From the fifth story of a decrepit building, a man was peering out from an apartment’s window. He was young, probably in his thirties, but his haggard complexion and emaciated frame lent him an old man’s appearance. He stood motionless that one could think of him a lifeless bust, only his fast-moving pupils betrayed his aliveness. He stared blankly at the empty streets which were deserted due to the national lockdown. Not a sign of human life could be discerned amidst the heavy silence that enshrouded the neighborhood. Even nature’s elements deserted the scene leaving the virulent and infectious virus to spread unbridledly. He could see his neighbors behind their windows moving restlessly or gazing despairingly from their windows. He thought, “This must be how animals feel being ensnared and displayed in a cage of glass. Except that there is no one to look at us but ourselves this time”. He spent a long stretch of time standing behind the window till the streetlamps lit, and his face, which suddenly became reflected on the window glass, reminded him of the irrevocable passage of time, and his mother who had contracted the virus weeks ago, and whose life swung like a pendulum between life and death.

He turned his back to the window now and stood facing the two-room apartment he lived in. His nose gradually breathed in the malodorous smell of sweat, unwashed dishes, and a dirty pile of laundry. In one corner of the room, a mass of cans was quickly heaping up. And for the first time, he felt utterly abandoned, alone, and his humanity slowly slipping out of his hands. His hands that used to be occupied with washing dishes in a restaurant all day long were now idle, almost useless. While standing helplessly thus, the shrill ringtone of his cell phone snatched him from his lethargy. His mother’s voice came out plaintive and distant.

-“You forgot about me…I’m dying and you can’t even call or come to visit me.”

– “You know I’m not allowed to come near you…All I can do is come to the hospital, and stare at you from behind the glass of your room’s windows while you’re lying there like a broken animal”

-“yes, yes, animal..they are treating us like pigs because we’re old. For two consecutive days, the nurse brings me a tray of food and puts it far away from my reach.. they don’t answer our calls and entreaties, and when they do, they yell at us or punish us for that… I just wanna die with dignity..”

Her sobs interrupted her whiny speech, and her words became cracked “animals…we’re animals..I want…to eat”. Her son remained silent, listening raptly to his mother’s words, but rage and guilt were gnawing at his heart. “Why do we have to make life more difficult for each other than it already is? How come that the mask of civility and humanity drops off our faces every time we are faced with death?…” Questions plagued his mind engendering bitter sensations of contempt and disdain.

-“I am coming right aw..”

-“no, don’t. You’re not safe even in a hospital. It is full to the brim with people..many are lying on the floor like flies or dead corpses…I can’t bear this pungent smell anym…”

Her words slowed down as she sobbed and gasped for breath. The smell of death emanated from the phone and permeated his nostrils. The mother’s voice petered out gradually until it became only an echo in his head. He tumbled down on the sofa and looked enviously at his cat, Hades. As his solitude began to tell on him, he felt the insurmountable urge to converse surging within him.

“you know Hades, life can make a joke out of human beings, just two weeks ago the neighbor in the adjacent apartment spent almost all his savings on hoarding food and toilet paper as if the apocalypse was upon us. Now, he is dead. Hi might have contracted the virus from the supermarket..idiot” he chuckled whimsically while patting his cat. “And here I am, hungry, jobless, penniless and dirty like a rat and still alive..”

The cat yawned as its master’s voice lulled it to sleep. His speech now flowed like an intermittent torrent and became frantic. “What’s all this human civilization for if it’s not going to preserve our dignity? The media outlets say that the situation is handled well, but my mother feels like a pig in a hospital.. is it because she is poor? or maybe because she is old..”

He recalled the day when his mother had taken him to a public hospital in the early morning due to food poisoning. There was a huge mass of people gathered around the door of one room. In his mind, their sallow faces had become anonymous with death. Where were the doctors or nurses? They were drinking coffee and exchanging jokes inside the room.

He went back to the window and continued his monologue with his reflection.

“Human civilization is but a sham..a farce..a preposterous joke! Here I am in the 21st century, the apex of human civilization, and I’m going to die not from a bloody virus, but from hunger. Humans are not almighty after all, are they? An invisible virus comes, and we are reduced to our primordial fear of death and survival drive”

In the distance, patches of cold nimbus clouds were quickly filling the sky. The light was emanating from the neighbors’ windows. They looked like a collage of moving pictures. A man was walking hurriedly to and fro in his room while talking on the phone. Another one was watering his plant and smoking a joint. A girl was listening to music and eyeing him amusingly from her balcony. He tilted his head from one window to another watching as each one of his neighbors occupied himself with some activity. The wind howled furiously beating against the window panes, and droplets of rain slid slowly on the window glass. The shutters were all closed now except his. He remained transfixed glancing at a wall of closed windows like a chased animal that had come to an impasse. Night joined the furious rain to deepen his sense of loneliness and abandonment. He was shut in now not only within his house but also within his head like a speck of dust caught in a maelstrom. Everything around him was still except for the thundering storm outside. This stillness was interrupted only by Hades’ sporadic and insistent meows and restless jumps on the sofa.  The phone rang again but this time with a cold, monotonous voice resembling that of a robot.

-“I’m sorry to tell you that we’ve lost your mother”

“lost? What a strange way to communicate death!” he pondered.

In the split of a second, his mind attempted to garner and store all the moments he had spent with his mother. He had already started to feel her facial features and voice waning away. The idea of her dying in abject conditions without his being there with her filled him with self-loathing and repugnance. The world seemed indifferent to her death as it had been to her existence. Indeed, the world was indifferent to all those who had died of the virus. They became just insignificant numbers on the battlefield of life and death, outcasts whose corpses carried the stain of contagion even after their death.

Two weeks after the death of his mother, the national lockdown was lifted, and his fellow human beings left their glassed cages. On the surface, life seemed to have resumed its normal course. People were chattering, laughing, and entertaining themselves as if they had not come face to face with death. This farcical show disgusted him. No one heeded his loss, destitution, and loneliness. The virus indeed snatched hundreds of thousands of souls but failed to diminish humans’ egoism and selfishness.

He pulled himself together and left his apartment which had turned by now into a trash dump. Wandering aimlessly through the city, he cast scornful looks at the passers-by. “Nothing has changed, and nothing will,” he thought. He went to the restaurant where he used to work to see if he could get his job back. In front of the restaurant’s back door, a homeless beggar was rummaging in a trash bin looking desperately for something that might fill his stomach. He ignored the beggar and hurriedly entered. The disparity between the beggar and the ostensibly affluent clients astounded him. “Nothing has changed, indeed” he repeated. He left the restaurant in desperation and turned into a dimly-lit alley where there was no light at the end of the tunnel.

 

– By Imane Lechheb