Chapter 4
I read somewhere that if you can love the wrong person, imagine how much you would love the right
person. People may think that it’s sad that I wasn’t loved by a man. But to me, the sad thing was that
the men in my life didn’t allow me to love them.
I think we have a desire to have someone in our life who we can express our love to. We long to say
‘I love you’ without even knowing whether we actually love someone. With the way our generation was
brought up, we didn’t really know much about sexual attraction or chemistry. I would have rewarded
kindness with undying love. I was not looking for the most considerate man in the world, but someone
who would at least allow me to pamper him, and want my attention.
As a newly-married 19-year-old, I was pushed away from showing affection by my first husband. Ijaz
was not just my husband, he was the first man in my life. I would keep an ear out for the bell of the
elevator to alert me to his arrival. I would rush to the door and hold it open to greet my husband with a
welcoming kiss. We were the only ones on the top of that building so there were no prying eyes. As I
would lean forward to kiss him, my husband would hold me back with his hands on my upper arms and
pull his head back, with clear distaste on his face.
I initially thought that it must be my hair or my breath. I was convinced that there was something
wrong with me. For the next twelve-and-a-half years, I would cook and then take a shower to make sure