In a way it was a relief. She knew now what to expect. He came to her infrequently and briefly, leaving when he had finished his grunting and sighing to sit in the living room. Sometimes he retreated back to Gulnaz. Shekiba always avoided Gulnaz the following morning, embarrassed and feeling as if she had committed an offense against her.
Her only reprieve was her bleeding. Only then could she whisper in the dark, her face flush with humiliation, “Forgive me, I have illness.”
He understood right away and would leave her chambers, seemingly relieved. Only last night was different. She had started bleeding two days ago.
“I have . . . I have illness,” she said softly, pushing her thighs together.
But he didn’t leave. Instead he sat again with his back turned toward her. He put his head in his hands.
“Things are not going well. Why are you still having your illness? Are you lying about it?”
Shekiba was surprised. His voice was gruff. “No, I would not lie about . . . about such a thing.”
“What happened to all that talk? All the talk about the women in your family and the lines of sons they birthed? You’ve been here for five months and you are still having your illness!”
Shekiba once again realized just how simple she was. That was the reason Aasif had taken her from the palace. Gulnaz had given him no children at all. He didn’t want Shekiba—he wanted sons.
“I . . . I . . . it was not talk. I had brothers . . . I—”
“This is a joke! How can this be possible? They were going to execute you. Do you understand that? Do you understand what you escaped?”
Shekiba understood better than anyone what she had escaped. She had been close enough to see the blood seep through Benafsha’s burqa and pool in the earth. She understood exactly what she had been spared.
“I understand.”
“Do you? Do you really? What are people to say? Two wives and not a single son! Do you know what that does to me?” He was livid. Gulnaz could hear him through the thin walls. She turned on her side, knowing that Shekiba was receiving the anger that he intended for them both. “A harem guard! Did you like being a man? Maybe that’s what it is! You liked being a man so much that now you refuse to be a woman! What are you? You are not a man! You are not a woman! You are nothing! Do you have anything to say for yourself? Where’s all the boasting now?”
“I . . . I . . .” Shekiba did not know what to say.
“I feed you and clothe you and for nothing! This is what you do to me! I should throw you out on the street! I should throw you back to the palace and let them do with you what they planned! You and your cursed face! Damn you!”
Shekiba braced herself for the blow but it never came. She cowered in a corner of her mattress. Aasif stormed out and slammed the door shut behind him. A few seconds later, Shekiba heard glass breaking and the metal gate clanged loudly. Her throat clenched, she could not help but agree with her angry husband.
Not a man, not a woman. I am nothing.
Gulnaz slipped quietly into Shekiba’s room a few moments later. Through the open door, a sliver of moonlight lit the floor of the hallway. The two wives stared at it, Aasif’s rant still echoing through the house. The first wife finally spoke.
“We have been married for one year and I have been unable to bear him a child. Your head would spin to know how many herbs I have ground under the pestle at my grandmother’s instruction. I have prayed at the local shrine and given alms to the poor. Nothing. My bleeding comes month after month, as does yours. He thought you would be different but I suspect now that Allah may have cursed him and no matter what woman or how many women he beds, a son is not his naseeb.
“And now, now that he has heavy sins on his shoulders, he may have poisoned his naseeb even more.”
This was the first reference Gulnaz had made to Aasif’s involvement in the palace scandal. Shekiba was not sure how much she knew.
“You were a guard there for the harem. He told me this much. You were living as a man. Your short hair, the way you walk, the way you hide your breasts. I think you may have been more content that way. To be honest, I would not mind trying it myself. I wonder what it would be like to be able to walk through the streets freely, without a thousand critical eyes. Do you miss it?”
This was something to which Shekiba, the woman-man, had given a great deal of thought.
“It did feel good. But . . . pants or a skirt, it changes nothing in the end. When it mattered, I was as vulnerable as any woman . . .” Shekiba decided against talking about the lashing. “And now I am here.”
Gulnaz intuited what Shekiba meant. “It must have been awful, what they did to you.”
Shekiba felt her back stiffen. There were still three raised scars she could feel when she bathed. She wondered how many more scars she had that she could not see. Gulnaz sighed.
“He was so angry. He did not say much about it but a wife knows her husband’s moods. He was angry from the beginning and I didn’t understand why until Aasif’s sister told me about her. She wanted me to know I wasn’t her brother’s first choice.”
Her. Shekiba looked at Gulnaz from the corner of her eye. Her expression was blank. She was talking about Benafsha.
“He knew her from before. She was nobody. Her family is as poor as they come and with three daughters, her father cursed his luck. She was just some girl who lived near his uncle’s home. I don’t know how, but he saw her once or twice.
“Aasif wanted her but his father rejected the idea. Not a proper family, not good enough for his son. But he kept at it. Kept trying to convince his father, and he had almost gotten his way when her father sent her to the palace. One less girl to provide for. Aasif was angry, but she was out of reach behind the palace walls so he let his father choose another family. And then we were married.”
Shekiba listened intently. Gulnaz was speaking to no one in particular.
“Men don’t like being denied something. Even if it is by the king. He won’t say exactly what happened there but I know something happened. I know it must have been terrible because he came home with eyes so red he looked like he could cry blood. He didn’t eat, sleep or speak for days.”
Shekiba looked away. She did not want to explain and hoped Gulnaz wouldn’t ask.
“And then he came home one day looking like he’d just met Shaitan himself. His eyes were dark and serious and he sat around staring at the walls, muttering something about atoning for his sins, begging forgiveness of God. He announced that he was going to bring home a second wife since I haven’t been able to bear him a child. There was nothing I could say to that, especially when I saw the look on his face. His family had spoken to him about the idea months ago but he hadn’t seemed all that eager. But I thought . . . well, when he said he would bring a second wife I wondered if he was crazy enough to think he could bring her here, but then it was . . . you.”
Shekiba kept her eyes on the ground. Her head spun. Benafsha had not turned him away. She had loved him, enough to protect him with her own life. How could a woman love any man so much?
Because of Benafsha, Aasif had saved her life. For that, Shekiba was grateful.