Horses of God by Mahi Binebine Read Free Book Online

stabbed. And on to the next. Ali made a show of remorse, hesitating briefly, and finally took the plunge. Khalil was not to be outdone. He was raring to go, grumbling that the dark-skinned boy was taking his time. He pushed Ali off, unsheathed his prick and went at it. His groans made the whole room erupt with laughter. There was only me left. I don’t know why I didn’t listen to my heart, which ordered me to leave, to run away as fast as I could from this accursed, hellish place. I stayed where I was, head down, stuck in a nightmare from which there was no escape. I felt their challenging stares forcing meinto a corner, my back against the wall. I was rooted to the spot, I didn’t know which way to turn. Hamid had left the room so as not to witness my shame. He knew my frailties, my cowardice. As God is my witness, I tried to step up. I had to prove to them I wasn’t a wimp, I was no queer. My honor—or my ass—was at stake. I went over to Nabil, trembling, thinking I could manage it, if only my lifeless dick showed some interest. Beads of sweat trickled slowly down my forehead, taking the route of tears and falling onto the naked body right in front of me. There were tears mixed with my sweat for sure; I recognized their salty taste in my mouth. At that precise moment, Nabil opened his eyes—eyes that were pitiful, bewildered, bereft. He must have been wondering what was happening. Had he committed a foul in the game that he was paying for now? Had he hurt someone? He didn’t know. Nor did I. In any case, his gaze banished any heroics my friends were expecting of me. They weren’t holding it against me, anyway, because I watched them slink off one after the other, as if they’d abruptly sobered up, suddenly realizing the depravity of their act. I stayed by Nabil’s mortified body for a long time, in silence. He struggled to get the words out: “So what happened?”
    I did not reply. I just pulled his gandoura down over his nakedness, over his disarray and humiliation, the way a stage curtain is lowered at the end of a macabre play.

8
    IT WASN’T ALL violence in Sidi Moumen. What I’m giving you is a condensed version of eighteen years on a swarming anthill, so obviously it’s a bit turbulent. These sorry episodes leave their mark on a young life. And a young death, too. A death almost without a corpse, because they had to scrape mine off the ground bit by bit. Ironically, they buried Khalil’s remains in with me: a jawbone with teeth missing, two fingers of a right hand, the one that had set off the device, and a foot with its ankle, because we’d had the bright idea of buying identical espadrilles. The burial was a rush job, because clearly he had bigger feet than me. So here we are, resting side by side in the same plot in the shadow of a jujube tree at the back of the cemetery—two boys who never got on. We weren’t entitled to any prayers because no one prays at the graves of suicides.
    I can still see my father, my brothers, and the most fearless of the Stars of Sidi Moumen standing round the hole I’d just been lowered into. I say fearless because they knew they wouldn’t escape a second summons to police headquarters. And our police aren’t famous for their compassion. When they nab a suspect somewhere, his whole village gets pulled in. But they wanted to be there. My father, who’d long claimed he couldn’t walk, had followed the pitiful procession on foot. And didn’t budge till the last spadeful. It was as if he’d picked up a few scraps of the life I’d just lost. My older brothers stood next to him, watchful in case his legs gave way. But Father stood firm, his chest thrust out like a soldier’s, barely leaning on the knob of his cane. He was the first to notice Yemma walk in. Yemma, or what remained of her.
    She’d left home the day the police armada invaded our shack and turned the place