Cellblock B 5:15 a.m.
What does one pray for…a cooler cell…more digestible food…longer hours of light…a cellmate? Does one pray that the man with fat hands, cold eyes, and a short stubble of hair not return to my cell today, not pull me out for questioning, doesn’t insist I am who he thinks I am—when I am not?
Did I carry that bomb? you ask. Actually, I tell you, it was a vest the authorities insisted I was wearing, a vest that was meant to explode and kill me as well as all those around me. Besides, what does it matter if I say yes, I carried it, or if I say no? Your people have chosen to believe that we are all terrorists. Your interrogators believe nothing I have said.
It matters, you say, pen in hand, because you cannot record me having bribed your way inside.
Do you mind? I ask gently. It is time for me to pray.
As you step out of the cell, you turn toward me. In your eyes, I see fatigue and frustration but also hope, and I wonder if perhaps you are what you say you are: a journalist who wants the real story about this place and about me to tell the world.
I lay out my blanket, bow, and pray that we will overcome the need for violence one day, that the spirit of compassion and peace will envelop this world and seal the cracks humans have created, returning us to wholeness. I lift my blanket, fold it into a neat square, and place it at the end of my cot, which takes up one entire wall of my cell. There is a sink and a toilet as well. I am one of the lucky ones. The vest they said I was wearing did not go off. I am not accused of murdering anyone, only planning to do so, so I have a toilet, sink, and cot. I have heard that others have nothing, just a concrete slab and four walls. Perhaps this is untrue, propaganda from others who are incarcerated, I really don’t know.
When you return that night, I apologize for my stubbornness. I will try to give you the story as I experienced it.
I was in the market they speak of because I was in that market every day. I sell cloth, or I used to sell cloth when people had lives there, when the streets were safe, and there was money to spend. Yes, I know our leader was a brutal man and that he murdered thousands, maybe tens of thousands, but our city had peace for many years, and our market flourished, and I sold cloth. Then your soldiers came and told us they were bringing the flag of freedom. Still, all of these years later, the market is not safe; bombs go off, guns are fired. There is neither freedom nor peace.
Why, you ask, was I in the market that particular day? I repeat, I was in that market every day, for where else would I go? I had gone there every morning for thirty years. My father sold cloth. My grandfather sold cloth, and so I sold cloth as well, lovely fabrics that traveled from the villages to the city, woven and embroidered, to be sewn into long shirts for men and dresses for women, long skirts that flowed around their legs when they danced. Yes, we do dance. Once we danced in joy. Not anymore. Fanatics and war. Now women cannot be seen on the streets without an escort. Now women get blown up by terrorist bombs. My daughter, did I tell you I had a daughter? Ah, I see from your expression that you already know this. Yes, I understand they believe that she was my motive to hurt people, but how is my one-legged daughter a reason to create more one-legged daughters? I do not understand this logic.
And so, you ask me again, and I say, No, I did not wear the dropped vest found near my stall in the market. No, I had no desire to harm anyone, let alone the people who bought my cloth, but I have said this before, and no one has believed me because we are all the same to them. You think we all look alike, and what does it matter if they pick up the wrong man as long as he looks right, is in the right place, lives in the right city, the right country—the country of terrorists? But your actions helped create such a country, so perhaps you should jail your politicians and generals. Not an innocent cloth seller.
How long have I been detained? I have been here for four years, two months, nine days, and I will be here until they let me go. Or not. That is how destiny works. I am just a tiny speck in the enormous fate of the world.
Thank you, you say, promising to print my story in your magazine.
I wish you a safe journey home.
Cellblock B 10:00 p.m.
I unfold my blanket and touch my head to the ground. I pray for the innocent children of this world, and then I go to sleep.
About the author: Vati loves nothing more than to write and has been writing in some form most of her life. Though currently bedridden, her imagination travels daily. She has a finished novel for which she is trying to find a home and is working on a collection of flash. She was a founding editor and writer for Stone Walls II journal and is a longtime member of Straw Dog Writers Guild. Her novella was published in Scarlet Leaf Review.
Contact her at vatisreiberg@gmail.com