“Can we start over?” Jamila asked.
“I’m agreeable to that,” Viviana replied.
“I am sorry my son—Sheikh Shithead—stole your freedom.”
Muhammad frowned. Aaliyah tried not to smile.
“He saved my life,” Viviana said, surprising him. “But he’s still a shithead.”
Muhammad’s face colored. “I am here, just so the two of you are aware!”
His wife and mother ignored him. He didn’t know if he should feel insulted or amused.
“I have no purpose left,” Jamila said, finally looking away from the window. Her gaze settled on Viviana’s profile. “I’m a useless old woman whose husband is dead, whose looks have long since faded, and who will be entirely alone when my Aaliyah takes a husband.”
“Ummi,” Aaliyah breathed out, “I would never leave you to be alone, nor would Momo.”
Muhammad was stunned. He felt more than a little sick inside that his mother believed as she did while he’d been too busy to notice.
Viviana’s head turned. Her heart was in her eyes. “I am motherless. I need you as much as your children do.”
Jamila started to sob, something he’d never seen his mother do. Viviana undid her seatbelt and before he knew it the two women were hugging.
Muhammad and Aaliyah glanced at each other, both of their expressions asking the other what they should do or say. Eventually his sister shrugged, providing “Sheikh Shithead” no glimpse into the female psyche at all. He grunted.
“Momo,” his mother chastised while hugging his wife, “such sounds are not becoming of the ruler of Raqqah.”
He sighed, the sound that of a longsuffering man. His sister, brat that she was, looked away, assuming wrongly he couldn’t see her grin.
“You’re still quite beautiful,” Viviana assured his mother. “The only difference between you and every other widow your age is you have an actual natural beauty as opposed to one painted on with a butter knife.”
“Do you think so?” Jamila asked hopefully.
“I’ve been telling you that for years, ummi,” Aaliyah interjected. “You just chose not to believe me.”
Viviana smiled, first at his sister and then at his mother. “You see? You could totally remarry if you chose to.”
“My father might not appreciate that!” Muhammad snapped.
His wife chose that moment to finally look at him, albeit with narrowed eyes. He’d take what he could get.
“According to you and your religion, he’s in paradise with seventy-two virgins. He’ll get over it.”
Muhammad’s nostrils flared. “Is that what you are hoping for, Viviana? That I die so you are free to remarry?”
“Momo,” his mother said, affronted, “you shouldn’t make everything about you.”
“Really,” Viviana seconded.
“I’m happy everyone is bonding at my expense!” He angrily slashed a hand through the air. “We are preparing to land in Dubai and switch to a smaller plane on the tarmac. If you are a woman, put on a damn hijab!”
If Muhammad thought the flight from Damascus to Dubai was tense, the flight from Dubai to the eighth emirate of Raqqah was the very definition of edgy. Now even his sister wasn’t speaking to him. In fact the only one talking to him at all was Viviana—if he could call reverting back into that damn caricature of a Muslim wife talking.
He hated those fake smiles and even faker, exaggerated gestures of humility and obedience. He knew what all three of them were doing and he refused to succumb.
“Oh all right!” Muhammad fumed, succumbing. “Ummi, you may remarry if you so desire!”
At last his mother looked at him. She smiled. “You’re a good son. I don’t know that I wish to, but it’s nice to know the option is available to me.”
