The Olive Tree Speaks by Omaima Abdelaziz

The Olive Tree Speaks

By Omaima Abdelaziz

From the short-story collection Outside the Bounds of Time

Some trees do not merely grow from the earth. Their roots reach far deeper — into human memory.

Faces pass beneath their branches. Generations come and go. They silently shelter stories of love and loss, wait beside those longing for soldiers to return from war, and absorb the tears of those who never did.

But what if a tree that had lived for centuries could open the doors of its memory?

What if we came close enough to hear the whispers of those who had left pieces of their souls among its branches?

In “The Olive Tree Speaks,” I did not want the tree to serve merely as a witness to time. I wanted it to become a living memory, carrying us from one age to another and reminding us that people disappear, cities change and concrete may surround the earth — yet some stories refuse to die.

And so begins our first journey outside the bounds of time.

The Olive Tree Speaks

Abdel Hadi Suleiman, owner of the Egyptian Construction Company, had manipulated the law until he obtained permission to build a massive shopping mall on the citrus and olive farm adjoining the home of Sanaa, a delicate young woman known as an experienced agricultural engineer deeply devoted to her work.

The uprooting of the trees began like an occupier violating a homeland.

How could tons of iron and concrete replace ancient trees and the fragrance of flowers? How could anyone sever a piece of the earth’s lung — the very lung through which we all breathe?

Sanaa refused to stand by helplessly.

She went to the municipal council, then to the police station. Everyone appeared powerless before the influence the man possessed and the fact that he had secured all the necessary official documents.

Only one possibility remained: Essam, the engineer supervising the project.

It was difficult to reach him, but when she finally did, she told him about what she considered a crime. She led him to the oldest tree on the property, an olive tree standing at the edge of the construction site.

It was nine hundred years old — perhaps older.

Essam looked at the tree with shame and sorrow.

Sanaa left him there, hoping his conscience might awaken.

The wind shook the branches above him.

He rested his head against the olive tree and heard faint murmurs, voices whispering to one another.

Startled, he stepped away and searched for the source.

There was nothing around him but the wind playing through the branches.

He stood staring at the tree in suffocating silence.

In his mind, he saw himself standing beside a giant guillotine, blood staining his hands and clothes.

He was about to amputate a living being that had committed no crime.

Long ago, young Fathallah waited beneath that same olive tree, his eyes fixed on the road.

He was waiting for Ferdous, the most beautiful girl in the village — the “Daughter of the Nile’s Brown Skin,” as he loved to call her.

Only a short time remained before he would leave with the army. The Crusaders had occupied Damietta days earlier and were advancing toward Mansoura.

He was forced to leave without saying goodbye.

He placed his palm against the tree and entrusted it with his farewell message. Then he left the fragrance of his broken breath upon its bark.

He walked away distracted and afraid.

What if he died without seeing her again?

Ferdous finally arrived, breathless.

She looked around the olive tree in a screaming silence.

Had he already gone with the young men of the village?

Had he left before wrapping her in the shawl of his words?

She began speaking to the olive tree.

Her fingers moved across its bark, and she pressed her ear against it until his breath seemed to fill her soul.

Within her heart, she heard the echo of his words.

The mist lifted, and she returned home sorrowfully to wait for him.

In another time lived Miriam, a gentle and dreamy young woman overwhelmed with happiness after marrying a handsome, calm man who indulged her wishes.

He had agreed to take her to Umm Kulthum’s concert at the gardens of Azbakeya Palace.

For Miriam, it was a day worthy of history, and she recorded it in her diary.

It marked the first artistic encounter between Umm Kulthum and the composer Mohamed Abdel Wahab.

All that remained was for Rashad to arrive quickly so they could reach the concert early.

“Please, Rashad, don’t go. Don’t leave me. You shocked me with the news of your marriage. How could you do this after we had agreed to marry? Didn’t you realize that I love you? I won’t give up. I can’t live without you.”

“It’s over. I married a good woman. Please… marriage is fate. You and I are colleagues now, nothing more.”

Rashad hurried away as though fleeing a monster inside himself, one that devoured him whenever his resolve weakened before his love for Zahra.

He had abandoned the idea of marrying her after learning that she had once been involved with another colleague.

Although he later felt troubled that he had never allowed her to defend herself, he made his decision and married Miriam, the daughter of his mother’s friend.

He could not bear what he believed had been Zahra’s deception.

At the concert, Rashad and Miriam sat in the fifth row.

The atmosphere was dazzling, almost as though the entire country were waiting for a presidential address from Gamal Abdel Nasser.

Happiness danced across Miriam’s face.

From time to time, she squeezed Rashad’s hand, refusing to let go, silently thanking him for making her dream come true.

Rashad smiled.

But his mind wandered among the words of Enta Omri.

The following day, Miriam received an anonymous telephone call telling her that her husband was involved with a woman from work.

