by Etaf Rum
“Thank you for coming,” Umm Ahmed said as she poured Fareeda and Isra cups of chai. Then she served them a purple container of Mackintosh’s chocolates, waiting until each woman had plucked a shiny piece from the box before returning to her seat.
“Alf mabrouk,” Fareeda said, unwrapping a yellow caramel stick. “A thousand congratulations.”
“Thank you.” Umm Ahmed turned to Isra, resting her eyes on her swollen belly. “Inshallah your turn soon, dear.”
Isra nodded, her jaw tightening. Fareeda wished she would say something nice to Umm Ahmed, or to any of the women in the room for that matter. They must all think she was a fool, always so quiet and vacant. Fareeda had wanted a daughter-in-law she could show off to her friends, like a twenty-four-karat gold bangle. Yes, Isra could cook and clean, but the girl knew nothing about entertaining and socializing. She was as dull as dishwater, and there was nothing Fareeda could do about it. She would have to choose more carefully when finding Omar a wife.
“So tell me,” Fareeda said to Umm Ahmed, who sat in the middle of the room. “Ahmed must be so excited to give his parents the first grandson.”
“Oh yes,” Umm Ahmed said, careful not to meet Isra’s eyes. “Alhamdulillah. We’re all very happy.”
“There is no better blessing than a healthy baby boy,” said one of the women. “Of course, we all love our daughters, but nothing compares to having a son.”
“Yes, yes,” Fareeda agreed. She could sense Isra’s eyes on her, but she didn’t want to seem envious by not participating in the conversation. “Adam does everything for us—running the family business, helping with the bills. I don’t know what we would’ve done if he’d been a girl.”
The women nodded. “Especially in this country,” said one of them. “The boys are twice as needed and the girls are twice as hard to raise.”
Fareeda laughed. “Exactly! I only have Sarah, and raising her in this country gives me nightmares. God help any woman who has to raise a daughter in America.”
The women nodded in agreement. Glancing at Isra, whose eyes were locked on Deya’s face, Fareeda felt sorry she had to hear those words. But it was the truth. It was better she learned now, Fareeda thought. Then maybe she wouldn’t think it was just Fareeda who thought this way. It wasn’t just her! Every woman in the room knew this to be true, and not just them, but their parents and their parents’ parents and all the generations before them. Perhaps if Isra realized how important having a son was, she wouldn’t be so sensitive about it.
Umm Ahmed poured the women another round of chai. “Still,” she said, her face hidden behind the steam. “What would we have done without our daughters? Fatima and Hannah do everything for me. I wouldn’t trade them for a thousand sons.”
“Hmm,” Fareeda said, snatching a piece of chocolate from the purple Mackintosh’s container and shoving it into her mouth. She was glad Sarah wasn’t here to hear this.
“So I’m assuming Ahmed named the boy after his father,” Fareeda said.
“Yes,” Umm Ahmed said, placing the teapot on the coffee table and leaning back in her seat. “Noah.”
“So, where is baby Noah?” one of the women asked, looking around the sala. “And where is Ahmed’s wife?”
“Oh, yes,” Fareeda said. “Where is your daughter-in-law?”
Umm Ahmed shifted in her seat. “She’s upstairs, sleeping.”
The women stared at her blankly. Fareeda scoffed. She could see Isra staring at Umm Ahmed, wide-eyed, perhaps wishing that she was her mother-in-law instead.
“Oh, come on,” Umm Ahmed said. “Don’t you remember how it felt staying up with a baby all night? The girl is exhausted.”
“Well, I sure don’t remember sleeping,” Fareeda said. The women chuckled, and Umm Ahmed dug her hands between her thighs.
“All I remember is cooking, cleaning, and picking up after people,” Fareeda said. “And Khaled waiting for me to serve him as soon as he got home.”
It was as if Fareeda’s words had ignited a fire in the room. The women began crackling with conversation, chatting about how exhausted they were, how there was nothing more to their lives than scurrying around the house like cockroaches.
