2
“Three weeks? That is all? You could not stay engaged longer than three weeks, Amir? I thought you would finally settle down, but no. Ya Allah, what use are you? Big muscles and a heavy stubble, but you are still a child.”
“This has nothing to do with me, Father. You heard the rumors,” said Sheikh Amir, flexing those big muscles involuntarily as he paced beside his father’s bed. The old man barely left that bed these days, and when he did it was on a wheelchair.
“Yes, I heard them. But I do not believe them. That woman would not betray you if her life depended on it. It is more likely you planted those rumors yourself just to get out of the marriage.”
Amir tilted his head back and roared with laughter, his green eyes shining from the glow of the sun. He shook his head and glanced at his father, the old man shriveled and fading, a shadow of his former self. The old Sheikh had been tall and strong in his youth as well, and Amir turned away from him as he pushed away the fear of the genetic muscular disorder that stole his father’s mobility at too early an age.
“Ya Allah,” Amir said, smiling and shaking his head, placing his hands on his tight hips and inhaling the warm desert breeze coming in through the open balcony that faced the west. Outside he could see the sun setting red over the ocher dunes in the distance, the shining domes and minarets of Johaar sparkling like jewels as the evening prayer call rung out across the kingdom. “Are you implying that I would plant a rumor that humiliates me just to get out of a marriage? I am a king, and if I want to do something, I just do it. I do not need a reason. I do not need an excuse.”
The old Sheikh grimaced as he tried to shift in his bed. Immediately Amir strode over to his father and helped him turn and reach for the glass of lemon-water, raising it to the old man’s lips and waiting while he drank.
“You sound like a spoiled child, not a king,” muttered the old Sheikh, nodding his head and pushing the glass away. “Please stop watching Game of Thrones, Amir.”
Amir laughed again when he saw the sparkle in the old man’s eyes—eyes that were getting dimmer by the day but still shone with mischief and affection at times. “It is done, Father. Marissa is history.”
“For a thirty-three year old man, you are accumulating a long history of failed relationships and broken engagements,” the old Sheikh said. “This is what you get for trying to challenge the old ways.”
Amir snorted. “The old ways of arranged marriages with four different women? Ya Allah, Father! I cannot bring Johaar into the new world if I cling to old traditions that have no place in it.”
“Sometimes the old ways are the best ways, Son. Consider it.” He shrugged in his bed. “Clearly you have the appetite for more than one woman. Or is that a rumor as well?”
Amir grinned. “You have been hearing a lot of rumors lately. Perhaps I shall take away your iPad.”
The old man laughed. “But I am halfway through the third season of The Americans!” The laughter morphed into a hacking cough, and the old Sheikh took another sip of his tonic before laying his head back. “Speaking of Americans, how is our new tourism initiative going? Are we seeing the foreign currency roll in yet?”
Amir nodded but without much enthusiasm. “It will take time. The advertising campaigns are not really underway. The first few direct flights from London have been relatively empty, according to the Minister for Tourism.”
“Put some more effort into it, Amir. Perhaps even put yourself into it.”
Amir frowned. “What do you mean? Myself in the tourism ads? Am I an animal in a zoo? Will people come to watch me sit on the throne and say, ‘Off with their heads!’?”
The old Sheikh coughed again as he chuckled. “I would crawl out of my deathbed to witness that.”
Amir swallowed hard as a lump formed in his throat. Both he and his father knew the old man was never leaving this bed. The muscular disorder was so rare it didn’t even have a name yet, but even a nameless disease can take a man down. Already the old Sheikh’s internal organs were failing as the disease spread. He did not have much time.
“I should line up the bloody doctors who promised to cure you and then failed,” Amir growled, clenching his fist and walking past his father’s bed and towards the open balcony. He breathed deep of the desert air, taking in the distant aroma of the evening fires that were common this time of year. The Arabian New Year would hit at the next New Moon, and the Johaaris had a peculiar tradition of building bonfires out in the open desert and staying up all night, eating and drinking, telling stories, playing music, and dancing to bring in the new season. The night was still a couple of weeks away, but the younger Johaaris liked to get started early.
The old Sheikh was silent as he stared at his son. Then he sighed. “We all live and die by Allah’s decree,” he said quietly.
Amir whipped around, his face peaked. “So I am destined to die the same way, Father? Losing control of my body? My days ending helpless in a bed?”
“Allah’s decree is not the same as destiny,” said the old Sheikh. “It can be changed.”
“So how do we change it?” Amir shouted, slamming his fist into the headboard of the gigantic teakwood bed, almost shattering the thick wood and perhaps even his hand. “How do we get you out of this bed and back on your feet, to finish your rule?”
