The Jewel Of Medina (31 page)

“What A’isha did was foolish,”
ummi
would say. “But does she deserve to die for it?”

What loyalty! It’s no wonder I spent most of my time in the bedroom. As in my father’s other homes my parents kept a dark house, one that banished the sun’s heat by blocking its light, creating an atmosphere as uplifting as a tomb. I missed the large, light cooking tent in the mosque courtyard with its banter, however barbed, among sister-wives while children shrieked and ran among us. My mother and Qutailah, by contrast, barely spoke to each other throughout the day.

I longed for a visit from Hafsa or even Sawdah. Muhammad had forbidden them to come to me, at Ali’s urging. My sullied reputation might affect theirs, he’d told Muhammad.

“They are to stay away until your name is cleansed,” my father told me.

“But I have done nothing wrong,” I protested. My father averted his eyes.

“What hope is there for me if my own father doesn’t believe I’m innocent?” I fretted to my mother as I helped her knead dough in the kitchen.

“What we cannot believe is that a daughter of ours would do something so stupid,” she snapped. “That story about losing your necklace was clever, but it didn’t fool me. What were you thinking of, running away with that boy?”

Exposed, I felt my face grow hot. “Controlling my destiny,” I said.

“Controlling what? Are you possessed?” Her eyes flashed.

“ ‘Control your destiny, or it will control you.’ Don’t you remember telling me that,
ummi
?”

Her laugh was as sharp as acacia thorns. “By al-Lah, are you fourteen or four? Only a child—or a silly young woman—would entertain such fantasies. Women control nothing in this world, A’isha.”

“But you said—”

“I was a fool!” She slammed the dough onto the counter, her face red. “I thought life could be different for you. The Prophet is a kind and gentle man who, I thought, would allow you to live as free as the wind.”

“He would.” I spat out my bitter words. “But he isn’t the only one giving orders at the mosque. Umar distrusts all women, Ali and Fatima hate me, and two of my sister-wives want to make themselves the
hatun
.”

“Do not let that happen.” My mother gripped my arm with a floury hand. “That Zaynab bint Jahsh could be a real tyrant. I would rather die than have you live as I do, A’isha.” Her gaze fell to my belly, and her features hardened. “Bear your husband a son, and all your problems will be over.”

Her accusatory tone made my blood rise. “Do you think I’m not trying?” I snatched my arm away from her.

“Not hard enough, from what I see. You’ve been with him more than two years, and what do you have to show?”

I cringed, feeling as humiliated as if she’d slapped me in the face. “I have nothing—I admit it, all right, Mother?” I cried in a choked voice. “By al-Lah, some things I can’t do by myself!”

She stepped closer and stared at me as if I were a stranger. “What are you saying?”

I turned away, embarrassed by her searching gaze, disgusted with myself for blurting out my secret. I’d never confided anything to my mother, who’d been too involved with her own problems. Now, when I didn’t want to talk, she was eager to listen.

“I’m going to lie down.” I took a step toward the kitchen door, but she grabbed my arm again.

“
Yaa
A’isha! I must know. Is the Prophet unable to—to—” She blushed as she searched for a delicate term.

My laugh was harsh. “I only wish that were the problem.” As much as I dreaded her judgment I knew I’d have to tell her the truth. Otherwise,
the rumor would run rampant through the
umma
that Muhammad was impotent. He would be a laughingstock, more thoroughly unmanned than if all his wives had run away.

“Muhammad doesn’t want me, not in that way,” I said in a tiny voice. “He never has.”

“Your marriage is unconsummated?”

I nodded, wincing, dreading her angry words. She’d blame me for this failure. And why shouldn’t she? If I hadn’t trembled in fear that first day, Muhammad would have made love to me, and I’d be holding his child in my arms this very moment, the proud
hatun
of his
harim
and honored mother of his heir.

After a long silence, her hand pressed my shoulder. Her tenderness surprised me so much, I forgot my embarrassment. When I lifted my face, I saw that she was crying. Not the great, heaving sobs I’d held back for fear they’d make me look guilty, but two lone tears rolling down her cheeks.

“You poor child,” she said, her voice clogged with emotion. “No wonder you left him.”

