S1, Account 4: Akil

I cannot speak, but I can hear. And they forget that just because my mouth no longer wages war in this dimension, that my ears still hear, that I can still see the depravity of their hearts. I hear them. I see them. And my heart burns in impotent anger and sorrow for my son.

I ask God continuously what I did wrong. What did I do so wrong that my son should go through this? He doesn’t even know. If I could speak, I would splinter his heart with the truth. Better to know now than find out later. Roy is still young, he can start again. How can she do this to him? How could Khadija do this? I look at her as she washes my face, shaves my beard, and I think to myself, how could someone so loving and caring, who treats me as if I am a dandelion plucked from a back garden, enact a betrayal so unexpected, so unconscionable and so spiritually violent, onto one of the people I love most in this world?

And I cry, silent tears, I cry all the time and they think it’s a medical issue and I’ve had medication prescribed for it, but I don’t have the speech to tell them that no matter how much they give me, I will never stop crying for the love my son deserved, had, and lost, in his own home. This is torture, the worst kind, and I don’t understand what I did to cause it, and to have to watch it unfold till the day I die.

Roy could not have been a better son. He is conscientious, kind, devoted, almost perfect. The same passion with which he cares for me, is the same he extends to his brother, and the same he extended to his mother before she passed away. He was young, 15, and it made him grow up in ways just existing wouldn’t. But he bloomed and he made me proud. I have never been able to comprehend the gift of being his father. But he is not without fault. In truth, his undying commitment and loyalty to those he loves, may have brought about his inability to see what is unfolding before him. But that is victim-blaming no? How can he be blamed for someone not controlling their baser instincts and choosing feelings over the act of love?

I heard her say she loves him “too” to that bastard and I threw up, literally, all over my clothes. They heard me and rushed in and were kind about it, and gently and carefully cleaned me up and changed my clothes, and it made me more furious because I wanted to hurt them. I wanted them to feel the malevolence of that act, and feel the guilt of what caused it to rattle round their rib-cages forever. But I am a weak, sad, old man, and all my protest could do was incite more kindness.

I am bereft. I am losing my health and worse, I am losing my son to the demons of society and dishonour. It’s like I can physically see them putting a noose around his neck, then tightening it and loosening it, and tightening and loosening it, every day. He comes into my room at night, when he thinks I’m asleep, and he sits on the chair beside my bed and cries. I don’t hear him, but I see the glint of moonlight through the window, reflecting off his tears, and I think my body and soul might shatter into ten thousand pieces. How can so much love come with so much pain? I just want to hug him and tell him no matter what happens, no matter when he finds out (because he will, reckless people always slip up), that he will survive and he can thrive again.

Here comes Dotun. I wish I was young enough and strong enough to kill him.

Originally posted: May 29, 2020