A Father's Betrayal

by Gabriella Gillespie

  I grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the door, worried about what she would do if I didn’t get her out of there.

  “Where are you going?” Gran yelled at us as I tugged at Yas to leave with me.

  “To hell!” I shouted back as we left the room.

  We ran out of the house and straight to our special place on the mountain. We got to the top and sat beside the rock that had our names carved on it.

  “What are we going to do now?” I asked Yas as we huddled together.

  “Stick together and always make sure we are there for each other, no matter what happens,” she told me.

  “Do you think Dad will ever change?” I asked, starting to cry again.

  “I don’t know Moo, never rely on him, and never trust him, but you and me, we will always have each other,” she said with a sigh.

  “Promise me you will never do anything like Issy did, no matter what happens?” I begged.

  “I won’t, don’t worry,” she said, hugging me.

  “Is that a promise?” I asked.

  “I promise Moo, I will always be here for you, I swear on Issy’s grave.”

  Chapter Six

  Yas Pulls the Trigger!

  After the mourning period finished everyone in the house went back to being their normal selves, but for us things would never be the same. It had only been around two months since we came from England and the cultural change alone was a lot to handle, but losing our sister had left us with an empty space in our hearts that could never be filled, or healed.

  Everywhere we went and everything we did reminded us of our sister. We had come as three sisters, but now there were only the two of us left and we didn’t feel whole. We talked about her and remembered the good times and would laugh about things we’d done together, but in the end we would always end up crying so much it hurt.

  As the months went by, we would avoid talking about her because the pain was becoming so unbearable we couldn’t carry on with our lives.

  Yas and I became closer than ever. She stopped spending time with Dad in the fields and stayed at home with me so that she could help me with the chores; it wasn’t that she couldn’t do them, she just never wanted to.

  We were not shown any mercy or special treatment just because our sister died. Within weeks of her dying we were put to work in the fields harvesting the crop, sugar cane, rice, wheat, grain and many more things that Granddad grew in his field; that’s where Yas was best at work. She buried her head in work to try and block out the heartache, whereas I buried my pain somewhere deep in my head, a place I never revisited.

  It was hard, back breaking work and the sun and heat made it even harder. Some days we would be put to work from as early as 4am and not stop until lunch time, and then we would have to go home and help Gran make dinner. Gran would stay home and make breakfast to bring it to us at the fields; she would then go back home and prepare dinner, but she would always leave the hard work for us until we got back from the fields at lunchtime.

  Once we finished dinner we would have to do all the chores that we would have done had we been home, fetching water from the fields, cleaning stables, collecting fire wood that we would have to chop ourselves from old trees. We even had to take the animals to graze in the fields most afternoons. Most nights when the sun went down we were still working and as soon as our heads hit the pillow we would be out like a candle.

  We rarely saw Dad; he became really withdrawn after Issy’s death and started staying at the fields day and night. His food would be taken to him and most of the time he wouldn’t even eat it himself, he would just give it to the dogs. We could hear our grandparents talking about him saying how they believed he was going crazy because he kept telling them that Issy was haunting him at night, but they just believed he was having nightmares.

  When we did see him he was quiet and wouldn’t talk to us much, only to tell us to do as we were told and listen to our grandparents. Our grandparents were getting stricter with us by the day. If I had time to myself in the nights before bed I would like to draw pictures with my pencils or read a book, but by now they had started shouting at me, telling me that, “Girls don’t draw pictures or read books!” They took away our English books we had brought with us from England so we couldn’t read any more.

  We always swore we would never stop speaking to each other in English, no matter what they did to us, because that was our thing, something that was ours that could never be taken away from us! We even came up with our own English slang so that Dad couldn’t understand us if we wanted to talk to each other when he was around. We would cut the beginning or end of words or speak with a funny accent to confuse him. Dad use to get so angry with us and shout at us all the time and tell us to speak Arabic but we wouldn’t, not to each other. With everything else they had taken away from us our Mother’s language wouldn’t be one of them!

  One night after we had gone to bed we could hear Dad and our grandparents arguing downstairs by the front door so we snuck out of our room and stood on the landing to listen to what they were saying. We could hear Dad trying to take one of the goats from the stables but Gran was shouting at him, calling him a madman and saying he was losing his mind because of what Issy had done!

  Dad was disagreeing with her, telling them he needed to sacrifice a black goat because Issy was coming to him at night and haunting him, just like she promised she would before she killed herself. He said he had a dream and in this dream she told him to sacrifice a black goat. He wanted to do this because he believed if he did she would stop haunting him. We could hear Granddad calling on Allah for help and guidance for his son and Gran just shouting at Dad for being weak and foolish. In the end Granddad told Gran to let Dad take a goat. He said if it meant that Dad would get some peace of mind then so be it. Dad took the goat and sacrificed it in the fields that night.

  When we went to the fields the next day we saw the goat’s blood besides the hut in the dirt but there was no sign of the goat and it looked like dad had tried to cover up the blood with dirt. The goat sacrifice was never mentioned by anyone.

