Page 244 - A Woman Is No Man

Isra

Spring 1997

Are you okay?” Isra asked Sarah that evening, after Fareeda and Nadine

had settled in the sala to watch their favorite show. She and Sarah would
sometimes join them, but tonight they stuffed cabbage leaves in the kitchen.
“I’m fine,” Sarah said.
Isra was careful with her words. “I know you’re worried about
marriage, especially now that . . .” She brought her voice to a whisper.
“After Hannah died.”
“She didn’t die,” Sarah corrected her, not bothering to lower her voice.

“She was murdered by her husband. And yet my mother still insists on
marrying me off like nothing happened.”
Isra didn’t know what to say. She didn’t see what Hannah’s death had to
do with Sarah. If every woman refused to get married after a woman died at
the hands of her husband, then no one would ever get married. Secretly Isra
had begun to suspect that Hannah had done something to get herself killed.

Not that she deserved to get killed, no. But there was no way a man would
kill his wife for no reason, Isra told herself.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m here if you want to talk about it.”
Sarah shrugged. “There’s no point in talking.”
“Are you afraid? Is that it? Because I understand if you are, I—”
“I’m not afraid.”
“Then what is it?”

“I can’t do this anymore.”
“What do you mean?”
“This.” Sarah pointed to the pot of stuffed cabbage leaves between
them. “This isn’t life. I don’t want to live like this.”
Isra stared at her. “But there is no other life, Sarah. You know that.”

“For you, maybe. But there is for me.”
Isra could feel her face burn. She looked away.
“You know I snuck out of school the other day.”