“Of course I remember,” Umm Ahmed said. “But things are different now.”
“Are they?” Fareeda asked.
“If my daughter-in-law needs to sleep, then why not? Why can’t I help her a little bit?”
“Help her?” Fareeda met Isra’s eyes briefly and then turned away, hoping she didn’t expect the same from her. “Shouldn’t she be helping you?”
“Fareeda is right,” a woman on the opposite sofa added. “What’s the point of marrying off our sons if we are going to help their wives? The point is to lessen our burdens, not add to them.”
Umm Ahmed laughed quietly, tugging on the rim of her blouse. “Now, ladies,” she said. “You all remember how it felt coming to America? We came without a mother or a father. Just a husband and a handful of kids. Do you remember how it felt when our husbands went off to work in the morning, leaving us alone to raise our children, in a place where we didn’t even speak the language? Do you remember how awful those years were?”
Fareeda said nothing. The women sipped their chai, peering at Umm Ahmed behind their cups.
“My daughter-in-law is here alone,” Umm Ahmed said. “The same way I once was. The least I can do is help her.”
Fareeda wished Umm Ahmed hadn’t said that. The last thing she wanted was for Isra to start expecting the same treatment from her. That’s one thing she always hated about women: how quick they were to compare themselves to others when it suited them. God forbid she remind Isra that at least Umm Ahmed’s daughter-in-law had given them a son. Not another girl. As if Fareeda needed another girl. A splotch of memory came to her, but she pushed it away. She hated thinking of it. Hated thinking of them. Trembling, she unwrapped a piece of chocolate, the crisp sound of the foil wrapping like white noise in her ears. She swallowed.
Deya
Winter 2008
One step onto Fourteenth Street, and Deya was shaking. The city was loud—screeching—like all the noise in the world had been let out at once. Yellow cabs slammed on brakes, cars honked, and people swerved by like hundreds of Ping-Pong balls flying jaggedly across a room. It was one thing to look at the city from the back seat of her grandfather’s car, another thing entirely to stand dead in the middle of it, to smell every whiff of its garbage and grease. It felt as if someone had let her loose in a giant maze, only she was stuck between thousands of people who knew exactly where to go, shoving past her to get there.
She read the address once, and then again. She had no idea where to go. She could feel the sweat building along the edge of her hijab. What had made her come to Manhattan on her own? It was a stupid idea, and now she was lost. What if she couldn’t get back to the bus stop in time? What if her grandparents found out what she had done—that she had skipped school and ridden the subway? That she was in the city? The thought of Khaled’s open palm against her face made her knees shake.
A man paused beside her, head bowed, typing into his cell phone. Should she ask him for directions? She looked around for a woman, but they all flew past her. She forced herself to approach him.
“Excuse me, sir,” she said, wiping sweat from her hijab.
He didn’t look up.
She cleared her throat, said it louder. “Excuse me . . .”
He met her eyes. She felt a conscious effort on his part not to let his eyes wander around her head. “Yes?”
She handed him the card. “Do you know where I can find this bookstore?”
The man read the card and handed it back to her. “I’m not sure,” he said. “But eight hundred Broadway should be that way.” He pointed to a street in the distance, and she marked the spot where his fingers landed.
“Thank you so much,” she said, feeling a heat rise in her cheeks as he walked past her. She was pathetic. She didn’t know where she was going, co
uldn’t even look a man in the eye without turning into a bright red crayon. Not only was she not an American, but she could barely even count herself as a person, feeling as small as she did at that moment. But she shoved these thoughts away, saved them for another time when she would sit and think of just how tiny she felt on the city streets. She started down the street in the direction the man had pointed.
Books and Beans stood at the end of an inconspicuous block on Broadway. Except for the black-trimmed door and windows, the entire bookstore was painted a bright, moroccan blue, standing out from the red-brick-faced shops around it. Through the glass, Deya could see a display of books within the dim space, illuminated by amber-shaded lamps. She stared at the windows for what felt like hours before building up the courage to walk in.
