The Esther Paradigm (A Contemporary Christian Romance) Read online

  Karim had never made me feel like that. Until today. And knowing that even he wished I were someone else…

  It cut deep.

  Had he been harboring those thoughts for long? When he’d married me, had he wished I were Maleka? Or at least more like her? Did he long for me to be more compliant and less independent? More meek and less vivacious?

  When he held me at night, when we made love, was it Maleka who filled his thoughts, haunted his memories? Had she pleased him more than I did? Did he yearn for her while holding me?

  In how many ways was I a disappointment to him?

  I opened my eyes and sniffed. Lawrence refused to appear and distract me with his escapades of wartime bravery.

  Would Esther be as stubborn, or would she be accommodating? Maybe she would even understand.

  Though our stories were separated by centuries, we had a lot in common. She was also a foreigner in a foreign land. Her husband had also been married before. Although, in one point I conceded to an advantage. Esther shared her husband, King Ahasuerus, with not only his previous wife’s memory but also a number of concubines.

  I shuddered at the thought of sharing my husband with other women in that way.

  I could see her in my mind though, in the palace, in her room, handmaidens around her, fanning her with palm branches. Gold bracelets encircled her wrists, an intricate crown upon her head. Turning my thoughts from reality, from the pressure in my chest and my view of the backside of the camel in front of me in the caravan, I journeyed into my imagination. My escape.

  Esther’s delicate face scrunched slightly, worry lining her brow. I was a spectator to this drama, notwithstanding it was one of my own making. But I could not converse with her, could not ask her all the questions I’d gathered every time I’d heard her story.

  Did the king love her, or was it merely her beauty that had caused him to name her queen? Had she loved him in return?

  The crease in her brow deepened, and my questions turned more to the moment. Or rather, which moment. Had she just found out about Haman’s nefarious plans? Something that would destroy all of her people. Or was her distress even more personal? Was her husband now visiting one of his concubines? Something that would without a doubt destroy her heart.

  The pressure in my chest increased, twisted, like a rag between two hands that sought to wring out every drop of water from it. As if I were feeling the betrayal Esther must have felt.

  And wasn’t I? Karim didn’t want me. He wanted Maleka.

  I fisted my hand and pressed it against my mouth to keep in the sob. I didn’t want my pain to become public knowledge. The teary-eyed American who couldn’t pull it together, who couldn’t make the journey like a real Bedouin—the men in the caravan would compare me to the handful of other women journeying among them. The ones who worked just as hard for everyone’s survival and did it with dignity and perseverance. It would just be another instance in which I’d fall short.

  The only way to move forward was to learn from the past. No one wanted me to be me. Instead they wanted me to be more submissive, less headstrong, quieter, gentler, meeker. My parents had called it a mirror, a reflection of Christ. But no matter how much I tried, I’d always fall short of being like Jesus. Even when I emptied myself and filled myself again with the Holy Spirit, the vessel was still a broken, sinful human.

  So I’d stitch closed the rip in my heart Karim’s words had opened. I’d don the robes of humility, meekness, submission. Hide myself under the covering of these cloths.

  I’d be all things to all people and nothing to myself.

  Underneath my breath I whispered goodbye to the Hannah nobody wanted.

  Chapter 16

  Karim

  Tension crackled on the air more than the fire in front of us. Samlil regaled the group with another tale, this time a folklore passed down from generation to generation. The others sat in rapt attention as he wound the story through its intricate details. My ears were closed to the telling, tuned only to Hannah beside me. I’d asked again for a story from her about America, her time there, if she wished, or the land of her birth in general. It had become a special time between us these last evenings. Though I knew her well, a lot could happen to change a person in six years. Through her stories, I felt she was opening up those missing pages of her life where I’d been missing.

  But that book was shut to me now. She hadn’t denied my request for a story, but what she’d shared, the simple descriptions of the rolling hills of Tennessee, were impersonal and lacked the depth and openness of our previous times around the fire.

