On the Bus: For my Son Ibrahim

On the Bus: For my Son Ibrahim

            I was on my way to see my son. I wanted a child so badly, I just went out and got one. I thought I was ready for motherhood, but my parents had to pick up a lot of my slack. I looked out the window and graffiti on the walls in Parowan proclaimed I was beautiful. The mountaintops were capped. I had forgotten what snow looked like. My old cross-country injury started complaining so I adjusted in my seat. Does it count as an injury if I’d never gotten it looked at? Being young I thought myself invincible; thought my body would take care of itself. I thought everything would take care of itself.

            My head scarf slipped and I became anxious about my modesty, and remembered those girls in India who were raped. I wasn’t getting any younger, and I was tired of being single. If I got raped who would have married me then? It was a question I asked myself because in my head the rape would have been violent although past experience proved I would acquiesce in the interest of self- preservation.

            He was someone I knew. I didn’t want him to think of himself as someone who was capable of doing what he was doing so I lied and said I was sorry even though he did it. I didn’t want to think of myself as a victim. When he finished he pushed me away, leaving me crumpled on the floor as he ran to the bathroom to throw up like he did when he was upset.

            It was about that time I became concerned with my modesty. I covered myself so only my eyes would show when I was out in the cold, but indoors my hands, neck, face, and hair were visible. I insisted on being treated like a dignified woman. I was less concerned as the year wore on. I still covered up, but to avoid getting tan and wrinkly.

            I used to believe in love before that. Used to believe there was someone out there I would meet and something inside me would click immediately into place and I would instantly worship him with everything I had, and that initial worship would be enough to carry us through those quaint little “rough patches” we’d have because we were annoyed at having to do the dishes three times in a row. I used to be quite the romantic.

            After that disappointment I fell out of love and after a year with no one to love I started to believe it didn’t exist. Romance was a social construct designed to make the social (sometimes legal, sometimes spiritual) contract to align two houses more bearable. Maybe I was trying so hard to close off my heart because I couldn’t stand to have it broken again. Even a year later, especially a year later, when the weather was the same kind of nice as it had been then, and the same songs were playing on the radio and in my head; it still hurt enough to cry.

            I wanted to fall in love. I wanted to find a good man and marry him and trust that enough of love would blossom and we would be happy. I wanted to, but my treacherous heart kept telling me that when I saw him it would swell and flutter and I’d just know. “I’ll do it,” it cautioned, “whether you’re single or not.” So despite receiving several respectable offers I found I could not do it.

            I was alone for so long I gave up hope and the offers stopped coming, and my biological clock kept ticking, and time stretched on and on like a treadmill, never getting anywhere but where you’d already been. Then I met him, and he was married, just like the first one had gotten married and I lied to him and said I was happy. I felt that spark and despite not knowing a single thing about him, I was instantly ready to pledge my self and my everything to him. He didn’t wear a ring so colors were more vibrant and jokes seemed funnier and the whole world was gayer than a 1950’s musical for two whole weeks before I spoke to him and cracked. Like a light switch, I was off- like the time I lay on the floor while a man threw up down the hall only worse because at least back then I had the plan to lie and let him think it was my fault because I knew it was something I could overcome and I wasn’t sure he could shoulder that kind of guilt. I had faith in those moments that time would heal and I wouldn’t always feel the way I felt.

            This time though, this time I had no hope. No hope, and so did you blame me for getting knocked up and saying I didn’t know who the daddy was? It was true after all. I didn’t really know him all that well, but he was beautiful and I wanted my baby to look like him. I wanted someone to love, and to love me. I had so much love to give, and after nine months of being bonded to another person I finally admitted my love, my devotion to this single, beautiful creature. Did you really blame me for giving birth to a bastard child out of wedlock? Do you still?