Authors: Day Rusk
I wanted him to feel that pain; and I wanted it to hurt more than it’s ever hurt anyone before, but, damn it, I was having a hard time letting go of my civilized self. I was raised to be a different person, and while thoughts of doing the deed excited me, and I knew it was necessary, there was still a fear there, a hesitation to cross that line permanently. So maybe I was procrastinating.
Or maybe I was enjoying tormenting him. He knew he was caught. And enough time had passed that he could also assume nobody knew where he was. Why would anyone suspect he’d come to my house? They had no reason to and he knew that; for the longest time now, we had no connection to one another – he had taken care of that connection. He knew I was going to kill him; he just didn’t know when, and I could see in his eyes that it was wearing on him. As tough as he liked to project himself, he was now facing his own mortality, knowing that in an hour or a couple of hours, or maybe after one more night he was going to be no more.
I had no compassion for him and I’m sure he knew that; since tying him and his friend to the chairs I hadn’t offered them any water; I hadn’t cleaned up their wounds, their faces caked with blood, some of the wounds probably on their way to a good infection if given more time. There’d been no bathroom breaks, and the way it smelled in the basement, one of them had obviously crapped himself; both had definitely pissed themselves. There was no prisoner-of-war, Geneva Convention to rule how I treated them, or what I must humanely do; it was just me and my desire to see him suffer. Both were aware of that, and for the most part it looked like Farooq had given up; choosing to suffer in silence, or so I thought.
“Is he even alive?” I asked Saif, as I sat back down in the chair in front of both of them.
“Fuck you,” uttered Farooq in a quiet voice, without ever looking up.
“I guess so,” I said.
Saif was just looking at me; there was still some defiance in his eyes, but the hours had taken their toll and he was hurting.
“You figure out how you’re going to do it, asshole?” he asked me.
“I’ve done some research,” I answered. “The Internet’s a hell of a tool. Did you know there are a lot of places in the human body you can stick a knife that will cause a great deal of pain, but not kill a person? You just have to know where and how deep to plunge it. Do it right and you can keep a person alive for a very long time, although, by the end of just such an experiment, I assume they’d prefer you just got it over with. Vlad the Impaler, one of Bram Stoker’s inspirations for Dracula, liked to impale his victims on a large spike and have them die a slow death on the end of that spike, like a bug caught on a toothpick. His soldiers, they figured out a way to drive a large spike through a man’s rectum, up through his body and out of his mouth, without hitting any organs that would result in a quick death. That way he could plant the spike and watch them die over hours or even days; a slow, painful death. You’ve got to admire that kind of commitment to killing someone, don’t you think?”
“You’re a fucking sicko!” he said, although with quite a bit less energy than he normally displayed.
“So why’d you do it? Why’d you listen to your Father? You could have said, ‘No.’”
Saif just looked up at me.
“My Father told me to go jump off a bridge or a building, I’d probably tell him I’m not going to do it,” I said. “I mean, you have to learn to say ‘no’ to your parents, especially when one of them is as psychotic as your Father.”
“Fuck you,” he said.
Again, with less enthusiasm and energy; I was beginning to think he was starting to just go through the paces.
“Why’d you do it, Saif?” I asked again.
“You wouldn’t understand,” he finally said.
I laughed, which I think caught him by surprise; he was looking at me with a strange look on his face; maybe he thought I’d finally snapped and the end was near.
“I wouldn’t understand. Motherfucker! What do you guys do, memorize that fucking line? Is that one of the mantras down at the Mosque? You wouldn’t understand? You’re from the West. Well, fuck you!”
I was so sick and tired of that sorry line.
“Maybe the problem is
you
don’t fucking understand,” I finally said. “Yeah, I understand, your sister didn’t tow the family line, and based on some centuries-old cultural custom, that is way out of date, you felt you had the right to take her life. Had the right to play God and pass judgment on the one thing that should be held sacred, a person’s right to live their life and play it out to its natural end. Maybe what you and every other asshole who embraces what you believe doesn’t understand is that times have changed; and what simpleminded individuals in the past believed is no longer acceptable in a more enlightened and progressive society.”
Saif was just looking at me; taking in my rant.
“Maybe it really isn’t about us not understanding, but you not understanding that growth and change, and that being more civilized, is the way of the world; we’ve come to understand that the ways of the past were not always right or even good for us. When’s the last time you went to the doctor complaining about something and he bled you with leeches?”
