Canceled Memories: A Novel

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139 15 At eight on the dot, Najwa was at the door of the medical laboratory. It was shut, so she rang the bell and waited. She didn’t hear anything. She rang again and waited. Nothing. She reread the opening hours posted on the door, 7:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., and stood waiting. Finally, she heard footsteps on the stairs, but it was just a woman carrying two sacks of fruit and vegetables. “Doesn’t the lab open?” Najwa asked the woman, who was about to go up to the second floor. “Yes, it does. What time is it now?” Najwa looked at her watch. “It’s a quarter past eight. It says here they open at seven-thirty.” The woman had stopped, catching her breath. “Nobody ever shows up before nine,” she said. “Why don’t you wait at my place? They usually open at eight-thirty.” “Thanks. I’ll just wait here.” The woman went up the stairs, and Najwa sat down on the bottom step, waiting. When the doctor had asked her to get some blood and urine tests, she was told that this lab was “one of the best” and that “all the employees are young university graduates.” She wondered as she waited, What about punctuality? At eight-thirty, a young man showed up. “Have you been waiting for us?” he asked, putting his key in the door. “For half an hour,” she said as she got up. The young man didn’t saying anything. He neither explained why he was late nor apologized. When he went inside, she followed him. She handed him the order for tests. 140      N a z i k S a b a Y a r e d He looked at it for a second and said, “Just a minute. The lab technician will be here shortly, and you can give her your urine sample, too. Why don’t you have a seat and get some rest?” He gave back the order, and Najwa sat down in the chair he pointed to. She was resting from the exhaustion of comfort she’d experienced the past half hour. Then a young woman came in and said, “Good morning, Ziad.” Then she looked at Najwa. “Good morning. Are you waiting for me?” Ziad answered for her. “She’s in here for blood and urine tests.” “Just a minute.” The woman disappeared inside. When Najwa looked at her watch this time, it was a quarter to nine. She almost asked the young man why they didn’t change the posted hours since no one showed up before nine, anyway. The woman came out and asked Najwa to follow her, leading her into a small room where Najwa handed the woman her urine sample. The woman sterilized Najwa’s arm inside the elbow and took a blood sample. She gave Najwa a cotton ball soaked with alcohol to press against her vein to stop the bleeding. She put the sample in a little glass tube. “Come by and pick up the results in a couple of days.” Najwa hesitated for a minute and said, “Aren’t you going to write my name on the urine and blood samples?” “I read your name on the prescription,” she said. “This is enough. I’ll remember.” “But you might get it mixed up with another sample if you don’t write people’s names on their samples,” Najwa insisted. The young woman looked at Najwa and said coldly, “We know our job, ma’am.” Najwa turned her back and left the room, straightening out her clothes. Another sample of fresh graduates, she thought. She remembered her excitement when she had argued with Huda when they first saw each other. She left the building. Two days later she went by the laboratory. Her test results were in a sealed envelope with the young man at the front desk. She paid for them and headed to the doctor. Had they sealed the envelope because of the frightening results? she wondered on her way. C a n c e l e d M e m o r i e s       141 The doctor took the report out of the envelope and examined it. He looked up at Najwa, smiled, and said, “Great! Your test results are excellent. What you’re feeling is, no doubt, a result of exhaustion.” “Exhaustion?” Najwa said, frustrated. “How can...