Woman Who Fell From the Sky - Jennifer Steil [156]
THE NEXT DAY, Thursday, August 30, is my last day of work. Tears stay close to the surface all day; I can barely hold myself together. Noor rings me in the morning to ensure that I am coming in and can edit her interview. I had stayed late at work the night before to edit Najma’s last piece before the party. She had sent me an emotional e-mail. “Please Jennifer, edit this yourself and make it a beautiful shape for me, don’t give it to anyone else to edit.” I honor their last wishes.
As a parting gift, I write recommendations for every single one of my staff members. I rather enjoy doing this, not just to help them, but to remind myself of just how far each one of them has come this year. Farouq now writes in English. Najma, who was unable to keep personal emotions out of her health stories and who had no idea how to incorporate studies into a real story, now is a capable health and science writer. Radia, who was a receptionist when I came, is now a novice reporter.
Noor and Najma come into my office together at the end of the day to say good-bye and to present me with a Yemeni purse woven from goat hair. None of us can speak for the tears. They just hug me, look at me with damp eyes, and hurry away. Even Jabr has to blink back tears as he shakes my hand good-bye. I am glad Zuhra has already left. I could not have handled all of the good-byes at once.
ZUHRA CAME INTO MY OFFICE the day before and stood uncommonly still in front of my desk. “I am going to say good-bye now.”
I stopped slicing the skin of the pomegranate on my desk and put down the knife on an old copy of the paper. Pomegranates were taking over my life. I couldn’t go a day without them. I thought about Persephone and how eating six pomegranate seeds in Hades consigned her to spending six months of each year in hell. One month per seed. If I were to spend a month in Yemen for every seed that I have eaten, I could never leave.
I was not ready to say good-bye to Zuhra. Someone is there every day of your life for a year, and then she isn’t. There is no transition. Wait, I wanted to say. I need time.
She came around the side of my desk and I hugged her tightly, my little bundle of rayon, like holding a Christmas present with all of its wrapping still on it.
I couldn’t say anything. There were no significant last words, no best wishes, no declarations of love. I could not talk. She didn’t say anything either. We just looked at each other.
Then she was gone.
Feeling numb and slightly queasy, I sat back down at my desk. I picked up the pomegranate.
When I emerged from my office to throw away the peels, Zuhra was still standing by Enass’s desk, gathering a cluster of plastic bags full of her possessions.
“If you stay any longer I am putting you back to work,” I said.
Zuhra smiled. Or I imagined she did, from the way her eyes glinted for a moment. “How many times have I said good-bye?” she asked Enass. And she walked by me to the door. “I’ll see you in New York.”
I nod.
She hurried across the courtyard, and I turned to follow her. I couldn’t help it. She didn’t see me. I walked out of the office to stand at the top of our three marble steps. She walked quickly, a bustle of black skirts and plastic bags, with her fringed, brown leather purse banging against her side. I watched her until she stepped out of the gate and was gone. She did not look back.
I WAS AT MY COMPUTER half an hour later when my phone beeped. It was a text from Zuhra, her last before getting on the plane: “I LOVE U.”
TWENTY-FOUR
reasons to return
During my worst months