Breaking the Silence

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By Fathi Afifi

He hadn’t seen the man for years. There were the classic phone calls, of course. Hellos, How are yous, How is your sister, How is your wife… Then they’d enjoyed written correspondences, for a time. Times changed, and the letters became the emails, and the frequent became the scarce. Then there were prolonged periods of silence, phases when one or the other was caught up in the obligations and tragedies and triumphs of life, and could not remember to call the other. And then there was a prolonged silence that did not break. Until now.

A Deadly Destination

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By Fathi Afifi

I want my son, he said. Bring me my son.

He looked up, but no one was around to hear him. The dim lights overhead flickered, casting sporadic shadows in the already-murky subway station underground. The long low benches, their original wooden seats darkened by grime and polished with use, were empty save for a few men further down the tunnel of the station.

A Misunderstanding

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By Fathi Afifi

Their first date wasn’t exactly a date. It was to conduct a business transaction; she wanted to sell him garage doors for her uncle’s business and he wanted her to consider a salesperson position with his own construction company. But they were young, and bumped into each other earlier that day in the bustling streets of Istanbul—truly bustling streets, so chance meetings were more fateful than coincidental—and she’d looked particularly fetching that day, with her black hair spilling out of her green hijab, and her emerald eyes moist with the wind. 

Misfit

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By Fathi Afifi

Excuse me. Excuse me. Excuse me.

Nobody listens anymore. Nobody cares to give me some elbow room. Nobody fits, actually.

The metro doors swish open and closed, the square-gummed jaws of some train-resembling animal, and if you’re lucky enough to be devoured within—then, well, you’re lucky. You’ll go where you need to go. You’ll make that dentist appointment, that afternoon philosophy class, that museum tour, that executive business meeting. If the train-beast doesn’t swallow you, sucks to be you.