Wild Boar in the Cane Field

by Anniqua Rana

  He placed his hand on his heart and then pointed at me.

  “You know what that means? It means I care for you. People think he’s not smart because he can’t talk. Like me. I talk, but they think I don’t know enough. But look. I married you, and we’ll have a baby.”

  I had never known that he was close to Maria’s father, Isaac. There were so many things that I had never noticed that Maalik had told me in the past eight months.

  As always happened, I was beginning to feel drowsy and drifted into a half sleep. Suddenly, the dogs began barking and I awoke. Maalik was no longer lying beside me. I looked around, but he was gone. I panicked. Where could he have gone at this time of night? Why had he left me alone?

  Usually he woke me up before he left to check the buffalo or went to relieve himself, and this bothered me. I had complained to him and told him to let me sleep, rather than announcing his departure. But that didn’t stop him from continuing to wake me, so what had happened now? Why had he left without waking me?

  I was too scared to go look for him, so I sat upright on the charpoy with my chador wrapped tightly around me. I peered into the night, into the depths of the cane field, hoping to see him appear, and then I heard a crunch behind me.

  “What?” he said, as I stared nervously in his direction. “You’ve told me so many times not to wake you. And now you’re upset that I didn’t.”

  He pulled at his clothes, and I realized he had just gone to relieve himself. He lay down beside me, and I settled down, too, placing my hand on his shoulder. His callused hand covered mine as we fell asleep.

  THE NEXT MORNING, Bhaggan took me to see the midwife in the next village. The hour-long walk left Bhaggan panting and holding her side. We stopped every ten minutes for her to catch her breath.

  “Why, Amman? Have you been staying up at night, praying for Sultan?” I asked her.

  She burped loudly. “No, my daughter. I ate the curry that Hamida’s mother brought over. It’s given me indigestion.” But I had seen her with indigestion before. It didn’t leave her breathless this way. I wondered if her concern about the debt or Taaj’s disappearance had weakened her, but she soon let me know what was troubling her.

  “Can you believe her?” she panted, as we walked along the dusty path. I knew Bhaggan was referring to Saffiya. “She can’t find her earrings, and she says Taaj must have taken them when he disappeared.”

  I reached out for her hand as she stumbled on a rock. I held it tight and said nothing.

  I had forgotten about the earrings. Why would Saffiya think of them now, after all this time? She hadn’t mentioned them to me when I had placed her ironed clothes in her closet, so why did she need them? It was the month of fasting, and there was no marriage for her to attend where she would need them.

  “She says she put them under the Holy Book a month before your wedding. My son might be irresponsible, but he’s not a thief. How dare she!” She stopped again and pointed to a nearby small mud boundary wall near the canal. “There,” she said. “I need to sit down for a bit.”

  I followed her to the temporary seat she had found under the neem tree. She was panting more than usual.

  “I didn’t fast today. I couldn’t wake up on time. I hope I’m forgiven.” Bhaggan didn’t say the five daily prayers, but I had never known her to miss the daylong fasts.

  “You didn’t fast, did you?” she asked me. “It’ll harm the baby.”

  I shook my head, still thinking about the earrings. I’d forgotten about them because I would never have occasion to wear them. I realized I needed to return them before they created more problems.

  I had planned to wear them to the movie theater with Taaj, but so much had happened, and we had never gone. And I had kept them hidden in the corner of my old bedroom that I shared with Bhaggan. I had forgotten to return them. I had no use for them in my new life with Maalik in the cane fields, but I needed to find a way to put them back before they created more problems.

  “Tomorrow I’ll go and organize her closet. I’m sure they’re where she put them,” I consoled Bhaggan.

  “Wait till you hear what the midwife says. I’m going to ask her to show you the flower of Maryam, which will calm you during childbirth. I don’t want my grandchild to come before his time. And what does Saffiya need the earrings for, anyway? She’s close to her time to meet her maker. She’ll need only a white sheet to wrap her then. Everything will be left here, the old hag!”

