Just Another Woman

Sometimes I can’t believe that my uncle and my father were raised by the same parents in an identical environment. While Gul is a great uncle whom I have fond childhood memories of, his roles as father and husband have always disturbed me. And yet, because he has always been generous, kind, and loving to all his nieces and nephews, I could never develop a fully negative attitude towards him.

Even as I write, a nagging guilt is creeping up on me, since this is yet another account that only exacerbates the awful stereotype of Eastern men as tyrranical chauvinists. This is not to say that sexism isn’t an intrinsic part of our patriarchal culture--just that a good many (at least educated) men are more open-minded and don’t come close to Uncle Gul’s degree of indulgence. He has three daughters, and this is a story about his youngest, whom I’ll call “Sheila.”

Around the age of twelve, Sheila was required to wear a veil in public. She was allowed out of the house only on rare occasions, and even then, never alone. After high school, her father thought it unnecessary for her to continue her education. She was better off sitting at home, helping her mother with the house work while the family waited for an appropriate marriage proposal. Being the “perfect,” quiet, shy, girl, she didn’t have it in her to stand up to her father. Her older sister Farah, after a tortuous, emotionally demanding, and courageous battle with her father, won it for both herself and Sheila--and not without being tagged as disrespectful, belligerent, and a disappointment. The two sisters went on to college and earned their degrees -- Farah, in Education, and Sheila, in Fine Arts.

Quite a few delegations came seeking Sheila’s hand for their sons or brothers, but Uncle Gul, often unreasonably disdainful, dismissed them all, claiming they were “not from good enough families.” And in the mean time, he never really made any efforts to find what he might have considered an acceptable match for his daughter. By the time Sheila reached thirty, the extended family members began to voice their concerns regarding the the young woman’s future. When she was thirty-three, an older cousin recommended one of his friends for Sheila. He talked to my uncle about it with high praise for his friend. This man was forty, never married, from a good family, and had a Ph.D. in History.

Furthermore, he was an associate professor at a prestigious university and had a devout following of students, fellow staff-members, and even outsiders, who saw him as a kind of revolutionary in his political views. Many believed he would some day hold a high government office. There was nothing my uncle could have found to object to -- and Sheila wasn’t getting any younger. So he agreed to see the family and the man. The meeting was set in my parent’s house since its location suited both families, and my mom and dad were more than willing to play host.

Sheila peeked through the curtains that divided the living room from the dining area to get a glance of her prospective husband. There was nothing in his appearance or mannerisms that she found the least bit attractive, but shrugged away the notion thinking ‘you can’t have it all.’ When the match was finally agreed upon, I got a call from Pakistan with the good news, and immediately thereafter wrote to Sheila, joking that the impossible had finally happened. Her reply reflected an affable acceptance of the imminent change in her life. So they got married a few months later, and everything seemed fine.

About six months after the wedding, I visited Pakistan with the added excitement of meeting my newlywed cousin, and the latest addition to our family, her husband. A few days after I arrived there, Sheila’s older sister came to my parents’ for a visit. When I asked Farah about her sister and how she was doing, I got a rather effortful “fine, just fine.” A part of me sensed that it wasn’t as fine as Farah was trying so hard to have me believe, but I let it go at that -- at least for the time being. In the following few days, I noticed that my cousin would get slightly withdrawn when Sheila came up in the conversation, so that we never got beyond skirting superficialities such as how she liked Karachi--the city she had moved to--or how accomplished her husband was.

One evening, Farah came home after visiting with some of her friends, visibly shaken. I was sitting alone in the TV room browsing through a magazine. Without uttering a word, she clenched my wrist and led me to our shared bedroom. When we got there, she locked the door, sat down on the bed, and covered her face with both hands.

“What, what’s wrong?”

She let her hands fall to the side--her eyes were moist, but her face held an expression of calm surrender.

“It’s Sheila. I just talked to her on the phone, and it isn’t getting any better.”

I had known this was coming -- some rising red flag in my subconscious precluded it from being a total surprise.

“We’ll take care of it,” the impulsive mother-instinct in me said before I knew it. “What happened?”

