Nadia Hamdan worked at a desk near the window in the permits office. She had a kind voice, and she was careful with it, because a kind voice could make a frightened person stay, and a hard form feel possible. On the morning Mariam Haddad came back to the office, with Rami Haddad beside her and Nour Haddad holding her hand, Nadia saw that the old woman was afraid, and she stood up, and she came around the desk, and she pulled out a chair.
She did not begin with the forms. She began with tea. Nadia poured tea into a glass and put it in front of Mariam, and she said, sit, rest, there is no hurry. Mariam sat, and her hands stopped shaking a little. Nadia asked Mariam her name, and Mariam told her, and Nadia wrote it down herself, in clear letters, and showed Mariam the letters, and Mariam nodded, and the name looked right.
Then Nadia took out the forms, one at a time, and she laid them on the desk like cards, and she explained each one in a kind voice, slowly, in plain words. This paper, she said, is for your name and where you live. This paper is for what you sell. This paper is for the place where you sell it. She pointed to each line as she spoke, and she waited after each sentence, and Mariam said yes, and for the first time she did understand. She said, you sell potatoes, onions, leeks, leafy greens, and tomatoes, and Mariam said yes, and Nadia wrote the words down, and Mariam thought that perhaps the paper was not an enemy after all.
Nadia explained the fee next, and she did not hide it, and she did not rush past it, because hiding a hard thing only made it harder later. She said the fee, and Mariam felt her hands go cold again. But Nadia kept speaking, and she said there was a new rule from the council, proposed by Rania Itani, and the fee for an old vendor with a small pitch would be less now, less than a day of tomatoes. Mariam asked her to say it again, and Nadia said it again, slowly, and the number was small, and the number was possible, and Mariam felt something loosen in her chest.
Nadia explained the rest of the forms the same way, line by line, with patience that never ran out. She explained that Mariam would need to sign her name, and that the signature only had to be hers. She explained that Rami could read every word aloud first, and that Mariam could ask as many questions as she wanted. She explained that the permit would name the pitch, and that the pitch would be hers, marked in chalk, clear of the shop doorway and clear of the walkway. Mariam thought about the folder on top of the wardrobe, and the clerk with the tired eyes, and she felt tears come to her eyes, and Nadia pretended not to see, and that was kindness too.
Rami read the forms aloud, slowly, and Nour followed along with her finger, and when Rami came to a hard word, Nadia explained it. By the end Mariam understood all of it. She understood that she would pay the fee from her tin cup, keep the receipt folded in her dress pocket, and sell on her corner, in her pitch, with her crates. She understood that she would still have to keep the pavement clean and the walkway clear, and those were fair rules.
When it was time to sign, Nadia put the pen in Mariam's hand, and Mariam's hand shook, and Nadia put her own hand, gently, over Mariam's hand, to steady it, and she said, take your time, there is no hurry, and Mariam signed her name, slowly, in letters that leaned a little to one side, and the letters were hers, and they were enough. Rami smiled. Nour clapped once, softly, and then put her hand over her mouth, because an office was not a place for clapping, and Nadia laughed, a small kind laugh, and said that an office was exactly a place for clapping, when a signature had taken thirty years to arrive. Mariam laughed too, and the laugh surprised her, because she had not laughed in the morning for a long time, not like that, not with relief in it.
Nadia stamped the papers, and she folded the receipt, and she put it in an envelope, and she gave the envelope to Mariam, and she said, keep this safe, keep it in your pocket. Mariam put the envelope in her dress pocket, next to her heart, and she felt the paper there, small and solid.
Before they left, Nadia walked with them to the door, and she said that if Mariam had any trouble, she should come back and ask for Nadia. Outside, the sun was bright, and Mariam walked a little slower than usual, and a little straighter, and she thought about Youssef, and she wished he could have seen the morning when the forms were explained in a kind voice, and the paper was finally within her reach.
Mariam did not yet know about the chalk line, or the council vote. She knew only that a clerk had spoken kindly, that a paper bore her name, and that tomorrow she would return to her corner with something new in her pocket, and something lighter in her chest.
Chapter Eighteen
The Shopkeeper Who Feared His Own Empty Shelves