April 9, 2008

With her cell phone glued to her ear, Shada is pacing up and down the courthouse hall.

“We need to do everything we can to get Nujood out of the clutches of her husband. We must alert the press, the women’s groups…”

After she finishes her call, she leans down to me, crouching to put herself at my height.

“Don’t be afraid, Nujood. I’ll help you get your divorce.”

No one has ever shown so much concern for me before.

Shada is a lawyer. People say she’s a very important lawyer, one of the best lady lawyers in Yemen, who fights for women’s rights. I look at her, my eyes wide with admiration. She’s beautiful, and so sweet. Her voice is a little shrill, and if she talks quickly, it’s only because she’s in a great hurry. She smells of nice perfume, with the scent of jasmine. As soon as I saw her, I liked her. Unlike the women in my family, she doesn’t cover her face, and that’s rare in Yemen, not wearing the niqab. Shada wears a long, black, silky coat, with just a colored scarf on her head. Her skin glows, and her lipstick makes her look chic, like ladies in films. And when she wears her sunglasses, she looks like a movie star. What a contrast to all those veiled women out in the streets!

“With me, you’ve nothing to fear,” she says, patting my face reassuringly.

Shada approached me this morning as soon as she spotted me. When everyone returned to work at the courthouse after the weekend, she heard all about me, and was very upset by my story. She decided that she absolutely had to meet me. I was in the courtyard when she called out to me.

“Excuse me, are you the little girl who came looking for a divorce?”

“Yes, that’s me.”

“Heavens! Follow me; we simply have to talk,” she said.

So much has happened these last few days that my head is still in a whirl. During the entire weekend- Thursday and Friday, in Yemen-Judge Abdel Wahed and his wife were especially good to me. I was treated to toys, tasty food, hot showers, and good-night kisses, like a real child. Inside the house, I even had permission to take off my married woman’s veil, the one my mother-in-law makes me adjust as soon as it starts to slip. What happiness, not to fear blows from a stick, or tremble at the thought of going to bed, or flinch at the slightest sound of a door closing. Yet in spite of all this kind attention, my nights are still very uneasy, because as soon as I fall asleep, I feel as though the storm were lying in wait for me, and if I close my eyes for too long, the door might fly open again, and the monster return. What terror, what suffering! Judge Abdel Wahed says that this is normal, that I’ll need time to forget all my pain.

When he brought me back to the courthouse on Saturday morning, it was hard to return to reality. At nine o’clock we were already sitting in his office, along with the other two judges, Abdo and Mohammad al-Ghazi, who smiled kindly at me when I came in. But here’s the thing: Mohammad al-Ghazi was very worried.

“According to Yemeni law, it is difficult for you to file a complaint against your husband and your father,” he told me.

“Why is that?”

“It’s a little complicated for a child your age, and hard to explain,” he answered. Then he talked about several obstacles. Like many children born in Yemeni villages, I didn’t have any identification documents-not even a birth certificate. And I was too young to initiate proceedings against anyone. Such reasons were easy for a learned man like Mohammad al-Ghazi to understand, but not me. Still, I felt, I ought to keep a positive outlook; at least I had found some nice judges who wanted to help me. After all, they were not obliged to take up my case and could have ignored my plight, as many others had, and advised me to go home to fulfill my duties as a wife. A contract had been signed, and unanimously approved by the men of my family. According to Yemeni tradition, it was therefore valid.

“For the moment,” Mohammad al-Ghazi told his colleagues, “we must act quickly. So I suggest that we place Nujood’s father and husband under temporary arrest. If we want to protect her, it’s better to have them in prison than at liberty.”

Prison! That’s very serious punishment. Would Aba ever forgive me? I was suddenly consumed with shame and guilt. And I felt dreadful when they asked me to go with the soldier who would arrest them, to make sure he found the right address. My family hadn’t seen me all weekend and must certainly have thought that, like my brother Fares, I had run away forever. I didn’t even want to imagine what my mother must have wondered when my brothers and sisters started clamoring for the bread I’d been sent to buy for breakfast. Besides, I was thinking about how my father had recently fallen ill, and had even begun coughing up blood. Could he survive imprisonment? If he were to die, I’d never forgive myself.

But I had no choice. Abdo had explained to me that when people are suffering, the evildoers must be punished. So I got into the car with the soldier. When we arrived at my parents’ house, however, the door was locked. I felt strangely relieved, and a few hours later, when the soldier went back there, he no longer needed me to show him the way.

That very evening, the judges decided to find a safe place for me to stay. In Yemen there are no shelters for girls like me, but I couldn’t very well remain forever with Abdel Wahed and his family, who had already done so much for me.

“Who is your favorite uncle?” one of the judges asked.

My favorite uncle? I thought the best choice would be Shoyi, Omma’s brother, a former soldier in the Yemeni army, now retired: a big, strong man with a certain prestige in my family. He lived in Beit Boss, a neighborhood far from ours, with his two wives and seven children. True, he hadn’t opposed my marriage, but he represented the forces of order, in a way-and he, at least, did not beat his daughters.

Shoyi was not very talkative, which suited me fine. He didn’t ask me too many questions, and he let me play with my cousins. That evening, before falling asleep, I thanked God for not allowing Shoyi to reproach me for my boldness, or even mention my running away. Basically, I think my uncle was as discomfited as I was by the whole thing.

The next three days seemed long to me, full of the same tedious things. I spent most of my time at the courthouse, hoping for a miracle, some unforeseen solution. Unfortunately, the future wasn’t clear. The judges had promised to do their utmost to grant me a divorce, but they needed time. It’s funny, but going every day to that big, bustling courtyard, I finally became used to the tremendous crowd that had so impressed me at first. I could recognize the young tea and juice vendors even at a distance. The boy with the scale was always busy weighing visitors who had time to kill, and now I sometimes smiled encouragingly at him. As for me, though, whenever I returned to the courtyard I felt a pang of discouragement. How many times would I have to go there before I could again become just an ordinary little girl? Abdo had warned me that my case was most unusual. But what do judges do when faced with one like that? I had no idea.

But I believe I am learning the answer from Shada, the beautiful lawyer with sunglasses. When she came up to me for the first time, I saw how she looked at me with great emotion before exclaiming “Heavens!” Then she checked her watch, opened her appointment book, and completely rearranged her heavy schedule. She began calling her family, friends, and colleagues; several times I heard her say, “I have to take on an important case, a very important case.”

This woman seems to have endless determination. Abdel Wahed is right: she’s an impressive lawyer. She must have lots of power; her cell phone never stops ringing, and everyone she encounters always greets her very politely.