Sheila looked at me pleadingly. “He hasn’t touched her, Anni -- all these months and he hasn’t gone near her.”

Nothing had prepared me for this, but I tried hard to contain my shock. All kinds of thoughts shot into my head in a scattered jumble of incoherent flashes. I started pacing the floor. “Don’t worry we’ll figure something out,” I mumbled.

“What’ll we do -- nobody else knows about this -- once he decides to see a doctor he’ll be fine, don’t you think? She’s trying to get him to go to one --but he, he gets mad at her. She cries all the time -- she was crying on the phone just now.” Farah’s lips trembled a little as she said this, and her face looked pale. She sat motionless, following me only with her eyes.

I told her we’d have to tell my parents, and make the four hour journey to Karachi as soon as we could.

The next morning my parents and I set out before sunrise to visit Sheila. None of us said much during the trip, and I couldn’t stop thinking about my cousin, my lifelong friend who hardly had a bad thing to say about anyone, who almost never complained about anything. Sometimes I think difficult and demanding natures actually help in warding off misfortune. She had waited so long and so quietly for this?

We finally got to her house a little before noon. Her husband was away for a conference -- or at least that was what she had been told. She smiled when she saw us and then hugged everyone. That night, after my parents had retired for the night, she told me everything.

On their wedding night, when they came into their bedroom, he asked her if she was comfortable, and suggested that she change. When they both laid down on their bed, he started off on some strange, droning lecture about history and politics. He asked her if she had an interest in anthropology and ancient and contemporary culture. She told him she preferred art and painting, but that she would be willing to read and find out more about history. “Drawing things seems to be quite a waste of time, don’t you think?” he said.

“It’s just another form of expression, and I’ve always been into it -- it seemed less boring to me than other subjects,” she replied unsurely. He remained quiet. Then Sheila heard his breath quickening, and a few moments later he was on top of her. It was frightening to feel the weight of his clumsy, heaving body on her (not that she had anything to compare it with). He seemed to be in a struggle -- grunting as if in anger and frustration. He finally rolled off her and let out a deep, growling sigh. By then Sheila was shaking with nervousness and uncertainty. Maybe this was how it was-- quite natural, surely -- getting married so late in life ...

He got up from the bed and settled down on an adjacent chair. “Khan had told me you were beautiful. Beautiful and intelligent and educated. I should never have taken his word for it. Never! This is why I didn’t want to marry -- it’s a blind plunge into an awful abyss -- how could I let him talk me into it. That two-timing bastard! He didn’t play it fair -- only thinking for his family.”

Sheila was speechless; what could one say in such a situation? She felt sorry for his embarassment and decided that it was manifesting itself in the form of defensive anger. In the morning he didn’t want to even look at her. She made him breakfast, and ironed his clothes, thinking if she could simulate normalcy, everything might eventually fall into place. No use intimidating him with accusing looks or insinuations. She’d give him time -- something she had been well-trained for in the course of her life.

Weeks passed like this. Few words were exchanged between them, the passing days bringing little hope and much anxiety. Then one night he tried again. She heard a scuffle next to her in bed -- it seemed like he was fumbling with himself. He grabbed her hand and pulled it down to his penis.

“See? I’m a man. A man!” He mounted her for the second time since their wedding, in a cumbersome attempt at consummation. He would pause every now and then, straddling her body with his knees. The darkness seemed saturated with a desperate tension, as Sheila felt the bed tremble under her.

While telling me all this, tears poured out evenly from both her eyes. I was at a complete loss -- I had anticipated total impotence -- “So you’re sure he had an erection,” I said.

“I think so-- it was hard.”

“Did he ever ejaculate--you know, did you ever see or feel fluid?”

“No-- but maybe it’s just me.”

“Shut up, Sheila! How can you do this to yourself? Stand up, for goodness sakes.” I hugged her for a little while and felt my own eyes well up. “How can you listen to him call you ugly? The fucking asshole--does he have any idea what he looks like?” It’s incomprehensible, painfully ironic, and utterly irrational, the expression my comment evoked on Sheila’s face. It was an embarassed, slightly defensive look -- this was her husband we were talking about.

