So, at last, Khalil Ayyoub — the same one who stands before you — has become head nurse at the Galilee Hospital. I accepted Dr. Amjad’s proposition and went to tell him the next morning.

Forgive me.

These two weeks flew by. I swear I couldn’t find the time to scratch my head. I asked Zainab to look after you, but I don’t know why I couldn’t do it myself. I’d get to the door of your room and instead of going in I’d hesitate, as if a wall had gone up in front of me.

It has nothing to do with my new position; I’m not like that, as you know. But I somehow felt I was floating, and I thought that maybe, just maybe, my fear would come to an end and I could go home. I miss my house and my grandmother’s cushion and the smell of decayed flowers. I told myself I would go back, but I didn’t. I swear it was only when the French delegation came that I dared go out into the streets of the camp. I found Salim then — and I’ll tell you more about him — but my uselessness and my fear drove me back to the hospital.

Will you forgive me?

I came back to you, organized everything, and convinced myself that leaving the hospital wasn’t worth it. We’re back to our old routine: I bathe you and perfume you and take care of you. I’ll tell you the entire story from the beginning, just as I promised I would two weeks ago. That was when I left you, sure that I’d see you in the morning, but the oxygen night happened. In the morning, I went to see Dr. Amjad in his office. I knocked on the door, went in, and stood there. As usual he had his feet up on the desk and was reading a newspaper, and, as usual, he pretended he hadn’t noticed me.

I stood there like an idiot and coughed, the smoke from his pipe rising from behind the newspaper, obscuring his face.

“I accept, Doctor,” I said. “Dr. Amjad. . Dr. Amjad. . I. .”

He moved the paper aside.

“Hello, hello! Please do sit down. I didn’t see you.”

“I accept the job,” I said.

He removed his feet from the desk, folded his paper, lifted his finger and raised his voice: “You’ll assume your duties immediately.” Then he rang the bell on his desk and Zainab came in.

“He’s responsible for everything from now on,” he said.

Dr. Amjad hid behind the newspaper again and Zainab stood there nailed to the spot, with no idea what to do.

“But, Doctor. .” she said.

“You’re still here?” he asked from behind the newspaper.

I asked him to brief me a bit on my new job.

“Later, later,” he said. “Go with Zainab and take over.”

So I took over.

You might think that I took over the administration of a hospital! It’s true that I am, practically speaking, the hospital’s director, now that Dr. Amjad has found that by appointing me he has an excuse to absent himself from work on a permanent basis. So, just like that, I’m back to being a doctor, the way I used to be, but. . This but says it all. I’m a doctor, but Dr. Amjad’s the real doctor! I examine, diagnose, and prescribe medicine — everything, but the patients say they’re waiting for the doctor’s opinion. And when the doctor comes, he doesn’t have an opinion. He agrees with my diagnosis and my prescription, but the patients wait for him just the same. One would think the only thing they have faith in is a diploma. I swear he knows nothing, but never mind, it’s better this way: I make the decisions without assuming the responsibility.

I took over the administration of the hospital and am in charge of three nurses. Zainab — you know her; Kamil, who stole the radio but who’s a nice kid (he has a beautiful voice and knows all the songs of Abd al-Halim Hafiz by heart) and who’s waiting for a visa so he can leave the country; and the Egyptian, Hamdi, who’s not a nurse, but we say that he is so the hospital won’t seem empty. Can you imagine an enormous hospital with more than forty beds and only two nurses! Hamdi’s also started helping us move patients and take care of them, even though basically he’s a guard. And there’s Kamelya the cook, who’s told me she’s decided to leave the hospital at the end of the month. We added Kamelya to the nurses’ list, too, and I’ve begun teaching her the basics.

So things were moving along.

I’d managed to get things under control to a certain extent, and that was my mistake, because when things are under control we discover what’s wrong — and here everything is wrong. There’s no medicine, no serums, nothing. It’s as though we aren’t in a hospital, and, in fact, we aren’t. We’re in a white building suspended in the air, and I’m its head nurse and its director. As I attempt to organize things, I am becoming more and more aware of the impossibility and precariousness of the task. When I accepted my new duties, I thought I’d find a solution to my problem, but now my problem has become part of the hospital’s.

Hamdi, the Egyptian, was shown the door. Dr. Amjad threw Hamdi out without warning and replaced him with a Syrian youth called Omar. Poor Hamdi was crying as he got his things together.

“What are you crying for?” I asked him. “Go and look for work. You barely earn enough to eat here.” He said he’d gone back to Egypt and that they’d thrown him out because he didn’t have a work permit.

“I don’t have a work permit either,” I told him.

He explained that he’d been here three years and that he’d come to Beirut through a smuggler in Damascus since Egyptians don’t need a visa to get into Syria. He’d coughed up seven hundred dollars for the Syrian smuggler who got him to Beirut. He’d thought that Beirut would be a stop on his way to Germany. He said he didn’t want to leave because he needed two thousand dollars to procure a visa for a European country from which he’d then slip into Germany. Now he’d be deported back to Egypt and return to his village penniless, so how would he get married?

The Syrian, Omar, talks to no one. He’s supposed to work as a guard and custodian but he doesn’t guard anything and he doesn’t clean. He has a little car that he traipses around in all day, and he returns to the hospital only to sleep.

Dr. Amjad told me to leave him alone.

“Don’t bother him. He’s free to do what he wants. You must understand, there’s no need to explain these things. We have to accept them and that’s all. They made me get rid of the Egyptian and dug up this fellow to keep an eye on the hospital. So you’ll just have to keep your mouth shut and swallow the rest.”

“The rest” means that we live in a place filled with security services, each of which is keeping an eye on the other, and we’re supposed to deal with them as though we don’t know. I don’t have any dealings with Omar, and practically speaking it’s Kamelya who guards the hospital at night. She stands at the entrance, lets people in, writes down their names, and that’s all.

We don’t need much of a staff. True, we have fifteen patients, but their families take care of everything. They change the sheets, bring food and clean the rooms. I don’t understand why they bring anyone to this hospital; they’d be better off at home. But they feel safe here, or they use it as an excuse to get out of the house. All we offer is free medicine; any cure is in God’s hands.

I’ll spare you the details of this strange world that I find myself in because you’re tired and need your rest.

I’ve come back to you now, and everything’s going to be as it was. Your condition isn’t great because of the ulcers. Zainab looked after you while I was away, but she didn’t do everything I used to do. She gave you a bath every two days, which is why the ulcers on your back have gotten so bad. Don’t worry, they’ll go away in less than a week, and you’ll be my spoiled child again. I’ll bathe you twice a day and won’t forget your ointment — everything will be fine.

Will you forgive me?

I swear you’re better company than any of the others. I see them roaming and muttering as if they were dead. We aren’t dead though, we’re seeking the aroma of life and are waiting.