  Bhaggan was as convinced that the baby was a boy as I was that she was a girl. I knew I was right, though. She had spoken to me through her movements. She had kicked me gently from within when I had called her by her name: Shahida, the witness.

  I had learned the meaning of the male version of the name, Shahid, when studying the Holy Book with Zakia. I liked it. When I told Maalik, he liked it, too.

  And now that I was confident I would have a girl of my own, I would call her Shahida. But there was no deterring Bhaggan, and no reason to. Soon enough, Shahida would be with us.

  And I knew the birth would be easy. I was strong and had never suffered any illness or injury, and bringing my first baby into the world would not be difficult. I was confident and urged Bhaggan to move a bit faster and get to the midwife’s house, which was now just down the road from us.

  I decided I’d return the earrings the next day, to reduce Bhaggan’s concern and to take the blame off Taaj.

  Flower of Maryam

  Bhaggan held on to my arm as we entered the courtyard of the midwife’s two-bedroom home. She took us into the smaller room, which had one charpoy, a stool, a sack, and a tin box. This was where she saw her clients. As in all other village homes, the corner of the veranda was the kitchen and on the other side of the courtyard was the bathroom.

  We crossed the courtyard, our footprints covering the freshly made diagonal broom lines. I imagined that after our baby was born, Maalik and I would make our hovel into a two-room hut with a spacious courtyard like this one.

  In one corner of the courtyard was a lemon tree with mint and cilantro around it; in the other corner, a chameli tree sprouted buds, even though it was now much cooler.

  The midwife sat us both on the charpoy, got us each a cup of sweetened tea and a biscuit, and then told me to lie down.

  “My daughter”—Bhaggan paused to catch her breath—“she is young. I told her the flower of Maryam will ease her pain. I said I’d show her how it works.”

  The midwife straightened her dopatta, walked toward the corner, and pulled a shriveled, clawlike plant from the dusty sack. A ray of light seeped through the one, very high window in the room and reflected off the grayish mass of stems. This was not a flower. I couldn’t imagine what magic it would perform.

  I lay on the charpoy, and Bhaggan sat hunched near the end of it. From where I lay, I could see the whole courtyard through the door that stood ajar, since the midwife’s husband had not yet returned home and her children played in the room next door. It was also the only way the room could stay ventilated.

  The midwife checked my pulse as she responded to the skepticism that I made no effort to hide.

  “From the time of the prophet, it has performed miracles. Maybe even before that.”

  She didn’t convince me, but I remained silent.

  She was perched on a low cane-and-straw stool. Her kameez and shalwar, made of an expensive material with large red paisleys, added to her aura of confidence and youth. She might have been about ten years older than I was, and I wondered if I would ever dress like her, with a chador that matched the paisleys.

  She pulled up my stained and sweaty kameez, exposing my stomach, and I wished I had changed into my special outfit before coming. She rubbed some coconut oil on her hands, and the flat gold ring on her left hand began to shine in contrast with her dark skin.

  Then she gently massaged my stomach and my baby responded to her touch. I closed my eyes and reached out to find Bhaggan’s hand, and it was clammy. The sweat should have died d
own by now. This worried me, but then the baby kicked and I opened my eyes.

  The midwife was composed as she explained to Bhaggan why she didn’t want to use the flower to calm me down that day . “It’s too early. She still has a month, and I’ll be wasting a very expensive plant.”

  “And my grandchild—do you think he’s not worth it?” Bhaggan responded, wiping the sweat from her brow with her dopatta and still adamant that the baby was a boy. She reached toward the fan on the tin box. It wasn’t hot. I couldn’t understand why she was sweating. Despite the time we had been at the midwife’s house in the village across the canal, Bhaggan’s breath seemed to be lagging at the low boundary wall near the bridge.

  “My daughter here is worried. I need her to relax. Show her how the flower will stop her pain as my grandchild enters the world, even if it is a month from now.” I was grateful that Bhaggan still called me her daughter, not her daughter-in-law, after my wedding.

