An Iron-clad Marriage

An Iron-clad Marriage

Ramzanali took the hammer in his hands and brought it down, as always, on to the now extremely hot iron-rod.

“Thwink!” The sound ricocheted off the walls of the tiny 10 X 8 room in which he ran his smithy. Ayesha, his wife of over sixteen years, did not fail to skip a heartbeat as the sound reached her ears inside the small living area at the back of the workshop. She was almost nine months pregnant and her tummy jut out quite visibly. Presently, she was preparing to go in for a bath, an activity that she indulged in about twice a week.

“Do you hear me, O father of Munna?” Her lilting voice brought a smile to Ramzanali’s lips and made his heart quiver afresh with desire.

“Haan, I can hear you, O wife of mine,” he replied with as much tenderness as he could muster in his gruff, uncultured voice. This characteristic was understandable as he was brought up, and now lived, in a small, non-descript hamlet two hours away from New Delhi, the metropolitan capital of India. Men and women like he and Ayesha had subsisted in nearly the same conditions of poverty and drudgery as they had for over the past three hundred years.

Their marriage had been solemnized before a kazi (a priest), in Ayesha’s absence, by his father-in-law and him agreeing to give/accept Ayesha in matrimony. Of course, Ayesha had already assented to the match earlier, as without that, the kazi would not have sat to conduct the ceremony. The kazi had sat with his eyes half-closed, disinterested in the actual ceremony, but looking forward to a decent monetary remuneration and a nice meal of hot kheer and mutton biryani.

From that day until this one, Ramzanali and Ayesha had lived a life of back-breaking hard work, bringing up a brood of four children, two boys and two girls. A life of drudgery, that is, except when Ramzanali joined his friends for a game of football.

For those who did not know it, Ramzanali was a master at the game of football. Living as he did in a rural area surrounded by open spaces, he began playing the game even before he mastered the Urdu alphabet at the local primary school. It was a mixture of inherent talent, hours of fast footwork after school with a band of fellow school-mates and the availability of free time that made him a strong player on the make-shift football ground that made up a part of the large space in front of his school. His father, Shamshadali, a blacksmith too, had often tried to discourage his son from pursuing a hobby with no real future.

“You should be helping me in the smithy, Ramzan,” he would say, “instead of wasting time kicking a ball from this part of the ground to that.” Ramzanali would ignore the comment as usual, and run away to meet his friends for yet another game. Their games would be fast and lack expertise or precision; they would last twenty-odd minutes, since by then it would be dark, and time to reach home to pray the Maghrib namaaz. Of course, even had they not prayed, it would be so dark as to render the ball nearly invisible.

Ramzanali remembered his matches as his hammer fell once again, almost by reflex, on the now almost completely beaten rod-tip. A smile came to his lips as he suddenly remembered that his wife had called out to him. He placed the rod on a large stone next to the one he sat upon, put the large anvil hammer in a pocket of the leather tool-holder tacked on the adjoining wall, and got up, loosening and re-tying the lungi he wore about his mid-riff. Drops of perspiration ran down his torso as he moved to where an oft-used body towel hung from a solitary nail driven into the now crumbling wall of his small smithy. He rubbed the towel on his face and then over his trunk, wiping off the rivulets of sweat that covered his well-toned, chiselled body.

Lifting up the dirty cloth that divided his workshop from his residence, he walked into the room at the rear. Ayesha was about to totter as she attempted to lift a large urn of water from atop the stove. Ramzanali ran swiftly to her side and deftly crooked his fingers around the hot urn. He gently pushed Ayesha back on to their bed and asked her where it was to be kept. His eyes were full of both anger and pity as he proceeded to deposit the vessel into the bathroom.

“Why did you have to even try to pick up such a large vessel?” He said this with not a little derision.

“You were busy, and I wanted to take a bath …”Ayesha began in an apologetic tone.

“Enough of this!” Ramzanali’s voice boomed with anger now. “Couldn’t you have waited for a few more hours? Our sons would have been home by then, and they would have helped you.” He turned to look at his two daughters who sat facing each other just beside the bed, playing a game of balancing stones on their hands. They were now looking aghast, stunned into collective silence by the booming voice of their abbu. “What were both of you doing? Couldn't you have helped your ammi? If nothing else, you could have at least come to call me,” he told them with reproach in his voice.