  I’d apologized earlier for my thoughtless words, and I’d do it a thousand times more if it would build a bridge across this rift I’d created between us.

  I picked up her hand and studied her unresponsive fingers. She didn’t flinch at my touch, of which I should be grateful, yet neither did she lean into it as she’d begun to do. My heart squeezed at the loss. My loss, yes, but more so hers.

  I had shattered her trust. Broken her in some way that all that remained in my hand was an empty shell.

  My Hannah had a voice that spoke against injustice. And surely I had not been just with my words. She should be yelling at me, putting me in my place.

  I gazed around the group gathered. Perhaps in private she would feel secure enough to speak from her heart, and we could find a way together to make this right.

  As I’d done every night, I stood and offered my hand to her, wishing those around the fire a good night. She slipped her palm against mine, her gaze cast to the ground as I led her away from listening ears and prying eyes.

  Earlier I’d arranged our bedding close enough to the others for protection, far enough away for privacy. I led her to the pallet and pulled her down beside me.

  Without a word, she unwound the hijab from her head and finger-combed her long, silky tresses. Taking up a brush, I scooted on my knees behind her and gathered her mane in one hand, running the teeth of the brush from the crown of her head to the tips of her hair that rested near her waist.

  “I’m sorry again for what I said. I take my words back.”

  She didn’t move to look at me, but her shoulders slumped a little. I didn’t want them to slump. I wanted them to snap like a whip ready for a fight.

  “Words of truth should never be unspoken.”

  “And words of anger should never be spoken at all.”

  Her body shifted. Even in the dim light of a waning moon on a cloudless night, the pain in her eyes shone. “Sometimes anger is what is needed to show the reality of one’s heart.”

  She started to turn away, but I caught her hand. Pressed it to my chest. I could feel my pulse through her fingers. “That is not the reality of my heart. It has never and will never beat for Maleka.”

  Her chin dropped to her chest, the hair I’d been brushing a veil over her face. I lifted the hand covering hers to tuck the strands behind her ear. The moment my grip no longer anchored her palm, it fell from my chest to her lap.

  I stared at her profile, willed her to turn her face toward me.

  “I don’t want to fight, Karim. Besides, if I’d listened to you in the first place, none of this would’ve happened.”

  “You are not to blame. I lost control, and that is unacceptable.”

  “We should just forget it ever happened.” She removed her shoes and tucked her feet under her legs.

  “Pain is not easily forgotten by the one who feels it or the one who unintentionally inflicts it. We cannot simply choose a memory or feeling away.”

  She lay down on her side, her back to me, and curled her legs up to her stomach. “I’m tired.”

  Should I continue to press or let it go? Perhaps this was her way to cope. Though I wished to talk about the matter, perhaps she needed time and space to deal with it on her own.

  I bent down and kissed her forehead. “Sleep well, wife.” Turning, I laid on my back and stared up into the starry sky.

  Tension radiated like hea
t off Hannah’s back, and the bond of our souls seemed stitched with discord.

  I didn’t like it. Not one bit. But what could I do, if anything?

  As the night deepened, life in the desert awoke. Hiding under the sand from the death rays of the burning sun, wildlife found safety at night. Relative safety, for both prey and predator alike emerged at this time. When the first glow of morning crested the horizon, the ocean of sand would bear the mark of the tiny footprints of the scarab beetle. Perhaps even the sideways serpentine pattern of a horned viper in search of a small rodent like a jerboa to feast on.

  My thoughts were as active as the desert nightlife around me. When the sun arose, they’d return to their hiding places and shelters of safety. I, on the other hand, could not bury my head in the sand. My problems would not go away at morning light. Still there would be threats looming against the Pratt family. Still our flocks would be suffering from an unknown disease.

  I glanced at Hannah’s sleeping form beside me.

  Still my wife’s heart would be broken by my own hand.

