The Pearl that Broke Its Shell

  Bobo Shahgul proved to be a woman of her word. Since her husband had died two years ago, she had happily taken on the role of the family matriarch. She presided over her sons’ brides with her walking stick, though there was nothing at all wrong with her legs. She had earned the right to walk with her head high since she had given her husband six sons and two daughters. Now it was her turn to oversee the roost with the same iron fist she had survived.

  Shekiba let herself be undressed and bathed. She found it much easier than resisting. The youngest wives were assigned the formidable task of deconstructing the beast Shekiba had become. Pails of water were brought in. Her hair was sheared, too far gone to salvage. They cursed her for the rank smells of every body recess, their nostrils seared. They put food in her mouth; someone moved her jaw, reminding her to chew.

  In a few days, Shekiba’s mind returned to her body. She began to hear what people were saying; she began to notice that her belly did not ache with hunger. Her fingers reached up and felt a head scarf covering the ragged edges of her chopped hair.

  I must look like one of my cousins, she thought.

  Her skin was raw and reddened from the brutal baths she had been given. Her aunts had scrubbed a layer of filth from her with a washcloth too rough for her frail skin. She had some scabs, while other areas stayed red and chafed, her body too malnourished to repair minor damage. At night, she slept on a blanket in the narrow kitchen, her feet often knocking against a pot and waking her up. In the morning, she was moved into one of many rooms where she would be out of the way while the wives prepared breakfast.

  I’m tired of lifting her. Get Farrah to help you. My back is aching.

  You say the same thing every day! Your back, your back. Surely, it’s not from doing anything around here. What has your husband been doing to you! Tell him to go easy.

  Giggling.

  Shut your mouth and pick up her arms. Ugh. I am queasy enough today. I can’t stand to look at her face.

  Fine, but we’ll put her in your room. My room still has her smell from yesterday and I cannot stand it.

  Shekiba let herself be moved around and insulted. At least she was not being asked to participate in this existence. But that would not last. Bobo Shahgul had other plans for her.

  The family home had a small kitchen where the wives all helped cook. There was one main family room where everyone sat around during the day, the children played and meals were shared. Surrounding those two main rooms were four or five other rooms, each assigned to one of Bobo Shahgul’s sons. Families slept together in one room. Only Bobo Shahgul had a room of her own.

  Shekiba was on her side in her uncle’s room when she vaguely felt Bobo Shahgul’s walking stick jab into her thigh.

  “Get up, you insolent girl! Enough of your nonsense. You have been asleep for over a week. You’re not going to get away with this kind of behavior in this house. God only knows what craziness your mother allowed.”

  Shekiba winced. A downside to her recovery was that her body now had the energy to sense pain. Again, the stick poked into her leg. Shekiba rolled onto her side and tried to push herself back, away from her grandmother. Her head was heavy with too much sleep.

  “Insolent and lazy! Just like your mother!”

  There was no escape from this woman. Shekiba eased herself to a sitting position and managed to focus her eyes on her grandmother.

  “Well? Have you nothing to say for yourself? Disrespectful and ungrateful. We have bathed and fed you and you can do nothing more than sit there and stare like an idiot?”

  “Salaam . . . ,” Shekiba said meekly.

  “Sit up straight and watch your legs. Although you may not know it, you are a girl and you should sit like one.” Bobo Shahgul snapped her stick against her granddaughter’s arm. Shekiba flinched and straightened her back as best she could. Bobo Shahgul leaned in close. Shekiba could see her deep-set wrinkles, the yellow of her eyes.

  “I want you to tell me what happened to my son.” Each syllable was punctuated by a fine spray of saliva.

  Your son? Your son? Shekiba thought, her mind suddenly clear and focused. Your son was my father. When was the last time you saw him? When was the last time you bothered to send him any food, any oil? You could see him in the field. You could see the pain in his movements. Did you bother to send him anything then? All you cared about was giving him another wife, saving the family name.

  “He was my father.” Shekiba left the rest unsaid.