I had to calm down; I was working myself up into frenzy; or maybe that was what I needed, maybe the end result of frenzy would give me the courage to finally plunge that knife into Saif. I calmed down a bit.
“So what did you gain?” I asked, yet again.
“I did what was expected of me,” he said. “Our family had been dishonored. Dishonored by you; Safia had crossed the line.”
“So you killed her. How’d that change everything? What were you and your Father, a hero in the community? Did everyone congratulate you and celebrate your actions - high fives for the guy who killed his sister; the guy who murdered an innocent woman?”
“It...was...RIGHT!” he screamed at me with renewed defiance and energy.
“WILL YOU FUCKING SHUT UP!” yelled Farooq at Saif.
I nearly fell off my seat; for the most part Farooq had been catatonic; I figured he had given up a long time ago, resigned to his fate and was just quietly waiting for it all to end. This sudden outburst, so passionate and alive, took us both by surprise.
“YOU KILLED YOUR FUCKING SISTER, YOU ASSHOLE!” he screamed at Saif. “You fucking killed her.”
Both Saif and I were looking at Farooq.
“I didn’t want to believe it,” continued Farooq. “I’d heard the rumors, but fuck it, they’re rumors, right? But I’ve had to sit here and listen to you and all this bullshit about honor and stuff. You killed your fucking sister, you fucking prick.”
I didn’t know what to make of Farooq’s outburst; was he really upset with Saif for what he had done, now that he had confirmation he had actually committed the act, or was he trying something new; something he thought might save his life; agreeing with me and turning on his friend?
I didn’t say anything; I just sat and watched.
“You know how it is,” Saif said weakly to his friend. “Your family’s Muslim.”
“The hell I do,” countered Farooq. “Yeah, my family’s Muslim; I have a sister, but there’s no way in hell anyone would ever convince me to kill her; there’s no way in hell my parents would ever want anyone to do such a thing; it’s insane, dude! Your fucking parents are certifiable.”
“But...,”
“Don’t give me any crap!” said Farooq, cutting him off. “Haven’t you got a brain in your head?! And fucking common sense?! She was your sister, dude! You’re fucking sister! Duty! Honor! To hell with it all; you’re going to rot in Hell!”
Farooq was running out of steam; his friend was also dumbfounded; Saif hadn’t expected his friend – possibly his best friend – to turn on him like this.
Farooq raised his head and looked directly at me.
“You want to know the truth?” he said.
I nodded my head.
“The rumors are out there about what happened to Safia; what her family might have done to her. Some choose to believe them and some don’t. For those who do, only a few were on board with what happened. We’ve even talked about it in my family...”
Farooq looked back at Saif, who seemed somewhat defeated now himself.
“...my Father told me I couldn’t hang out with Saif anymore; he told me Saif and his family were no good, but I didn’t listen. You know, bros! I should have listened to my Old Man...”
Farooq looked back to me.
“...we talked about what happened to Safia; we couldn’t believe they could have really done that to her; she was such a nice girl; but just in case it was true, my Dad warned me away from Saif and his family. Some at the Mosque, they were treating him and his Dad well, but many, well, they secretly detested what they had done. They regained no honor here, maybe back home if we were in Pakistan, but not here; no one really gave a shit that Safia had moved out of the house and taken up with you. No one! It was all in their heads, this fucking dishonor thing. They were shunned more by those who believed they killed Safia than by anyone who knew she’d left home and taken up with a non-Muslim. Isn’t that right, Saif?!”
Farooq looked to Saif, who looked up at him.
“You’ve gained nothing, but lost a sister,” Farooq added. “You fucking moron! You’re a goddamn murderer and I’ve followed you to your fucking fate!”
Farooq looked back at me.
“He told me you were coming after his family; stalking them. You wouldn’t give back Safia’s stuff and we could get it back by just coming over here and scaring you. He said you were a pussy. He said the second you saw us, you’d get frightened and just give us everything. It got out of hand. I was an asshole. Stupid. I’m sorry. There, that’s it in a nutshell. I don’t deserve this. This is between you two. I’m tired and I’m hurting. Do something forchristsakes, I can’t take this any longer.”
I looked at Farooq, who was looking back at me, tears running down his face. Collateral damage, isn’t that what they call it? It was an issue between Saif and I, he’d just been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I wasn’t going to get any more out of Saif; what was I looking for anyway? Even with answers, none of it would ever make any sense in my mind. None of it ever could.
