The murky, wine-colored rags swayed below her knees, and she danced out barefoot from a muddy side street. Converging on me aggressively, her palm was thrust out and she begged for money and groped her empty stomach. "I'm sorry, I can't give money to everyone who asks. Many people ask me for money, everyday. I'm sorry."
She leaned into me and took my hand and repeated her plea. Her rough fingers manipulated mine and crushed them and caressed them all at once. She pulled my hand into her chest; and when I resisted, she seized me with a desperate strength. The look in her eyes was strange and fiercely adamant. "Are you going to walk with me until I give the money?" I chuckled. Her breath was smoky and fermented, and it surrounded me.
We rushed on through the busy street, and though I had picked the direction, she seemed to be steering our feet. Faces laughed at the odd couple holding hands, maneuvering puddles and jumping sewers. Arriving at the storefront where I had business, I stopped and she clung to me violently. I laughed.
"OK! I will give you the money!", and I took a 500 frank note out from my bag.
Her arms opened in the air, and she looked at me with adoration and embraced me. I put my arms around her and felt her face move from my shoulder and smudge into my neck. I would let her kiss my cheek; but her lips came quickly to my mouth and I laughed and struggled. I tried to disengage politely, but her arms were wrapped around the back of my neck. She pressed her lips frantically into my teeth and around my mouth as I smiled and pulled away. My hands worked the knot of her arms loose and I stepped back. She caught hold of my left arm and kissed every bit of it that she could before I pulled it away.
"OK." I said a bit sternly. "Goodbye!"
Old men passing the afternoon in chairs under the shop's awning grinned at me and laughed to one another. They had watched it all and told me that the girl was deranged. "She is deranged?" I asked, reviving my senses. The old Arabian men nodded again, and I went in to buy a can of powdered milk.
3 comments:
Wow, great writing, Nathan. Of course you know who that girl was...Jesus.
Some thought he was deranged too.
Nathan,
Please write a book. I will buy it. Then I will place it on my coffee table and brag to all who visit my house that I once lived with such a crafty weaver of words.
Nathan, your words are putting me right there with you, better than any visual images could. Love the writing about the church service in particular. Your sensitive relating of your experiences is a gift to all who read these treasures.
Don't stop. As Jeff said, Jesus was there in the deranged woman - and there are many more manifestations of our Lord to meet everyday -to those who are wide awake - and you most certainly are.
Write on!
Love, Aunt Julie
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