The beginning

A Chapter by Zak

A story about an orphan kid that had a continuous dream about being with his parents. He attempts to travel across a whole continent to find out if his parents are actually still alive.

“Ahh�"” I yell out, quickly force myself to stop. I abruptly wake up from a dream that felt so real yet it can’t have been true.

Though I wish it could be true, I knew it couldn’t. With everything, there’s always that possibility that it could be true.

As usual, I am up before the sun crossed the horizon. I take a couple of deep breaths and get up and neatly make my bed. My room is very small but organized. I know where everything is located in my room. Despite it being very small, I am thankful to have a room. I am thankful for many things in my life.

Before I leave my room, I meditate. It helps me keep my mind clear and focused on my day, especially today. Sundays are supposed to be very busy in the market. I meditate longer on Sundays.

I move the ripped curtains that cover the window to check if it has rained overnight. The wooden flaps that separated the inside of the house and the outside creaked open as usual. There wasn’t anyone outside at this time. Two dogs were brushing through trash cans looking for food. The cool breeze is only around in the early mornings. It begins to feel like an oven when the sun is out, especially with no clouds.

After I finished my morning routine I slowly open the wooden door not trying to wake anyone up. I head down the uneven stairs which I have almost fallen down from many times.

“Good morning Darius,” Ahmed says softly as I reached the bottom of the steps.

To my surprise, I see Ahmed sat down at one of a sidaris, which is a Moroccan style couch. They are rectangular cushions that lay flat on the ground. Each sidari has pillows that stood perpendicular to the sidari and parallel to the wall. He usually does not wake up this early, until we’re about to head to the shop which is a couple of minutes away from home.

“Good morning, have you ate breakfast yet,” I ask.

“No, not yet.”

“I’ll make some breakfast right now,” I said while walking to the kitchen which was smaller than my room. There has always been ticking sound at the kitchen and to this day we still don’t know where it’s coming from.

For the past couple of years, I’ve always drunk tea in the morning. My stomach got so used to it that if I don’t get my daily dose of tea, I can easily get a headache. I wonder why Ahmed is up, I usually wake him up after I make breakfast. Breakfast is usually simple, a cup of tea with bread and olive oil. Doesn’t cost much to make and it's clearly healthy. Ahmed must be at least triple my age but he still as strong as most teenagers. Occasionally we have hard boiled eggs or fruits, only on special occasions.

As I carefully poured the olive oil on a plate for all us to dip in, I heard a door open from upstairs. Fatima must be up, I tell myself.

The tea starts to boil from the top and I know its ready. I set everything on a big round wooden plate and I carefully walk to the small living room on the other side of the stairs. I see Fatima coming down.

“Good morning Fatima”

She replied back with a good morning. I set everything on the table and sit beside Ahmed. Fatima walks to the kitchen to get something and joins us.

I cut a piece of bread for each of us. It’s quiet while we eat. Only the mysterious noise from the kitchen can be heard. I try not to eat quick and let Ahmed and Fatima eat more than me. I’m more than thankful for them letting me live with them. Until

Ahmed tells me, “Eat Darius, you’ll need energy for today.” I then eat without hesitation.

“How long till you finish with the red rug,” Ahmed asked his wife as he looked on the other end of the room. A large weaving loom with an unfinished rug. Fatima looked the loom as well.

After a moment she said, “Possibly four days. Maybe three if I get help from the neighbors.

We finished eating and I picked up the dishes and walked to the kitchen.

“Just leave them on top of the counter by the sink. I will clean them,” Fatima called out softly.

I went back upstairs to my room to get ready. In the summer it can get really cold as the concrete material it's built from holds on to the cold. I quickly put on my shorts that are very loose. They’re very good when it's hot outside since they don’t insulate the heat. I put on one of the white t-shirts I have.

As we walk to our shop, I think about how much money I’d make today. Even though there was no way of knowing, I still liked to think about it. Ahmed gives me the money that he thinks I deserve after each day of work. It usually is a fair amount and I’m thankful to even be able to work. It could always be worse I keep telling myself.

We are usually one of the first shops to open up in the market. The shop is rectangular with only three sides. The fourth one opens similar to a garage door. We don’t have any houses with garage doors in my town but our neighboring city in the west has many of them. We don’t have many cars, to begin with. Most commoners just walk to where they want to go to.

Ahmed sits in the back of the shop where there’s a long table that extends from one side to the other. He usually deals with counting the money. I initiate the conversation with the customers. If I don’t know something then he joins in and provides the customer with a more detailed plan. I enjoy selling things so much that I try to help out with other shops as well but of course only the ones that don’t sell carpets. Just so I don’t lose sales from our shop, the shop that I officially work at and that pays me.

“Darius,” Ahmed called out from the back as I sat in front of the shop waiting for customers to walk in. I turned around.

“Can you go back home and grab some change, I don’t think I got enough for today.”

Without any hesitation or a reply, I got up and put the small chair back inside the shop. I ran back home and saw Fatima focused on the carpet.

