Emily Sanderson
Author:Emily Sanderson
Fictional story from my imagination
Chapter 1
Alexandria, Glym Area, August 1951
Everything was beautiful and
tidily arranged. The room was smooth, warmly cuddling its contents. The window,
which was overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, was splendidly decorated with
purple velvet curtains. On the little dressing table neatly scattered my
beloved collection of French perfumes. On the marble floor there lied a round
elegantly patterned Persian rug, of the same purple colour as the window
curtains. On the wall, there was a large painting of a beautiful woman sitting
on a sofa and holding a golden old-style guitar. On her side there was a small
table with some glasses of wine on top.
I,
the then nineteen year-old Emily Sanderson, was comfortably lying on the bed. I
came first to Egypt when I was four years of age with my English parents. My
father was a senior British army officer and my mother was a traditional
housewife. We visited UK regularly on holidays where we stayed with my
grandfather, a widower whose only son was my father. Despite our long stay in
Egypt, my parents did not really mix, or had any meaningful personal
relationships, with the local people. To me, Egypt was very much my second home
country. I grew up among and went to school with local Egyptians. I naturally
became bilingual and developed what I would describe as a mixed
English-Egyptian identity.
Held
in my hand were a few sheets of paper containing some of my most favourite
Arabic poems. On the chest of drawers by the bed was my much be-hated alarm
clock – that I nevertheless could still not live without – which would ring
persistently and relentlessly every morning until it had made sure that I was
mercilessly awakened.
I
was in a world of my own, eagerly surfing through the poetry papers in my hands
before I was dragged back to the real world by a sudden knock on the door. Of
course it was my mother, who then walked into the room and, without paying much
notice or interest to what I was doing, started having a conversation with me.
“Emily, it is nearly ten o’clock and you are still in
your bed!” exclaimed my mother as she was pulling open the curtains. It was
a really beautiful and sunny morning, but still – like most days – a very
ordinary day in the eyes of Egyptians. Sunny warm days are the expected norm in
Egypt, and are somewhat taken for granted rather than appreciated.
“You need to call your friend Maggie, she called three
times from the University this morning when you were still asleep,”
continued my mother, “when you go out, make sure you don’t get much further
from Glym. The Egyptians have been demonstrating a lot lately and I don’t want
you to get caught in the middle of rioting thugs.”
My
mother was a generally calm woman with a beautiful slim figure and dark hair. I
reluctantly got up from bed and asked her if breakfast was ready.
“Of course it is ready, but your father and I have
already eaten. It is only you left I am afraid.” Replied my mother. I gave
her a quick kiss on the cheek as I walked through to the bathroom to get ready
for the day.
“You are the best mum in the world, I feel so lucky being
your daughter,” said I in a cunning tone. That was not completely untrue.
Although I loved my mother very much, we were not really close friends. In fact
we were not friends at all. Our relationship had always been that of a mother
and her daughter. Maybe this was partly due to my very different personality
and my, in my mother’s view, eccentric thoughts and ideas.
“Waking
up at ten in the morning, only to find your breakfast ready and waiting for
you! I won’t stay with you forever Emily, and I really feel sorry for your
future husband. What will he do with you?” exclaimed my mother as she was
leaving the room.
“He
will love me and will work hard to keep my finger nails well-clipped all the
time, or he will suffer,” shouted I from inside the bathroom and we both
laughed.
On
my way down the stairs, I could clearly hear my father’s voice as he was
talking on the telephone to my grandfather, who was then in London. I quietly
walked through the lounge and started making myself a cup of coffee. Indeed, it
was quite a spacious and stately sitting room with a decoratively coved high
ceiling in a fine and intricate pattern. Three elegant chandeliers were hanging
down, adding further depth to the prestigious appearance of the place. On the
cream-coloured marble floor were two large red-brown patterned Persian rugs.
The large window overlooking the back garden was sublimely covered with
classic-styled golden curtains. On one side of the room was the generously
mahogany-trimmed four-piece creamy leather suite, which occupied only a third
of the space. I took my seat on the other side of the room, by the large dark
mahogany dining table, where twelve cushioned chairs were comfortably
positioned around. My parents were sitting opposite me, and next to each other
on separate chairs on the leather suite. My father was already dressed in his
full suit, holding the telephone handset in one hand and a cup of tea in the
other. He was in his mid fifties but looked ten years younger, truly handsome,
tall and well built. He had a neatly trimmed thin moustache and was
clean-shaven. He was used to regularly contacting his lonely father, almost on
a weekly basis. Their telephone conversations were generally short and to the
point, and this one was certainly not an exception. Very soon the telephone
conversation came to an end, along with the last sip of my father’s teacup.
“Emily,
your grandfather will be spending his Christmas holiday time with us, here in
Egypt.” Said my father as he was standing up in preparation for departure
to work.
