The Pearl that Broke Its Shell (19 page)

We heard a soft thump. Abdul Khaliq began speaking again. “That should cover it,” he said simply. “You’ll have plenty there to cover the bride price of each of your three daughters. Of course, as family, we will share with you some of the products of the land to the north. Perhaps that would be of interest to you.” I knew my father’s eyes were bulging at the promise of opium. My mother shook her head.

“Now we need only arrange the
nikkah
date for these three unions. Wouldn’t you agree?”

“I… I suppose… Abdul Khaliq,
sahib,
what about a wedding? A celebration?” Usually there was something. Guests, food, music.

“I don’t think that’s really necessary. My cousins and I, we’ve all had weddings. The most important thing is to have the marriage done properly with a
mullah
. For that, I’ll bring my friend Haji-
sahib
.” He waved his hand in the direction of the bag. “Now that this matter has been settled, I’m sure you agree that the
nikkah
is the most important part.”

My father, my grandfather and my uncles were silent. My mother and I felt our stomachs drop, knowing they could not resist what Abdul Khaliq was offering—more money than our family had ever seen and the promise of a steady opium supply. I covered my face with my hands and pressed my head against the wall.

I slipped out of Madar-
jan
’s clutching fingers and left her standing there, stunned. Three daughters. Turning me into a boy hadn’t protected me at all. In fact, it had put me right in front of this warlord who now demanded my hand in marriage. Barely a teenager, I was to be wed to this gray-haired fighter with bags of money and armed men to do his bidding.

My sisters looked at me, already crying. Shahla was trembling.

“It’s terrible, Shahla!” I sobbed. “I’m so sorry, I’m so very sorry! It’s so awful!”

“They’re really agreeing to it?”

“It’s… it’s just like you said… there’s too many… they’re giving Padar so much money…”

I couldn’t bring myself to form the words. Shahla understood though. I saw her eyes well up and her lip stiffen before she turned her back to me. She was angry.

“God help us,” she said.

I wanted to be outside with Abdullah. I wished I could be chasing stray dogs with him or kicking a ball down the street. I wondered what he would say if he knew I was to be married.

That night, I dreamed of Abdul Khaliq. He had come for me. He towered over me with a stick in his hand, laughing. He was pulling me by the arm. He was strong and I couldn’t get away. The streets were empty but as I walked past the houses, gates opened one by one. My mother. Khala Shaima. Shahla. Bibi Shekiba. Abdullah. Each one stood in a doorway and watched me walk by; they all shook their heads.

I looked at their faces. They were sad.

“Why aren’t you helping me?” I cried. “Don’t you see what’s happening? Please, can’t you do something? Madar-
jan
! Khala Shaima! Bibi-
jan
! I’m sorry! Shahla, I’m sorry!”

“Allah has chosen this as your
naseeb,
” they each called out in turn. “This is your
naseeb,
Rahima.”

CHAPTER 19

A
bdul Khaliq Khan was a clever man. A clever man with many guns. He knew all the right buttons to push. My father had never seen so much money and would choose opium over food even if he hadn’t eaten for days. What good were his daughters anyway?

We were young but not that young. Shahla was fifteen years old, Parwin was fourteen and I was thirteen. We were flower buds that had just started to open. It was time for us to be taken to our new homes, just like Bibi Shekiba.

My father had come into our room and ordered my mother to make a
shirnee,
something sweet he could put before the guests to show our family agreed to the arrangement. We didn’t have much so Madar-
jan
gave him a small bowl of sugar, wet with tears, which he took and laid before Abdul Khaliq’s father. The men embraced each other in congratulations. We girls huddled around my mother, looking to each other for comfort.

The arrangements moved quickly. Abdul Sharif was a rugged-looking man in his thirties and his brother Abdul Haidar was probably a few years older. Abdul Sharif had one other wife at home but was content to take on a second, especially since the bride price had been covered by his cousin. Abdul Haidar already had two wives at home. Parwin would be his third.

Come back in two weeks for the
nikkah
,
Padar-
jan
had said, his eyes darting back and forth from the guests to the black bag on the floor.

S
hahla was so angry that she did not speak to me for four days.

I tried to talk to her but she wouldn’t look at me.

“Why did you have to make Padar so angry? I don’t want to go with that man! Parwin doesn’t want this either! We were fine! Leave me alone. Go and be with Abdullah now!”

I was stunned. My sister was right, though. I had pushed the situation without thinking about anyone else. I wanted to be allowed to wrestle with Abdullah, to walk to school with him and feel his arm around my shoulder. This was my doing.

“I’m sorry, Shahla. I’m really sorry! I didn’t mean for any of this to happen! Please believe me!”

Shahla wiped her cheeks and blew her nose.

Parwin watched us, her mouth in a tight pout.

“One by one, the birds flew off… ,” she said quietly. I looked at her, her left leg tucked under her and her right stretched before her. I wondered how her husband would treat a wife with a lame leg. I could see in Shahla’s eyes, she was thinking the same thing.

Shahla blamed me. If I hadn’t pushed Padar-
jan
that day, then he and Madar-
jan
would not have had that argument. And we would not have been betrothed to Abdul Khaliq’s family.

I wondered if it would have made a difference. I wondered if one small difference in the sequence of events would have altered the paths we ended up on. If I hadn’t let Abdullah, sweet, strong Abdullah, pin me down in the street for my mother to see, we wouldn’t have argued. I would have eaten dinner with the family. My father would have gone on smoking his own paltry opium supply and he would not have thought to complain to Abdul Khaliq that he needed to marry his daughters off.

