Say: Have ye thought: If (all) your water were to disappear into the earth, who then could bring gushing water?

                       —The Noble Quran, Surah Al-Mulk: The Dominion, 67:30

Time is a thief. Five months later. It is the third day of Ramadan but I don’t want to cook anything. Don’t feel like having any company. I’m not in the mood to read or recite any Surahs from the Quran. I have the whole day to market for food. Run errands. Whisk our house before gathering with my husband and family at dusk to break the fast with dates and water. Pray Maghrib, the sunset prayer. Then Iftar, our evening meal. My daughter, Jolie, says she’s on her way to help. But I don’t expect her to. She is still waiting for Christian, her fiancé, to come home.

My parents are old. Silver-haired. Radiant with an emotional and physical exhaustion that undermines their beauty. I am my father’s daughter, having silver hair on my left eyebrow. Three sunsets ago, I walked with my father around the city block of the campus of Bennett College on the east side of Greensboro’s neighborhood. His three-to-four-foot stride is now seven inches. Never knew it was possible to move so slowly and yet still be moving forward.

My father. I used to call Superman when I was a child who would pick me up and take me for a spin. He could make me fly. My father. With no bottom at all to his endurance. Could run up and down the tennis court without breaking a sweat. My father. Four blocks at a pace of a kid on a scooter. The hush of time is the sound of a body emptying itself—the world dreams itself awake. Everything is temporary. My father.

I walk to Harris Teeter. I take my phone to dictate a list. Dates, water, lamb, chicken, rice, romaine lettuce and spinach, mixed fruit of strawberries, blueberries, oranges and watermelon chunks. I stop to pet a dog. My phone transcribes what I said to him, “My goodness, look at you, you’re so beautiful, what a beautiful face.”

There is no beautiful face aisle. My father whispered to me last night before leaving, tapped my shoulder, “Don’t worry about me. The light at the end of the tunnel is just another train coming at you.”

I grab a couple of containers of Medjool dates. A case of spring water. Put them in the cart. Look long and hard, looking past them. My mind is somewhere else, Christian and Jolie were together since middle school. He was her religion. Not Islam. I’ve seen it all. Both would cut classes. Sneaked Christian to her room while I was at work, or school. Smoked weed. Reminiscing one day I was home off from work and heard a noise coming from Jolie’s room. It was Christian hiding in her closet. There was a time she had him in her room…in my house, for over a damn week. Their fights. Sometimes physical. Even though she moved out of my house at 18, I was in their relationship, dealing with it all. I did not like him. Did not care for him. But the birth of their son, Christian, Jr., five years ago changed everything. We call him CJ. Christian lived with acute myeloid leukemia, which eventually softened him up. Jolie loved Christian. I struggled to be at peace with it all.

When I get to the butcher’s section, there’s already a long line. Allows me more time to wander. On December 8th. Two weeks after Thanksgiving, Christian and Jolie had an argument in their apartment. She tells him that she needed time to think things through and they should take a break from each other. Although they have never argued or fought in front of their son, she told him she’s tired of his abuse. Frustrated, she goes out through the back door of the kitchen to have a smoke. Christian goes to take a shower. The butcher’s rope disintegrates in my mind to a can of tennis balls I remember in Christian’s closet. He grabs something from the closet and leaves their apartment. I don’t know where he is heading.

My daughter returns to the kitchen after smoking a cigarette, goes to the bedroom to find Christian is gone. Heads back to the kitchen, discovers his wallet and cell phone on the kitchen table. She yells for him, but he already disappeared around the corner.

A stocker in the rice aisle walks up to me with concern, “Are you alright, miss? Hey, have you seen a ghost?” I look down at my brown hands. Pale. I grab the bag of rice and head towards the produce section. I begin to think about my father. Then three tennis balls juggle in front of me, disappearing to the next aisle. In their communication, they radiate the whole situation in a luminously simple way as a moving example of multiple artists capable of emerging from such a restrictive environment. The way a sunset can make even the most spartan of situations look beautiful.