“Let them be,” said Ayesha, as she moved forward to protect both her daughters. “It wasn’t their fault,” she added. Her eyes pleaded with Ramzanali to end the unpleasant conversation right then. Ramzanali’s anger deflated just as suddenly as it had come, and he plopped down on the bed.

“Come here,” he beckoned to the two girls who now hid behind their mother out of fear. The girls shrank even further. Ayesha moved aside and pushed them forward into their father’s arms. He hugged them tightly, tears rolling down his cheeks as he begged for their forgiveness. The girls, just 10 and 7 years old, could not understand why their father was crying, and joined in with their own sobbing. Ayesha pulled them away, consoling them with her own motherly skills, and presently, the girls quietened down and returned to their corner, where they sat stiffly, not even glancing at the stones they had left aside.

Ramzanali asked Ayesha to sit next to him. She gestured a No! with her eyes and looked at their daughters, warning him about their presence. On their part, the daughters were still looking at their parents with curiosity.

Ayesha slowly came over to where Ramzanali sat on the bed and sat down next to him with considerable effort. Just then, she felt the baby kicking and moving. Ayesha let out an involuntary exclamation of surprise and giggled. She took one hand of her husband and put it on her stomach.

"Can you feel the baby, O father of Munna?" She asked Ramzanali. He could not clearly make out the movements but he responded with an eager expression.

"Yes, yes, Ayesha, I can feel our child moving around in your tummy," he said, just to please her.

Ayesha smiled inwardly. How easily he lies! She released his hand and gently withdrew a few inches from him. He sensed the movement and made as if to advance further, but she made her intentions clear by calling out to the children.

Ramzanali realised that the magical moment had passed but this did not deter him from reaching out to caress his wife's face. She enjoyed his touch, as always, but moved away in polite defiance.

Angered by the repeated refusal of his espousal of love for her, Ramzanali threw the towel he carried on his shoulder, and getting up off the bed, left for a game of football.

Ayesha stood up and walked to the bathroom. She picked up all the things needed for a bath and went in, closing the rickety door behind her. While going in, she checked on the dal and rice that were cooking on the choolah (stove that ran on wood as fuel). The aromas of freshly cooked dal and rice were just right. She lifted the lid of the vessel that had the dal cooking inside it. The dal seemed done. She removed the dal off the stove and checked the rice next. It needed some more cooking. The grains were softening, but would need a little more time to cook.

"Kamela," she said, calling out to her elder daughter, "come here and keep an eye on the rice, okay?"

Kamela came scampering over to where Ayesha stood. She was nearly 10, and knew how to check on cooking food. She told her mother not to worry and to proceed for her bath. Ayesha patted her head, muttered “shukriya, beta” and went in for her bath.

Pouring water over herself, Ayesha's mind began to wander. I still remember him as a handsome husband who allowed me to take my own time to submit myself to him. When he told me he was a keen footballer, I was overjoyed, because I had had friends tell me that sportsmen are sensitive and understanding; besides, they also make good husbands!

She mentally ticked off Ramzanali's positives: Loyal. Truthful. Honest. Hard-working. Loving. Good father. On the other side of the balance were his negatives. Impoverished. Sex-crazy. Short-tempered. Impulsive. He has so many virtues I dislike, and none of the vices I love. She rued the fact that he never went out with his male friends in the evenings. He never gave her the privacy that she sometimes pined for; too, he never left her alone with her kids. Even when he was supposedly busy in his front workshop, he found time to keep checking on her. Did he think she would have fallen with the large water-bearing vessel back then? Of course, he did! her soul said to her, making her smile again. I wield so much power over him, and yet, why do I feel so helpless? Rubbing herself with an old, much-worn but clean towel, she dressed up in her Punjabi salwar-kameez and came out of the bath, a plan forming in her mind.

Kamela and her younger sibling Wahida raised their heads from the game they were playing to see a steely resolve in their mother's eyes.