  I was so relieved by the time the harvesting was over; it meant we could rest from working in the fields for a few months. Even though we were exhausted and had got everything from the fields to the house we now had to sort everything out. We had to grind the flour by hand on a big round stone flour grinder with a wooden handle, where you’d pour the grain in the top through a hole then pull the handle round and round until the flour came out into a bucket at the bottom. This would take weeks doing it a handful at a time; again it was hard work!

  We had to break down the rice stalks until all the rice was off them and on a sheet that had been laid out. Then we had to separate the good rice from the bad rice. There was always work to be done and never enough time in the day!

  We were never allowed to sit down, and after being in Yemen for a few months and starting out hating the women’s gatherings in the afternoons, we came to realise why women enjoyed them so much! That was the only time when they could get out of work and the house, just sit down and gossip to other females about things other than work!

  Many of the young girls we had made friends with were pregnant, but they still had to work in the fields, some of them younger than me! One day I’d see a girl on her hands and knees working the fields or carrying a huge bucket of water for miles, the next morning I’d be told she had her baby. Some of them even gave birth in the fields! None of the girls would get to see a doctor from the time she got pregnant or when giving birth.

  Some young girls were married off outside the village and we wouldn’t see them again, many more were married within the village to their close relatives, first cousins.

  Sometimes they would have gatherings in the evenings, especially at the times of harvesting because people would be busy in the afternoons. Just because we had finished our harvesting didn’t mean other people had finished theirs. One evening we had been to see a young girl who had had a baby; this
was a usual reason why women would gather together. We got back around 8pm and were looking forward to going to bed, but when we got back we had a visitor.

  Uncle Nasser was at the house; he had come at an earlier time that evening, which was unlike him because he usually came in the middle of the night, but all I could think of was the fact that he was there. I hated him with such passion and he knew this!

  He was already upstairs so we didn’t have to see him that night, but I couldn’t sleep knowing he was in the house. I just felt uncomfortable. Yas told me not to worry, she said she would look after me and make sure I was OK but I still couldn’t sleep, I had a horrible feeling about him being there, a feeling I couldn’t get rid of.

  The next morning we carried on with the chores as usual. Uncle Nasser had been out most of the night so he was still asleep, and when he woke up Farouse ran around after him as usual. After dinner, while Uncle Nasser was downstairs in Granddad’s room chatting with him, we went upstairs to clean and Yas found Uncle Nasser’s hand gun.

  I absolutely hated guns and was terrified of them! But Yas loved playing with guns so she picked it up and started playing with it, pointing it at me and pretending to pull the trigger. Farouse was begging her to put it down and as usual, I started to cry! Yas started making fun of me calling me a sissy and pointing the gun at me saying “Bang! Bang!” Then all of a sudden, Uncle Nasser walked in the room.

  His face went red with fury when he saw Yas with the gun but he tried to stay calm.

  “Yasmin, give me the gun, it’s loaded and dangerous!” he told her.

  He had his right hand down by his side but slightly risen, gesturing at her to hand him the gun. But as she went to hand him the gun it went off! The bullet took off two of his fingertips, then it went through his thigh and out through his buttock!

  Of course I started to scream, but it wasn’t for my uncle’s sake. In my fear of seeing Uncle Nasser enter the room I hadn’t seen Yas turn the gun away from me and I thought the gun had gone off in my direction! Stupidly I’d thought I’d been hit! Although I wasn’t in pain I was frantically searching for a gun wound in my body!

  Uncle Nasser didn’t say a single word for a moment until Farouse saw the blood and started screaming that her dad had been hit.

  Yas was in shock; she just stood there like a statue until Uncle Nasser calmly approached her and took the gun out of her hand.

  “It’s OK! I’m OK!” he calmly told her, but within seconds our grandparents were upstairs and when Granddad saw blood dripping from Uncle Nasser he went crazy!

  “Who did that?” he demanded to know.

  “It was an accident, she didn’t mean to do it,” Uncle Nasser said, looking at Yas, who was still stood there in shock.

  With that, Granddad launched himself at Yas and sunk his teeth into her shoulder just beneath her neck, biting her so hard he instantly drew blood! Yas screamed and pushed Granddad off her throwing him against the wall, and then she ran out of the house and towards the fields.

  Our grandparents were worried about Uncle Nasser, the bullet had gone clean through but he was bleeding badly. They couldn’t take him to the hospital because he was a wanted man and it was too risky driving him out of the village at that time of day. Gran ran out of the house to get a medicine woman who lived in the village and I went to look for my sister.

  I knew she wouldn’t have gone to the fields because she would have been too scared of Dad, his mood was unpredictable. He was like a ticking time bomb and we knew sooner or later he was going to explode so we were trying our best to stay away from him. I went to the only other place I knew she would be. I found her at our mountain, she was shaking like a leaf and crying so I sat down beside her and put my arms around her.

  “Is he OK?” she asked, wiping away her tears.

