The Matriarch Matrix

by Maxime Trencavel

  Zara hugs him, her nonverbal way of saying thank you.

  Peter, though, needs to ask another question, one that has rattled within him ever since they saved Jean-Paul. “Zara, if you don’t mind, I do wish to ask you another very personal, maybe private question.”

  She looks at him cautiously, then nods yes as she kisses his nose.

  Summoning all the bravery he can, Peter asks his burning question. “Why do you own a pink pickup truck?”

  She laughs. He is so much her Little Boy in all the good ways. She puts her serious face back on and replies, “The Daesh soldiers were afraid if they were killed by a woman, they would not go to heaven. My rose truck would nearly always send them running, and many times we never needed to fight.”

  Peter touches her hair, pushes it back behind her ear, and strokes her neck. “That’s one of the reasons why I have come to love you so. You are so smart.”

  Zara takes his hand and puts her hair back over her ear. She swallows. “I cannot do with you what a man and woman who are very close do. They took that away from me. It is impossible for me to have sex, to enjoy sex, to have children. But we need to be together. We need to sleep together. But there cannot be sex, because I am no longer a woman in that sense.”

  She turns around in bed away from him. “I have done very bad things, and I was punished for it. Each time I was with a man, bad things would happen afterwards. I went against my faith. And I was punished so that I could never be with a man again. My brother was tormented by what he saw happened to us, the bad things that happened to my sisters, their mother, and me because I was careless. He fought with the PKK out of his penance for not being able to help us. He died over his guilt over not being able to help us. In reality, my bad actions led to his death.

  “I killed my sister, and it was my fault she was taken. My other sister, Diyar—a year after she returned to her father’s family, she set herself on fire out of family shame and dishonor for what they did to her, what my misdeeds did to get all of us punished in the worst ways imaginable.”

  Peter puts his arm around her, offering her comfort. She pets his arm as she says, “That is the box I did not want you to see. I am a very bad person. And I live in perpetual punishment for it.”

  Turning her around to face him again, Peter caresses her cheeks in that special way that demonstrate to her familial love. He hugs her tightly and deeply for a long while. She feels peace in his arms. He whispers in her ear, “I am willing to take vows of chastity, the same as Jean-Paul did, still deeply in love with his Sister Magali. What is important is my love for you, which transcends the physical.”

  She caresses his cheeks back and says, “I cannot love you back. Such a thing is no longer possible.”

  He kisses her lightly, then deeply. He whispers again in her ear, “I can love you without you feeling that you need to love me in return. I think I now know what unconditional love means. You have shown me. And for that I will be forever grateful.” They kiss deeply again.

  Peter then dares to ask, “Zara, will I ever be more than a little boy to you?”

  She smiles, so deep throughout her being, and replies, “You will always be my Little Boy.” She hugs him and they embrace. And they feel the peace that bonds them—to each other, and to the voice.

  In the middle of the night, Maryam sneaks a peek into her daughter’s room. Empty. Not even the bed touched. She then peeks into her son’s room. And there they are in a lovers’ embrace under the covers. She looks up and thanks Xwedê.

  The next morning, Zara takes her Little Boy out for a hike in the hills behind her great-grandmother’s village. Not quite the mountains of Duhok, where she grew up, but she still loves the outdoors and the freedom to go as she pleases. As they begin to leave the compound around the house, her little black lamb comes running up to rub against Zara’s leg, making the cutest of little mehhhs. Zara picks up the lamb, her child. She asks if she missed her. She hugs and kisses her and rocks her like a baby, and then her other little lamb comes over. She picks this white one up as well with hugs, kisses and rocking along with the black one.

  This side of this mysterious woman does not escape Peter’s attention. Is this the soft-eyed, compassionate Zara her Sasha referred to?

  Putting her little children down, she says to Peter, “If we could all be in submission to Xwedê as well as are my little lambs, all would be better.”