Deya stepped into the bookstore and waited for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. Inside was a single room, much longer than it was wide. The walls were lined with black shelves and filled with hundreds of books that towered up to the ceiling. Velvet tufted chairs sat snugly in odd corners of the room, providing a soft contrast to the exposed brick walls, and a cash register stood near the entrance, lit by the dim flicker of a lamp. Beside the register sat a plump white cat.
Slowly, she made her way down the center aisle. A few people floated between the shelves, their faces hidden in shadows. She must be in here somewhere, Deya thought, running her fingers across the spines of old books, inhaling the scent of worn paper. Marveling at the rich selection, she found herself drifting toward a set of chairs near the back of the shop, wanting desperately to curl up against a window and crack open a book. But then she saw a shadow move from beside a pile of unorganized books. A person was staring at her. A woman.
Deya approached her. When she was close enough, the woman’s face emerged from the darkness. Now she was certain: it was the same woman who had dropped off the envelope. She was staring at Deya’s hijab and school uniform, smiling. Clearly the woman knew who she was.
But Deya still didn’t recognize her. She studied her face closely, hoping against hope that it was her mother. It was possible. Like Isra, the woman had deep black hair and fair olive skin. Yet her hair fell wild and wavy over her shoulders, her cheeks were full and bronzed, her lips a crimson red. Isra’s hair had been straight and smooth, her features plainer. Deya moved closer. She was startled to see the woman wearing a short skirt, her legs covered only with sheer panty hose, and she wondered how she was able to walk around town without feeling exposed. She must be American, Deya decided.
“Is that you, Deya?”
“Do I know you?”
The woman gave her a sad look. “You don’t recognize me?”
Deya moved closer, studying her face again, carefully this time. There was something familiar in the openness of her eyes, the way they held her gaze in the dim light. She froze, a piece clicking into place. Of course! How could she not have recognized her sooner?
“Sarah?”
Isra
Spring 1991
Isra’s second pregnancy was a quiet struggle. In the mornings, while Deya slept, she kneaded dough and soaked rice. She diced tomatoes and onions, simmered stews and roasted meat. She swept the floors, washed the dishes, cracked the kitchen window to air the house when she was done. Then she mixed a bottle of formula and returned to the basement, where she crooned her daughter awake. Her growing belly prevented her from holding Deya like she used to, so she propped the bottle against the crib instead, swallowing her growing guilt as she watched her suckle from a distance.
Isra returned downstairs once her afternoon chores were done. She lay in bed and stroked her belly as Deya sucked on her bottle. Upstairs, the sounds followed their usual rhythm. Sarah jerking the front door open when she returned from school, dragging her backpack to her room. Fareeda commanding she join her in the kitchen. Sarah pleading, “I have homework!” More than once, Isra had considered asking Sarah to bring her a book from school, only to change her mind. She couldn’t risk upsetting Adam, who’d been working longer hours since Deya’s birth. Besides, when would she have the time to read, with another child on the way?
She kept her hands on her belly, tried to picture the baby growing inside her: Was it a boy or a girl? What would happen to her if she bore another girl? The night before, Fareeda had mentioned going back home to find Omar a wife and joked that she would find Adam a new wife, too, if Isra gave them another girl. Isra had forced a laugh, unsure of Fareeda’s actual intentions. It was possible. She knew women back home whose husbands had married again because they couldn’t bear a son. What if Fareeda was serious? She shook the fear away, feeling foolish at the thought. It shouldn’t matter if her baby was a girl. Even the Qur’an said that girls were a blessing, a gift. Lately she had been reciting the verse in her prayers. Daughters are a means to salvation and a path to Paradise. She traced her belly and muttered the verse again.
