It felt good, being in the garage. The prayer mats on the walls were embroidered with verses from the Koran, in gold-thread calligraphy. The sparse furniture consisted of a raffia mat, a low table, a television, and a bookcase. Sitting cross-legged, dressed all in white, his beard carefully trimmed, Abu Zoubeir radiated a strange light. When his eyes rested on one of us, we had the impression he was reading our hearts, like a book. He had a sixth sense for discerning our innermost thoughts, our doubts, and our questions, to which he had clear and precise answers.

How old were we when those meetings began? Fifteen, maybe sixteen. Hamid was the first to start visiting Abu Zoubeir. I’d see them nattering away for hours over by the cesspools, near where we’d buried Morad. Hamid seemed fascinated by the eloquent conversation of his friend, whom he referred to as a guardian angel. To me he was more like a demon. In the beginning, I hated him, because my brother didn’t notice me anymore, he ignored me. It was as if, overnight, I’d ceased to exist. Hamid was no longer interested in the Sunday games, or the fights that came after. Or even in his own business, which wasn’t doing well. The boys he employed at the dump were stealing from him with complete impunity; but he couldn’t care less. He’d lost all authority over the glue sniffers and his other flunkies, who’d gone freelance. Worse, he’d stopped getting high and, to crown it all, he’d begun to pray five times a day. The transformation was complete. Yemma was happy because he’d taken a job selling shoes in the city with a friend of Abu Zoubeir’s. Nothing was the same as before. He’d bore the pants off us with his piety. On Fridays, he’d go to the mosque and take his place in the front row next to Abu Zoubeir, who’d then give a speech. He let his beard grow; he was the shadow of his former self. Gone was the dandy always up for a fight, sharp as a razor, organizing his own life and everyone else’s. Mine especially. I’d grown up and could look after myself now, but I missed him. If, in a game, I made a spectacular save, I’d glance around for him, in case he was admiring my exploits from afar. I needed his applause, his yelling, his sudden storming of the field to give me a hug. But he wasn’t there. His time was divided between the shop, the garage, and home, where he only came to eat. Gone, too, was the gaiety he usually spread around the table, the ridiculous stories that had Yemma in stitches. He could even extract a smile from my father’s mummified face. He’d jeer at my brothers and no one would be able to get a word in edgeways, he was always so talkative, so funny. All that was gone. He managed to spin a kind of austere web that gradually entangled us all. We couldn’t watch TV in peace because he’d be doing our heads in with his diatribes about the American-Zionist conspiracy that was brainwashing us all, corrupting our morals and insidiously infecting each one of us. Yemma didn’t understand a word he was saying, but depriving her of her Egyptian and Brazilian soaps was out of the question. So, just to irritate us, he’d start noisily reciting the Koran in the room next door.

As time passed, Hamid would come home less and less. Eventually he set himself up in a shack near the garage, lent to him by Abu Zoubeir. That hurt a lot, because he left a gaping hole at home. I went on loving him in spite of it all. He was still my idol, on a par with Yachine, my soccer hero. I’d get up at dawn to go and meet him before he left for work. He’d take me to Belkabir’s, a stallholder who made doughnuts that were second to none. Sitting behind a vast frying pan, the man with the spreading paunch would fling rounds of sticky dough into boiling oil. They’d instantly swell as they floated, giving off an exquisite smell. We’d buy a big crisp ring of them and take it to the café, order mint tea and happily munch away. Hamid said I ought to find myself a job so I’d be able to feed myself properly. He’d have a word with Abu Zoubeir, who had friends everywhere. I agreed, because I adored doughnuts. Sometimes he’d put me off my food by talking about hell so early in the morning. He’d insist that on the day of the Last Judgment the infidels would be thrown into vats of boiling oil, that their skin would keep growing back so they’d carry on frying and the suffering would be atrocious. That gave me goose bumps. I told him I believed in God and I’d never get fried like a doughnut. That’s how I became an apprentice mechanic with Ba Moussa. A grubby job, but one I was conscientious about. And since Nabil was bored and kept hanging around the bikes I was fixing, he was taken on too. Together, we made a great team. So much so that Ba Moussa, who was an inveterate kif smoker, came to rely on us and we became professionals.

The shop consisted of two connecting rooms. The one at the back, which was tiny, dark, and airless, was where the boss lived. It had a bed and a table, on top of which, in pride of place, was a transistor radio, which blared from morning till night, and a suitcase for his clothes. A bare bulb, emitting a faint glow, hung from the low ceiling. We were always knocking our heads on it. The other room was our workshop: there was a crate full of tools, some old tires, nuts and bolts, screws, and a mountain of ill-assorted scrap metal that could be reused. But in fact, except when it rained, we always worked outside. The bicycle held no mysteries for us anymore. And then we progressed to the next stage: mopeds. That was a whole different story, but we knuckled down. Moussa would give us easy jobs to start with, and more complicated ones as we went on. And if, when we made a mistake, he took the liberty of giving us a beating, it was for our own good. We knew that. You have to be tough on apprentices at times, even if Ba Moussa, when he was annoyed, could deliver a real drubbing. I learned to keep out of the way, but Nabil had a knack for being in range. He bore the brunt of it. But hey, that was the deal.

It took us a few months to get the hang of the work. We learned to strip an engine in next to no time, lubricate it, replace the faulty parts, and reassemble it. I’d be ecstatic when an engine started up first time; I’d take it for a trial run on the tracks over at the dump. My friends, seeing me roar past, would howl with jealousy. Some of them threw stones and shouted: “Bourgeois filth!” I’d give them the finger and keep going. The boss was proud of us. As was Hamid, who’d come to visit, bringing bread, a tin of sardines, and potatoes. It was great. In those days, I was stuffing myself, spending half my salary on food. The rest I’d give to Yemma, who’d give it back to me in different ways. She bought balls of wool and knitted us jumpers, gloves, hats, and socks; she’d buy me a pair of espadrilles or anything else she could find at the souk that was cheap and useful. I’d put on weight and had grown about ten centimeters. It was all going so well. But in Sidi Moumen, the moment an engine is running smoothly, a bit of grit will get in to jam it. Without fail. It was woven into the fabric of our destinies.

If Nabil was a graceful creature, it wasn’t his fault. If men did a double take as he walked by, he hadn’t chosen to have a pert ass, or white skin, or silky curls. The older he got, the more desirable he became. I’m not saying I was immune to his charm. His feline, delicate beauty attracted me just as much as the others. I’m not saying I’d never considered it, but I’d quickly banish those appalling thoughts from my mind. The memory of that night in his shack with the Stars still makes my stomach heave. Nabil was dogged by bad luck, which is contagious. It was an easy life, for sure, now that we were no longer scavenging on the dump. We had a cushy job that brought in a hundred dirhams a week and elevated us to the rank of princes. Not for a moment did giving it up cross our minds. But that damned ass of Nabil’s only ever caused us grief.