  And the black and white lambs of submission follow her up the hill with Peter in tow. Many kilometers later, the black lamb finds her way into Zara’s arms again. And much to Peter’s surprise, somehow the little white lamb finds her way into his arms, and he carries Zara’s surrogate daughter on the hike back. Zara does not fail for a second to notice that her little lambs approve of Peter, for lambs do not lie.

  At the top of a hill, they stop to enjoy the view. A new braveness has entered Peter’s soul since meeting this woman. He takes a step he would have never, ever, have done before. He confesses, “My mother is very pious like you. You would like her.”

  First with a twisted mouth, she peers into his eyes. Then with an uplift on one side of her mouth, she says, “I take that as a compliment. May I ask you a question in return?”

  Feeling a moment of endearment, Peter nods.

  “Is your fear driven by your mother? Is it her religiousness that frightens you so?”

  That stops Peter in his tracks. For all the browbeating he has endured, he knows she does so for love. He glances at the woman in front of him and sees the exact same. A furtive smile that passes as quickly as it came, he faces the image of his fear. The gravestone. The loneliness. The emptiness. The darkness. But only the hand of his mother saved him. And he takes the plunge, saying what he has never said to a woman, to anyone before.

  “I’m afraid of being left alone. Of being abandoned. Of facing the world alone. After my father killed himself, I blamed God and left him. If it were not for my mother, I would have been alone.”

  Pupils enlarged, Zara takes his hand into hers. “You are not so alone. In how you feel, at least. After my father killed himself, I blamed everyone. And I went off to kill everyone as I put Xwedê on hold.”

  “And you came back to Xwedê,” Peter replies, stroking her hand. “After my father’s death, my mother became even more Catholic than she had been before. Her faith helped her cope with her grief. Helped her find light in life again.”

  “No, Peter. In that, I differ from your mother. After killing all those who led to my father’s death, all those who tormented my sisters, my darkness, my spiritual isolation became even greater. And yet I did not return to Allah. It was my last act with Sasha that broke the dromedary’s back. It was him who led me to seek refuge in my faith.”

  She hugs Peter. The hug that only family can give, and receive.

  On the way back, they pass by a house. Kilda’s, says Zara as she asks Peter to wait while she talks with her. Peter plays on the doorstep with the two little lambs, and a teenaged girl comes out wanting to play too. They play and play until the lambs seek their adopted mother’s attention. Peter finds some white rocks and two black ones and plays wolves and sheep with the girl. Something that does not escape Zara’s attention either.

  After the young girl’s sheep surrounds the last wolf, the soft-eyed Zara sits down with Peter and they play with her wooly children. Seeing how they have adopted Peter, she hugs him, gives a peck on his cheek, and takes his hand to stand. And they leave for home without a word said.

  After lunch, Roza and Maryam take Peter outside to teach him to whirl. This whirl is simply the worst for Peter, never one to dance, other than trying to waltz. Zara laughs at Peter’s attempts to stay upright and not hit anyone or anything. Seeing how amused is her surviving offspring, Maryam invites her daughter to whirl with Peter. Zara smiles and shakes her head no. Her mother relents as it is only a matter of time.

  That night, the same thing happens again. Zara sneaks over to Peter’s room after everyone has gone to bed. Mar
yam peers out and watches her, so happy her little Zara has put the tenets of her faith aside for the moment as this man is the right man. But then she hears them leaving his room. Maybe she is finally taking him to her bed? She peeks again and is puzzled as they leave the house with blankets.

  Outside, Zara and Peter sit with the object. She whispers to him, “It means so much to me that you do not talk of the aliens. You show your respect of the voice. Of me. And I feel that much closer to you.”

  Peter replies, “Alien or God, I do not know. I know my obedience is to you.” They touch, embrace, kiss, and Zara leans her head onto his soft shoulder.

  Closing his eyes, Peter searches for his bravery gene. For he is about to reawaken the dragon. Willingly.

  “Zara, who was the woman you stopped and talked with earlier?”

  Stiffening a little, Zara replies, “Oh, Kilda? Roza babysat her when she was young.”

