

Things will happen, I said. They will.

We separated and I walked back home. As I climbed the stairs to my
apartment, I felt the landings getting longer. And when I passed by the windows on the
landings, I went faster
and faster. The wells of light looked like
water that could drench my hair, gush over my shoulder, fall like mop-water out of
buckets thrown from balconies by housewives in sunny places, with permanent cigarettes
on their lips and aimless twitching eyes. Now I ran up the stairs, looking for my keys,
but could not find them. Cursing Reza, I accused him of stealing my keys. Frantic, I
took off my jacket and searched it. Then I took off my shoes, my pants, and dug my hands
through many pockets. I found the keys at last and somehow managed to open my door. I
went inside the apartment and quickly reached for the curtains on the windows and closed
them. I had inexplicable energy. I wanted everything to cease moving, but at the same
time I knew that nothing was really moving. I went to the kitchen and frantically banged
my shoes on the counter, whether the creatures were there or not. I hit my shoes against
the sink, the dishes, the fridge. Then I climbed onto the counter and hit the walls,
chasing creatures and slapping them flat. I could see myself doing this as if I were
someone else's double and could predict every future move. Everything happened
within time lapses. And just when I was about to kill a few more creatures, I heard a
voice whispering to me: Manipulative, good-for-nothing murderer.

Before it could continue, I scrambled to the floor, lifted my slippers in
the air, and said, Stop your insults or I might just slap your face.

Anger, hmmm. I never thought you would act on it again, the voice
said.

And when I looked behind me, I saw the gigantic striped
albino cockroach standing on two of its feet, leaning against the kitchen door. It
had grown to my size — even bigger, if you were to measure its antennae that
touched the ceiling. It had a long thin face, curved like a hunched back, and as it
spoke two of its small hands continuously rubbed against each other. Let's see you
pounding with your slippers now, it said. Not feeling too big anymore, heh?

I was suddenly convinced that the Last Day the two Jehovah's Witness
ladies had told me about had come to pass, and that all the good people had been zipped
up to heaven. Only the likes of me had been left to face the creatures, the future
rulers of the earth. Judgment Day seems so informal, even personal, I thought. I had
always thought there would be collective punishment, an endless line of exhausted people
pulling on ropes under the whips of half-naked, leather-bound foremen and slave-drivers.
But this seems more personal. A representative of the future ruling race is actually
here to escort me.

So, the world finally came to an end, I said to the striped beast.

But
mon cher
. The slimy creature at my door leaned its head
sideways. The world ended for you a long time ago. You never participated in it. Look at
you, always escaping, slipping, and feeling trapped in everything you do.

It is not escape, I said. I refuse to be a subordinate. It is my voluntary
decision.

Yes, yes, the creature said impatiently. Because in your deep arrogance
you believe that you belong to something better and higher. You are what I call a
vulture, living on the periphery
of the kill. Waiting for the kill,
but never having the courage to do it yourself.

And what is a cockroach like you to judge? I replied, waving my shoe in
his face. Hiding and nibbling on bits and pieces, on crumbs, I shot back at him.
I'm not intimidated by your size or your horrific looks.

Yes, we are ugly, but we always know where we are going. We have a
project.

An evil, oppressive one, if I may add! I shouted.

A change. A project to change this world, the creature corrected me, and
waved his whiskers.

And to subordinate and kill all those who do not conform to your
project.

Kill? Did I hear you say kill? Dear child, let's not be judgmental
here. Let's not open wounds and recite the past. I have known you since your
childhood. I even bit you once. Ah, I am sure you remember that day back home. Imagine:
a barefoot child, gliding on those dirty tiles, in a hurry to go outside and play.
Without socks, and in a childish hurry, you slipped your little toes inside your little
shoes and something soft and tender fretting in there bit you. That was me. When you hid
in your mother's closet I was also there, and when you stole candy from the store
I was there, and when you collected bullets, and when you followed Abou-Roro down to the
place of the massacre and watched him pull golden teeth from cadavers, I was there.

