Whatever is meant for you will reach you even if it is beneath two mountains, and whatever is not meant for you will not reach you even if it is between your two lips."
— Imam Al-Ghazali
Chapter 52
Wordlessly, I started walking back to the house. I felt the sympathetic looks from the chief security and his men, and upon reaching the house, the rest of the domestic staff.
But none of them was brave enough to approach me, not even Madam Maria.
I walked wordlessly up the stairs and to my room, my resolve to leave growing with every step.
Even as a corpse, I was going to find a way out of the ranch if it was the very last thing I did.
I lay in bed as day eventually turned to night, falling into a deep depression, wondering how to get myself out of the mess life had made for me. Ya Allah, grant me an escape, I whispered into the darkness. But just as I was sinking to the bottom of the abyss, I remembered Jacobi's promise to me.
"Nobody is going to hurt me, and more importantly, nobody is going to hurt you. All that is over, Zeynep. That part of your life is over. You're not going back to that place."
And I was comforted.
For some inexplicable reason, I trusted his promise to get me out of, not only the ranch but this country entirely.
He wasn't going to allow me to waste away, not after seeing firsthand how Ibrahim had almost sent me to my maker.
He was going to rescue me.
"Insha'Allah," I murmured, letting the assurance settle in my heart.
This was the comfort I had as I drifted off to a deep and restful sleep, and the next morning, I was relieved to awake on my bed.
I hadn't sleepwalked in all the time I'd been in the hospital and had feared being back in the ranch would trigger a relapse.
But it hadn't. Instead, I'd awoken with a peaceful smile on my face, confident that, even as I slept, Jacobi was working towards getting me out of there.
It was this confidence that saw me through the next few days, allowing me to go about my normal business without the cloud of my captivity hanging over me.
In anticipation of my imminent departure, I started putting a few of my important items aside, things I didn't want to leave behind in the ranch. I was pleasant and friendly to everyone, even the chief security, whose new mandate was to keep me enslaved within the four walls of the gates.
Even though I knew it wasn't his making, I also didn't want to part acrimoniously with any of the people I had known as family in the 23 years of my stay in America. Come what may, people like Madam Maria, Ahmed, Fidelia, Ali, and the rest of the staff at the ranch, would always hold a special place in my heart, no matter where I went.
"Bas Allah ki marzi dekho," I told Madam Maria one evening when she expressed her sadness at my withdrawal. Just see the will of Allah.
She nodded, perhaps not fully understanding but sensing the finality in my voice.
"Sab kuch Allah ke haath mein hai," I reminded myself. Everything is in Allah's hands.
And with that, I waited for the moment my fate would change.
"I'm happy to see you happy," madam Maria remarked, as I busied myself in my garden, which had been neglected while I was away and was now overgrown with weeds. "I was afraid this…this new development would break you."
I smiled. If it hadn't been for the hope I was holding on to, it very well almost would have. "It's no problem. Where do I go anyway?"
Madam Maria hesitated, and I wondered if maybe she had heard something in my voice that had given my plans away.
It wasn't that I didn't trust her, far from it. I just didn't want to say or do anything that would compromise our plans.
After having previous escape plans already dashed, I was especially protective of this one.
Nothing could happen to destroy it. Absolutely nothing.
That Friday, as he would typically do when he was in town, the minister summoned me to accompany him to the mosque. I took extra care with my looks that morning, wanting to look my best if we saw Jacobi.
It had been four days since I'd left the hospital, and his absence from my life was already leaving a crater-sized hole in my heart.
I couldn't wait for the time when we would be together…forever.
As prayers went on, I was disappointed to see that Jacobi hadn't made it to the mosque.
My disappointment soon gave way to worry. What if he had already forgotten about me? What if he had no plans to rescue me? What if he had decided it was best to leave me at the mercy of minister Omar Hakim and his evil son? What if he had permanently left my life?
I was so deep in thought that I barely acknowledged pleasantries from the other imams, not even the overly boisterous one from the newly promoted Afar. All I could think about, worry about, despair about, was that waiting for Jacobi to rescue me could just as well be a pipe dream.
