REDEEMING MY LIFE…

Here's something I almost value like my life... It is my first full story. Hope i really hope you people like it...

I am Maimoona Ali Hakeeb and this is the story of my life… or rather a part of it!
Being born in an orthodox family, that too a Muslim one is not my chai ki pyaali. The struggle; it might be too grand a word to use, but I can’t find any other word to use instead; took away half of my strength to fight… that too just to grow up. Maimoona Ali Hakeeb!!! My name… this name, it still gives me goose bumps.
My mother, my Ammi, loved me. She always used to make those lovely coconut burfis that still makes my mouth water. She used to give me the first burfi she makes. I never could make my burfis come out like hers… there was magic in her hands.
Ameer, my younger brother… We were like 2 peas in a pod for Ammi; but for Abhajaan, we were poles apart. He loved us, no doubt. But in front of Ameer, I was always forgotten. I was left in that deep, dark corner. I always felt unloved, even though I knew somewhere that I was loved… just that it was a bit less! I used to wonder why?? Silly and stupid me! But I was a bit too small to understand these ways of the world!
I have had the basics of education… the 3 R’s. I was, and maybe still am, good at painting and sewing. It was said or rather my Ammi said that by the age of 16, I’d become the best cook in the whole of our village, ——pur. But then, I would have rather had Ammi’s haath ka khana, than anybody else’s, not even mine! Her rajme ki sabji, roti, chaaval and those sweets… it would be a feast within one and a half hours…
My childhood was just like any other girl’s in ——pur; with helping Ammi with the housework, playing for sometime, learning housework and the like. It wasn’t full of hardships or anything; it was ok. But I’d become a woman before my childhood ended.
I was 17 and 17 was the age to get married in ——pur. A girl past the age of 18 was not worth marrying. Many people came to “see” me. But none liked me — too thin, too tall, too dark, and too modern. Can you imagine? Me and modern going hand in hand. But my Abhajaan must have got a shock of his life. For from then on, I wasn’t allowed to step out of the house. My last ounce of freedom was taken away from me. And I truly was bonded. It soon became clear that none wanted to marry me or rather I wasn’t that appealing. So it was quite shameful for my parents. It was said that my name should be changed to Main-hoon-na, because I’ll always be around for someone to marry! The insult!
I was 18 then and Abhajaan came in, he was so happy! In Shah Allah!! It was also the first time that he hugged me before Ameer. It came as a surprise that after all those rejections that he still had some love left for me… He called out, “Ameer ki Ammi, come out…” My Ammi came out and it seemed as if she understood what Abhajaan wanted to say even before he said it! I didn’t understand what was going on until… Ammi said to me, “It’s time for your nikhaah, my dear.” She turned to Abhajaan and asked him who was to be her beloved’s husband…
That was the turning point in my life. I didn’t ask to be married to a man almost 40 years older to me—married to the 56 year old, drunkard Rasheed. But who was I to go against my Abhajaan’s word. I knew Abhajaan’s word was like writing on the stone—indelible and as legible as fine print. Ammi disapproved of the match but she knew that she couldn’t do anything. A woman has no right to contradict a man—her father, her husband or her son…
Now what is one to do??? Life goes on… As for me, I was in suspended animation. Life never moved fast enough now; mainly because I didn’t want to live—finding no enjoy in anything. My nikhaah was a big affair in my village, because my father was a big man. After the marriage, after saying kabool, I was no longer Maimoona Ali Hakeeb. Instead, I was just Maimoona Rasheed. I was being taken to a new village, ——bad; a new house, maybe a home or not… a totally new life!!! My new life was different. I was bonded for life and my black burqa signified this.
Even though I had been very young when I got married, as compared to the marrying age now, I did have dreams of my marriage, like every other young girl. A tall, dark and handsome man on a white stallion, who had enough respect and love for you! But then I’d forgotten that I, the not-so-pretty one, the dark and thin (mind you, thin not slim) one, had no right to dream!
Our first night was… I would rather cut myself that tell you, but… Rashe… We, women aren’t supposed to call our husbands by their name… a mark of respect or is it again a belittling reminder of bondage???... I had to get accustomed to this… He came in… in a drunken haze. That night I understood how one can use a body as a doll, a punching bag and a sex-toy all rolled into one. It was disgusting to me… still is. Saying it is almost like swallowing your own vomit! I screamed. My nails must have really injured him because he yelped like a street dog and then I was used just as if I were a punching bag… I was officially his…
Days passed. Nights came. Nights were nightmares to me without me shutting my eyes! Every night was like the rerun of our first night! How could I have lived through all that???
