𝓜𝔂 𝓫𝓪𝓫𝔂, 𝓶𝔂 𝔀𝓲𝓯𝓮

55# LOSS

CENTRAL MOSQUE,
ASOKORO, ABUJA.

Yahya had experienced loss many, many times in his life. He'd lost many siblings, his father, friends and work associates. If you'd asked him, Yahya would tell you he knew what loss felt like, but now, he realized he'd been wrong. So, very wrong.

He stood in the mosque, having just buried his wife, in the same vicinity she'd been killed not a day ago. Yahya hadn't been able to cry. Not yet. Not when they'd led him to her in the hospital. Not when his sons had fallen to the ground next to him, crying. Not when they'd gone to perform her janazah; to wash her before she was buried.

No, Yahya had just gone through the motions. He'd spoken just once, when he was asked if he wanted to perform his wife's janazah himself, and he agreed. He'd washed her, not making a sound the entire time.

The entire process had been methodical. He'd done it convincing himself that it wasn't his wife that he was performing ghusl for. When he pressed on her abdomen, he convinced himself that it wasn't the abdomen that had swelled with his children many times in the past, that hadn't been able to house them, that had been the cause of his wife's cries for a child that would remain in her, full term. When he washed over her head, he let himself be deluded that it was just a wound and not a gaping bullet-hole that his hands had run across. And when his hands took down her braids, fibre through fibre, he rejected the feeling of familiarity. For afterall, this wasn't the hair of the woman he'd loosened and gotten tangled many, many, many times... this was the hair of a stranger he didn't know.

Yahya went through all of the processes, and sometimes he saw himself on the table, sometimes he saw this other woman that had a striking resemblance to his Zaynab. Sometimes, he felt like it was him being washed, like it was his nose that was plugged up with cotton. He couldn't breathe. To an outside observer, Yahya may have met all the requirements of performing ghusl: muslim, of sound mind, discernment. Yet to Yahya, he'd never felt further from sanity. Wasn't sanity the ability to think in a rational manner? How then could they call him sane? 

Yahya struggled with wanting to remain in that room, and wanting to bolt. But alas, once he'd taken what had been the perfume Zaynab always urged him to wear, and oiled the white cloth with it, and once he'd placed those clothes...no, shrouds on her, layer after layer until her face was concealed, and inaccessible to him, Yahya knew it was the end. And in that moment, he could not deny, nor delude himself into rejecting that he'd infact just completed the ghusl rites for his wife.

In his heart, there was only pain. And in his heart, only one sentence on loop. "Ya rabb, your servant has returned to you. For the sake of her love and obedience to me, and to her family, accept her into your jannah. Make her of those who have earned your love. And reunite me with her in your paradise, on a day there will be no more parting. Ameen".  Yahya glanced at his Zaynab one more time, at the ties he'd bound her with. Then he smiled. "Till jannah, ya Zaynab".

***

By the time Yahya had come out of the room to lead the janazah prayer, the mosque was crowded with so many cars, and twice as many people. Yahya avoided the crowd, and went straight for the imam. The imam smiled when the saw Yahya, a wistful thing that barely caused one side of his mouth to inch upwards. Yahya couldn't return it. "Your wife was very, very loved in this masjid. People have been trooping in". 

Yahya tried to manage a smile, but went with a nod instead. The imam nodded back in understanding, and led them inside. Jamil and Ayman stood off to one side, likely avoiding the crowd as their father had done. They'd have to return to the hospital soon enough, but for now, their priority was with their mother, and making sure nothing went wrong in her final moments.