Karma Unleashed: Chapter 2
The suburbs had lost their charm, and so did life in the United States
Friends,
Thank you for being on this journey for me. So far, you have read:
So, without further ado, here is Chapter 2.
If you have the time to read this, I would be really grateful if you could send me your feedback.
Chapter 2
Days turned into weeks, weeks into months, and when a year passed, Karma started to get antsy. The suburbs had lost their charm, and so did life in the United States. The streets were too quiet. The neighbors were boring. The shops had nothing new to offer, and she had already finished watching her favorite shows. Her sex life was predictable. The honeymoon was over. Life in the US was no longer as charming as it had been portrayed in the movies. It was mundane, a mediocre existence.
She wanted more, and no, she didn't want to volunteer like Jamal suggested. She wanted kids, but despite their regular lovemaking, her period came every month, signaling her empty womb—her failure to achieve her purpose in life.
Jamal’s mom was also getting antsy. “What’s going on?” she asked Karma on the day she came to visit. They were both sitting on the front porch, sipping hot tea. Her gold earrings caught the light, blinding Karma. Why are you not pregnant yet?”
“We are not rushing,” Karma lied. What else could she say? That she was afraid she couldn’t bear children?
“Really? What are you doing? Is he ejaculating outside?”
Oh, God! Did Jamal’s mother really use the word ejaculation? “Yep,” said Karma more calmly than she felt, taking a sip from her tea.
But she couldn’t help but worry whether both her mind and her womb were deformed.
At night, Karma would rub her belly and wait for a vision, hoping to see herself pregnant, nursing a child, or swinging a toddler at a playground. Nothing. No visions came. Was her future childless? Could she ever bear to live with that scary thought?
Would she consider other options like adoption or surrogacy? No, no! She wanted to experience pregnancy, natural childbirth, and breastfeeding. She wanted to experience it all. Karma knew she would be a great mother. She had always loved kids and sometimes preferred their company over that of the adults. Children were pure and never judged her for her condition. She enjoyed playing with her younger cousins and her friends' younger siblings. She adored babies and loved to smell their heads. She was always curious to see if they would provide her with visions, and when they did, they were mostly positive: images of them on a playground or splashing in a pool. Karma was convinced there was a reason God gave women breasts, a womb, and round hips. Women were created to bear and feed children with their bodies. Women were never meant to be childless.
She thought about her mother and her struggles to have a second child. She remembered her mother talking about her issues to her friends. She remembered going to the doctor with her mother several times.
“Not sure there is anything we can do,” Dr. Fawaz told her mother at the end of her appointment when Karma was nine years old.
She remembered seeing her mom cry as they sat in the backseat of a hot cab with a smoking driver and windows that wouldn’t roll down.
She remembered her mom’s joy when she got pregnant a few months after the doctor’s visit and her devastation afterward.
“I just miscarried,” her mom had told her between tears. “I just lost my baby.”
Did she have her mom’s infertility issues? Was that the reason she couldn’t conceive? She panicked.
“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” Jamal told her a few days after her conversation with his mother as they were getting ready for bed. “We’ll figure it out. There are a lot of great doctors here. We’ll get checked out next week. I know a great doctor. Things will be okay.”
He hugged her and wiped the tears streaming down her face with his thumb.
“I love you. We’ll have a child soon. I’m sure of that,” he said, pressing his forehead to hers. “Doctors are performing miracles these days, and medicine has advanced beyond our imagination.”
Yes. He was a doctor. He’d know these things. She hugged him tightly, not wanting to let him go. Sometimes, she wondered if he wanted children as much as she wanted them or if he was okay with them being a childless couple forever. She wondered if his life in the US made him accepting of the idea of childless women—an oxymoron. Women should never be without children.
When their fertility tests came back as “undetermined,” Karma shut herself in her room.
“I can’t imagine my life without kids,” she said between sobs. “Remember when I said I wanted five children? I was serious. Now I can’t even have one! Don’t you see the irony here?”
“Sweetheart, who said we couldn’t have kids? There are lots of fertility treatments out there.” He tried to soothe her, but she felt like a failure.
“I’m so scared. So, so scared of all this fertility stuff—the tests, the needles, all of that. What if I go through all of this but still can’t have a child of my own? How cruel is that?”