  “Your father? And a lot of good that did him! He could have had a decent life. He could have had a wife to look after him, to bear him sons who would grow our clan and work on our land. But you did your very best to keep him secluded, trapped with such a wild creature as yourself that no one would want to come near you or him! First your mother, then you! You killed my son!”

  Her stick jabbed Shekiba’s breastbone.

  “Where is he? What did you do with him?”

  “He is with my mother. He is with my brothers and my sister. They are all there together, waiting for me.”

  Bobo Shahgul fumed at Shekiba’s detachment. As she suspected, her son had been buried without her knowledge. Her eyes swelled with rage.

  “Waiting for you, eh? Maybe God will see fit that your time come soon,” she hissed.

  If only, Shekiba thought.

  “Zarmina! Come and get this girl! She is to help you with the chores around the house. It is time for her to start earning her stay here. She has caused this family enough grief and she needs to start making up for it.”

  Zarmina was married to Shekiba’s oldest uncle. She had the strength of a mule and the face of one too. Shekiba guessed she was the one who had scrubbed her skin raw. Zarmina walked into the room, wiping her hands on a rag.

  “Ahhh, so finally we can stop waiting on this girl hand and foot! About time. God has no use for the lazy. Get up and get into the kitchen. You can start peeling the potatoes. There is much to be done.”

  This was the beginning of a new phase in Shekiba’s life. She was no stranger to hard work, to lifting and peeling, to scrubbing and hauling. She was assigned the least desirable chores in the house and accepted them without argument. Bobo Shahgul wanted her to pay for her father’s death. She made this clear every day, sometimes calling out his name and clucking her tongue.

  She would even wail and lament the tragedy of his death.

  “He was taken too young. How could he have left his mother to grieve him? How could such a thing happen to our family? Have we not prayed enough? Have we not followed God’s word? Oh, my dear son! How could this have happened to you?”

  Her daughters-in-law would sit at her side, plead with her to be strong and tell her that Allah would care for him since his own family had not. They would fan her and warn her that she would make herself ill with all this grief. But Bobo Shahgul’s sobbing came without tears and turned off just as easily as it turned on. Shekiba continued with the task of brushing the rug. She did not bother to look up.

  What happened to you? We heard that they call you shola-face. Did you put shola on your face?

  Her cousins asked the same question over and over again. Shekiba ignored them for the most part. Sometimes people answered for her.

  She did not listen to her mother and that’s what happened to her. Did you understand what I said? So you had better pay attention to what I say or your face will turn just as hideous as hers!

  Shekiba became a very useful instrument for discipline in the house.

  Look at what you’ve done! Clean this up or you will be sleeping with Shekiba tonight!

  There was no end.

  God has punished Shekiba. That is why she has no mother or father. Now go wash for prayers or else God will do the same to you.

  CHAPTER 7

  RAHIMA

  MADAR-JAN KEPT ME AT HOME for a couple of weeks, wanting me to get used to the idea of being a boy before she let me test the waters outside of our home. She corrected my sisters when they called
me Rahima and did the same with my younger cousins who had never before seen a bacha posh. They ran into their houses to report the news to their mothers, who smirked. Each had given her husband at least two sons to carry on the family name. They didn’t need to make any of their daughters a bacha posh.

  But Madar-jan ignored their looks and went about her chores. Bibi-jan hated that anyone in her family was forced to resort to the bacha posh tradition.

  “We needed a son in the house, Khala-jan.”

  “Hmmph. Would be better if you could just have one as the others did.”

  Madar-jan bit her tongue for the thousandth time.

  Padar-jan barely seemed to notice the change. He had been gone for a couple of days and came home exhausted. He sat in the living room and opened an envelope of small pellets. He squeezed them between his fingers and sprinkled the mix into a cigarette casing. He lit one end and sucked on it deeply. Thick, sweet smoke twisted around his face and wrapped around his head. My sisters and I came in from outside to find him sitting there. We stopped short and said hello, our heads bowed.

  He looked at us and inhaled deeply. He squinted through the smoke as he noticed that something was different about his three daughters.

  “So she’s done it then.” And that was all he said about the matter.