  “She’s not ready yet. She still has time. I’ll use it when her time is close. It’s expensive. It comes all the way from the desert. I give it to women who can’t conceive, and two of my clients miraculously conceived because of it. Flowering it now will be such a—”

  Bhaggan didn’t let the midwife finish her sentence. She undid a knot from the corner of her dopatta, pulled out a bunch of crumpled notes, and threw one on the tin box.

  “Here. I can spend anything for my children and grandchildren. Just put the plant in water and show her how it blossoms, to calm her when her time is near.” Bhaggan would not be intimidated by the midwife, but the midwife was also Bhaggan’s match. Maybe her dealings with so many families gave her the confidence to speak up.

  “I tell you, Amman, I don’t want it to make her body react too soon,” the midwife responded.

  “You think I don’t know what it takes to have a child? Three of my own, and the last one after his father had died. I know more about childbirth than you do. Two children, you have, and think that’s enough. These new ways. Getting an operation.”

  The midwife seemed slightly put out by Bhaggan’s reference to the personal information she had shared the last time we had come, but Bhaggan was unperturbed and continued her rant about the benefits of more children.

  “If my man had not died of a snakebite, I would have had more. But you, you’ve stopped already. Even when you have a husband.”

  The midwife glanced at me conspiratorially. I wanted to acknowledge this confident woman with a smile, but I knew Amman Bhaggan would be upset at the open disrespect.

  Amman Bhaggan was distracted, rubbing her shoulder as if it pained her and breathing deeply. She swelled her nostrils to keep the air flowing smoothly.

  When this happened at home, Saffiya would caution her, in a matter-of-fact way, “Bhaggan, your body is asking for a rest from all that weight you carry around.”

  The midwife pulled my kameez over my stomach and wiped her hands with a small towel on the stool, then went to the hand pump in the courtyard to fill a stainless-steel glass with water and brought it to Bhaggan to help calm her down.

  “You should have taken a horse carriage today, Amman,” the midwife said.

  “Yes. I know. She is getting on in years, and the long walk has tired her,” I responded, thinking she was considering Bhaggan’s breathlessness.

  “No. I’m talking about you. You’re too far ahead in your pregnancy to travel such distances on foot.”

  “Not me,” I responded. “I’m made like this glass of steel. I won’t break, no matter what happens to me.”

  The midwife stroked my hair. “You’re still a child. Your amman should have waited to marry you. You have your whole life to bear babies.”

  The midwife didn’t know I had no real mother. I had met her once I knew I was pregnant, when Bhaggan had brought me to her to confirm it. I had been stunned when she had admonished Bhaggan for letting me get pregnant so young. This was the first time I had heard anyone talk this way. Saffiya, Bhaggan, and the villagers all wanted the young village girls to marry as soon as their monthly bleeding started. I wondered if others thought like the midwife.

  Her tenderness bruised me. I felt my eyes begin to water, and I shut them again. I didn’t know how to react to such consideration.

  I could hear Bhaggan’s breathing begin to regulate, as if it had just left the wall and was finally catching up with her. I smiled at the image.

  “Maybe she’s right,” Bhaggan conceded. “I should have sent the horse cart to bring the midwife to the hut in the cane fields.”

  “She’s living there all by herself,” the midwife said.

  “No. My son Maalik …” Bhaggan sounded defeated and added, “What can an old woman like me do? She has to live with her husband. And that’s where he lives.”

  “Bring her back to your home for these last weeks. She will need some care and comfort. What will she do if the baby is born and there’s no woman to care for her?” Her compassionate tone was like a gentle massage to my soul.

  Bhaggan didn’t have time to answer. The sound of the children arguing in the room next door interrupted us. A little girl with a bright pink dress and two braids with pink ribbons burst into the room and hid her face in the midwife’s lap.

