Zakia - Episode 7

 

The Jumu'ah prayer was a necessity in Younous's Empire. And right before this prayer was observed, a tafsir (a lecture) was always passed across. Kabir was often in charge of this, however, that very Friday, the Amir (leader) had decided to lecture us all instead. 

The chosen topic was Jihad (fighting in Allah's cause) and it seemed to me like the Amir (leader) was trying to justify his criminal lifestyle.. 

"Allah, subhana wata'ala (How great His Majesty) said in the Holy Book," The Amir stated in quote, reciting the verse in Arabic before translating right after. "Jihad (holy fighting in Allah's cause), is ordained for you, though you dislike it, and it may be that you dislike what is good for you, and you like a thing which is bad for you . Allah knows but you do not know.." He explained. 

And I couldn't help but wonder what exactly it was we were fighting for. Day after day, our hands got stained by blood. And it really didn't matter how often we washed our hands while performing wud'hu (Ablution; purification performed before prayer), the blood stains remained metaphorically there; We still remained nothing but murderers, terrorists. 

We were literally fighting people who had done absolutely nothing wrong to harm us, and yet, he claimed it was all an act of worship. 

"..the only verified religion in the sight of Allah, the most High, is our religion," The Amir (leader) continued. "-and so, this means that anyone who's not our member, or any of our member who fails to follow this path of Allah that we stand by, is absolutely against us

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. And that's why we have to fight them, all of them..!" 

"All for Allah's sake!" That was how he ended the lecture that afternoon. The prayer that preceded was swift, as everyone had soon retired back into their various rooms, including myself. 

Back in my space, I laid flat on the bare ground with my gaze fixated at the ceiling, and the hot, salty tears that trickled across my face was not exactly for me, it was for the poor girl that'd been raped a few nights back.

It could have been me, I thought to myself. And at that point, I realised Iman had been right all along. My case was really different. I was indeed lucky, but why? I asked myself.

And instead of answers, what I got in return was a brief knock on my door.

"Who is it?" I inquired in a low, surprised tone, wiping the tears off my face. No one's ever knocked on my door before. 

"It's me, Iman," came a calming response. 

And heaving a sigh of relief, I offered him in. "It's open."

"Why are you crying? Is anything the matter?" These were Iman's questions on sighting me. Instinctively, I looked away, wiping my face over and over again. "Usaynah, talk to me," He insisted. 

I was hesitant at first, but I'd eventually blurted out some few seconds later. "Kabir raped her.." I said. "That girl that tried to escape, he raped her." 

At my revelation, his eyes widened in shock, and I knew he was most definitely surprised that I knew about all of it. 

"Usaynah," He started calmly. "I told you before, and I'm telling you again. Stop being nosey. The less you know, the better for you." He repeated. 

"How do you expect me to stay ignorant?" I yelled amidst my own tears. "I'm technically a part of this already, not that I want to be, but it is what it is." 

"I know," His tone remained calm. "I understand. I don't want to be a part of this too." 

There was something about the way he said this that caught my attention. For the first time ever, Iman was not wearing a straight-face.

Read " After Grad " by the same author ( Ishola Ubaydah )

. He was showing an emotion: that of melancholy. 

"You're doing this because he's your father right?" I inquired tentatively. 

But "No," came Iman's surprising response. "I'm doing this so he won't kill me.." 

And there was a really long pause afterwards, filled with the kind of silence that got me incredibly uncomfortable. Nonetheless, the confession Iman made right after, is something I could never forget..

"My father (the almighty  Amir) used to be an illiterate, who could neither read nor write. He was a business man, and so he often got duped because of this, which explained why he decided to learn. He started learning to read and write, he started making a tremendous improvement. And most importantly, he started to read the Qur'an. My father was so obssessed with reading the Qur'an, he couldn't do without reading it in a day.. Initially, I thought it was a good thing, not until he started going extreme. He started giving incredibly false meanings to everything. He became the extremist you know now."

"By preaching his false beliefs, he built this so-called Empire; he also vowed to kill anyone who doesn't follow this path that he created out of nowhere.. And when I say anyone Usaynah, I mean anyone.."

"Because he killed my mother, his wife, all because she also failed to support him."