Jealousy ignited inside her.

Questions crowded her mind until she could barely breathe.

She went outside to walk and somehow found herself beside an ancient olive tree near her home.

She embraced it, perhaps hoping to draw strength and steadiness from it.

Her tears streamed down and fell across the tree’s weathered bark.

A breeze passed over her and dried them.

Then she heard a strange, indistinct whisper.

She ran her fingers over the branches and leaves.

There were muffled voices.

Was the tree speaking?

Or was she losing her mind?

Strangely, she felt no fear.

Instead, an unfamiliar peace settled over her.

She returned home, her mind wandering between the voice on the telephone and the voice of the olive tree.

She said nothing to Rashad and remained silent, thinking about what had happened.

Rashad, too, remained immersed in an inner struggle.

Zahra’s image would not leave him.

Whenever he tried to forget her, he sank into the darkness of his own depths, unaware that she was attempting to take revenge on him.

Essam, meanwhile, suffered throughout the night.

The olive tree pursued him through his dreams.

He returned to it and listened closely.

It sounded as though an entire crowd lived inside.

Then he noticed a tiny opening through which light escaped.

He looked through it.

An enormous world appeared before him.

Conflicting emotions.

Whispers.

Screams.

Sorrow.

Joy.

His head began to spin violently.

He clung to the olive tree — and suddenly it pulled him inside.

He screamed.

A hand reached toward him and seized his own.

A woman called his name.

Essam stared in astonishment.

“Sanaa! Where am I?”

Elsewhere in the tree’s memory, sorrow had fallen across Fathallah’s heart.

Before the battle he had longed to see Ferdous’s face and hear her prayers for him.

But the moment of battle came.

Al-Zahir Baybars devised his plan, and the enemy was defeated at the Battle of Mansoura.

The returning forces carried news of victory.

Joy illuminated Ferdous’s face.

She rushed to the olive tree to tell it the news.

A commotion stirred among its branches.

Her black veil caught on one of them.

She tried to free it, but the fabric tore, leaving a piece trapped among the branches.

A shadow crossed her face.

She went back to seek news.

Fathallah had returned only as a lifeless body.

“Sanaa… that olive tree will not be destroyed. I swear to you, it is alive. There is an entire world inside it.”

“Yes. It has witnessed so much. I’m glad you finally believe it must be saved.”

“How did I not know you before? You are such a gentle soul. When I’m near you, I feel so much light and energy. Never in my life did I imagine I would listen to the bark of a tree. You are extraordinary.”

Miriam could no longer hide what she knew about Rashad and his colleague.

“Rashad… tell me about your life before we married. Were you ever in love?”

“What kind of question is that? Have I failed you in some way?”

“I don’t know how to lie. I received a call from an unknown woman. She told me you were involved with someone you work with.”

The surprise unsettled him.

He shouted:

“Are you spying on me? Yes, I loved Zahra, my colleague. I left her and married you. Is that a crime? I treat you well. What more do you want?”

“I want you. You feel like a stranger to me. Why did you do this to me?”

Miriam wept for a long time.

She returned to the olive tree and poured out her confusion.

What should she do?

Should she leave him and go?

Or should she fight for his love, hoping perhaps that the threads of her affection might wrap themselves around him until he forgot his past?

Rashad came home early from work.

She was not there.

Anger seized him, and he assumed she had returned to her father’s home — until he saw that her belongings were still there.

He went looking for her.

He could not understand what was happening inside him.

Had his heart changed?

Why had he suddenly come to hate Zahra for hurting Miriam with that telephone call?

Wasn’t Zahra’s call proof that she was still attached to him?

And yet his heart ached for the pain Miriam had suffered.

Then he remembered that Miriam had once told him about an old tree near the ancient waterwheel, a tree that somehow made her feel at peace.

He went there.

He placed his hand upon the olive tree.

Miriam noticed him.

He took her hand.

“I will never feel like a stranger again now that I have found you. I have said goodbye to the past. I am here with you — in the present and in the future.”

He meant every word.

The olive tree witnessed his faithfulness to her until, eventually, both their souls returned to their Creator.

Ferdous knew Fathallah would never return, yet she continued waiting.

She refused to accept that he had died in the war.

She felt he was still alive inside the olive tree.

She continued visiting it, speaking to him through it until she, too, departed this world.

She joined him after entrusting her love to the olive tree, leaving it as witness to a devotion that survived even death.

Construction continued at full speed.

High walls rose around the site.

Never before had the remote area experienced such noise and movement as it did while the shopping mall neared completion.

And there, at the entrance of the mall, the olive tree remained standing proudly.

Within it lived thousands of stories.

Within it lived a long history.

It became a destination for visitors as the oldest living tree in the area.

People began calling it:

The Talking Tree.

And the whispers inside it remained an unsolved mystery—

to this very day.