The old Sheikh shook his head. “My rule is done, Amir. The throne is yours. The kingdom is yours. The future is yours. Perhaps that was Allah’s decree, and my sickness was only incidental. A means to His ends.”
Amir ran his fingers through his thick black hair, shaking his head as he began to pace. He clasped his hands behind his back and turned on his heel when he got to the far end of the sprawling, hundred-year old bedroom. His father was right, and Amir knew it. God’s decree or not, Amir was Sheikh and supreme ruler, and there was work to be done. The Kingdom of Johaar was not blessed with the vast oil wells of Saudi Arabia or the pure, high-quality oil of some of the smaller kingdoms. There was some oil, but it was being pumped to capacity and the writing was on the wall. The last three generations of Amir’s family had invested their billions of dollars in oil revenues wisely, and the kingdom was wealthy enough to continue to provide free education and a monthly stipend to every Johaari citizen. But Johaar needed to find its place in the new world, and for that Sheikh Amir needed to keep the younger generations engaged and invested in their kingdom’s future.
Amir’s father had pointed out years earlier that the younger generation of Johaaris would leave for the larger, more exciting cities in greater Arabia, the Far East, and the West if there was nothing to keep them excited about their small homeland. Fostering startup companies and other initiatives were underway, but those took time to get going, and the old Sheikh had suggested tourism as one way to raise Johaar’s profile in the world.
“Tourism also has the effect of raising a country’s profile in the eyes of its own citizens,” the wise old Sheikh had told Amir. “It will give the younger Johaaris a sense of pride when they see Americans and Europeans and Japanese visiting our tiny country with their tiny cameras and making a big deal out of it. Keeping the newer generations invested in their kingdom will bring returns down the line. Mark my words, son.”
And so they’d appointed a Minister of Tourism and begun the series of initiatives and investments designed to bring in both foreigners and foreign currency. Amir had been ambivalent about the whole thing to begin with: In his mind it felt tacky and desperate to be offering discounted airfare and subsidized hotel rooms to bring in tourists. That would only bring in the discount-hunters, the people on small budgets, the deal-seekers. He’d instead wanted to raise prices and try to make Johaar a destination for the rich and famous of the Western world. Would that not raise their profile more than bringing in the typical “ugly American” tourist with his already maxed-out Visa card?
But the old Sheikh had been adamant. “The western world is seeing a backlash against the elites, the so-called ‘One Percent.’ And besides, we cannot compete with some of the world’s elite vacation spots anyway. Do you think we can get George Clooney to sell his house on the French Riviera and set up shop in Johaar? We must play to our strengths, Amir. We can position ourselves as affordable but not cheap. An exotic destination that will give even middle-class foreigners a taste of old Arabia. They cannot find that in the modern city of Dubai. And Saudi Arabia is still too strict and austere.”
“Old Arabia,” Amir had said. “All right, Father. I will take it under advisement.”
Old Arabia, came the thought as he scanned the peaks of Johaar’s minarets, the smooth curves of the domes, the distant swells of the ever-shifting dunes. The sun had dipped out of sight, and the prayer calls were done. Once again Amir had missed the evening prayer. It had been months since he joined his people in the Grand Mosque in Johaar’s City Center.
Amir sighed when he turned from the balcony and walked to his father’s bed. He pulled the soft woolen blankets over the old Sheikh and touched his forehead. Still warm. The fever was constant, it seemed. How much longer could the old man’s body fight the disease? Was this Allah’s decree or His punishment? Was there a difference?
The young Sheikh summoned the attendants to watch over his father, and then he left the room, pulling out his phone as the teakwood double-doors closed behind him. He punched the keypad and waited.
“It should not take my Minister of Tourism three rings to answer a phone call from his Sheikh,” said Amir sternly, though his green eyes sparkled and his dark red lips curled into a smile. “Now tell me, how are things going? Do we have any takers for my father’s idea of giving away plane tickets and hotel rooms to bring in some noisy Americans?”
Amir listened, his eyes widening along with his smile as the Tourism Minister replied. “A wedding? Really? Ya Allah, that is interesting. No, cancel the hotel’s offer of hosting a grand reception the week before the wedding. Instead, inform the wedding party that the Sheikh himself has invited them for a visit. You can give them a tour of the century-old Royal Palace of Johaar, and at the end I will greet them and congratulate the couple. That used to be a tradition in old Arabia, where the Sheikh gave his personal blessing before every marriage.”
The Sheikh hung up and smiled, shaking his head when he thought back to the old laws he’d studied as a young Sheikh-in-training. Old laws even more outdated and politically incorrect than a man taking four wives. He laughed as he remembered one of the most interesting: Sheikh’s Privilege. An old law that made it clear the Sheikh was the man in charge, the alpha male, the man who could claim ownership of everything and everyone in his kingdom. Every man and every woman.
Especially every woman.