When The Angels Came - Chapter III: Propositions And Prison Cells

Propositions And Prison Cells. Cool. Also, this one gets even darker. Be aware.

III- Propositions and Prison Cells

“F

 

OR long time I have been thinking about you, Lahmin.” She said, though she hated to. The look on his face said it all: he would accept, she would throw away her life to him. Hesitantly, and with a bitter kind of hate emerging in her mind, she let him continue in the traditional fashion.

“Then Famina Marimana, I would ask you to be my wife,” he said with a smile and joy that she attempted to imitate, and it seemed to fool him as he grabbed her by the hand and dragged her off, through the forest, back into town.

“We must ask your father’s permission!” he called back, and she smiled bitterly at the irony. One thousand and one chances now slipped from her grip and the looming possibility of marriage now turned into a certainty as they stood before her father and he gave his approval with a crooked smile.

 

She fell into a routine, growing ever further away from reality and becoming more dependant on the opius day by day. Life became shattered, each minute an obstacle that had to be overcome, only for another to appear in its place. Perhaps the drugs helped dampen the loss of her prospects, perhaps they made it all so much worse, it depended on the day.

However, in this stupor which she had fallen into, she felt herself begin to have feelings for her fiancé. Nothing akin to love, more a kind of caring. It was as if she wished to keep him safe.

She knew she couldn’t go on like this, and Jemania and Makammad eventually helped to lessen her daily intake. They saw her come back from the pit, and grow into a new, darker version of her old self. They could see something was wrong, even if they did not know what.

“You know,” said Jemania one sweltering day at the food house, “you can always tell us if there is something wrong.” Famina didn’t bother and lied, again, that it was all fine. What was it worth anymore? He may as well decide to care for him, and maybe even love him. It was the best she could do. But still, her freedom was to be thrown to the wind. She hoped that something may change and take her away from her mess of a life.

 

Upon the eve of the marriage, Famina sat with Jemania in her room, sewing silently. The walls were sand coloured, close to red, a bed sat grumpily in one corner and a rug on the floor. The girls rested upon rocking chairs under one, faintly flickering light bulb. The momentous day that stood before them tomorrow had thrown Jemania into a hurried frenzy for her friend, and Famina yearning for more of the opius than she would be allowed.

“So, how exited are you, on a scale of one to ten?” said Jemania for about the fifteenth time that day. Famina grunted slightly, then realised she may as well humour the girl.

“You want my honest opinion? Ten.” She lied, and her friend beamed.

“It must be so good. To... have the chance” Guilt flashed in Famina as she heard the words, spoken in a much darker tone than she was used to. How could she mope and moan about the marriage when her friend here would never have the chance? She may as well be honest about her true feelings.

“Jemania,” she began, hesitation striking. Should she? “Jemania, I must confess in something. I... I do not wish to marry Lahmin.” Jemania nearly fainted.

“What!? What!?” she shouted, and it took a while for Famina to calm her down and explain.

“My parents made me ask him. They hit me!” Jemania was shaking slightly, and had dropped her needles onto the rug. The daily power surge that struck at about three o’clock in the afternoon began, the bulb above their heads growing brighter marginally.

“You... you were forced to do it?” she seemed flustered still, but her wits were slowly being drawn in. A small amount of hope grew in Famina. Maybe Jemania would help her run away? Maybe. The look on the girl’s burnt face was hard to read, one moment pity, the next anger, the next...

She stood up and sighed.

“You should be grateful. A husband. Maybe even a family to come. I will never have any of it! Respect your elders; they have given you a chance.” The spite in her voice was shocking, a distinct snarl grown out of jealousy and anger. “Take it or be damned in my eyes, you ungrateful b***h!” Jemania turned and strode off, not looking back. At the door she flicked the light switch, and the bulb petered out slowly, menacingly before fizzling away completely and leaving Famina in darkness.

 

So the wedding day came, with an increasingly desperate Famina on the arm of an ecstatic Lahmin. In his eyes happiness had come. In hers it was forever lost.

They sat over the bowl of holy water, a priest standing over them. Her man was dressed in the best suit he could find, his father’s from back on Terra, while she wore a beautiful orange robe patterned like curling flames. Her head was decorated with jewellery, golden in the open air of the fine morning. Around them in a cluster stood their respective families, all peering into the centre of the ring to see the joining of these two young people.  The priest droned the scriptures and vows, Famina staring straight ahead into the boy’s eyes. In there she saw devotion, love, happiness... And something else. Something that lay behind all the joy and smiling, a kind of darkness that, once seen, could never be forgotten. It stuck in her head like an itch, that black behind the white. It struck fear into her heart. It hurt.

