Forty Rules of Love(37)

“Did you see what happened?” I said as I staggered back toward my table. “Someone hurled a stone at me. They could have killed me!”

Hristos raised an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, but what were you expecting? Don’t you know there are people who don’t want to see a Muslim in a tavern? And here you are displaying yourself, reeking of alcohol, your nose glowing like a red lantern.”

“S-so what?” I stuttered. “Am I not a human being?”

Hristos patted me on the shoulder as if to say, Don’t be so touchy.

“You know, this is exactly why I abhor religion. All sorts of them! Religious people are so confident of having God by their side that they think they are superior to everyone else,” I said.

Hristos did not respond. He was a religious man, but also a skilled tavern owner who knew how to soothe an incensed customer. He brought me another carafe of red wine and watched me as I guzzled it. Outside, a wild wind blew, slamming shut the windows and scattering dry leaves left and right. For a moment we stood still, listening carefully, as if there were a melody to be heard.

“I don’t understand why wine was forbidden in this world but promised in heaven,” I said. “If it’s as bad as they claim, why would they serve it in paradise?”

“Questions, questions …” Hristos murmured as he threw his hands up. “You are always full of questions. Do you have to question everything?”

“Of course I do. That’s why we were given a brain, don’t you think?”

“Suleiman, I have known you for a long time. You are not just any customer to me. You are my friend. And I worry about you.”

“I’ll be fine—” I said, but Hristos interrupted me.

“You are a good man, but your tongue is as sharp as a dagger. That’s what worries me. There are all sorts of people in Konya. And it’s no secret that some of them don’t think highly of a Muslim who has taken to drink. You need to learn to be careful in public. Hide your ways, and watch what you say.”

I grinned. “May we top off this speech with a poem from Khayyám?”

Hristos heaved a sigh, but the Persian merchant who had overheard me exclaimed cheerfully, “Yes, we want a poem from Khayyám.”

Other customers joined in, giving me a big round of applause. Motivated and slightly provoked, I jumped onto a table and began to recite:


“Did God set grapes a-growing, do you think,

And at the same time make it a sin to drink?”


The Persian merchant yelled, “Of course not! That wouldn’t make any sense!”


“Give thanks to Him who foreordained it thus—

Surely He loves to hear the glasses clink!”


If there was one thing these many years of drinking had taught me, it was that different people drank differently. I knew people who drank gallons every night, and all they did was get merry, sing songs, and then doze off. But then there were others who turned into monsters with a few drops. If the same drink made some merry and tipsy and others wicked and aggressive, shouldn’t we hold the drinkers responsible instead of the drink?


“Drink! for you know not whence you came, nor why;

Drink! for you know not why you go, nor where.”


Another round of applause followed. Even Hristos joined the excitement. In the Jewish quarter of Konya, in a tavern owned by a Christian, we, a mixed bunch of wine lovers of all faiths, raised our glasses and toasted together, hard though it was to believe, to a God who could love and forgive us even when we ourselves clearly failed to do so.





Ella





NORTHAMPTON, MAY 31, 2008

“Better safe than sorry,” said the Web site. “Check his shirts for lipstick stains, see if he comes home smelling of unfamiliar perfumes.”

This was the first time Ella Rubinstein had taken an online test, titled “How to Tell If Your Husband Is Cheating on You!” Although she found the questions tacky, by now she knew that life itself could occasionally feel like one big cliché.

In spite of her final test score, Ella didn’t want to confront David on this matter. She still had not asked him where he’d been on the nights he hadn’t come home. These days she spent most of her time reading Sweet Blasphemy, using the novel as an excuse to cover up her silence. Her mind was so distracted that it was taking her longer than usual to finish the book. Still, she was enjoying the story, and with every new rule of Shams’s she mulled her life over.

When the children were around, she acted normal. They acted normal. However, the moment she and David were alone, she caught her husband looking at her curiously, as if wondering what kind of wife would avoid asking her husband where he’d spent the night. But the truth was that Ella didn’t want a piece of information she wouldn’t know how to handle. The less she knew about her husband’s flings, the less they would occupy her mind, she thought. It was true what they say about ignorance. It was bliss.