  Peter shifts his position. “And Waja, her daughter—she has scars on her.”

  Zara sits straighter, her eyes starting to darken. In a deeper voice, she laments, “In some traditional Kurdish families, young daughters are betrothed to men of power or wealth for the benefit of the family. Kilda’s daughter, Waja, was thirteen years old. About the same age as my aunt Leyla and my best friend Peri when they were essentially sold off by their families. None of these marriages worked, and the poor girls were left suffering, traumatized, abused sexually and physically by their supposed husbands, as was Waja.”

  He reflects on Dr. Beverly’s advice. Be patient. Be a good listener. Build trust. And do not pressure them to talk about what they do not want to talk about. But now, having touched this troubled soul in their time around the object, Peter cannot sit back and let her suffer so either. Inside he is coming to understand that his new role in her life will require him to be courageous.

  And so, Peter takes her hand into his and delicately continues his line of questioning. “And what happened to Waja? She’s safe now, right?”

  Zara shifts a few times, stares down, and quietly replies, “Waja escaped from her tormentor, the man who paid her father for her body as his third wife. And this man wanted his property back.”

  Squeezing his hand tightly, she pauses in the midst of many conflicting emotions, in the midst of dark memories of so many lives to be forgotten. “And I solved the issue. He will never torment Waja again.”

  He hugs her in the way she has missed, wanted, and so needs now. Zara feels the recovered bump on his head, the one that bled at their first meeting. “I suspect you have done the same in your life,” she says as her hand descends to his right arm, to a spot she had felt when she taught him how to aim his pistol on the shooting range.

  He puts his hand upon hers at that spot on his arm. “My little sister. They had her pants down, pinned against a wall, and she was only in middle school. I was bigger than they were, but there were more of them than me. But she got away while they took out their anger on me. Lucky for me, she got help, and before those boys could do real damage, they ran.” He rubs his right rib cage.

  She strokes his hair back, kisses him on his forehead, a wet one—the kind that bonds the likes of them. “Your little sister, your Mrs. Harrison, your Mei, and then me. You fool people when they meet you. They think you foolish, weak, and cowardly. But underneath that veneer lies a brave, clever man who arises when a woman he cares about is in need. Tell me I am wrong about this?”

  They hug and she whispers into his ear, “Who arises when I need you most.” And she kisses his ear.

  Sensing the moment, his hand under her chin, Peter lifts Zara’s head up to make eye contact. “Zara, do you trust me?”

  Given her history of trusting men with her intimacies never resulting in a positive outcome, she first tries to turn away, but a newfound strength in Peter’s hand holds her fast and steady.

  He wraps his arms around her, transmitting a warmth she so needs at this moment. She relaxes and sinks into his embrace. With eyes closed, a sense of security envelops her. The same as when her father held her. The same as when her first Little Boy wrestled with her.

  She opens her eyes and says, “I trust you.”

  Sitting up straight, nearly choked up, she says, “But don’t break my trust, Little Boy. Or I’ll have to kill you.”

  Her words no longer transmit fear to Peter, as he has come to appreciate this is how she says, “I love you.” Hands again on her cheeks, he plants a wet kiss upon her nose, a lip-grazing one on her lips, and then a deep tongue-laden kiss down into her mouth and throat.

  Zara braces herself for what she would expect men in her past life to do after a kiss like this. Intimacies that she has not had for many a year. Intimacies she physically cannot fulfill for him. Intimacies she had forestalled having in her life by choice in her pursuit of her faith. But now she wants him. Somehow he knows how to fill that void within her. As with their past touches, wet touches, the sense of peace, calm, and harmony overtakes all her proclivities. She accepts that what will happen now must happen and puts her destiny in his full control.

  And although her desires would want otherwise, Peter’s hands do not go down to her chest, nor down between her legs, but instead push her hair behind her ears. He licks the fingers of both his hands and begins to massage her temples, driving the wetness into her. Peter’s superpower of assembling diverse abstract information into a simple statement has led him to understand that the exchange of their fluids is a way to activate something very ancient in the both of them.

