“Back in El Paso, my life would be worthless. Everything's gone in life, nothing is left, [but] my love is stronger than my fear of death,”

– Marty Robbins

Excerpt from "1978”

(2025)

How quickly Sa’id’s life escalated from obedient son to lead surgeon at Las Palmas Del Sol Hospital, was hard to estimate. From Sa’id’s standpoint, the whole thing just kept tumbling forwards until he was seated on one of the low twin brown and gold brocade couches in cowboy boots and a suit, holding a beer against his thigh while their European friends mingled around their living room in El Paso, Texas. That he and his wife had become the centrifugal force in their ex-pat friend group meaning they were suddenly obligated to host all manner of events and dinners outside his range of capacity in his current standing at the hospital, that his oldest daughter was still struggling with English even after seven years of living in the States, and that her and the rest of his daughters were upstairs only pretending to be asleep, still riding on a high from the braids they’d gotten done in Juarez earlier that day as a distracting treat to flutter in the face of the series of recent arguments between Sa’id and his wife, Fatimeh, were all a minor details compared to the main event in his heart. The surgery had gone alright, but there’d been a fluke and now he was sitting on yet another lawsuit. Protected still by the hospital and all its layers of medical board protection, Sa’id could not shake his self-prescribed directive to go back to the hospital, now, to do something active and productive to counteract the complication.

While Sa’id smiled and nodded at his guests, his former patient was now being monitored through the night by a Dr. Johnson. There would be nothing more for Sa’id to do. The patient’s family had been direct in their mistrust of Sa’id even though he had warned them about this specific outcome prior to the operation. A lung is a delicate thing. But none the less, they had become inflamed at the very complication happening and instead of admitting their disappointment, they found in Sa’id the perfect scapegoat. 

Sa’id took a long sip of his beer. Returned the glass to his thigh.

And what does the Doctor think of the lager? said Peter who had just sunk down into the couch next to Sa’id. Peter and his wife Sabina had brought the lager back from Germany, he always asked the same question. Sa’id caught Fatimeh’s eye across the room. She had been monitoring his behavior, afraid he would bring down the mood of their guests. She would be right about this of course, but Sa’id was not in the business of admitting defeat.

Later in the evening, Peter and Sa’id would stand outside on the porch enjoying a cigarette and wiping the sweat from their brows, the rest of the party would have gone home but Peter and Sabina would stay behind to mark the differentiation in levels of friendship between themselves and all of Sa’id and Fatimeh’s other friends. Peter would confess to Sa’id that he was concerned about the progression of his four-year-old son’s asthma. This was the kind of thing you learned to expect of your friends as a doctor. And although Sa’id feigned annoyance whenever he complained to Fatimeh about this, he thought it was ultimately something to be proud of. It denoted his reliability. Peter would cough and Sa’id would make a dry joke about keeping his toddler off cigarettes for a week to see what would happen. Peter would bellow and this would prompt their wives who stood in the kitchen to look out the French doors to see what was so funny. They would find their husbands in good form. Somewhere in the distance an air conditioning unit would start up, rumbling in the cramped dry desert night. Rumbling so loud it could be heard equally as deafening outside as in the kitchen instigating a simultaneous but separate conversation about whether to re-fit their houses for central air. In the Kitchen, Fatimeh and Sabina would arrive to the conclusion it was worth the money, outside Sa’id and Peter would arrive at a contrary conclusion. The grand clock in the living room would chime 1am and Peter and Sabina would walk out to their car while Fatimeh and Sa’id would stand in the doorway waving them down the street until they turned the corner out of sight. Sa’id would then stack up the empty beer cups in the living room, placing them gently in the sink to soak, washing thoroughly the sticky residue off his fingers. Fatimeh would lay down on the couch in the parlor and let out a sound of relief for her feet. In later years she would be diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis, but for now it could be blamed on the stiff heels she insisted on wearing for added height. In two weeks’ time the pomegranate tree planted as an homage to the country they would only visit less than five times in the following half of their lives, would produce its first green fruits, their girls would reluctantly unpeel their braids but rejoice at the frizzy curls they would find beneath the ribbons, Fatimeh would finally look into getting her oldest daughter an English tutor, and Sa’id would suffer his first mental breakdown.