Mother of All Pigs. Malu Halasa

ashtray.

      Mother Fadhma has had years of practice and is attuned to her daughter-in-law’s nuanced expressions. She can tell if Laila desires solitude at the breakfast table and will retreat from the kitchen without a word of greeting or a second thought. Fadhma stays out of her daughter-in-law’s way. It’s bad enough living in Laila’s house, but her stepson Hussein has to support Fadhma and her youngest daughter, Samira.

      This morning Laila is apparently making an effort. She refills the old woman’s tea glass before pouring one for herself and sitting down on the other side of an impressive spread of boiled eggs, lebne yogurt, sliced tomatoes, scallions, green and black olives, dried za’atar thyme, olive oil, and bread.

      “So what did you think?” Fadhma rarely initiates conversations with her daughter-in-law, but she has been feeling unsettled since the arrival of their twenty-two-year-old visitor. Muna’s father, Abd, is the second son of Fadhma’s sister, Najla. Fadhma raised him and his five brothers with her five girls and two boys, after she married Al Jid following her sister’s death. Abd’s departure from Jordan twenty-five years ago accelerated the decline of her immediate family, but the old mother doesn’t blame him for that. He was the first of Al Jid’s thirteen kids to challenge a thousand years of tradition by marrying an ‘ajnabi, a foreigner.

      “She certainly doesn’t resemble our side of the family,” Laila observes drily.

      Yesterday evening, when Fadhma met Muna for the first time, she blurted out, “Like Chinese,” which made everyone, including Laila, laugh nervously. The vast stretches of land and ocean separating the two countries have not prevented unpleasant stories from arriving by mail, telephone, and, worst of all, word of mouth. The ugly temper of Muna’s foreign mother, who slashed her husband’s suits and smashed a kitchen’s worth of dishes, entered Sabas family legend long ago. The accounts only confirm the uncertainty of marriages to unknown, unscreened outsiders.

      “Imagine,” the old woman snorts, “the girl could have come with her father. Instead she insists on traveling alone when the Crushers are smashing their way across Syria and Iraq.”

      Laila is frustrated that Mother Fadhma insists on calling the jihadists the “Crushers,”—from the word deas—seemingly just to annoy her, but she refuses to be drawn in. She’s rarely interested in her husband’s family. She finds the young woman by herself fascinating.

      “When I asked Muna if she has a boyfriend or if her family has plans for her to marry, do you know what she told me?” Laila picks at the food on the table and doesn’t wait for her mother-in-law’s reply. “She said, ‘You’ve got to be kidding.’”

      Last night Laila felt such a mixture of disapproval and jealousy that she was unable to continue the conversation. Going over it again this morning, she still finds it hard to believe and adds aloud as an afterthought, “Such confidence—freedom.” As soon as the words leave her lips she can tell she has said something wrong.

      “We’ve had too much of that around here. It’s contagious, don’t you think?”

      The malice in Fadhma’s voice is unmistakable. But Laila wasn’t referring to the unpleasant subject the two of them have been avoiding, although she admits to herself she has been bothered by it for quite a while.

      “You need to talk to Samira,” Laila states matter-of-factly. “After all, you are her mother.”

      “Yes, the mother is the first to be blamed.” The old lady makes a desultory motion with her hand under her chin as though slashing her own throat. “But I tell you now,” she adds testily, “I am not the only person at fault in this family.”

      Laila, expecting the worst, steels herself for a first-thing-in-the-morning fight. Instead her mother-in-law begins to openly despair, which strikes Laila as out of character, for Fadhma usually shows no emotion other than stubbornness.

      “I’ve begged Hussein to remind Samira of her duty—to counsel her. It is her reputation and ours at stake.” Straightaway Fadhma’s mood changes and her words come out as though forged in molten lead: “But his attention has been elsewhere.”

      Suddenly one of the English idioms Laila teaches in level two at school comes to mind: there is an animal in the room more unpredictable than an elephant—dirtier and smellier too. It is rampaging through their lives… However aren’t all their disagreements like this? Fadhma always tries to deflect any criticism. This morning Laila refuses to be dissuaded.

      “When I’ve questioned Samira she always has perfectly good excuses for going out,” Unperturbed, Fadhma sips her tea.

      “The new headmistress said she saw Samira in the capital,” Laila responds. “Imagine, the girl drops out of teacher training college, has nothing to do, and ends up among strangers when it’s so dangerous! Of course Mrs. Salwa only thought she recognized someone who looked like Samira.”

      The two women huddle together in strained silence. Laila doesn’t exactly remember when she began to suspect that Samira was acting carelessly. It hadn’t been during the big upheavals during the Arab Awakening; she and her teenage friends were too young to go to the demonstrations. But something’s turned toxic. Laila isn’t sure why that is—the political uncertainty all around them or the company Hussein’s half sister is keeping.

      Although Laila harbors many doubts about the society in which she lives, she meticulously stays within conventional boundaries, and she expects those she lives with to do the same. Samira, her husband’s unmarried half sister, is particularly vulnerable since relatively little is needed—perhaps only a rumor of a girl’s indiscretion—for the entire town to become inflamed and a family ostracized forever. In a culture where a woman’s virtue is paramount, any defense of it is a sign of its erosion. Better to avoid scrutiny. The women of the Sabas family have to protect one another because no one else will.

      Rising slowly from her seat, Mother Fadhma smirks triumphantly and says, “At least with our guest, my girl won’t be out by herself, will she?”

      The old woman draws the new robe around her like a protective shield. Its thick material will make her sweat like a pig. Forgetting herself, Laila almost laughs out loud. It is the English idioms about animals she finds useful inside and outside the classroom.

      Her thoughts are interrupted by seven-year-old Salem bounding into the kitchen. Relieved, the two women turn from each other. Laila takes her son’s perfectly formed face and squeezes it between her hands. She admits that despite everything she has cause to be thankful. Her eldest is a great source of comfort to her, and seeing him fresh and alert immediately improves her mood. He was born exactly nine months after her marriage, and with Hussein still living full-time in the army, her firstborn became the love of her life.

      In the doorway, a second, smaller boy waits quietly. Dark like his father, Mansoor also inherited his father’s disposition and tends to be reserved and moody. Sometimes the most trivial things overwhelm him and his asthma flairs. Laila instantly notices his furrowed brow. He finds it hard keeping up with a brother who, though a year older, is much more self-assured.

      She beckons to her second son, calling softly, “Habibi, darling, come here,” and pats him on the back as he climbs onto the chair beside hers.

      Both children still in their pajamas have washed their faces. Salem stuffs bread and yogurt into his mouth, while Mansoor begs Laila to feed him.

      “You’re a big boy now,” Salem sneers.

      “Am not…” Mansoor’s voice trails off into wheezing.

      Laila, shushing him, cuts up a boiled egg with a spoon and slips it into an unreceptive mouth. Before the taunts start again she warns, “Your new aunt is sleeping!”

      The boys lower their voices. Her sons like their visitor. They tore open the gifts she delivered from their overseas relatives and were impressed to meet a real live American, like Abby on CSI. Moments later Salem forgets his mother’s warning and waves a fork under his brother’s nose. The squabbling brings Fadhma immediately