  Khala Shaima was the reassuring voice that Madar-jan needed to hear.

  “Raisa, what else were you going to do? Your husband is delirious half the time and of no use to you. You can’t send the girls to school or even to the market because you’re afraid of what will happen. Your in-laws are all too busy talking about each other to help you out. This is your only option. Besides, it’ll be better for her, you’ll see. What can a girl do in this world, anyway? Rahim will appreciate what you’ve done for him.”

  “But my in-laws, I—”

  “Forget them! The person who doesn’t appreciate the apple doesn’t appreciate the orchard. You’ll never please them. The sooner you figure that out the better off you’ll be.”

  MY FIRST ERRAND AS A BOY was an exciting one. I was to go to the market for oil and flour. Madar-jan nervously handed me a few bills and watched me walk down the street. My sisters poked their faces around either side of her skirt trying to get a look as well. I kept glancing over my shoulder and waved at Madar-jan cheerfully, trying to inspire a little confidence in both of us that I could pull this off.

  The streets were lined with shops. Copper pots. Baby clothes. Sacks of rice and dried beans. Colorful flags hung from front doors. The shops were two levels, with balconies on the second floor where men sat back and watched the comings and goings of their neighbors. None of the men walked with any urgency. The women, on the other hand, moved purposefully and carefully.

  I stepped into the first shop I recognized, a large sign overhead announcing the arrival of a new cooking oil.

  “Agha-sahib, how much for a kilo of flour?” I asked, remembering to keep my shoulders straight. I couldn’t quite bring myself to look the man in the eye so I kept shifting my gaze to the tin cans he had stocked on the shelf behind him.

  “Fifteen thousand afghanis,” he said, barely looking up. Not too long ago, a kilo of flour had cost forty afghanis. But money was worthless now that everyone had bags of it.

  I bit my lip. This was double what I had seen him charge my mother, which she complained was already too much. I wasn’t surprised. I had come to this same man twice before when my mother had reluctantly sent me out to the market and I had been able to bargain him down to half of what he originally demanded.

  “That’s too much, agha-sahib. Not even a king could pay that much. How about six thousand afghanis?”

  “You take me for a fool, little boy?”

  “No, sir.” My chest puffed to hear him call me a boy. “But I know that Agha Kareem has flour for sale too and he charges much less. I didn’t want to walk all the way down to his shop, but . . .”

  “Ten thousand afghanis. That’s it.”

  “Agha-sahib, it’s only one kilo I’m asking for. Eight thousand afghanis is all I’ll pay.”

  “Boy! You’re wasting my time,” he barked, but I knew he had nothing else to do. He’d been picking dirt from under his fingernails when I entered his shop.

  “Then I’ll pay you twelve thousand afghanis but I’ll need a kilo of flour and a kilo of oil to go with it.”

  “And a kilo of oil? Have you—”

  “I’m no fool, agha-sahib,” I said, and forced myself to look him in the eye, as a boy should. He stopped short and his mouth tightened. His eyes narrowed as he took a good look at me. I felt myself shrink under his stare. Maybe I’d gone too far.

  Suddenly he let out a guffaw.

  “You’re a little smart-ass, aren’t you?” he said with a smirk. “Whose son are you anyway?”

  My shoulders relaxed. He saw the bacha posh but it was just as Madar-jan had promised—people understood.

  “I’m Arif’s son. From the other side of the field, past the stream.”

  “Well done, my boy. Here, take your oil and flour and run off before I come to my senses.”

  I quickly counted out the bills, took my spoils and hurried back home to show Madar-jan. My walk turned to a jog as I realized I didn’t have to be demure and proper. I tested an old man walking by. I looked directly at him, meeting his squinted eyes and seeing that he didn’t react to my forwardness. Thrilled, I started to run faster. No one gave me a second glance. My legs felt liberated as I ran through the streets without my knees slapping against my skirt and without worrying about chastising eyes. I was a young man and it was in my nature to run through the streets.

  Madar-jan smiled to see me panting and grinning. I laid the goods before her and proudly showed her how much money I’d returned home with.