  “Yeah unfortunately he is, he’s lost a few fingers but he will manage!” I replied sarcastically.

  “That’s not funny Moo, really? Has he lost his fingers?” she asked, her voice trembling.

  “Just the tip off one I think, or maybe two. The bullet just went through his leg, he’s fine, he was laughing and joking when I left!” I lied, trying to make her feel better. I had a look at the bite marks on her shoulder and told her not to worry because they would soon heal; mine did when Granddad bit me. We chatted for a while and I tried to make her laugh. I could always make her laugh when she was feeling low.

  We both knew that when we went back she was going to be in trouble so we stayed there until it got really dark. Dad was home by the time we got back and Granddad was fuming, pacing up and down the room and cursing Dad for bringing us from England and into his life. Dad was in a really bad mood and his voice was like a raging bull!

  “Where have you two been?” he demanded to know.

  “We just went for a walk, Yas was upset because…” before I could finish my sentence Dad slapped me as hard as he could across my face! It felt as if my face had caught fire and I burst into tears. My whole body started shaking and my legs felt like jelly, Dad use to terrify me when he was angry.

  Yas was about to scream at Dad, but before her words came out he slapped her just as hard across her face; but instead of crying or even flinching she stood there in front of him, defiant, glaring in his eyes.

  “Go on then, hit me some more, I’m not going to cry, I’m not scared of you!” she dared him.

  “You will listen to me if it is the last thing you do, I promise!” he threatened with his fists clenched, then he stormed out of the room back to the fields.

  That night Uncle Nasser was taken to a friend’s house nearby, he had lost a lot of blood but he was OK. He had been shot many times in his life and had many battle scars to prove it so Yas’s bullet wound was just another scar to him. The bullet went straight through and didn’t hit any major arteries or bones so no permanent damage was done. He had lost the tips of two fingers but he managed without them.

  Our grandparents didn’t stop cursing us for days, and even though I didn’t do anything wrong I still got cursed, because according to our grandparents we were Devil children. That’s what our Grandparents called us on a daily basis: ‘Devil Children’!

  Chapter Seven

  The Secret Matchbox

  It had been around five months since we came from England and we tried our best to fit in and keep our heads down. We knew it would only be a matter of time before we got sold off and we thought if we kept quiet and tried our best to do as we were told we would somehow be spared. We had heard rumours about men asking for our hands in marriage but until then Dad had refused, however we knew this wouldn’t last forever. Yas and I used to be terrified every time Granddad had a guest, thinking it was someone who wanted us.

  Our village was a small village, it had one tiny shop and that was that. It never even had a school, but all of that was about to change because a small school had just been built in the village. The male teachers were being brought in from far away to teach the young boys. Girls were not permitted to go to school or have an education in our village.

  Because the new teachers didn’t live in any of the villages nearby, they were given a house in our village; that house just happened to be opposite our Granddad’s house.

  There were two teachers; one of them had dark curly hair, olive skin, broad shoulders and was just really good looking! The other one, he was taller, his hair was lighter and so was his skin, he was good looking too but not as good looking as the dark haired one!

  Our Granddad was one of the elders of the village so it was his job to welcome the teachers to the village and to invite them for food in his home. That day the teachers were coming to dinner.

  When they arrived, we were in the kitchen cooking dinner. They were not the only ones invited that day to our house. Granddad had invited the other elders of the village to come to dinner to talk to the teachers about what would be expected of them whilst they were living in our village. Because we never got many visits from people outside our village we w
ere all hyped up not knowing what to expect!

  In the kitchen we had two tiny round windows, just big enough to stick your head out of and look out onto the street. The windows were like the rest of the house, made out of cows dung and straw. The windows were quite small and deep so you would have to lean in and really stick your neck out before your head looked onto the street. If you tried to pull your head back in too quickly without twisting your head sideways, you would get a scrape on your chin from the roughness of the straw and dung!

  Anyone coming into our house for dinner would have to come past one of the windows, because they were on either side of the house. We all wanted to get the first look at the teachers, so every time one of us heard a male voice coming from outside the window we would race to one of the windows! Our Gran was shouting and cursing us. “Shame on you girls!” she yelled as she tugged us down from the windows, and threatened to call Granddad if we didn’t stop.

  Gran went down to get something and swore that if she caught us in the windows when she got back we would be in trouble, but as soon as she left the kitchen we all jumped up to fight for who would get to the window first.

  When they finally arrived I was the one with my head stuck out the window! The moment I saw the dark haired teacher I had a crush on him! I was banging my leg on the inside of the window to let the girls know they had arrived because I knew if I’d pulled my head back in I would miss them walk by, and there was no way in hell I was taking my eyes off him!

  I could hear Farouse screaming at me to let her have a look and I could feel her tugging at my clothes. “Get off!” I said under my breath, not wanting to scream at her because I had my head jammed in the window, but as I did the dark haired teacher looked up at me. Anyone else would have tried to pull their head back in from the window but I couldn’t take my eyes off him! He smiled at me and I smiled back, and with that he was gone.