  Rationally acknowledging her new mate is not simply after intimacies with her glands and orifices, she does the same to him, massaging his temples with wetted fingers. And they meld in the presence of the object. A lightness. A dissociation from the external as all sounds slowly disappear. A floating within a growing warm light.

  And she begins to feel free at last. Until she senses him reaching for the black zone buried deep within her. She opens her eyes, pulls her hands back, and yells, “You promised you wouldn’t touch me there. You promised to respect my privacy.”

  Catching herself and not wanting to lose him as well as the only other two men in her life who made her feel so secure and safe, she decides she will let him cross another line of hers. A compromise she might live with, even though he will be disappointed. So, she takes his hand down to the growing warm wetness between her legs and says, “Touch me here instead, but not where you tried.”

  He shakes his head, taking his hand moist with her lower essences, to his lips. He licks her wetness on his hand and then plants another deeply throaty kiss upon her lips and mouth. She calms again.

  “The voice. What would the voice want you to do?” Peter whispers quietly. “Know that I am totally committed to you. And I believe that the oral tradition is clear. Only man and woman together. And we two, truly together, can solve anything.”

  She logically comprehends that he is correct, but past precedent has shown otherwise.

  Gone is the quivering young man hiding in the fetal position as the bombs fell around them. He has discovered a new sense of courage around her and this object. He wets his fingers again and massages her temples. She closes her eyes with the growing warmth, but a little piece of her still remains tense. He kisses her again, licks his fingers again, but this time places them behind her neck, upon that special bump their lineages share. And his soft digits lightly rub there.

  And total surrender happens. She lets her strong will to protect that dark place in her dissipate. She surrenders all as she wets her fingers and places them on the same place behind Peter’s neck and rubs.

  As they lose themselves into their new surrender, their new release from earthly bonds, their willingness to follow the light, the memories of an ancient time come back to them. An aged, solidly built dark-haired woman lies on a mat covered by blankets. She is dying. Kneeling at her side, holding her hand, is a lithe yet strong woman with long straight black hair, crying for her mother. Normally the epitome of strength, thi
s daughter is distraught at the impending death of the true source of her inner strength.

  “Ki, my child,” says the dying mother. “Please do not fret for me, for I will go to another place of beauty. I fret, though, for you, my child. Your obedience and faith are inspiration to all of my grandchildren, your children, your nieces and nephews. But I am saddened that you cannot touch what your sisters and I have touched, no matter how much you pray.”

  Wiping her uncustomary tears, Ki replies, “Please do not worry for me, Mother. I will continue my faith in your god. I will continue to lead prayers along with my sisters many times each day for all in our village. I have come to peace with the fact that I was not gifted as you three to hear the voice. I can live with this with my love for you and my sisters.”

  “My dear Ki. My dearest. You are the most faithful, the most obedient of all who do not hear. But I fear you will not join us, not because you do not hear the voice, but because you have not fully let go, not fully surrendered. Only when you do can you truly be with the voice, and with me after my death.”

  “But, Mother, I do not understand. I am obedient. I am humble to your god and to all. I live in modesty and respect.”

  The older woman signals for her daughter to lean towards her. She strokes her daughter’s face. “You are the one with the greatest compassion of all our lands. I love you so. In your compassion, you have internalized a hatred of those who killed your father and grandfather, who raped your grandmother, your aunt, and me. All of this darkness resides in a tiny place deep within you that you show to no one. You must release yourself from this bondage, which restrains you from fully following the voice.”

  As the dying mother closes her eyes, Ki signals for her sisters to come in prayer around her. And the elder woman’s facial features become clear to Peter and Zara. Hers is the face of Zara, at which Zara opens her eyes in shock.

  Knowing what his other half needs at this moment, Peter kisses the forehead of the woman in front of him, the one with the face of the ancient matriarch, and gives her the familial deep hug.