  I turned to where she had entered, and a boy not much older than she was stood frowning in the doorway. I could tell he wanted to enter, but his mother’s gaze kept him transfixed. “Remember what I’ve told you,” she said.

  His tiny fists were clenched in defiance, as he tried not to respond while he was being disciplined in front of us. From where I lay, I looked at him and smiled, recognizing that feeling of daring to resist. Would my daughter be like him or like Maalik? I could tell he was in no mood to smile back at me as he lifted his chest and held his breath to contain his tears of anger.

  “You’re supposed to take care of your little sister, not fight with her.” She gently pushed her daughter’s face off her lap and addressed her.

  I looked at the girl. She was smiling. Even at such a young age, she had learned how to get her way, to get her mother’s sympathy. But the midwife knew her daughter, and her tone changed as she addressed her. “And you. I’ve told you to listen to your brother. Respect him. Now go. Let me take care of this woman.”

  “Is her baby coming out?” The girl’s voice reminded me of Maria’s when I had cared for her at that age, but she was not as innocent. She was trying to charm her mother before she left the room to be with her brother again.

  “Not yet,” her mother responded. “She has time.”

  “Are you going to show her the flower magic?” Her daughter smiled. This little girl knew how to win her mother back.

  The midwife stroked her daughter’s hair and smiled at her. “Go get me the earthen bowl and fill it with water at the pump.”

  The little girl rushed out, and her brother followed her. He seemed to have forgotten his original anger and wanted to join in on the fun of the magical flower.

  This interaction between a mother and her children was entirely different from what I had experienced or seen with Bhaggan or Jannat, but it pleased me. I would admonish my children like this, and then I would hug them and make them laugh, like the two laughing at the hand pump outside.

  I could see the children at play from where I lay. The little boy pumped energetically, and his sister stood close to the stream, barely able to hold the bowl as water splashed everywhere.

  Her brother, noticing it was too heavy for his sister to carry, took the bowl from her hands and brought it to the doorstep. He stood there, knowing not to cross over it into the room where I lay on the charpoy, and his mother took the bowl from him. She placed the shriveled plant into the bowl. Nothing happened.

  The midwife sensed my impatience. “It takes time. Keep looking at the plant.”

  I’m not sure how long it took, but I could hear Bhaggan’s heavy breathing in the background as each bud of the flower unfurled, spreading the twig into a fully blossomed plant. I mig
ht even have dozed off for a while, but I was awoken by the midwife explaining what had happened.

  “You see. The flower will call to your body to open up, to release the new life. The pain will reduce and become a sweet pleasure when you see your baby for the first time.” She touched my stomach again and announced, “You see, even your baby has relaxed as you watched the flower bloom.”

  Was it possible? I wondered. I had seen the buffalo give birth. One had nearly died because its baby got stuck, but I knew I was strong enough to bear that pain. And I trusted the midwife. She knew what she was doing. She had cared for so many other women through childbirth, even had her own beautiful children.

  The midwife was now distracted by a fly that had just entered the room and landed on the rim of the bowl.

  “The weather gets slightly cooler and these darned flies reappear,” she complained.

  “Bring me the flyswatter,” she told her daughter, who now wanted to please her mother, so she ran to get it, causing a commotion, and the fly disappeared through the window.

  It was nearly time for the late-afternoon prayer. Amman Bhaggan clearly wasn’t in any shape to walk home, so the midwife told her son to call the horse-cart owner from the house down the street from her. “Tell the driver to make sure his horse is calm. One of my clients and her mother need to return before dark, but he should drive carefully,” she instructed him.

  As he left, she reminded me, “Please, stay with your amman until the baby comes. Someone will notify me when it’s your time, but don’t go back to the cane fields until the baby is born.”

  I couldn’t imagine returning to sleep in the room I shared with Bhaggan in the bed I shared with Maria. Not now, with my own baby growing inside me.

  The call for the late-afternoon prayer reminded me that I would be returning to a familiar pattern of life before the baby came.