THE UNFORTUNATE MARRIAGE OF ARDO ISMAACIIL HEEBAAN
The photographer cautiously started his moves with a deft and reassuring pat on the shoulder of the young lady. He held the edge of her dress at the shoulder and lowered it so that the bare skinny bones protruding are captured in the picture. Ardo felt nervous but saw no malice in the act. Turning back to her, after gazing at her from behind the lenses for a minute and more, he took the lean scarf off her chest. And with a sudden pulsating move, he laid his hands on her bosom and squeezed the protected asset. Ardo lost breath in awe and disbelief. The hollow eyes looked at the man who continued moving his hands upside down unashamedly.
True, she was at the age where babies grab any stuff nearby and stuck it onto their lovely mouths. Perhaps, that partially explained why she has to succumb to his manly hands so readily. She fell back onto the couch, and her body slumbered motionless like a cadaver. The predator removed his shirt, and the tee under, on which the words “Xooluhu waa laf dhabarka dhaqaalaheena” were printed in bold. He must have got the T-shirt from one of these seminars and workshops. Those who tease him say the dictum is decipherable even from his bare body, implying he doesn’t take due care of his hygiene. He quickly took off his pants and lowered himself onto his prey.
Earlier in the morning, the pandemonium in Aboor (termites) Photo and Video was deafening. Adan-Qaawane, the sole owner and photographer, was overwhelmed with requests and reprimands from customers. From a lady who swore the breasts in her wedding picture aren’t hers because they are oversized, to a man who kept on urging him to do extra-editing on his video so that his picture pops up at regular intervals from the heart of his bride.
Under pressure from all corners, he almost exchanged blows with a short sturdy man who said his balding head is more pronounced in the picture and tore it down in front of him.
“You can not come to my studio with a Bidaar that looked like that of Cigaal Shiidaad and claim I have receded your hairline,” Said he, in anger.
In delirium, Ardo thought she was in Hospital after a tragic accident. She understood what is going on. The Doctor, desperate to save her life, was pushing her chest up and down to restore her breath. She felt sad for the Doctor, and cursed her ingratitude for failing to respond to his selfless hard work. She summoned all the energy she could muster, and pulled herself up.
Adan’s intention for that late afternoon schedule with the young lady was to do what he has done to some clients before-some willing, some unwilling. But, he never imagined the ease with which it will happen. It validated his self-confidence about his handwork with women. Wacays and all those losers must know about it. But that is later.
With glee, he lustfully closed his eyes in anticipation of a divine blending with her flesh. The shuddering body of the young lady alerted him to the horror of his life. He was hit with an earthquake measuring over eight points in the Rector Scale.
When he opened his eyes, they met that of hers. Her eyes were turned up, the white fat covering the entire bulb, and a suppressed shriek that sounded like the last cry from a goat just slaughtered come with the incessant grotesque movement of her body. Her mouth moved from its position and was near her left ear, and white saliva poured out of her mouth in quick succession. He screamed.
Two clients who came to the studio after he started his work with Ardo, and were sitting at the reception room, waiting for their turn, rushed to save the man from whoever is taking out his anger on him. They didn’t make it far. Like a whirlwind from the Kalahari, a speeding naked man hit them with such force that they were thrown against the tiny walls of the four-by-four room.
Pedestrians and the squatter ‘qat’ merchants in front of the studio put their hands on their eyes not to see the disgrace. Some shook their heads in sympathy for what they saw as a man who just lost his sanity.
That day might have exposed the scandalous activities behind the curtains of this amateur photographer, ruined his business, and might have earned him the nickname 'Qaawane’; but it kicked off the beginning of a long-lasting agony for Ardo. Two days later, she was diagnosed with severe epilepsy.
She felt her revulsion to men- for all what they have done to her- the rape attempt, the constant last minute heartbreaks she suffered as they betrayed her after learning about her health condition, was unjustified when she met Bile. She finally got the honour of being the Caruusad. All the longing for that moment, all the bile that bubbled in her stomach for a long time, whenever she heard horns blown for a wedding party in her neighbourhood evaporated in a moment. And she yielded to the enormity of the joy and cried.
She had no idea Bile would forget his words, characteristically, like any other man. When she got her first baby, he started commenting how he is overstrained by the ‘unending’ illness of Ardo. Their marriage looked like a charity thing; the benevolent man who took an ailing woman for marriage, because he is good and kind. That self-realisation about his righteousness and the consequent feeling of self-worth, made him feel she is indebted to him. So, any request for a reciprocal attention and care, was to be viewed, by him, as a sign of petulance and back-stabbing.
Her condition deteriorated as the result of the hurt inflicted on her. Indeed, she realised he has killed her more than those who turned her down. For she now knew there is no hope. No hope of the god-fearing and humane man, the loving and caring man who would not make her illness a factor in their relationship. Who would imagine what he would have liked to be done to his own sister should she be in the state his wife is in.
The night she fainted in front of him while breastfeeding the baby boy she so adoringly loves; he continued eating the food she served him. Deep inside, he rationalised that he won’t be of help in any case, and hoped she will go through the routine and finally recover. If she dies, he thought, it will be sad. He resisted the distasteful thought that kept on coming to his mind about the second marriage, and how careful he will be not to repeat his mistakes.
The second marriage was to happen only three months later. But Ardo wasn’t dead; biologically at least.
When he refused to come back to her and her child, but out of courtesy to her family- who happen to be his long-time acquaintances, continued supporting her financially, she didn’t protest. Like a humiliated prisoner of war, she sank her teeth into her lips in anger, waiting for divine administration of justice. By then, of course, she was bed-ridden, with a paralysed hand and leg.
She asked for divorce, so that the thought of him leaves her all together. She didn’t get it.
