DESTINED TO BE HIS GARMENT

Chapter 18

'Her protruded belly has been a part of her for the past thirty four weeks. With swollen feet, indiscriminate spitting and horrible morning sickness, she has been struggling. Not only with that. But with her husband's incessant need for a boy. The one that will be the custodian of his wealth.

They had been struggling for the past five years for a child. Having been ostracized by the community for being sterile, her husband had been in the best mood ever since her conception. Always careful and more caring with her in order to avoid any miscarriage. Seeing to her every need and making sure she was most comfortable.

She on the other hand hadn't been brutally talked about or maltreated by her husband's family because she had bore fruit from her previous marriage. A marriage that had last for only a month until she was widowed. But a marriage that brought forth her A.J. Life hadn't been easy then. Pregnant and widowed. It was not a situation she had envisaged herself to be a part and parcel of. But a situation Allaah had already planned for her. Allaah being great, gifted her another husband. A caring and God fearing one, she had thought. Because he had loved A.J as his own and A.J knew him as his father.

Until he started giving off the hint of the need for a boy since the day they found out she had conceived after years of frustration and with their marriage on the verge of collapse because of infertility problems. He had grown obsessed with the need for a boy. In fact, he had been desperate. There had been no conversation about child birth without him infusing the fact that she must give birth to a boy. He had forgotten that it was Allaah that determined the sex of any child he was to have and the fact that nobody knew what the child she was to give birth to would be in this world, but Allaah.

Fatima had always made it a point to remind him about this. But he had always gotten annoyed at her for that. He would sometimes shout on her to stop thinking about giving birth to a girl because he wouldn't entertain that. All she had done then was make du'a for a change of his heart and for Allaah to provide him what he wanted.

He would boast to his friends about being a father of two sons although one was still in the womb whose gender was still unknown to anyone but Allaah. Fatima had started to doubt her husband's fear of Allaah and his level of eeman as a result. She had become a mess thinking about it.

His obsession had started to scare his wife and she was afraid of what he might do to himself or her if she happens to bring forth a female child.

His dislike for a female child had grown intense that he had given a stern warning to his wife when she was in labour not to bring any female child to his house. Even before they got to the hospital.

So she had remained in the hospital for about two weeks when she gave birth to a baby girl on the excuse that she was under medical observation. That was what she had told her family. She had made countless excuses for his absence to her family anytime they visited. He hadn't stepped a foot to see her after he learnt 'what' she gave birth to. She grew tired and named her daughter Najwa. To her, her daughter was a blessing no matter what her father thought.

They were supposed to be twins. A boy and a girl. But due to complications in the delivery, they lost the boy. And that even aggravated the situation.

After he had calmed down enough, he came to get them discharged from the hospital. Fatima had to buy a ram herself to name her child. Her husband wasn't in talking terms with her. No amount of coaxing could get him to look at her twice. All he knew was A.J and his work nothing less, nothing more. He ignored her as though she never existed. As weeks passed, his hatred for the innocent Najwa grew intense. As the girl grew, so did his fervent loathe for her.