I didn’t say anything to Farooq; Saif now had his head down, defeated and beaten. I just got up from my chair and headed for the stairs, climbing them silently, lost in my own thoughts. I do believe I heard Farooq say quietly to Saif, “You’re going to hell, dude, fucking Hell.”
It was going to be a crowded ride on the way to Hell, as a few of us had recently earned the price of admission there.
I
Lay
on the bed, once again amongst Safia’s things in the guest bedroom.
God, how I missed her.
I don’t know if I can ever convey the beauty of her smile. How when she looked at me and smiled, that and the glint in her eyes, acted like a drug on me, elevating my spirits and letting me know that the world was all right – that true beauty existed and I was a lucky man for having found it in love.
I lay there on the bed, desperately trying to recapture the glory of that smile; desperately trying to have one more hit of that drug that had made me feel like anything was possible in life, that I had found my Shangri-La.
I remember shortly after my Father’s passing, I had a dream where I’d met him in a field somewhere – no place that I recognized. I think I had mentioned earlier that my Father could give the greatest bear hugs in the world; if I haven’t, well, he could. Dad was a hugger and gave them all the time; many of which I had taken for granted. Well in this dream, it felt so real and was so vivid, that when he hugged me I felt it, as if it wasn’t a dream; it was one of his better bear hugs and I was in Heaven. We were together again. I remember waking up from that dream happy and with the anxiety of trying to keep it alive and fresh in my mind; every feeling, every sensation – I didn’t want to let it go, because I knew it would be gone forever. It did fade, and I went to bed every night hoping and praying for just one more vivid dream like that where everything felt so real; one more chance for a hug from the man who meant everything to me. It never happened again.
As I lay there on the bed, I was afraid that Safia would fade as well; that I’d forget it all.
What had we done?!
We’d fallen in love.
What else had we done?
We’d made love.
Wasn’t that the crux of it all?
Wasn’t that what Fathers like Safia’s were trying to prevent, keeping their daughters away from sex? She wasn’t a teenager; she was in her early twenties, a grown woman. It should not have been an issue.
In many ways it was all about the sex, namely the fact our engaging in it was viewed as wrong and dirty; about her leaving the faith and having an intimate relationship with someone outside the faith and out of wedlock. Sex has been feared for way too long; men and women trying to curb those natural impulses that drive us as a species; a futile effort that has failed again and again over the decades, if not centuries. Why is it, no one believes that sex and the act of making love isn’t dirty and bad, but instead one of the greatest gifts God has given us? The pure intimacy of sharing the act with someone you love, or even just really care about, or even if it’s just two people willing to provide shared pleasure, and the pure sensations it brings about, what’s wrong with that? Sure, it doesn’t come without its follies – like unwanted pregnancy or disease if you’re not careful - but for the most part, the act itself is a true gift and the most beautiful act two people can share with one another; it should be celebrated, not shunned.
I know I said I didn’t like to kiss and tell; I didn’t want to disrespect Safia, but maybe I’m saying that because I’m buying into all the crap people believe about sex – the negative propaganda that has taken root since the dawn of time. There are many moments in life that will live with us forever – milestones in our life that are significant and important. I experienced one of those milestones on the night Safia and I made love for the first time.
We were both extremely nervous. Not because we were virgins – we’ve all ready covered that – but because this was going to be our first time and somehow we knew it was important; the start of a long journey of loving one another until we were old and grey.
There’s a natural anxiety to seeing someone naked for the first time; unless, of course, you’re so confident in yourself you couldn’t foresee anything being wrong. I’d imagine the majority of us, however, have a little nagging fear in the back of our minds that we won’t measure up; that somehow it will be a disappointment, and I’m not talking here about penis size or anything as juvenile as that. Just that when you’ve met that special someone – and you know they are that person – there’s a fear it will slip away because you won’t measure up in so many ways; unless you’re fooling yourself, we all know that none of us are perfect, and that some of our flaws can be deal breakers in the relationship department.
So, yes, there was a slight anxiety and nervousness upon disrobing in front of one another for the first time.
How to describe Safia?
Breathtaking, I guess. Truly breathtaking.
It was when she was there, standing before me, naked, that my nervousness and anxiety subsided; no thought could survive in my head as every ounce of my being took in the sight before me. She was just so beautiful – captivating; how I ask you, how in the world could this ever be dirty? How could the sight of such beauty ever be wrong?