  “Well, well. Looks like my son bargains better than his mother!” she said.

  I started to understand why Madar-jan needed a son in the home. Certain chores she had left for my father had not been done in months. Now she could ask me.

  When my sister’s shoes came undone, the rubber sole flopping like an open mouth, I took them to the old man down the street. With only three fingers on his right hand, he could fix any shoe in any condition. I brought bread from the baker and chased the stray dog down the street. My father would come home, his eyes red and small, and laugh when he saw me.

  “Bachem, ask your sister to bring me a cup of tea. And tell her to fix me something to eat too,” he said, ruffling my hair as he walked lazily to the corner of the living room and stretched out on the floor, his head thumping against the pillow cushion.

  I was confused for a moment. Why hadn’t he asked me to bring the tea and food? But realization swept over me as I walked into the kitchen. I saw Rohila first.

  “Hey, Rohila. Padar-jan wants some tea and something to eat. He’s in the living room.”

  “So? Why didn’t you put a plate together? You know there’s some korma-katchaloo in the pot.”

  “He didn’t ask me. He said for me to tell my sister. That’s you. Anyway, I’m going out. Don’t take all day. He looks like he’s hungry,” I said cheerfully. Rohila’s hazel eyes gave me a look even as she turned to heat up a bowl of potato stew for our father. She was angry and part of me knew I was being a brat, but everything I was experiencing was new and I wanted to enjoy it. I ignored the shadow of guilt and headed out to see if the stray dog had returned for another game of chase.

  A month later, school was back in session and my nerves were again rattled. Madar-jan trimmed my hair and spoke to me cautiously.

  “You’ll be in the boys’ classroom this year. Pay attention to your teacher and mind your studies,” she warned me, trying to make this little talk sound routine. “Remember that your cousin Muneer will be in your class as well. No one, the teacher, the students, no one will ask you about . . . about anything. Just remember that your father has decided to send you to school this year. You are one of the boys and . . . and . . . mind what the tea
cher tells you.”

  It would be different, I understood. Khala Shaima’s plan had worked well within the confines of our family compound and even in my trips to the bazaar. School would put this charade to the test though, and I could sense my mother’s trepidation. My sisters were furious. Padar-jan had decided they were to stay home even though I could have accompanied them to school.

  Muneer and I walked to school together. He wasn’t the brightest of my cousins and I rarely saw him since his mother kept her children away from the rest of us. That probably worked in my favor. He needed to be told only once that I was his cousin Rahim and always had been, and in his mind there never had been a Rahima. I breathed a sigh of relief that I didn’t have to worry about his giving me away.

  “Salaam, Moallim-sahib,” I said when we arrived.

  The teacher grunted a reply in return, nodding as each student walked in. I wiped my moist palms on my pants.

  I felt the teacher’s curious eyes follow the back of my head but it could have been my imagination. I scanned the room and stayed close behind Muneer, noting that none of the boys seemed fazed by me. I kept my head bowed and we made our way to the back of the classroom, where Muneer and I shared a long bench with three other boys. One boy was especially eager to show how much he knew about the teacher.

  “Moallim-sahib is very strict. Last year he gave four boys bad marks because their fingernails weren’t clean.”

  “Oh yeah?” his friend whispered. “Then you better keep your finger out of your nose!”

  “Boys! Sit up straight and pay attention,” the teacher said. He was a rotund man, his shiny bald head rimmed with salt-and-pepper hair. His neatly groomed mustache matched his sparse hairs. “You’ll begin by writing your names. Then we’ll see what, if anything, you learned in your last class.”

  I quickly realized the male teachers were just as strict as the women. Class wasn’t much different except that there was more whispering and shooting each other looks than I’d ever seen in a girls’ classroom. I wrote my name carefully and watched Muneer struggle from the corner of my eye. His letters were awkwardly connected and an extra dot had changed “Muneer” to “Muteer.” I debated correcting him but the teacher looked in my direction before I could even begin to whisper. He walked around the room and looked at everyone’s names, shaking his head at some and grunting at others. Very few seemed to meet his standards.