No, you were not! I threw my slipper at the creature's face. Soles
will make you shiver, insect! Ha ha ha, no matter how big you get you will always crawl,
insect, crawl! I screamed at
the monster. I, at least, have no fear
of stomping soles, of the sound of earth when it rattles under marching men's
boots. I, at least, have the courage to refuse, to confront.

And kill? the insect interrupted me. You are one of us. You are part
cockroach. But the worst part of it is that you are also human. Look at you how you
strive to be worshipped by women, like those jealous, vain gods. Now go and be human,
but remember you are always welcome. You know how to find us. Just keep your eyes on
what is going on down in the underground.

WHEN I TOLD
the therapist about my encounter with the giant cockroach, she was quiet for a moment, and then asked me to tell her more.

It was a big cockroach. And we had a conversation, I repeated.

What did you talk about?

Me.

What about you?

He said that I am part cockroach, part human.

Genevieve was quiet again. She looked me in the eyes. Do you feel part cockroach?

I don't know, but I do not feel fully human.

What does it mean to be human?

I'm not sure. Maybe being human is being trapped.

To be an insect is to be free, then?

In a sense. Maybe.

Tell me how.

You are more invisible.

To whom, to what?

To everything, to the light.

How long ago did this happen?

What?

The encounter with the cockroach.

Five days ago. On Saturday.

And since that time, what happened? Did it visit you again? Or did anything else appear to you?

No. Nothing happened. Or everything happened as usual. I went to work the next day, everything was normal.

Did you take something that day you saw the cockroach?

Like what?

Like drugs.

I kept my silence.

If you still do drugs, I can't help you, Genevieve said. But I am glad you shared that with me. It could be a reaction to something you took. If this happens more often, and especially when you are not on drugs — because you will not take drugs again, right? — you will tell me, right? I won't ask more questions now, but you are lucky that you got out of the hallucination. Some people never recover from episodes. Drugs are usually not the only cause of hallucinations, but in your case they make you more vulnerable. What are we going to do about it?

About what?

About taking drugs! Genevieve's voice became higher and she looked more irritated, more disappointed. I am here to assess your situation, she said, and to monitor your progress. Yes, I am here to help you, but you know what? In the end I am an employee of the government. People are paying taxes for you to be here. Do you understand my responsibilities? I really want to help, but you have to meet me halfway.

Somehow, despite her anger, I was waiting for her to touch my arm as she sometimes had in the past. But with time she had become more cautious. She could tell that I wanted to bring her hand into my lap, to hold on to her fingers. I hate to admit it, but the big roach knows me well. I want to be worshipped and admired.

THE NEXT DAY
at noon, a soft, light cascade of snow fell. I could see it through my window. It was the kind of wet snow that hits the glass and immediately turns to water. I opened the window, stuck my hand outside, touched the outer side of the glass, and waited until a falling flake hit my open palm. I pulled back my hand, closed the window, and licked the drop in my palm. I had always wanted to capture one of those flakes before it settled and took over the ground, the cars, and the city roofs. Little creatures that seem insignificant and small are murderous in their sheer vast numbers, their conformity, their repetitiveness, their steady army-like movements, their soundless invasions. They terrify me.

My grandmother told me about the famine days, when zillions of grasshoppers came and invaded the countryside and ate all the grain, all the fruit, all the vegetables. Her family survived only because they had a few chickens and they dug up roots. But the famine took the lives of half the population, and then the Turkish army came and confiscated the stores of grain and food. There was a boy, she remembered, who was her own age and who came every day and asked my grandmother's mother for food. All he said was, Aunty, I am
hungry. But her mother chased him away. And then my grandmother chased him away. And then one day he didn't show up. My grandmother cried as she told this story. She watched those insects settle like clouds on fields and turn them bare and plain. I see people that way, I see snow that way, I see wind, cars, the words that fly from people's teeth, the white dust that I channel through my nostrils, the flowing water that way. Everything is made of little particles that gather in groups and invade. All nature gathers and invades.