Now she smiled, the prayer filling her with hope. She needed tawwakul, submission to God’s will. She had to trust in His plan for her. She had to have faith in her naseeb. She reminded herself how blessed she had felt when Deya was born. What if Allah had made her pregnant again so soon in order to give her a son? Maybe a son would make Adam love her. She closed her eyes and recited another prayer, asking God to grow love in Adam’s heart.
She had failed to earn his love despite her many efforts. She had learned to recognize the patterns of his behavior, to anticipate his shifting temperament, to better please him. Most nights, for instance, Adam’s mood was volatile—particularly when Fareeda gave him a new request, like paying another semester of Ali’s college tuition, or when Khaled asked him to work longer hours in the deli. To compensate, Isra would be extra accommodating, slipping into her best nightgown, fixing his dinner plate just the way he liked, reminding herself not to complain or provoke him. Then there were nights when he would come home jolly, smiling at her when she greeted him in the kitchen, sometimes even pulling her in for an embrace, rubbing his scratchy beard against her skin. With this small gesture, she would know he was in a good mood, and that, after dinner, he would roll on top of her, pull up her nightgown and, breathing heavily in her ear, press himself into her. In the dark, she would close her eyes and wait for his panting to settle, unsure whether to feel happy or sad about his good mood. Uncertain whether she would have preferred for him to come home angry.
“Why are you so quiet?” Adam said when he came home from work one night, slurping on the freekeh soup she had spent the day preparing. “Did I marry a statue?”
Isra looked up from her bowl, which she had placed on the table because Adam said he didn’t like eating alone. She could feel her face burn with shock and embarrassment. What did Adam expect her to say? She did nothing besides cook and clean all day, her hand in Fareeda’s hand, never a moment’s rest. She had nothing interesting to talk about, unlike Adam, who left to work every morning, who spent most of his day in the city. Shouldn’t he initiate the conversation? Besides, he had told her he liked quiet women.
“I mean, I knew you were quiet when I married you,” Adam said, shoving a spoonful of soup into his mouth. “But a year with my mother should’ve loosened you up.” He looked up from his bowl, and Isra noticed that his eyes were glassy and bloodshot. She wondered if he was sick.
“She is quite the woman, my mother,” Adam said. “Nothing like any of the women in your village, I’m sure.”
Isra studied his face. Why were his eyes so red? She had never seen him like this before.
“No, not Fareeda,” he mumbled to himself. “One of a kind, as her name suggests. But she earned that right, you know, after all she’s been through.” He propped both elbows on the kitchen table. “Did you know that her family relocated to the refugee camps when she was six years old? Probably not. She doesn’t like to talk about it. But she lived a tough life, my mother. She married my father and raised us in those camps, rolled up her sleeves and endured.”
Isra met his eyes and then looked qui
ckly away. Even if she tried to act like Fareeda, she couldn’t. She wasn’t strong enough.
“Speaking of my mother,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, “what have you two been up to lately?”
“Sometimes we visit the neighbors when the chores are done,” Isra said.
“I see, I see.”
She watched him shovel food into his mouth. She didn’t know what to make of his unusual behavior, but she thought she’d ask if she’d done something wrong. She swallowed dry spit. “Are you angry with me?”
He took a gulp of water and looked at her. “Why would I be angry with you?”
“Because I had a daughter. Or maybe because I’m pregnant again. I don’t know.” She looked down at her fingers. “It feels like you’re avoiding me. You barely come home anymore.”
“You think I don’t want to come home?” he said, waving his hands. “But who else is going to put food in your mouth? And buy diapers and baby formula and medicine? You think living in this country is cheap?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I’m doing the best I can to support this family! What more do you want from me?”
Isra considered telling him that she wanted his love. That she wanted to see him and get to know him, wanted to feel like she wasn’t raising a child on her own. But if he didn’t understand that, then how could she explain it? She couldn’t. She was a woman, after all. It wasn’t her place to be forward in her affections, to ask a man for his time, for his love. Besides, any time she tried, he scorned her attempts.