Namal (English Translation) By Nimra Ahmed

Chpt 13: And your Lord has revealed to the bee...

"This is the room I have never entered. This is the room where I could never breathe. Darkness spreads here like a bat. There is no light except for a dim torch. The yellowish hue of honey bees covers everything, and the black dominance signifies destruction. A sense of ownership exists. But these are the ones who own me—neither cruel nor indifferent, just ignorant. This is the time of the honey bees!

In winter, they spread themselves across the entire frozen expanse, where in the warm days, only the dead would lift their bodies.

Honey bees are all female.

Servants and queens.

They have freed themselves from their males. Winter is for the women.

Will their hive survive this winter?

Will it be able to enter the next year?

What flavor will they experience?

The roses of Christmas?

Honey bees have started to fly freely.

They are feeling the sparkle of spring."

(Sylvia Plath)

After quickly apologizing to Hashim, they both got up. Silent. Completely silent. The dining table was set at home. Haneen and Zumar quietly sat down. The meal began. Zumar could hardly take a few bites. Her hunger had vanished. While eating, Faris was looking at her intently, but he didn’t say anything. The food was not finished, and Haneen quickly left. Everyone was looking back at them, wondering what was wrong. First, Zumar locked the basement door. When she came down, she saw Haneen pacing around, shaking her head in denial.

"Haneen, do you remember on the day of my nikah, Saadi was taking an appointment to meet some Haleema through his boss? There can’t be just one Haleema in the whole city working for Hashim." Haneen was not willing to accept this. Zumar glared at her sharply as she stood up. "But the Haleema whose boss knew about the exam challenge was Hashim."

Haneen froze suddenly.

"Look, Hashim has been telling us from day one that he hasn’t met Saadi since the wedding. He mentioned the wedding of Kiran Hamad's acquaintances (the wedding for which Zumar had sought help from Mrs. Jawahat), but Hashim is lying to us. Now, Nourishaan is also lying. They must know something."

"Never! He would never tell my brother about the exam," she was shaking her head. "And what need would my brother have for an appointment to meet Hashim? There was no record of any call to anyone at the time of your nikah in my brother’s call records."

"Maybe he’s using some other number. There was definitely something about that meeting that Hashim hid from us."

“Enough, enough! Stop it!” she suddenly shouted. “Always blaming Hashim. What has he done to you?”

Zumar frowned in annoyance. "If you take off the blindfold from your mind, you’ll see."

"I shouldn’t have told you all this. I knew one day you would just dismiss me." Tears welled up in her helpless eyes.

Then she rubbed her eyes. A sudden realization struck her. The necklace that someone had slipped into her brother’s pocket on party day. It wasn’t in her brother’s belongings when we came here. If her brother had indeed met Hashim, then maybe he had gone to return it. What would Hashim have said? Had he come to return a stolen necklace to Saadi? He must have thought we would misunderstand, so he saved her brother’s honor. Zumar was reassuring herself more than anything.

"Then why did Hashim tell him about the exam to save Saadi’s honor?" A sudden thought flashed in her mind. He must not have told anything. "I can never believe that. But you will still judge  me, right?"