"What is the problem, mom?" asked Kamela, with not a little fear. She had never seen that look in her mother's eyes.

Ayesha looked at her and said, "Wait for your brothers to come home, and I will tell you."

***********
Later that night, when Ramzanali came back home, he found Ayesha sobbing in the bathroom.

"What happened, mother of Munna?" He asked with what appeared to be genuine concern. Around his wife sat all his four children, the boys appearing a little unconcerned, the girls, obviously looking distraught. Hearing no reply to his query, Ramzanali drew his elder daughter to him.

"Why is your ammi crying?" Kamela, he saw, was also crying, her tears having formed kohl-bordered lines on both her cheeks.

Kamela shuddered a little but said nothing. When asked again, she said that she knew nothing, for ammi had said nothing to her.

Determined to find out why Ayesha was crying so, Ramzanali posed the same question in turn to all his children. Munna, who was 11, shrugged his shoulders to convey that he did not care why she was crying. He got up off his perch on the bed and ran out of the house. Mansoor, all of 9 years old, came to his father and clutched him tight, sobbing as he unburdened the peculiar feeling of sadness and inexplicable portent of coming calamity upon his father's chest.

"Ab koi to mujhe batayein ki kaa baat hain?" (Will someone tell me what the matter is?) By now, Ramzanali was getting restive and angry. His youngest, Wahida, gripped her mother even more tightly than before, while Mansoor detached himself from his father’s grip and walked away through the front door out into the now-closed smithy.

Ayesha stirred a little and began wiping her face with her dupatta. Ramzanali grabbed her shoulders from behind and whipped her around to make her face him. Imagine his complete surprise when he saw that Ayesha was actually laughing! Immediately, the two girls also started twittering and giggling and the two boys came back in and hugged their father.

"What? I mean, what is happening?" Ramzanali could barely hide his distress and confusion.

Ayesha looked down with modesty and whispered, "We all put up an act, O father of Munna."

"An act?" Ramzanali sputtered.

Ayesha smiled and gently disengaged herself from his vice-like grip. "I wanted to remind you of our youth and your past," she said by way of an explanation. She paused and added, "And I wanted to play a prank on you to entertain you and to make you forget your miseries for a short while!"

"But ... but ..."

"So how was the drama put up by us?" asked Ayesha, looking fresh and a lot younger than her age on account of the two beautiful dimples that now adorned her face.

Ramzanali slowly realised that this had been a well-orchestrated attempt by all his family members to defuse his tensions, and as the smoke cleared, so a smile began to form on his lips. Seeing his tense face relaxing, his children approached him and hugged him from all sides. Ayesha beamed at him and at her brood with obvious pride and happiness.

A simple charade had brought the love for the family back to her husband. She marvelled at the idea and thanked Allah for having given her the inspiration for the same. She got up to reach for a glass of water, but before her hands could close around the tumbler, a shaft of pain shot through her lower abdomen. A rush of liquid down her legs gave out a clear signal that the baby was on its way.

"Father of Munna! The baby is coming, Alhamdolillah!"

Ramzanali shot off the bed in a jiffy and went over to her side.

"Don't worry, mother of Munna," he said soothingly. "Just breathe deep and keep calm while I get Maydam from the dispensary ... Munna, Kamela, look after your ammi while I fetch maydam-sahiba! And you two," he was almost screaming now, pointing to the other two children, "don't you create any trouble for your ammi, okay?"

The younger children nodded, by now caught up in the urgency of the coming child-birth. Ramzanali picked up his face towel and draped it over his shoulder. He looked at his wife with a rush of deep love, and, with a last glance at his house and his children, he ran out to fetch help.

The End

This story was written as Team India's contribution to the June 2007 round of the following international contest on Writing.com:

FORUM

Project Write World  (13+) A celebration of writers and their distinct cultures to bring us all together. #1254279 by iKïyå§ama

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The prompt I used for this story was one of the four given by kiyasama. It is a quotation attributed to Sir Winston Churchill. This is the quotation and the story is woven around it:

“He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.”

THE END

Word Count: 2609