“But
last time he said he couldn’t make it for Christmas this year, because he would
be busy establishing his cotton textile firm.” Replied I in a cautious disappointment.
I did not really want to tell him that I would very much prefer my grandfather
to stay where he was, in London, and leave us well alone. I still remembered
his last year’s Christmas visit, when he seemed to have nothing better to do
than give me endless lectures on how to behave and who to be friends with. No
doubt he would want to take control of my life again this time as he did the
previous year.
“I
don’t know,” replied my father in a deep concerned tone, while fixing his
eyes on the floor, “but the economic situation back home is not very good.
Even here, the situation is becoming rather unstable and certainly not as
peaceful as it used to be.” Continued my father in the same concerned tone,
“Although the war is over, I am not sure if we can realistically continue to
provide long-term security for the vast cotton farms in Egypt and Sudan, in
order to safeguard a continuous supply of cotton for any textile firms back
home.” Then he looked up and turned his eyes onto me saying, “Emily, I
am thinking that you may have to complete your studies in England, for I do
fear for your safety here, both you and your mother shouldn’t ideally be in
this country by next year.” He kept looking straight into my eyes for a
moment, maybe to see the effect of his words on me. He then turned and looked
at my mother very briefly before leaving for work.
My
father was an extremely confident man. The fact that he himself was beginning
to feel insecure about his family future worried me greatly and deep in my
heart I feared that he could probably be right. Where would we go? Alexandria
was literally my home city, for I grew up there since my early childhood. I
could not bear the thought of us leaving our house, of course not because it
was in Glym, the then most prestigious neighbourhood in the city. Alexandria
was itself a beautiful harmonic mixture of different races: Italians, Greeks
and native Egyptians. Yet, they all lived peacefully together in what could only
be described as true integration. The city was then very liberal and open to
the whole world, probably due to its strategic geographical location by the
Mediterranean Sea. I knew Alexandria very well indeed, its theatre halls, streets,
cinemas, universities and even coffee shops. For a long time, I was convinced
that the city and I were two inseparable partners.
I
had already successfully completed my second year of my Art studies at Farouk
University. I still had two more years before graduation, and I was planning to
start the first term of my third year in less than three weeks. I had many
friends there of different backgrounds, the closest of whom to my heart was, by
far, Magdoline who liked to be called Maggie.
It
was almost midday by the time I was knocking on Maggie’s door. Their house was
in Zizinea area, which was not too far from Glym. I was wearing a short summer dress of a pink colour. Soon
Maggie’s mother, Camellia, opened the door and invited me in. She was a beautiful
middle-aged Coptic Egyptian woman, of average built with a short dark hair. She
welcomed me in and asked me to go to Maggie in her room. The house was very
tidy, and although it was much smaller than ours, it was certainly large enough
for Maggie and her mother, who lived together for many years after the death of
her Greek father during an air raid in the Second World War. Camellia worked in
a large publishing company as a secretary. Being only a year older than me,
Maggie was indeed very mature and rational for her age. She had always been
passionately proud of her Egyptian roots, which were reflected on her features
and appearance to a significant degree. With a long thick wavy black hair, a
slim yet curvy attractive figure, penetrating direct looks from wide dark eyes,
and an infrequent but reassuringly captivating smile from fine full lips,
Maggie could be described as nothing but stunningly beautiful. She had what
most people would see as eccentric views of life in general, which did not earn
her many friends. To me however, Maggie was the person I had always wanted to
be but never could become. She had all that I did not have. She was
extraordinarily courageous, daring in fact, and brutally hest, yet immensely
helpful, loving and caring. I could not have dreamt of a better soul mate. The
vast social gap between our families had helped not but drawn us closer
together.
Maggie was unusually quiet;
standing by her bedroom window, and did not even look at me as she heard me
enter the room. I shut the door behind and asked her what the matter was.
When
her eyes started filling with tears, I knew that something had gone seriously
wrong.
“Marwan will marry his cousin”, said Maggie in a
tearful and saddened tone.
I
was completely shocked. Marwan and Maggie had been in love for years, and
everyone thought they were the best couple to suit each other.
“How
come? What happened? Surely this won’t be the end, he will no doubt soon come
back to you.” Said I in a hesitant tone that I very much wanted to sound reassuring
and positive, but failed to do so.
“Here,”
Maggie showed me the wedding invitation card, which had been in her hand all
the time. I knew then that her relationship with Marwan was truly over, and
that the tragic way it ended would leave a lasting emotional trauma on Maggie’s
heart. I started wiping her tears and then silently hugged her. I felt her
heartbeats thumping inside my chest, while her warm tears quietly flowed down
my cheeks. She started shaking and crying very painfully, and only then I
realised how much she was really in love with him.
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