I sit in the center of the soft bed strewn with rose petals, strings of jasmine forming a cloying canopy from the bedposts to the ceiling. The room, decorated for the consummation of my marriage, is one of the many guest rooms in Abba’s palatial house, his ancestral haveli. Yusuf, my husband, enters the room and sits beside me. He lifts the gold-embroidered dupatta drawn over my face in bridal tradition, tilts my chin up, and says “Mashallah” in admiration. As if he hasn’t seen my face before, as if he isn’t my second cousin, as if he hasn’t grown under Abba’s aegis. As if he doesn’t ride in my father’s imported cars, doesn’t command his goons, doesn’t partake in his entitled endeavors.
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