That day, my daughter, who works from home, called me to ask if I could pick up CJ from preschool. My darling grandson. But I couldn’t. My cat, Noodles, was nestled in a blanket faded as the ocean, laid swollen with trinkets. Intent, I stroked a streak of wet hair under her throat, curlicued with fluid, as one by one its young slid out in a glazed wrapping, each cradling a purse of blood and blue meat, all of it, strange…likely vomit, a kind of food she struggled to eat.

Jolie picked CJ up from preschool close to 12:30 p.m. because he wasn’t feeling well. Once Christian was settled in at his mother’s apartment, he called Jolie to talk about their earlier argument, wanting to work things out. I don’t get along with Christian’s mother, but we are civil with each other because of our common bond with our grandson. He switched his mother’s phone to FaceTime and their son joined in the conversation, telling them both that he loved them. “I love you, too,” my daughter said in a rushed tone, telling him she had to get back to work and that she would call back at 1:30 during her lunch break.

Jolie did step outside to smoke. She did not call him back at 1:30—she was distracted with their son. Her work. Christian shot himself in the head in his mother’s apartment in the bathtub…their lives forever darkened. What is my plan to save my daughter’s misery and suffering after Christian committed suicide last winter? By the time I get to the dessert aisle, everything is solved.

Unbeknownst to my grandson, he screenshotted a photo of his father’s face during their final FaceTime conversation. Christian’s face was dark, except for his eyes. They weren’t his. Empty. I will never know why he chose to be in the bathtub, but it provided a haunting backdrop of his final seconds. If all the water were to disappear into the earth, no amount of gushing water in the world would ever cleanse him. The devil was in a guise of Christian. And he won the fight.

The relationship between my daughter and her fiancé was toxic, often with performances of emotional and physical abuse. She stayed with him because she didn’t want CJ to be raised by a single parent. Christian was all she’s ever been with. She has no friends. I know without a doubt Christian loved and cared for CJ. It was beautiful to witness Christian’s gentle side with his son. I can admit now that I loved him. The art of suicide is much more of a private performance. It always lasts. Selfish. It is about longing and guilt. The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what you share with someone else. Poor Christian.

This is when my daughter came to her senses with me that she is now free. Saved. All is well and I have everything I need. But I can’t help worrying about my daughter.

Standing in a long line makes me aware of everything. I understand what my father meant—I see a train coming right at me.

A’oothu Billahi minash-Shaytaanir-Rajeem

 Bismi Allahi alrrahmani alrraheem

I seek refuge in Allah from Satan, the outcast

In the Name of Allah; The Beneficent, The Merciful

 

“I CAN’T FIND MY MONEY!” I slap at the pockets of my abaya and my jacket, “I know I have the money mama just gave me for tonight.” I look behind and beside myself, then directly at the cashier as if she could solve my dilemma, or that I pick her money till. I shrug as the aroma of fried chicken sneaks towards me. Nothing is working out! What’s my plan to even save this moment?

Alhamdu lillahi Rabbial AlAAalameen

Alrrahmani Alrraheem

Maliki Yawmi Alddeen

Praise be to Allah, the Lord of the Worlds

The Beneficent; The Merciful

Master of the Day of Judgment

 

The people in line behind me, including the cashier in the sky-blue shirt and khaki pants with a matching hat, has been waiting rather patiently for me.

Iyyaka NaAAbudu Waiyyaka NastaAAeen

Ihdina alssirata almustaqeem

Thee (alone) we worship; Thee (alone) we ask for help

Show us the straight path,

 

I take a breath, “Alhamdulilaah, Ya, Allah, forgive me!” Finally, I found my money. Pull bills from my small wallet. Shake my head, hand her the bills. I thought I was moving in exponentials. Things blurred or bent in me, like a dance between chaos and order. No. We all move a notch on this sprocket, the specifics of which I will never be able to shake.

Sirata allatheena anAAamta AAalayhim

ghayri almaghdoobi AAalayhim wala

 alddalleen

The path of those whom Thou hast favored;

Not the (path) of those who earn Thine anger

nor of those who go astray.

Aameen