My life was over; I thought… but then like a ray of light of happiness and hope came the news… I was pregnant. Hearing this, he didn’t say a word nor did he even nod. But the atrocities on me got reduced, though his drinking continued. How could my Abhajaan have chosen such a man for me??? Maybe he was compelled to just marry me off to somebody, just to take away a burden and the shame on his family! I wish I would die… but then another life was in me now—I had no right to kill it too.
9 months quickly flew past. My belly was huge. My baby was ready to come out. It was early in the morning when my water broke. A midwife was called. The pain! It was unbearable. The only thought that was going through my mind was that I was going to die and how come I was still alive. My baby was causing me so much pain. That ache! “Push, push, push”—cried a far away voice. I obeyed. I had a hand in my hand. I squeezed it with all my strength and pushed. What is the use of all this pushing if the pain isn’t going anywhere…?
After what seemed like all eternity and which afterwards I came to know to be just one hour, came a beautiful calmness… serene and heavenly. The pain had gone. I was all sweaty, dripping in the sweltering heat of a hot summer morning. But I felt cool and sedate after that struggle. The pain—it stopped as if it’d never started and it was then that I heard my baby cry. It was the most beautiful sound in the whole world. That cry. The baby, a girl, she was placed next to me. So soft, so pink, so beautiful, the bubbles she blew… All of a sudden all that pain I bore was forgotten. I wanted to live now. I needed to live. It was then that I understood what a woman was. Next to God, she was the only one capable of giving birth to life. She was important. She was divine. She deserved love, respect and everything else. I promised myself—I would never let my baby suffer like I did. I would never let her bear even a tenth of the unhappiness I bore. I will have her survive in this man’s world alone. She wouldn’t need a man to survive. She will be a woman… an independent woman! I looked at my girl again… the small projection where the umbilical cord had been slashed—searing her from me. She hadn’t been cleaned after her coming into the world from that warm hollow of mine. I was transfixed by her… how must she have felt inside me and what will this world give her???
Maybe God wanted my promise to be true… maybe God wanted my daughter to be happy… but why such means??? Even before my husband could hold my, ok… our daughter in his hands, he died. He died on the same day my baby was born. The Hakim who always cured the sick in ——bad was called in. He said that it was some heart problem which was due to all the drinking. But the waggling tongues in the village couldn’t extricate the two events—my baby’s birth and my husband’s death—from each other. Soon my baby—my unnamed one—was called the unlucky one and slowly the degree of insult heaped on us grew. And within 2 days of my baby’s birth, I left the village. I thought of coming back to my paternal house, my maayka, but I knew that my parents and Ameer would be the target of many more insults due to us; and maybe I wasn’t sure whether they would accept us. What was more shameful and insulting than a widowed daughter and an unlucky baby???
I knew I had to live—for my child. I took my baby and a few bare necessities, my jewellery and some money to the city. I shed my burqa and with it, I broke all the ties I had with my family, ——pur, ——bad and my whole past. I was a new person. It was a new life for me… for my baby! The city was one place which didn’t have any place for traditions or age-old customs. I’d once gone there to buy some material for our clothes with Ammi. I was so awestruck by the tall buildings and bazaars that I was rooted to the ground. I was almost lost when I stopped walking. Pretty soon I’d found a place there where I could buy what was called flats; apartments in a big building to live in! What was so flat about then I never understood… it was irony to the core. They were in the tallest buildings in the city. With all of my wedding jewellery, I bought one flat for us. It was ok for winters and the monsoon. But summers would be so hot that I get reminded of the heat of that deciding day of my life—the day my baby was born. Coming to the city helped me think over my whole situation. I felt grateful to God for a lot of things. Maybe, I felt liberated after the death of my husband. I had never felt love for him. I had always seen him in a drunken stupor which never commanded my respect. It was in his dark and unwholesome fear that I’d lived… but now, with no Him or rather no Rasheed, I was at last free. I had enough courage to call him by his name… Maybe it was God’s will that I and my baby live happily…
After 4 days of my baby’s birth, she was named… Zoya Maimoona Ali Hakeeb. Zoya… which means “life”. My baby, my Zoya… my new life!!!
And I was back to Maimoona Ali Hakeeb. I did not want even the shadow of my past to touch my dear Zoya. I didn’t want my Zoya to have anything to do with Rasheed, that man who had no respect for a woman or that distant village which had once called her unlucky.