She opened her arms and enfolded me in barley flour and linen cloth and lavender. In the circle of her arms, safe and secure at last, I was finally able to release the tears that had been building up inside me, to let them burst forth in a sweeping torrent, flooding from my eyes and heaving my chest in wave after wave of remorse over wrong choices and broken dreams, and fear of a future that might hold a terrible death for me.

For many minutes she held me, patting my back and stroking my hair with a stiff hand accustomed to working, not consoling. At last when my tears had run dry and my hiccupping breath fell in a long, ragged skein, she loosened her hold.

She smiled gently and wiped my face, then led me into the courtyard. It was empty save for a lone nightingale perched high in the pomegranate tree, filling the air with its sweet
chirr, chirr, chirr.

We sat on the grass together, and she reached for my hand as though it were a cherished gift. She gazed into my eyes. The love I saw there filled my heart near to bursting.

“Do not worry too much about the Prophet,” she said, stroking the back of my hand with her fingertips, sending warmth to my heart. “I have
seen the affection on his face when he looks upon you. It will not be long before desire fills his heart, also.”

“I wish I felt as confident as you,” I said. “But his new wives are so beautiful. I don’t know how I can compete.”

“A’isha!” My mother opened her mouth in astonishment. “Have you no mirror, child? Do you not realize how you have blossomed? By al-Lah, you grow lovelier every day. Who among those women has hair like fire, or eyes that change color with her moods? You will surpass them all, A’isha, and the Prophet’s mouth will water for you.”

“If I ever see him again,” I said, blinking back more tears as I yanked blades of grass from the earth.

“He will come. And when he does—” she gave the back of my hand a light slap “—you must convince him of your innocence.” She paused. “Are you innocent?”

I straightened my back, indignant. “How could you even ask?”

She waved her hand. “What is done is done, and it is not my business. Whether you are innocent or not, you must make the Prophet believe you are as pure as Mecca’s well of Zamzam. Only then will he take you back. You can do it, A’isha! You must. The future of the
umma
depends on it. Already they fight in the streets over you, and it will be worse for us all if Muhammad divorces you.”

The unspoken alternative—stoning—hung between us like a sword we were both afraid to touch.

“I would like to do as you say,
ummi
. But I’m not sure I can convince Muhammad of anything. Why would he believe me?”

“You are the only one he will believe, child. And then, when he takes you back—A’isha, do everything in your power to conceive.” She gripped my hand so tightly I winced.

“The bond between mother and child is the strongest bond of all,” she said. “And if you are truly loving, then you will find the love you want. Unlike the love of a man, which changes over time, the love of your child will never diminish. Even you and I—” she relaxed her hand, although it trembled still, “—are linked by our love for each other. No one and nothing can ever take that away.”

And so my mother renewed my dreams for the future. I began again to imagine myself the queen of Muhammad’s
harim
, the mother of his
curly-haired boy, an infant all warm and smelling of milk and with cheeks too plump not to kiss all day and night. But, by al-Lah, I was not the Virgin Maryam! To bear a child I would need to consummate my marriage with Muhammad.

Yet—confined in my parents’ home, forbidden to go to him, how would I attract him to me? Barirah was my answer. As a servant, she could go anywhere she pleased. She brought me fresh reports every day: Ali had found a willing witness in Zaynab’s sister, Hamnah, who fabricated tales about me and Safwan. Zaynab cleverly kept her distance, insisting that I was virtuous, as far as she knew. Meanwhile, war nearly broke out between the Aws and the Khazraj over whether Safwan and I should be killed, and who would hurl the first stone. And in the market, Safwan lost his temper during one of Hassan ibn Thabit’s slanderous poems and attacked him with his sword.

At night, tears pooled on my windowsill. I’d gaze out at the moon Muhammad loved so much and wonder if he was looking at it also. Did he think of me? Or was he finding comfort in Zaynab’s arms? Jealousy stung me, but I shrugged it off. Self-pity had caused me nothing but trouble. It was time to face the facts: Men would be telling me what to do for as long as I lived. I might not like their rules, but I couldn’t escape them. Safwan couldn’t rescue me from servitude; nor, I’d discovered, did he really want to. The Prophet of God himself couldn’t loosen this yoke, not without losing the support of men like Umar, who clung to the old ways.

