God is Most Great. God is Most Great.

I testify that there is no god but God.

I testify that Muhammad is the Messenger of God.

Come to Prayer. Come to Felicity.

God is Most Great.

There is no god but God.

As Leila and I played a game of tag, racing between the two palm trees that marked the boundary of my father’s small property, I laughed with the fearless delight that only a child who knows no concerns can experience. I sometimes think that was the last moment of my life when I was totally innocent and unburdened, and there are days even now when I return to that tiny strip of land, the palm trees long since cut down, and remember.

My stomach had been hurting all day and I guessed that last night’s roasted lamb had not sat well with me. But when I ran through the yard, feeling the tiny blades of grass tickling my bare toes, the kiss of budding hyacinth and chrysanthemums at my ankles, I forgot all my discomfort in the unfettered joy of being alive.

I was faster than Leila, as I was faster than almost anyone I knew, and the poor girl was huffing and puffing with exhaustion as she desperately tried to catch hold of my skirt. I feinted and dodged her giggling attack with the agility that would have made a cheetah proud. But Leila was persistent and came after me with renewed vigor, when her foot was caught in the loop of a weed and she fell, scraping her knee against the warm, rich earth.

“Are you all right?” I called as I ran over to help.

Leila cried as if the foot had been amputated and I looked her over to check the extent of the injury. But as far as I could tell, she had just scraped her knee, not even broken the skin.

“Stop being silly,” I said, annoyed at her need for drama. “You’re not even bleeding.”

Leila sniffed and wiped her eyes, and then I saw her look at me with shock.

“But you are.”

With those three words, my childhood ended.

I glanced down to where she was pointing and froze. My dress had ridden up as I sat on the grass and a dark trickle of blood was running down my thigh.

THE NEXT FEW DAYS were uneventful, and I was in obstinate denial that anything had changed. I could hear my parents whispering urgently late into the night, but for once I was not curious as to what they were talking about. Perhaps it was because I already sensed in my heart that the life I had known was over. I was a woman now, and I was betrothed to a man. It was only a matter of time before those two realities would lead to an inevitable conclusion, but I didn’t want to face it. I kept playing with Leila and my dolls and stubbornly refused to don the scarf that adult Muslim women used to cover their hair in modesty. My mother decided not to press the point, letting me have a few days where I could pretend to be a child still.

Of course, in truth I was still a child. At the age of nine, my menses had come a year or two earlier than most girls’, which perhaps should have been anticipated, as my breasts had begun budding in earnest a few months before. But my heart was that of a little girl. And my father and mother had gone out of their way to let me stay that laughing, dancing child who could put a smile on their faces when the burdens of age pressed down upon them.

But everything comes to an end. We can either fight that truth and be consumed in grief, or we can surrender and flow to the new world that the river of life is taking us. Surrender is what I had been taught since my earliest days, for that was the meaning of Islam itself-surrender to the Will of God.

I was playing on the seesaw with Leila when the time came

“Aisha! Come inside!” my mother called one afternoon.

I could hear a catch in her throat, a suppressed welling of emotion. In that moment, I knew what was happening, and I surrendered. I climbed down from the seesaw and kissed Leila tearfully, as if saying good-bye forever, and then walked with my head bowed back into the house.

29

My mother and Asma washed my face with clear well water they had gathered in an iron pot. They made me change out of my play clothes and helped me put on a new red-and-white-striped gown that they said had been imported from the tiny island kingdom of Bahrain to the east. This was to be my wedding gown. I would be married tonight to the Messenger of God. And at the tender age of nine, I was about to become a Mother of the Believers, a revered status in this world and the hereafter. Yet I felt small and unworthy, unready for the responsibility.

My mind raced with questions to which I had no answer. How was I going to be a wife in any sense of the word to a man over forty years my senior, whose own daughters were older than me? And how could I, who barely knew a handful of verses of the Qur’an by heart, serve as any kind of spiritual guide or mentor to the Muslims? I remembered my parents’ conversation from years before, when my father had said that Gabriel had announced my wedding to the Prophet in a vision. Surely the angel had a made a mistake! For the past three years, I had let that story of the Messenger’s dream puff me up with vanity and pride, but now I wanted nothing more than to be forgotten and ignored.

As my mother closed the clasp of my dress around my neck, it felt as if she were putting a shroud over me. She kissed me on the forehead and smiled, and I wanted to smile back but I could not remember how.

My father entered, wearing a long yellow robe and turban. His shoulders were stooped lower than usual, and he nervously pulled at his wispy beard, which was dyed red with henna. Abu Bakr looked at me in my striped dress, a saffron veil covering my hair, and I could see tears welling in his eyes.

He held out his hand. I clasped his palm, felt the familiar roughness of the calluses that cracked even as he squeezed my fingers. He said nothing, and neither did I. We walked out, hand in hand, followed by Umm Ruman and Asma, and strolled through the gently paved streets of Medina. I could smell jasmine in the air, sensuous and pleasing. But it did not alleviate my fear, the fear of every virgin on her wedding night. I had learned the facts of life by watching the stray dogs in the alleys of Mecca and had always found the idea that men and women did the same both amusing and repulsive. I had heard that the first night was painful for many women, and I was suddenly terrified of whatever lay ahead. I wanted to run back to the safety of my bed and have my mother sing me to sleep with a lullaby.

As we walked through the streets, I saw eyes on me from every direction. Women wearing aprons emerged from their homes to gawk, and men in colorful tunics stared at me and then whispered to one another, perhaps acknowledging that the Messenger’s new wife was indeed as beautiful as rumor had it. I noticed that their eyes never went to plain Asma, and I felt a pang for her. I prayed in my heart that Zubayr would emigrate to Medina and marry her, so that the old matrons would stop clucking their tongues. The fact that I was ten years her junior and was marrying the most respected man in the city, while Asma lived alone pining for a love that might never be, added fuel to their catty gossip. The injustice of how women are judged, by their features rather than the character of their souls, never outraged me more than at that moment.

And then my thoughts stopped along with my breath as we stood before the Masjid. It was more of an open courtyard than a building proper, with walls made of mud brick and the trunks of palm trees. The sun had set an hour before and the Maghrib worship ceremony was finished, so the prayer ground was largely empty, except for a few devout men and women who were still kneeling in prayer. Their devotion and focus on Allah were so great that they paid no attention as my wedding party entered the courtyard.