"Look at that wretch of a man," the minister chuckled, interrupting my thoughts. "So, he finally decided to return to Boston"
I looked in the direction of his gaze, and my heart did a somersault when I recognized Jason's father, Idris. Following the death of his family, the man had left Boston, moving from one neighbouring city to the other in search of an alternative livelihood or, better still, an alternative life, as rumour had it.
But looking at the old man, time had not been kind to him at all. He looked twenty years older than he should have, had lost a lot of weight, and walked with a stoop, metaphorically carrying the weight of the twelve years it had been since life took his beloved family away. Or rather, since minister Omar did.
I tried to stall, so that we wouldn't have to walk past him, but the minister clearly had other plans.
"idris!" he called out. "Wow, it's been ages! Where have you been all these years?"
He glared at us, and if looks could kill, the minister and I would have died several times over. I stood there like a statue, worried that he would charge over to attack us, but to his credit, the man continued walking.
But the devil was working overtime that day.
"old man.. I'm talking to you," the minister called out, his voice dripping with mockery and sarcasm.
"Where are you rushing off to? Or rather, to whom? Abi, do you have a new wife warming your bed at home?"
As my husband laughed, I wished the ground would just open up and swallow me, his callousness making me more ashamed than I had ever been.
I couldn't believe he could be so cruel to mock the man about what he had lost.
Idris slowed down and turned around. "I don't blame you. It is the society that has given you the effrontery to still be walking around proudly, instead of rotting in jail, that I blame."
"Jail? Me?" the minister exclaimed, his eyes still twinkling with mischief. "For just greeting you?"
Idris shook his head and laughed, a dry humourless sound. "Allah will avenge me. You will die like a criminal! That is my promise to you."
All humour and mischief departed from the minister, and he straightened. "You better shut that poverty stricken mouth before it lands you in trouble!"
"I can see that the truth is bitter to digest!" Idris continued, noticing he had hit a sore spot with his aggressor. "You think you have caused me shame? Your death will be shameful and disgraceful! You call me a pauper? You will die even worse than one! Allah will hear my prayer!"
The minister let out a loud hiss as he grabbed my hand. "God saved you that I'm just coming from prayers. You would have slept in the cell today for threatening me."
But I could tell that he was shaken. He ranted and cursed all through the short ride home,
complaining about having to mix with people who weren't even 'fit to clean his shoes'. As he fumed and raged, all I could think about was Jacobi ,praying that he hadn't forgotten me as I now feared, because rather than spend my life with a man as evil as the one beside me, it would be better to just take my own life.
The next morning, I could barely eat my breakfast and just toyed around with the curry on my plate.
"You don't feel like eating curry?" madam maria asked. "You want me to make something else for you?"
Even though there were always at least 2 other cooks in the house, madam maria still remained primarily responsible for the minister's meals and, by extension, mine. I smiled at her and shook my head. "I'm just not very hungry this morning."
She looked around to make sure nobody was within earshot, before pulling up a chair. "I heard that the minister was exchanging words with a certain person yesterday."
I nodded, without offering anything more. The last thing I wanted to do was gossip.
I half listened as she relayed the version of the story she had been told and didn't even bother correcting her when the account implied both men had been close to exchanging blows. It was easier for me to allow her to believe what she wanted to.
When she noticed I was less than an eager participant in her gossip, she rose to her feet.
"Why are you so quiet, I hope you're not falling sick again. What happened to you wasn't an imaginable thing. It might have caused some damages ," she remarked, with genuine concern on her face. But before I could even think of anything to say in response, she caught sight of someone walking up to the house.
"As if he heard us talking. Isn't that the doctor?"
My heart jumped straight into my mouth as I saw that it was, indeed, jacobi. It took everything in me not to race to the front door and hop straight into his arms. Instead, I had to restrain myself from showing any outward emotion. No, I couldn't do that, not if we wanted to remain under the radar. But inwardly, I was dancing.
He hadn't forgotten me after all.