“Actually he works really hard, he wasn’t this bad when he was younger.” She pointed to one of his older pictures sitting on the mantle. “The whole world raves about him, Anni… he’s like a star. The other day an old lady fell in the street and you should have seen him. He helped her inside the house and got a doctor for her, and even paid him for the call. His students visit all the time, and the look in their eyes -- they’re mesmerised...”

“That doesn’t mean a thing -- Jekyl and Hyde -- it’s an old story,” I snapped. But even as I said this, I realized that her husband’s angelic reputation in the outside world only further complicated Sheila’s predicament. Would anyone believe her? Would they sympathize if and when it came to divorce matters?She went on, as if uninterrupted, “He says I belittle him by saying that history and social science is boring. I shouldn’t have been so direct --”“Direct? Sheila, all you said was that you loved art -- come on, stop this -- you’re making me nervous now. The first thing you’ve got to get through your head is that he’s the one who needs a shrink, or a lobotomy. You can’t make your situation any better by being such a non-person,” I almost yelled. After hours of talking, it seemed like I had finally scratched the dense, almost maniacal cover she had entombed herself in. It turned out that there was a lot more to the saga, which she had been hesitant to reveal. After a month of marriage, her husband had moved into the guest room. Once, in a desperate attempt to understand things, she told him that sex wasn’t everything and that they could at least be civil to each other -- she would be willing to live with him if only he’d give her a chance. He responded ferociously, saying that she was making a deliberate attempt at infuriating and humiliating him. When she patted his shoulder and asked him to come back into their bedroom, he slapped away her hand and pushed her against the wall, screaming at her to leave him the hell alone. “Who else knows about all this?” I asked her.

“Almost all his brothers and sisters suspect something, and his mother too.”

“How?”

“They visit all the time--it’s hard to miss. Actually he got a letter from his brother -- the one in the navy -- a few days ago. I found it under his clothes in the cupboard.”

She gave me this letter, and as I read it, I felt the whole room move around me in a dizzying, nauseating, gyration.


Dear Qaiser,

I hope my letter finds you in good health. I am writing to you as an older brother, with your welfare in mind. Since you got married, you seem reclusive and unhappy. Your wife looks timid and depressed as well. This is unusual for a newly married couple. I asked Ammi about it but she doesn’t know what to make of it either. So I decided that it was in the best interest of everyone that Saira have a talk with your wife. Sheila wasn’t willing to say much but Saira gathered enough information from the conference to confirm my lifelong suspicions about you. All of us feared this, but why are you making it worse by torturing your wife? Why do you want to tempt God’s wrath? She’s a human being, and somebody’s daughter and sister. Can you imagine the suffering you will be putting so many people through?

I want to help you; I know some very good doctors and psychiatrists. There is nothing wrong in going to one. Write to me or call me at my office number.

Your brother, Ishtiaq



"They knew, they all knew about it, Sheila! They used you as a guinea pig, an experimental drug. How could they do that?” She took the letter from my limp hand, carefully folded it, and put it back under her husband’s clothes. She had no idea what to do next. When I suggested that a divorce was inevitable, she was alarmed by the prospect.

“No, no. What about Abu -- he’ll be devastated. What’s everyone going to say -- you know how our people are -- they’ll make my parents’ life a living hell. I can’t do this to them.”

“Well, we’ll talk about all that later. For now, you’re packing up and coming with us. We’ll go in the morning. Leave him a note or something.”

For all of Sheila’s resistance to the idea of a divorce, the notion of immediate escape from this suffocatingly hopeless environment brought relief to her face. She didn’t argue, and the next day we left.

In the ensuing week or two, the matter became public. Sheila’s brothers-in-law came to my parents’ house a few times for negotiations. I had to come back to the United States in the midst of all this, but kept up with the situation through letters and telephone calls. He wasn’t agreeing to a divorce because it jeopardized his standing in the community. A year after Sheila left, it finally happened, through the efforts of some of my family members and his brothers. Sheila stayed with my parents for a while and completed a two-year diploma program in computer applications. Sheila and Farah both work now and live in a little rented place not far from my parents’ house. And life goes on as usual.