  When we were children, what had returned a smile to her lips after a trying time? I racked my brain to remember. There had to be something. A lot had been asked of her when she and her parents had received permission to live among us as one of our own. Hospitality is a way of life for our people, but the Pratts hadn’t sought lodging for a time or season, but for good. Hannah and her parents had been willing and the clan patient, but there had been times, for Ethan and Elizabeth as well as Hannah, when the expectations had been a little too high and the allowances a little too low.

  What was something that had eased Hannah’s hurt in such cases? Something that brought the joy and vibrancy back into her life?

  Singing.

  Like a melody on the wind, I remembered her girlish, high-pitched voice raised in song followed quickly by fits of laughter. Sometimes Elizabeth would start the song and coax the lyrics out of Hannah. But once she got going, the silliness of her songs never failed to wrap around her and fling away the melancholy.

  One particular time I’d found her down in a wadi, her arms hugging her bent knees pressed tightly against her chest. As I’d descended toward her, I’d heard the telltale sniffs. Then she lifted her head and seemed to stare off into the distance for a few moments before she started to sing. The song was in English, and while I could catch a word here or there, ultimately I hadn’t a clue about what she’d sung. The ending of the verses seemed to conclude with similar sounds, and after three or four verses, she burst into laughter.

  I sat beside her and asked what she’d been singing, but she only tilted her head and looked at me funny. No surprise. Her family had been with us a few short months by then, and Hannah’s Arabic had been about as good as my English.

  I sang a few generic notes and shrugged my shoulders, then pointed at her, hoping my rudimentary sign language would cross our communication barriers. Light dawned behind her eyes in understanding, and she sang another verse.

  I shrugged my shoulders again, at which she pursed her lips to the side in response. She concentrated for a moment, and then her whole face brightened. She sprinted to a nearby bush and found a small stick in the underbrush. After she returned to my side, she pushed the point of the stick to the ground and began to draw pictures.

  The first was an oval with stripes. Which didn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. Next, she drew the tail of a whale. I knew because my father had once taken me to the coast and we’d seen the native group of humpbacks. On the tail, she drew lots of small circles.

  I looked at her, brows low over my eyes. Either there was something I wasn’t getting, or American songs were seriously crazy.

  The third picture was of a flying bug of some sort with something hanging down from around its neck.

  Hannah had dropped her stick and covered her giggles with her hand, and I’d left as puzzled as before.

  Later, when we both were more familiar with the other’s native languages, I’d asked her about the song. Apparently the striped oval was a watermelon that grew by a bay where there was a horde of silly animals that wore silly clothes and did silly things.

  Even after I understood her words, I didn’t understand the song. I never understood any of the songs. A particular favorite of hers being a ballad a cucumber sang about his undying love for his lips.

  Americans were weird.

  The chirp of a locust rubbing its legs together filled the night’s silence.

  Maybe if I caught him he could accompany Hannah tomorrow when I asked her to share another of her nonsensical songs with me.

  Chapter 17

  Hannah

  I awoke with my eyes gritty. As if sand had made its way behind my lids in the middle of the night and danced along my irises. I sat up and rubbed the heel of my palms against my closed eyes, hoping my tear ducts would do their job and wash away the discomfort. Water was scarce, and I didn’t want to have to ask for some merely so I could rinse out my eyes.

  I lowered my hands and blinked rapidly. There, that was better.

  Or maybe not. Without the physical discomfort, I was no longer distracted and was keenly aware of a deeper pain. Or lack thereof. A void really. Emptiness. Hollow. As if I had gotten up and walked out on myself, and yet here I still was.

  I shook my head, knowing my thoughts sounded crazy. How could I be both gone and here? Body and spirit could not be separated. Yet, that was what it felt like.

  I shook my head again, harder this time. Feeling sorry for myself would get me nowhere. It wasn’t going to come up with lesson plans, something I probably should have been doing on these countless miles rather than conjuring up images of Lawrence of Arabia. No one looked favorably upon wallowing. The next time I was pitted against another in a brutal game of comparison, it would only tether about my legs like an anchor and sink me.