One of the greatest gifts God has given us is women. And even though some want to claim man was created in God’s image and man came first, I have to vehemently disagree. God spent an inordinate amount of time perfecting women. The beautiful shapes and curves that he – or she – sculpted, the angles and the pure aesthetic beauty, well that wasn’t an afterthought, don’t believe that for one moment. Woman was his masterpiece, and to prove that, not only is woman one of his most beautiful creations visually, but he also gave her the ability to create; there is no way that in giving women the ability to get pregnant and create life – nurture life for nine months – that woman was an afterthought and created after man. He put everything good and great he could in the creation of woman, and when he had finished that, he realized she would need a companion, an equal companion; little did he know that his second creation, created from the scraps of what was left over from his masterpiece, was going to one day turn on that masterpiece and try to subject her, or he probably would have found another companion for her. He had no way of understanding that man would fear her for her ability to create – the power within her. Nonetheless, woman was God’s masterpiece, and man, well a ridiculous afterthought at best.
I knew this as I looked at the beauty that was Safia.
We kissed. I wrapped my hands around her naked body for the first time ever, and pulled her close to me. There was nothing between us; our bodies met, the flesh touching for the first time. The warmth of her body was exhilarating; she was both soft to the touch yet firm. We fell back on the bed and kissed for the longest time, our bodies held close together in an embrace I never wanted to stop.
Oh God, it was amazing.
We were just lost in our togetherness, deep passionate kisses, sharing ourselves completely and without inhibition.
Safia overwhelmed me; just her beauty and my excitement at being allowed to share such an intimate moment and activity with a woman like her; remember, we hadn’t rushed into a sexual relationship, but had taken a great deal of time to get to know one another on an emotional level; you have no idea how intoxicating that can be, and how much more it heightens the actual pleasure of that moment when you decide to just stop sharing one another emotionally, and embark on a physical relationship.
I’ve all ready said too much here. I don’t want to get into the specific details of what we did to one another, what we shared with one another, on that first night or any night after that. That was between us, private. All I can say is that we both loved one another and it felt right, so it hurts to think that anyone could ever tell us that it was wrong, or dirty. It was beautiful.
We made love and then we lay in the darkness, basking in the glow of our activities and the mutual pleasure we had shared. Safia was lying on her stomach and I was lying next to her. We were quiet; nothing had to be said, we were just enjoying the moment. It was then that I knew I loved her; truly loved her.
Making love is supposed to be romantic, or at least that’s how it’s portrayed in movies; it’s never as perfect as in the movies though; things happen; there are sloppy movements from time to time, etcetera; its imperfection is what makes it so perfect. As we lay there in the quiet, suddenly, and without warning, she broke wind – yes, she farted. It wasn’t anything nasty, just a little toot that seemed more amplified due to the quiet contentment in the room.
It was brilliant.
It’s a fact of life, we all break wind. It’s just how the body works. Normally, however, we like to keep it to ourselves – although some of us don’t mind sharing with the world. I assumed Safia liked to keep it to herself; she struck me as that kind of person.
It took everything I had to not laugh. I’ll admit I’m a sucker for a good fart joke, so I was all ready in trouble when it happened. I knew that at that moment she had tried to squeeze one out quietly, so that I wouldn’t know. At some point in the proceedings, she realized she was no longer talking with her “inside voice” but with her “outside voice.” It had gotten away from her and there was no way I couldn’t have heard it. The look on her face, if I had been able to see it in the darkness, must have been classic. As I thought all this, the harder and harder it became for me to contain myself. I finally burst out laughing.
“It wasn’t me, it was the cat,” she finally said.
We didn’t own a cat.
I knew I had finally found the woman for me –
imperfect perfection
.
It was time. Time to stop basking in memories of Safia and do whatever it was I was going to do. It was time.
I made my way out of the guest bedroom and headed for the door leading down to the basement. I was deep in thought; almost in a trance as I made my way down the stairs, the knife that had taken Safia’s life was in my one hand.
It was time.
What had my Father said to me one time about something I was supposed to do, but was procrastinating about? “It’s time to shit or get off the pot, son.”
He was right then, and it was the right sentiment now.
It was time to end all this once and for all in one way or the other.
Both Saif and Farooq looked up as I took my position in front of my chair and in front of them. They had noticed the knife in my hand and could see I was thinking deeply – highly concentrated. I believe they knew the time had finally come.
I stood there in front of them, looking at them, lost in my thoughts.
It was time.
What was I going to do?
I hadn’t the slightest idea!