2 Minute Worlds

The door was locked from the outside.

I was four, maybe four and a half. Schoolbag dangling from my neck. Standing in the alley, drowning in May sunlight.

I called out once. Then louder. Then so loud it scraped my throat:

Maa…a…a…!

Nothing. Just the empty street, hot and quiet, like the world had stepped out for a nap.

I don’t remember how long I cried. Long enough for my chest to ache. Then she appeared, running, folding me into her arms. She smelled like rice and worry. That night she didn’t stop cursing herself, telling everyone: “The child was alone… I was only giving the neighbor Qur’an rice… she trapped me in her chatter…”

It wasn’t her fault. But it wasn’t mine either.

After that, no matter how old I got, the first thing I asked when I came home was: “Where’s Ammi?”

“She’s in the kitchen.”

“She’s on the roof, drying chilies.”

“She’s in her room, folding things.”

Every answer calmed the crying child inside me.

The truth? We never really saw her eat. Or rest. She fed us like it was oxygen, and maybe that was her meal: feeding, feeding, feeding until her hunger just disappeared. Our mothers were magicians. The new generation doesn’t get those kinds of mothers. Time, I guess, ran out of stock.

Once, my little brother fainted from fever. He fell in the courtyard. Mother saw him drop—and she dropped too. He woke up fast. She didn’t. We shook her, begged her. “Ammi, he’s fine. Look, nothing happened.” She opened her eyes, saw me, pulled me into her chest like she wanted to crush me into safety. That was the second time she hugged me like that. The first was outside the locked door.

Years later, in Makkah, she vanished in the crowd. Half an hour, gone. That half hour was a lifetime. When she finally reappeared, her face swimming out of the masses, I screamed like a child again: Maa…a…!

She grabbed me, pressed me against her. Comforted me, comforted herself. Same hug, same magic.

And then last night, in a dream—or maybe not a dream—the alley was back. The May sun burning. The door locked. Empty street. I screamed: Maa…a…!

But no one came running.

The latch stayed fastened.

The street stayed empty.

The child kept sobbing.

The sun of memory kept blazing.

Whenever I hear someone call out to their mother, something inside me cracks open. I remember mine. My chest twists. I can’t breathe. It feels like my heart will explode.

But I tell no one.