But the priest was touching the water to their foreheads, and he was telling them to kiss, and she realised she’d missed her chance. This was it. He touched her face and leaned in, pressing his lips against hers. The warmth seeped into her, and she hated it. Closing her eyes to dull the pain in her heart, she tried to appear in love. Tried to be the wife he wanted. But as they drew away and opened their eyes she saw, again, that darkness behind it all.

 

After the party, the dancing and the joviality came the last part. The sealing of the bond, which she’d kept from her mind until now, which would be the worst part of all.

The room was oblong, a bed at one end, a picture of the pair together at the other. Apart from these things, and a small cabinet in a far corner, the room was oddly bare and empty. She sat alone on the bed, the noises of her now-husband faintly echoing from the washroom.

How did she end up like this? She could have married someone she loved, someone with money and power and influence and someone who cared for her. Now she was stuck here, with this boy and that darkness behind his eyes.

He entered. She stood, fighting back tears and grimacing, never ready for whatever was to come next. He moved to her and pressed his body in close, his hands on her, and she was trying to back off, but she fell backwards onto the bed. His hot breath entered her lungs, choking her. His body pressed her down, making it impossible to breath and impossible to turn away from it all. She hurt, pain shooting through her. He wouldn’t stop.

Something crashed, the door maybe, and there where hurried footsteps. Lahmin turned up, giving her breath, and suddenly the place was filled with angry voices. The boy moved off the bed, his confrontational stance speaking of anger, and he drew his fist up to punch whoever had entered. Another loud noise cracked suddenly and he fell to the floor, revealing five policemen armed with guns. One was pointing at Lahmin, now on the floor and cradling one of his legs as he sat crumpled in a growing pool of blood. Another had drawn his gun in her direction and she shrunk back into the sheets, terrified.

Her husband was cursing at the intruders. “Fakk you! What gives you the fakking right to come in here?! You shot my fakking leg! You-“ He was cut off by one of the policemen, a burly man with a scar on his right cheek and a no-nonsense look on his face.

“Shut up, you”, he said, then turned to the other men and started ordering them around. Two grabbed Lahmin and Famina cried out despite herself. Another two came to her, calming her and holding her as she thrashed around. All she could see were the faces of the two men above her, shouting for calm, but above their words she could make out the noise of Lahmin, crying out, flailing and hitting and kicking, before there was a loud thump and he made no more noise. She lay back, her face streaming with tears and her body shaking violently, uncontrollably. And as Lahmin was dragged from the room, she wondered whether Lahmin was the boy she thought.

 

“You must get him back.”

Jemania stood before her, looking into her eyes with malice. Famina refused to return the stare, instead looking down at the rug on the floor.

“Listen to me!” she shouted, “you get that boy back from that prison. You save your husband, or Allah may as well throw you in the rubbish”. Famina looked up quizzically.

“Allah?”

“Have you not been listening to me for the past five months? I’m Muslim now.” A pang of guilt shot through her. She hadn’t realised, what with the drugs and the wedding.

“We don’t even know why they arrested him. What if Allah willed him to be there?” she asked, feeling like a small child being told off by a teacher.

“Allah would not wish him to be there. Allah wants him here with you. Go get you boy, you ungrateful girl.” Famina wondered why Jemania had grown to hate her so much. It must be jealousy, or spite, or a terrible mix of both. They used to be such good friends.

Deciding at once that she must at least try to save her husband, she stood up. Jemania looked again into her eyes, and this time Famina looked back and nodded.

“What must I do then?” she asked, swayed and separate. But still, in her head, however much she wished to love the boy, that darkness at the back of his eyes stayed even as she tried to block it out.

 

Author's Note

Um... Be nice!

Reviews

[VoodooWebs]

Whoa, you write quite nicely. Your word choice mixed with good grammar...It makes me happy. I like the storyline. It's quite good. I don't understand how people can live on Mars, but I suppose that's because it's fiction that it works. You seem to kind of drag on a bit through some parts, but others you rush through. Overall, the entire story is good thus far. I don't understand Jemania very well; are you meaning for her to be a total mystery of hate and despise? Is it because she cannot wed?
I'm glad I found the beginnings of this book. Keep it up.