She was my life, just as her name stated. She was my luck. She came into my life and my sorrows were numbered. She gave me happiness which had never even had place in my wildest dreams. Feeding her, bathing her, clothing her and all the motherly jobs took away my sorrows. The deep creases that worries and unhappiness had left on my dark and unhealthy skin went away. My skin’d attained a glow which only a feeding mother had. I was happy tending and caring my dear Zoya. I had forgotten my worries. I and my Zoya lived in a cocoon of self-content. But then of course my money started to drain out. I’d saved some money, but that wasn’t enough for looking after both of us... So I did all sorts of jobs, starting with odd jobs, sewing, and painting. When she was of age, I sent her to school—not the best school of the city, but a good one. I couldn’t afford the best school with my income. My baby, my Zoya looked special and sweet in her uniform. Her childhood was nothing like mine. It was full of fun and frolic. She knew nothing about the cruelties of the world, or its hardships. She was innocent and free. She had a life which I thought never existed. She was happy! Aah! My dreams were slowly taking shape. As my Zoya grew, we needed more money. It was then that I started a catering business with a friend I made in the city, my neighbour, Ruksaad, who was to become my best friend in the coming years; she, my support and I, hers… She had run away from marriage and with her lived a baby girl whom she’d adopted. Like me, she just had the basics of education and with this it was that we started our small business… our business was successful; successful enough to sustain the four of us. This girl, whom Ruksaad had adopted, was of the same age as my Zoya and her name was Ayesha. My Zoya and Ayesha went to different schools, but they became friends, thanks to their mothers. Ok, agreed not best friends. But they were more like sisters. They had their own lives but they knew that they could trust each other like sisters do.
Ruksaad and I were like this too. But we knew that we needed each other to survive this city; especially with the business. 2 villages had beaten me and I was prepared to let a city beat me now…
Getting up early to start cooking with the few people we’d employed; for a wedding or an engagement or just a party; had become part of our lives. We’d saved some capital so as to expand our business. We employed more people and we became big. We even started our own hotel—‘The Inn’—simple and leisurely. I must say it was a good investment because soon we could move out of the flat and bought a house which we shared. We’d become that close—me and Ruksaad. This was how Zoya and Ayesha became close… so close that they were inseparable. They passed school—ok, not exactly with flying colors, but somewhere in the top of their class. They were brought up in an environment put together by two scheming business women. So naturally, they wanted to go to business school; and that they did. To the same college too. Fate you call it and I call it careful development and perfecting their resumes that only a few businesswomen were skilled at.
College life was fun for them, I think, but also something new. They were shown the world there. The scheming, dog-eat-dog, man-eat-woman world. Ok, so I’m a feminist, I have a right to be after all that I’ve gone through… school protected them, and the college showed them what they were protected from. They were provided with education—the best tool against the world. It was then that I and Ruksaad found HSK or Harjeet Singh Kaur who turned out to be the best publicist ever and thanks to her, we’d a huge line of masalas and chutneys and sauces and all that in pretty little glass jars, with the caption of—“Bottled Temptation”; maybe farfetched… but it was a huge temptation to name it so. We now also had two or three branches of our caterers in the city. The city was big enough for them… really big. It’d been a long journey since I was married to Rasheed…
I and Ruksaad now felt that we had 2 daughters and not 1 daughter each… we loved Zoya and Ayesha…
Soon, it was time for their graduation. Convocation!!! The word is music to my ears! I was 40-something then… just 40 and I felt I’d lived for ever!
I was the happiest person in the world. Ayesha was called up and then came Zoya. They had graduated; this time I proudly say, with flying colors. My lovely Zoya whom I’d held in my hand like a sweet beautiful doll long back; my baby—the pink girl child, was on the brink of womanhood. In her robe and that hat with that string… forgot what it is called; she looked so lovely. Tears in my eyes… like when she, for the first time, walked without support and when she stood first in her class… so also now I had tears in my eyes. I was so happy I couldn’t control myself; I just had to stand and clap the loudest. I was content with my lovely Zoya. And I wasn’t just a woman. I was a success too. My promise was being fulfilled right in front of my eyes…
It was then that I noticed… My baby was wearing a black robe just like the black burqa I used to wear. But my burqa had meant bondage for me. But for my Zoya, this black robe meant freedom. I was happy. My baby, who once needed me to survive, could now survive on her own in this “man’s world”. She could dream. She needn’t kill her dreams like I once did. If she wants, she can marry; if she doesn’t, she needn’t. She can do whatever she likes—live her life as she wants… God bless her. My Zoya is a woman… an independent woman.
She’s a girl, but she isn’t a doll…
If she wants, she can do it all!!! —In Shah Allah!