I sit alone against the neighbor’s wall. I sit ever so carefully on the sand. The huge annoying pad, like a monstrous bath towel, sits between my thighs. I’m afraid of being caught sitting here by mother, because she’ll scold me. I’m afraid of being seen by Ahmad’s mother, because she’ll shout at me in front of everyone, then she’ll take me to my mother who’ll scold me. But mostly, I’m afraid that Ahmed will see me like this. 

Wasn’t it yesterday that my legs were exactly like Ahmed’s? Wasn’t it me who was an expert at climbing olive trees, my shoes leaving grey sole marks on the once white neighbor’s wall? Wasn’t it yesterday that Ahmed’s mother pinched both our ears for breaking the large ceramic urn she inherited from her granddad? But we escaped her, Ahmed & I. We slipped through her fat fingers. We held our breath, our laughter and our fear. Every emotion intensified as we huddled together behind our neighbor’s wall. My stomach ached with laughter. 

Now my stomach aches with pain. Now I sit alone. I push my aching back against our neighbor’s wall, the wall of my innocence. My mother’s tears of joy, my aunt’s cries of delight and the roundness of my body, all suffocating me. Yesterday my body was mine and I loved it. But it has deceived me, it has revolted against me. It has become my master, my dictator, my jailor. It stole from me the excitement of jumping across the roof tops of our houses. It stole from me the simple pleasure of carelessly sitting cross-legged on the ground. It imposed its changes upon me, without asking me, without my permission. And now it’ll imprison me inside the walls of its cycle, which has nothing to do with me. It’ll imprison me for one hundred days and one hundred nights, every single month. 

Everything is just so stifling, and this proof of my womanhood keeps on leaking from underneath. This evidence that proves nothing to me except that I’m no longer the same and that I’ll never again be who I used to be. I raise my head to the sky which has flown away and deserted me. I have been sitting inside these trousers since forever, the dreadful pad seems to be getting bigger and bigger. I don’t recognize myself. Is this still me? I don’t think so. I’m not sure if even the me inside remains unchanged, for when did I ever sit at the foot of this wall rather than throw my legs over and climb it? 

I sit tightly on the ground, hiding my backside, hugging my knees to hide my tender, painful breasts. I feel this river of sticky liquid oozing out and I suddenly remember very clearly words I’ve heard before about a red stream on wedding nights, and how only oceans of red will wash away sins. I feel caught in this strange tide and I do now know where it’ll take me. How did I get from my world to find myself marooned in this one so quickly? 

I’m so nervous. So ashamed. So frightened. What if the pad leaks and turns my trousers into a large swamp? What if the grains of sand beneath me are stained? What if Ahmed challenges me to a race right now? All I want is to beat him home. 

I don’t dare get up.

I’ll sit here and wait for the sun to disappear.  I’ll stay put and wait for nightfall, perhaps it’s darkness will dissolve all evidence of my red femininity.

Fadwa

(translated from the Arabic by author).

“You don’t have to burn books to destroy a culture. Just get people to stop reading them.”

Ray BRADBURY, U.S. science-fiction writer (1920).