Alnihayya

||M a r r y M e||

T h i r t y  N i n e
This one is for Sydhussain
:)

'O soul at peace,
Return to your Lord,
Well-pleased, well-pleasing.
Join my servants,
Enter my paradise.'

-Surah Fajr| Verse 27-30-
(The Glorious Quran)

☆

Mashal

I was ten when I first saw a caged bird.

It was winter, the temperature a few degrees below zero. I was skipping my way back home from school and the pet shop had displayed the metallic cage on the show window.

I remember the green parrot biting the cage rails with its ruby beak. Tirelessly, moving at different angles to get its freedom.
With my teacher's words in my mind, 'Freedom and independence is a basic right', I still remember sneaking into the little shop and seeing the owner busy with a customer as a chance to open the cage.

The way the parrot fearlessly flew out of the cage is imprinted in my memory. The grunting owner as he tried chasing it around but it escaped out of the shop, out of his grasp and into the sky.

A tiny emerald speck against a pale western sky.

I remember grinning as I stared at the green bird.
"Are you free now?" I had whispered.

To this day, I imagine the parrot writing a 'yes' in the sky.

"Baba... Zeyara-- what is going on?!"

"Sit down Mashal. I'll explain everything." Baba replied in a calm tone, supporting his elbows on the table.

I should've just obeyed him. That way I wouldn't have to experience what happened next but sitting down didn't seem like an option at all.

"No! Zeyara you tell me what's wrong?"
I sprinted over to him and grabbed his arm in a flush of adrenaline. "Why are you not talking to me?!" I shook his arm and stared into his stern, unblinking eyes.

"Get away woman!" He snarled, pulling his arm out of my grip.

Later on I realised the parrot wasn't free. In the shop it was caged and in the open it was chained to the sky.

Zeyara walked over to his seat with a scowl decorating his face, leaving me cold and numb.

I was visibly in shock, asking myself what I did wrong.
Or was Zeyara joking? He had to be joking. He can't do this to me, I know he can't.

"Mashal please take your seat." Baba repeated his words that I had ignored previously.

All eyes in the room were fixed on me except for one pair. I slumped into my seat, at the other end of the table, away from Zeyara.

My eyes were not wet, I was not sad. I was confused. I was shocked.

I glanced at him one last time. He immediately looked away with no expression on his face, mouth remaining just a grim line.

"There are only thirteen people in this world who know that I'm alive. Twelve of them are in this room right now. The ten senior leaders of Alnihayya, my daughter Mashal and me." Baba shrugged slightly.