“Shh, shh. Don’t talk like that. There are so many paths to explore. It’ll happen to us. I promise you.” He caressed her hair, then gave her a long kiss. “You know what, in the meantime, why don’t we start thinking about your restaurant? Remember, that was your dream? We can start looking for a location and investors, then hire a chef. You can recreate all your wonderful Arabic dishes, and you don't have to do much. You can hire a manager, and you just make decisions. This way, your time will be flexible.”
She pulled away from him. “Not now, Jamal. I’m not ready,” she said, her voice escalating. “Stop trying to distract me from what I really want.”
He backed up, hands held up like a criminal on one of the cop shows she liked. “Okay, okay, easy. No need to yell at me.”
She crossed her arms in front of her chest. “I’m not yelling. I’m just upset.”
“Fucking, hell, Karma!” he shouted. “I give you everything. Stop whining like a spoiled brat!” He got off the bed and left the bedroom, slamming the door behind him.
A sob traveled up her chest and croaked out of her throat. Karma was shocked by his outburst. She had never seen him angry like that. All her life, no one had ever shouted at her. Not even her dad, who mostly kept to himself and let his mom run the house affairs.
For once, she wished she could see a vision when she touched Jamal.
Karma slipped under the covers. She wanted to disappear. Cease to exist. She looked outside the window. It was pitch black and gloomy. The suburbs are no place to experience joy. The only sound she could hear was the chirping of the crickets and a faint dog bark. Her Apple Watch (a gift from Jamal on their one-month anniversary) said it was eleven o’clock. It was six in the morning in Bilaq. Too early, but she didn’t care.
She called her mom on Facetime.
“You mean, he just shouted?” asked her mom.
Shouting was an exaggeration, perhaps. But he had raised his voice. And his words were harsh. “He’s never talked like that to me before.”
She could hear her mom snicker. “Come on, Karma. Men get angry and yell all the time. That’s why they’re men. Would you rather him cry all day like a woman?”
“Of course not! It’s just . . . I’ve never seen him like this.” Leave it to her mom to be less than understanding.
Her mom raised her voice slightly. “Did he hit you?”
Karma was taken aback. “What? Definitely not!”
Her mom sighed. “Then, what’s the issue?”
“He has never done that before, and you know yelling can be traumatizing, too.”
Karma could see her mom’s eyebrows as they drew together. “Listen, habibti; men get worse by age. Their tolerance decreases, so brace yourself. We just have to tolerate them. God made us more patient. That’s why we are the ones to bear children.”
Karma sighed. Maybe Mr. Perfect American Husband had a flaw after all. In the grand scheme of things, she was lucky. Luckier than most women. “You’re right. I have to tolerate him.”
Karma went to bed early that night, thinking about what her mom had told her.
Women are more patient.
***
The next day, Jamal came home from work in a great mood. “Come outside,” he said cheerfully as he walked in the door.
She cocked her head. “Why?”
“I have a surprise for you. It’s in the car.”
She walked with him to their asphalt driveway, where their black Honda SUV was parked. He opened the back door, and there it was, a black puppy sitting quietly in the back seat.
“Thought he would keep you company,” said Jamal, smiling. “I’m sorry we bickered last night. I know you’re stressed about fertility treatments. Maybe a puppy will help for now.”
Karma looked at the puppy and didn’t know what to feel. She had never owned a dog before. What was she supposed to do with it?
Jamal touched her back, nudging her closer to the panting dog. “He’s a male lab. What do you think of the name Baladi?”
Karma climbed in the car. The dog whimpered and looked at her with sparkling eyes as he wagged his tail. She sat beside him, put her hand on his back, and petted him. As soon as she did that, a vision started to form in her head. She was about to begin suppressing it by replacing it with good memories, but then, without giving it a second thought, she let go. She was so exhausted and depressed that she let her guard down and let the actual vision take over her mind. She saw Baladi running off-leash in a vast green field and heard someone call his name. Baladi turned around and returned to his owner, who petted him and gave him treats.
The pet was happy.
The owner was happy.
The owner was her.
It was the first time she had seen herself in a vision.
“I like the name Baladi,” she told Jamal as she smiled.
Baladi—Arabic for “my home.”
*
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P.S: If you enjoyed this chapter, I think you'll love my novel They Called Me Wyatt—a speculative murder mystery set in Jordan and the U.S. You can grab your copy here. Thank you so much for your support!
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