Henna House (31 page)

“Nu,” she said, “Sister-whoever-you-are, let me do it with you.” She held onto me like a little monkey.

I smiled. “You want to write with me?”

She shrugged. “Let me do it with you,” she repeated.

I thought for a moment and then I wrote
,
aleph
. Her hand fast on my own. Then
samech
,
, and
peh
,
. I let the stick rest between my legs. She was squatting by our letters, and now rocked back and forth on her heels.

“What is your name?”

“Esther.”

“Pretty name for a pretty girl. Would you like to see your name? Yes? Come here, darling; put your hand back on mine. That's right.” Together we wrote her name,
, and then I drew a little crown over it. “Like Queen Esther, you too may wear a crown.” She squealed with delight and called to her sisters. Soon I had written the names of four little girls in the earth, and one by one they had put their hands over mine, helping me form the letters. Over in the culvert, the voices of the men gliding up and down the liturgy reached us in an emphatic crescendo. A tall woman with heavy-lidded turtle eyes came over and clucked for her daughter—little Esther, who had started me on my naming game. The girl went to her mother and then disappeared behind her.

“What is it? What are you doing?” The woman squatted down by the scribbled harvest of names.

“Just showing the girls how to write their names.”

“Eh?”

“Just their names, nothing more. See, there it is,
Esther
.” I pointed to the first name, the one with the crown. The woman squinted, puffed out her cheeks, then thrust her tongue through a blank spot in her teeth. She made a tsking sound. My heart fluttered, for she looked angry, and I knew that my mother would chastise me for making trouble with strangers we met on the road. But then I remembered—with the shock of the newly bereft—that my mother was dead and would never chastise me again. I suffered a terrible pang at this knowledge, for in the strange way that a captive will grow to love her captor, I would miss my mother's constant rages and disapproval. I looked over to where our men were praying with their men. I was sure that the Habbani men had learned to
read as little boys. But these women and girls were as ignorant as I had been before the other Damaris came to Qaraah. Had I overstepped? The woman's face warmed in a broad, openmouthed smile. She pointed to her own chest, thumping the red, yellow, and green embroidery under her many necklaces.

“Rosa,” she said, “my name is Rosa.” She put out her thin callused hand, encased in an ornate sarcophagus of rings and bracelets. She clutched onto mine, over the stick. I was startled. “Rosa,” she repeated. “I am Rosa.”

She wanted a lesson too.

“And I am Adela,” I said. “Here; I will show you how to write your name.” I formed the
resh
and
vav
then
zayin
and
heh
, and when I was finished, I added a little flower next to it. All the while she held onto me like a rag doll—slack-wristed—so that I could move for the two of us without any resistance. Rosa called to one of her sister-wives, a younger woman with a high forehead, a nose like an upside-down arrow, long lashes atop piercing eyes, and a birthmark on her chin. Her name was Hemda, and I wrote her name too. Hemda called to her daughters, four leggy girls who looked like miniature versions of their mother.

Hani came to see what I was doing. As soon as she understood the “lesson,” she picked up a stick and began to write, just as I was writing, with an extra hand atop her own.

“So we have a school?” Hani asked, smiling and squatting behind the smallest girl, a little jewel with green eyes who had a zigzag scar on one cheek. “How wonderful. The School of the Road we can call it. The School of the Road for Girls.” She took the hand of the little girl with green eyes, closing her own fingers over the child's little beringed fingers. “Like this, baby,” she cooed. “You write the
tet
from the top left to the top right, not the other way around.” I looked at them together, the little Habbani girl and Hani. Hani had her mother's coffee-bronze Indian skin. The Habbani girl was much darker and finer boned. Hani was round and soft, and her hair had golden glints in it. The Habbani girl's hair was obsidian black—braids oiled and gleaming. Hani was curled over the child, her own necklace—a single wrought amulet box—gently touching the back of the child's head. They looked like two mismatched species, as if a lioness had adopted the cub of a mountain panther. By the time we finished, we had written the names of at least ten women and girls in the sand. Each girl guarded her own
name. Some picked up their own sticks and began to copy the shapes of the letters. Two little girls got in a fight because one accidentally stepped on the other's name. The mothers also picked up sticks. Hani and I walked among them, correcting and complimenting their efforts.

*  *  *

The next day I was at the water's edge. We women had bathed, and now I was dipping my feet. The Habbanim all went barefoot, and I was enjoying the break from my sandals, which had been cutting into my heels.

“Sister-whoever-you-are?”

I felt a tug on my dress. It was little Esther.