I waited a few seconds to catch my breath.

“What happened,” asked Fatima. “Is someone chasing after you?”

“No, no, I just ran here from the shop,” I told her waving my hand as I held on to the wall with my other hand. “Ahmed wants to change for the day, he said he might not have taken enough money.”

Fatima slowly gets up and walks upstairs. I stay by the door waiting for her to return. A couple of moments after she waddles back downstairs and hands me an envelope. I thank her and sprint as fast as my legs could take me back to the shop.

As noon approached the sun beams down. There are definitely more merchants than before I left. The dirty ground filled the air. After every day of work, we always take a shower because of the dirt from the ground.

I walked into our shop and Ahmed was sitting down in the back. I gave him the envelope with the money and sat back in front of the shop. Many people walked around but not many coming into our shop.

As the day progress, the scorching sun beamed down. It defiantly started to feel a lot hotter than this morning. I put on my big round hat to cover up the sun. Ahmed hands me an ice-cold water bottle that he was keeping in a cooler at the back of the store. I could feel the ice cold waterfall down to my stomach as I gulped it down.

The ice-cold water gave me the energy that I needed to get customers into our shop. I made a few people interested in buying rugs. People started flooding into the shop as I started to greet people outside. I could be very persuasive sometimes but I never lie about things. All the years I’ve been working with Ahmed, I think its the smile and friendliness of my personality that brings people into the shop. I have been told by Ahmed this too. He, on the other hand, doesn’t smile much.

A little past noon, we took our break for lunch. Similar to breakfast, our lunch is a simple meal. I usually eat lunch really quick then try to head to other shops and learn how they sell things and help out as well.

Today was different. As I was finishing up my lunch in the back of the shop. I heard someone start to increase their voice. Ahmed started yelling at him and I quickly got up and walked towards them.

“This rug was not made well, you said I could return it for my money back,” the man yelled out.

“Yes, return it for your money back but not damaged, I will not give you the money back. How am I supposed to sell it after you damaged it,” Ahmed shouted back at him? I stand there beside Ahmed to observe conflict. I try to see who is right but they both have their reasoning that’s ideal.

“Keep your promise, give me my money back or you’ll regret it,” the man continued.

I try to step forward towards the man but Ahmed stops me with his hand without breaking eye contact with the man. I remove his hand and he looks back at me but I continue to look at the man. The man glances at me.

“What do you want,” I ask him as if I didn’t already know what he wanted. I stand in front of Ahmed just so the man doesn’t hit him. The man is definitely bulkier than me but I’m taller. Being taller definitely increases my confidence just in case he decided to

become physical. On the other hand, Ahmed is much older than him and weaker.

“I want my money back,” he replied firmly.

I wrapped my arm around his shoulder and said, “let’s go for a walk.”

He continued to walk with me out the store and I kept my right arm wrapped around his shoulder. I turn my head around before we left the shop, and tell Ahmed, “I’ll be back.”

We walked out of the shop and followed down the filled alleys of customers.

“We need to make an agreement about this issue. I understand you want all your money back. Ahmed doesn’t want to take back the rug because it's ripped now and will need to work on it to fix it,” I told him.

“Yes, yes, I know, but it's not my fault the big rug easily ripped,” the man replied.

“Yes, I also understand that. It’s not Ahmed’s fault that it ripped. It happens, one in a thousand,” I told him truthfully. “It just happens to be the rug you bought. We had issues like this when rugs rip.”

“So what do you think we should do then,” he asks his voice sounding a lot calmer.

I think for a while. Still wrapping my arm around his shoulder walking down the alleys with people going and out of shops.

“Well I think what is fair to do is to give you three-fourths of your money back and we keep the rug,” I told him.

He thinks for a while. I also add, “If you want to buy the rug again after its fixed back together, it’ll cost only half the price.”

“I bought it for six hundred dirhams… so I will get back four hundred and fifty,” he asked.

I look up for a while, trying to do the math out in my head. “Yes, that’s correct. Impressive how fast you did that calculation, not many people could have done that calculation in their head that quickly” I smiled.

“Let’s go back and talk to Ahmed,” I said as we walked back to the shop.

I told the man to let me do the talking while we were walking back. When we got there, Ahmed was talking to another customer. We waited till he was finished than he looked at us. So, I walked up to Ahmed and explained to him everything that we talked about and how that is the only fair way to go about it.

Ahmed concurred with me. He then gave the man the money agreed upon and the man left the shop without another word.

I started to organize things before we close the shop for the day. As usual, Ahmed counted the money the store made today. It must have been a lot of money. He came up to me and gave me one hundred dirhams which were the most I have ever received in a day.

“Wow did we make a lot of money today,” I asked him as he handed me the money.

He didn’t look at me nor did he respond. I wasn’t complaining, only curious. After we closed shop the sun was about to head down the horizon. Another full day of work completed and now its time to head back home. As we walked back home, the dream I had the night before suddenly crossed my mind again. Still trying to decipher what the meaning of it was.