Maybe I could have stayed a boy, running alongside Abdullah, making faces behind
Moallim-sahib
’s back and having my father ruffle my hair when I walked by. As if he wanted me around.

But that wasn’t my
naseeb
.

“It’s all in Allah’s hands, my girls. God has a plan for you. Whatever is in your
naseeb
will happen,” my mother had sobbed.

I wondered if Allah hadn’t meant for us to choose our
naseeb
.

With my father standing over her shoulder, my mother reluctantly made three baskets of
shirnee
. She covered a cone-shaped block of sugar and loose candies from Agha Barakzai’s shop with a layer of tulle she’d purchased with some of the bride price. She cut swatches from her nicest dress and edged the sides with some lace she’d been given as a gift. Three large squares, one for each basket. These were our
dismols,
as important as the sweets. My father nodded in approval. My mother avoided his eyes. I looked at them and wondered if that was how it would be for each of us with our husbands. Or if they would be more like Kaka Jameel, who never seemed to raise his voice and whose wife smiled more than any woman in our family.

I wondered why they were different.

Padar hardly noticed what was happening at home. He didn’t even notice that Madar-
jan
slept in our room with us, instead of at his side. He was busy counting bills and smoking opium at least twice a day. Abdul Khaliq had made good on his promise and my father was enjoying his end of the bargain.

“I’ve brought home a chicken, Raisa! Make sure you send some to my mother, and not just the bones, mind you! And if the meat is dry and tough like last time, you’ll have no more tomorrows.”

My mother hadn’t eaten more than a couple of bites since the suitors had left and her eyes looked heavy. She was civil with my father, afraid to rile his anger and risk losing her youngest daughters too.

In the meantime, Madar-
jan
had to undo what she had done to me. She gave me one of Parwin’s dresses and a
chador
to hide my boyish hair. She gave my pants and tunics to my uncle’s wife for her boys.

“You are Rahima. You are a girl and you need to remember to carry yourself like one. Watch how you walk and how you sit. Don’t look people, men, in the eye and keep your voice low.” She looked like she wanted to say more but stopped short, her voice breaking.

My father looked at me as if he saw a new person. No longer his son, I was someone he preferred to ignore. After all, I wouldn’t be his for much longer.

I
lingered around Shahla, brought her food and helped with her share of the chores. I regretted the way things had happened and wanted her to know how sorry I was that I’d pushed her into Abdul Sharif’s home. These things I told her while she stared off. But Shahla was too kind to stay angry long. And we didn’t have long.

“Maybe we’ll be able to see each other. I mean, they’re all part of the same family. Maybe it will be like here and we can see each other every day—you, me and Parwin.”

“I hope so, Shahla.”

My sister’s round eyes looked pensive. I suddenly realized how much she resembled our mother and felt the urge to sidle up next to her. I felt better with her shoulder touching mine.

“Shahla?”

“Hm?”

“Do you think… do you think it will be terrible?” I asked, my voice hushed so Madar-
jan
and Parwin wouldn’t hear.

Shahla looked at me, then at the ground. She didn’t answer.

K
hala Shaima came over. She’d heard rumblings through the town that Abdul Khaliq and his clan had paid our family two visits. She figured my father was up to something. Her knuckles whitened when Madar-
jan
told her, sobbing, that her three eldest daughters were to be wed next week.

“He’s really done it. The ass made himself quite a deal, I’m sure.”

“What was I to do, Shaima, with a room full of gray-haired men? And he is their father. How could I have stopped anything?”

“Every man is king of his own beard,” she said, shaking her head. “Did you try to talk to him?”

Madar-
jan
just looked at her sister. Khala Shaima nodded in understanding.

“A council of asses. That’s what you had gathered here. Just look at these girls!”

“Shaima! What am I supposed to do? Clearly, this is what Allah has chosen as their
naseeb
—”

“Oh, the hell with
naseeb
!
Naseeb
is what people blame for everything they can’t fix.”

I wondered if Khala Shaima was right.

“Since you know so much, tell me what you would have done!” Madar-
jan
cried in exasperation.

“I would have insisted that I be present. And I would have told Abdul Khaliq’s family that the girls were not yet of age for marriage!”

“A lot of good that would have done. You know who we’re dealing with. It’s not some peasant from the streets. It’s Abdul Khaliq Khan, the warlord. His bodyguards sat in our living room with machine guns. And Arif agrees with the plan. Do you honestly think they would have listened to anything I had to say?”

“You are their mother.”

“And that’s all I am,” Madar-
jan
said sadly. Her voice grew quiet. I’m sure she didn’t think any of us could hear them. “There is only one thing I could think of doing.”

“What is that?”

Madar-
jan
looked down, her voice lowered.

“A death in the family would mean there could be no wedding for at least a year.”

“A death? Raisa, what in the hell are you talking about?”

“It happens all the time, Shaima. You and I have both heard stories. Remember Manizha from the other side of the village?”

“Raisa, you’ve lost your mind! Just think about what you’re saying! You think setting yourself on fire is going to solve any problems? You think orphaned girls are better off than married ones? And what about the little ones? What do you think they’ll do without their mother? For God’s sake, look at your in-laws! You’ve got two widows in this compound and your brothers-in-law are eyeing them already.”

My heart pounded so loudly I was certain they could hear it.

“I just don’t know what else to do, Shaima!”

“You have to find a way to turn them down. To make Arif turn them down.”

“Easier said than done, Shaima! Why don’t you come for the
nikkah
? Bring your big mouth and I’ll see what you do then.”

“I will be here, Raisa. Don’t think I won’t.”

Madar-
jan
looked exhausted. She leaned her head against the wall and closed her eyes; the shadows under them had darkened since yesterday.