The sunrise shone through the cracks of the thatched roof and onto their faces. Farida was the first to awaken, and the first face she saw was her husband who was still asleep. She looked over her shoulder to see her son also asleep. She gently woke up her husband and whispered to him, "Sammy, time to get up."

He turned to face her, smiled and said "of course it is. I had the most beautiful dream of us sitting on the beach, not a care in the world. Just you, me and our little junglee."

"Don't say that," she replied playfully. "He's ours like it or not."


They both laughed quietly to not wake the baby, they smiled, and stared at each other in silence. After a moment she interrupted it, "if Bari doesn't make it today ill go to the market today and get it myself." 

He nodded his head in agreement and got up to get ready for his day. 


Outside of one chaotic outburst, the morning was fairly pleasant for Farida. With the baby on her back she left her home and headed towards the market. On her way she saw a group gathered close to the beach performing the traditional Reguregu rights. This was the indigenous Fijian burial rights, as she paused to take in the scene she felt a heaviness overcome her. She walked up to the market to grab a few things along with her milk. The village market was run by a woman that she was familiar with from their motherland. So she asked "Aunty, who passed away?"

The lady answered "it's that wonderful boy Bari, so sad he was just found in front of his home by his mother. So very sad." 


Bari? Farida paused and thought to herself, this is really very sad, he was such a kind person. Without another thought she said out loud, "Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un," grabbed her basket and proceeded home. 


She wasn't very close to Bari, but she liked him very much and felt a deep sadness that she couldn't shake, and without anyone close by to share it with, she kept walking back home to prepare dinner for her family. 


The moment she stepped through the door, the cries began. She had a relatively quiet morning but she knew that was momentary. Now she had to continue on with her day with a heavy heart and a baby that was not going to relent. After about an hour of of constant fuss, her exhausted baby, who's cheeks were flushed red finally gave up and went to sleep. 


Farida sat there in silence, collecting her thoughts and emotions and tried to piece together how this young man passed. She was unsatisfied feeling unresolved but she concluded that she would wait for her husband to come home, and see if he would ask the people in the village what had happened to him. 


She got up off of the mat that she was sitting on, opened the door to let in the ocean breeze, turned on the radio and tried not to think about it. She felt a little peace knowing Sameer would be able to get an answer. 


These next few hours for her were always the longest. With the house kept, dinner prepared and baby asleep it would be another 5 hours before her husband returned from work. She also knew it was just a matter of time before her baby would be consuming all of her attention. She let herself relax and let her thoughts drift away. Her eyes slowly began to close when she was jolted warm awake by someone running on the gravel towards her open door, she jumped up and bolted to the open entrance but there was no one in sight. She took a few steps out and looked around, but there was no one, confused she walked back into the home and felt chills rush through her entire body. 


That same instant Aleem yelled out and began crying hysterically. She rushed over to him, scooped him up into her arms and began trying to soothe her baby. She sang to him, tried feeding him, tried laying with him, but not today. This wasn't going to be an easy fix, and this Momma was prepared for it. She went through her usual routine of baby calming activities, but no progress. 


After an hour of attempts she had to put him down, and give herself a chance to collect her emotions. She thought of the funeral and thought to herself…

"Maybe we were too close to the Reguregu."

"Is it the black magic Aunty was talking about?"

"Did we bring something home with us?"

"Why would anyone want to do this to us?"


The thoughts flooded her brain but nothing was fitting into place. All of these things were racing through her brain to the soundtrack of Aleem screaming his lungs out. She went to her baby and pleaded with him, she even tried to bribe him, she was really at her wits end. 


She tried one more time to feed him, no luck, she picked him up again, began to pace with him, and his volume began to lower, and he started to catch his breath, in the distance there was a very faint sound of bottles clinking. In an instant Aleems eyes widened, he stared at the open door like he saw a ghost. She noticed his reaction and whipped around to look at the opening but there was no one there. 


She thought she was hearing things as the volume of the bottles clinking got louder. The calm was momentary as the baby erupted into a volume of crying so loud that she actually had to turn her head away from him. She was getting overwhelmed, all of the sounds were flooding her brain and she was beginning to panic. She put the baby down on the chatai, took a step back and yelled "Aleem stop right now or I'm going to call Bari!!"


Aleem looked at her, and immediately fell silent, she exhaled deeply, she regretted using his name but she had no patience left. Immediately after that there were two loud steps that crunched the gravel right outside her door. All the blood left her face, she stood there paralyzed, Aleem was fixated at the open entrance, she was too scared to turn around, as she did she heard an unforgettable voice that sent shockwaves through her body…."Yadra Farida" 


Written by Arif Ali