We, the flies, witness to Tara’s death, protected Shahida, her daughter, until sunrise. Tara lay on the canal bank where she had given birth to her baby, and the baby lay beside her, covered by her mother’s dopatta. One after another, we flies joined to protect the baby.
The dawn sunlight reflected in the dead mother’s eyes, searching for the song of lost love.
Love will survive, but I will drown.
It came from a radio hanging from the handle of the milkman’s bicycle. The unoiled bike’s squeals competed with the blaring music. The bicycle was barely balanced between two large milk cans that wobbled as the milkman tried to avoid the last of the night’s hyenas crossing the road and disappearing into the cane fields.
On the road that Tara had walked the night before, two figures traveled in opposite directions. The milkman, on his bicycle, rode toward the village. The maulvi, after making the call for the early-morning prayers, was walking hurriedly toward the main road. He would take the bus to the shrine. The morning sun shone directly into the maulvi’s eyes, blinding him in the moment when he turned the corner to face the milkman.
From our perch, we could see the road, but to protect her, we flew over to Baby Shahida, her hand still covered in fluids of her afterbirth, her eyes blinking at the morning star as it faded in the sunlight. She called out to it.
“Who’s there?” the milkman shouted.
The milkman and the maulvi heard the baby’s cry at the point where their paths met.
The milkman swerved left and then right to balance the two sloshing milk cans. He wobbled for a second and then landed on his right knee, tearing his shalwar and losing the top layer of knee skin. He was too distracted to notice the watery milk turning a light shade of pink and then a sloshy brown as it mixed with the blood and then with the surrounding mud.
“Son of an owl! Bastard! Sister fucker!” the milkman shouted.
But the maulvi was already climbing up the canal bank, following the sound, a whimper—a baby?
And then there was silence.
The milkman followed the maulvi up the embankment. He was a crude man made cruder in his pain. He shouted to the maulvi, “Your mother’s milk is all over the road. Will she replace it, or will your wife?”
The sun lifted itself from behind the mist-laden canal just enough for both of them to see the bloodied bodies.
We, the flies, disentangled ourselves from the bodies and disappeared behind the bushes.
Both men looked disbelievingly at what lay before them: Tara dead, and her baby still sucking at her mother, while we protected them both.
For that moment, the milkman forgot his pain and cussed as he exulted in what he saw: “Your mother—it’s a miracle! The baby was born of a dead woman.”
The maulvi, seeing the truth of what lay before him, shouted back, “Son of an owl! Run to the village and call for help. Tell Bibi Saffiya that Tara is dead and the baby is alive! Go now!”
The milkman nearly rolled down the embankment and rode in the direction of the village.
The maulvi sat down next to Tara and placed his hand on her face. His body shuddered with mournful, soundless sobs.
After a while, we flew toward him and landed on his hand. He looked up at us and thrust us away, so we flew back onto the baby, who had now begun to whimper.
The maulvi then turned around to pick up the baby. He had seen new babies before, but only those who’d been cleaned and wrapped tightly in a sheet. How he’d longed for a baby all these years, and Zakia had had only miscarriage after miscarriage.
The fifth time she got pregnant, the baby stayed for eight months in the comfort of the mother’s womb, and then he took his wife, Zakia, to the hospital for a cesarean. The baby never returned home with Zakia.
To Zakia, the maulvi said, “It’s the will of Allah.”
After that, the maulvi’s mother tried to find him another wife. But each time she mentioned it, he looked at her in disgust, and, knowing her eldest son, she backed off.
Then Zakia, broken, suggested another wife, too, and he threw the dinner tray across the room, not caring that the aloo baingan splattered everywhere. He left and didn’t return for two weeks.
Zakia cleaned the bits of potato and eggplant strewn all over the floor after he left, but the stain remained on the wall and she lay staring at it in the afternoons, somewhere between sleep and wakefulness. If she looked at it from a distance, it looked like a mustache, but if she looked more closely, it looked like the name of Allah. It even had the small connector on top, which in the loneliness of the afternoon was a stronger message that she was not alone. A more powerful being was giving her peace, telling her to stay silent during this ordeal. To keep praying five times a day, and then to add more time during each prayer, and then to wake up before the morning prayer to pray before the prayers of others could be heard.
For two weeks, Zakia prayed for her husband to return, and she made a deal that if he returned, she would stay silent and would not ask for more.
For those two weeks, we witnessed the maulvi sitting at the shrine, praying for peace. Praying for patience. Most of all, he prayed for a baby, in whatever form that might come in. It needn’t be his own. It could be a child of the village. He would no longer settle for a child of his own but would become a father to all children. Even if they had their own fathers, he would care for them and then add a layer of comfort to protect them further. He slept on the prayer mats and ate the free food from those who needed to reward the people who prayed for them.
He listened to the holy men sing:
My beloved has returned.
Allah has united us.
And the supplicants moved their heads to the beat of the dhol. Some came with boxes of sweets, chicken, and goats covered with henna; others came with garlands of hundreds of rupee notes, a whole year’s income. Anything to get their prayers heard. The maulvi sat and prayed for two long weeks, not wanting to return to the comfort of his wife until his own prayer was acknowledged.
Now, miracle of miracles, his prayers from those twenty years earlier had been answered that morning. With both hands, he picked up the baby. Covered with afterbirth, she was still connected to Tara, and he held her close to his heart. He dipped his right hand in the canal and very gently wiped her face. He took his turban off his head with the same damp hand and struggled to wrap it around the baby. He could see her heart pumping in her tiny body. He would make sure she survived.
Enraptured, he spoke to Shahida. “You’re late, but you’re here. You should have told us you were coming. I would have done some preparation. I’ll get you a doll, a plastic one from the stalls at the shrine, one that looks just like you.”
She no longer called to the disappearing star as he continued to talk to her.
“I’ll cook two cauldrons of goat meat for the whole village. I’ll announce to everyone that my princess has arrived. Your mother is waiting for you at home. You’re a sly one, aren’t you? Coming without an announcement.”
The baby started to whimper again as they sat waiting for help to arrive. Her tiny hand reached out to us, asking us to continue to protect her, as we had done all that night. We were assured she would live.