Running away had been futile. Wherever I went, life would be the same. Resisting my chains only seemed to tighten them. Yet all around me women found ways to slip those bonds, to discreetly flout the rules and then return to their so-called captivity before anyone noticed. I was smarter than Umar and Ali together, a better warrior than most men, as beautiful as any woman, and the daughter of Abu Bakr al-Siddiq. I held the power to live life as I pleased—not by fighting or running, but by using my wits.

I would have to find a way to live within the confines of my womanhood. To be a warrior, like Umm ‘Umara, but in a battle that was uniquely mine. If I wanted my freedom, I’d have to fight for it. My first step would be to clear myself of these charges. But how? For once, my mind failed me—and so I turned to al-Lah.

I fell to my knees and prayed for hours, begging His forgiveness for my impulsive act, asking Him to show me the way to win my husband’s trust again. Finally, exhausted, I fell asleep on the floor of my room, and God sent His answer to me in the form of a vivid dream.

When I awoke, I plucked a sprig of lavender from our courtyard and asked Barirah to present it to Muhammad.

“Tell him I rub my skin with this fragrance every day in anticipation of his visit,” I said. Then I adorned my hands and feet with henna, painting red and purple leaves and flowers on my skin.

She returned that evening. “He says nothing, but he lifts the flowers to his nose and smells them.”

The next day, I sent a cup of water. “Tell him I fill this cup with my tears every day from missing him.” Then I had my mother’s servants wash my clothes and scent them with lavender.

That evening, Barirah still brought no reply.

“He drinks the water and says there is no salt. I tell him you cry so much, the salt is all used up.”

The third day, I sent a poem. Barirah frowned at the date-palm leaf on which it was written. “I cannot read this.”

“Neither can Muhammad. Tell him it is a private poem, meant for his ears alone. Tell him I long to recite it to him in person.”

An hour later, Barirah came running into my room, her eyes shining.

“He comes today!” she cried. “Quick, mistress, we must dress you.”

In former times I would have rushed around in a panic, anxious to be ready when he arrived. But those weeks in my bedroom had given me much time to think. In particular, I’d pondered Zaynab. She acted like the world’s most desirable woman—like a woman worth the wait—and Muhammad seemed to agree with her. Yet she was no lovelier than me or Hafsa. The difference came in the way she presented herself. She carried herself as if she were a valuable work of art to be gazed upon but not touched. And she mesmerized Muhammad. His gaze followed her, and his hands were always reaching out for her—gestures she coyly eluded, admonishing him to “wait until tonight,
habib
.”

So I took my time dressing for Muhammad’s visit. Barirah heated a tub of water in my parents’ bath, where I sponged my body and cleaned my hair. Then I dressed in the cream-colored gown my mother had sewn for
me, and I swept my hair away from my face with a set of shell combs. I fastened my agate necklace about my throat, the one I’d claimed to lose in the sand the night the caravan left me behind—but then I removed it. It would only remind Muhammad of our troubles.

As I was about to apply my makeup,
ummi
flurried in.

“
Yaa
A’isha, give thanks to al-Lah! The Prophet has arrived.”

I smiled coolly. “Please tell him I’ll be out in a little while.”

My mother gasped. “But A’isha! The Prophet expects you now. You must come at once!”

“I’ve been waiting three weeks to see him,” I said. “I’m sure he can wait a few minutes for me.”

Half an hour later I stepped into the living room, where lamps like so many moons illuminated exquisite tapestries hanging on its walls. My arms dripping with fragrance. My hair shimmering like fire. My face made up like an exquisite flower. Muhammad’s eyes kindled a flame the instant he looked at me.
You’re the most gorgeous woman he knows
. I straightened my back and lifted my chin. “
Ahlan
, husband.”

He stepped forward, more fully into the light. I suppressed my gasp. He had become so frail and gaunt—not the mighty Prophet of al-Lah, but a mere man. His shoulders sagged as if the frame that held him had broken. Before, I might have teased him, might have said,
I’m the one who’s supposed to be sick, habibi.
The new me said nothing. I did not throw my arms around his neck, although I yearned to embrace him. I was his favorite wife. He was supposed to approach me, not the other way around.

He cleared his throat. He glanced at my parents, who stood against the wall. My mother twisted the rings on her fingers and grimaced. My father looked away.