“Why did you wait all this time to tell me this?” asked Abbas with tears in his eyes. “I was so scared you would leave me and I was afraid to lose you” replied Fatimah with a trembling voice. “Please! You have to believe me. It was a stupid mistake and I have completely repented. I love you and you are the only person I have left in the whole world.”

“If you did love me you would have told me from the beginning Fatimah” shouted Abbas as he tried hard to recover from the shock. “You’re not a virgin! How could this be?” murmured Abbas to himself. She’s not a virgin! He stood in the middle of the room like a man with past deeds darker than his own shadow. Something lurked deep within his chest. He kept thinking to himself if this was karma.

“I thought you were the one for me” suddenly blurted out Abbas. “I am still the one and this doesn’t change anything.” insisted Fatimah. “Why does it have to be so horrific? Is it because I’m a girl? What about you haven’t you ever done any evil deeds you wish you could take back?”

“People will talk if the man you sinned with appears and spreads the truth about you. They will all point at me and say there goes the man who married a whore! If we have children, people will eventually point at them and call them the children of a whore too” said Abbas angrily. “But I’m not a whore and you know that! Even if I was a virgin, anyone who is anybody that has hostility towards me or you could spread rumours. People will always talk, so who cares if they do? We love each other and that is all that matters.” insisted Fatimah again desperately. It was pointless. Abbas wasn’t in the room anymore. All that remained there were shadows — dark, creepy and confused shadows.
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The above is a short piece I wrote 2 years ago during a “bumpy” time in which I was refining my ideologies regarding certain aspects of morality. I’ve got many similar pieces scattered around written on different forms of media. One day I shall compile them all and come up with a decent novel. The day it gets published, I’ll cancel it from my “to do before I die” list.

In Sudan and much of the Muslim world it’s a huge deal marrying a girl who’s not a virgin. There’s something I don’t like about this picture. Society subconsciously paints itself using a selective choice of paints. Men don’t get the same “dirty looks” that girls do and I don’t think that’s fair. After all it’s the men who go around “banging” the women don’t they not? In the context of the society where I come from, such attitudes are so very hypocritical in my opinion to the extent that they heavily disgust me sometimes. Truth be told, almost all the horny “bangers” banging other men’s daughters and sisters with their “weapons”, would literally bang anyone who simply dares to get sexual thoughts over their daughters or sisters. This literal banging would be carried out with a diverse variety of weapons. This literal banging would be done with the sole purpose of punishing other men for misusing their “weapons”. Moreover this literal banging would be carried out in the name of honor. “Honor”, a lovely word that means different things to different people. It’s a word easily interchangeable with the word “virginity”. I find it rather very funny and slightly depressing too or vice versa depending on my mood when I think about it. Where’s the honor in punishing someone for a crime the punisher himself is guilty of? Where?