  Karim crested the nearby knoll, two small steaming mugs in his hands.

  Didn’t matter the rations, there was always coffee. I grinned as I accepted the cup and forced out a cheerful “Good morning!”

  Karim didn’t think I could bury the memory of him comparing me to Maleka. I’d prove him wrong. I’d tuck that little gem along with all the others into the deep, dark recesses. A locked door I never opened.

  “I was thinking,” Karim said as he drained his coffee in one shot. “I haven’t heard you sing since you came back.”

  My heart froze in my chest.

  I’m sorry, Hannah. We’ve chosen April to fill the soprano spot. Maybe you can try again next year. The memory leaked under that closed door like smoke from a burning building. I hadn’t tried out the next year, or any year. I hadn’t sung at all after that. I wasn’t any good, and no one wanted to hear me. To be fair, I hadn’t given up after one setback. That had just been the last rejection I could take.

  I glanced at Karim. He stared at me in that searching, serious way of his.

  “I’ve, uh, been busy, is all.” I deflected. “With the attack on my parents and the wedding. You understand.”

  “Of course.”

  I exhaled, relived I’d darted around that mine.

  “We have a few moments now, before we need to pack up and head out.”

  My pulse thundered louder than the annual Bedouin camel races.

  “Teach me another one of your ridiculous songs that I can never understand.”

  I laughed, but it sounded high and squeaky to my ears. “If you won’t understand it anyway, then what’s the point?”

  I turned and began to pack up our belongings. The faster we were ready to go, the faster we could get going. I’d gladly mount that camel’s back if it meant Karim would drop this topic.

  Already he knew enough of my shortcomings. I didn’t need to add to the list. For all I knew, Maleka had the voice of an angel and he’d often sat and listened to her serenade him at night in the privacy of their shared bedroom. If I sang something even as nonconsequential as “Down by the Bay,” my go-to silly song of choi
ce when I was little, I’d be mortified if his lips turned down in disappointment.

  I couldn’t fail his expectations another time. Not so quickly after the camel-riding fiasco.

  “The point is they make you laugh.” He didn’t turn away when a flash of vulnerability entered his eyes. “I miss hearing that sound.”

  There hadn’t been much to laugh about lately. What was it I’d thought to myself after I’d realized it was Karim who stood before me after the sandstorm? After I’d registered the lines creasing his face had been there not from laughter but from hardship?

  A sigh escaped my lungs. I’d said, if anything, I’d wanted to see him smile more. Laughter was contagious. If he missed hearing it from me, then maybe he’d join in.

  I looked at him out of the corner of my eye, a sly grin spreading on my lips. Only one song would do. Win or lose, there would be a reaction.

  With an air of innocence, I opened my mouth and sang the song dreaded among all parents far and wide. The song that circled and circled but never ended. By the fourth go around, Karim’s brow quirked and the lyrics were leaving my mouth on bursts of giggles. But I didn’t give up. I kept singing. And singing. And singing. Until Karim doubled over in a fit of laughter, his hand held up in surrender.

  “Stop! I give up.” He wheezed. He planted his hands on his knees and looked up at me from his hunched position with a grin. “That one is worst of all.”

  I lifted my lips in a cheeky smirk. “I know.”

  He shook his head with another chuckle, then walked up to me and planted a firm kiss to my lips. When he raised his head, all mirth was gone. “Thank you. That was the best thing I’ve heard in a while.”

  Things shifted between us. Maybe not quite to the way they were, but the deep ache in my chest that had pulsed since Karim’s rejection lost a bit of its sting. I couldn’t hold on to it. Had already consciously decided not to. But this was more than just forgetting a hurt against me. Whereas I’d thought I’d need to say goodbye to who I was in order to make things work, Karim had remembered something about me that was all…me.