Chapter 8: The Apartment Confession
The cheap plywood door of Nada’s apartment shuddered under Mustafa’s frantic pounding, echoing in the hallway’s sterile quiet. He practically fell in when she opened it, his face a wet, crumpled mask of tears, his breath hitching in ragged gasps. The scent of oud incense curled around them, clashing violently with the sour tang of his sweat and despair. "She’s destroying herself, Nada!" he choked out, the words thick and broken, stumbling past her into the blend of sleek white Kuwaiti furniture and vibrant Sudanese cushions. His heavy frame collapsed onto her pristine white sofa, tears immediately soaking into the fabric. "That bastard… Fahad… he’s ruining her! Corrupting her! I heard…" His voice dissolved into wet, hacking sobs, shoulders heaving. "I heard everything on that call!"
Nada closed the door slowly, the click sealing them in with his misery. Her own face was drawn, shadows under her eyes mirroring the exhaustion in Ran’s, the memory of that Parisian dressing room call – Ran’s choked screams of humiliation mingled with pleasure, Fahad’s crude commands – still vibrating in her bones. She moved to the small, modern kitchenette, the hum of the traditional Sudanese radio a low, incongruous backdrop. "Coffee?" she asked, her voice flat, needing to do something, anything. He shook his head wildly, a helpless, broken motion. "I can’t… I can’t eat, I can’t sleep… Every time I close my eyes I see it… Him… inside her… the sounds she made… sounds she never…" He covered his face again, the sobs wracking him. "She liked it, Nada. She screamed for him."
Nada poured coffee anyway, the rich aroma doing nothing to dispel the fog of anguish. She brought the small cup to the low table but didn’t sit. She looked down at his shaking form, a profound weariness settling over her. The diamond choker Ran wore like a brand flashed in her mind. "She’s… caught in something, Mustafa," Nada said carefully, avoiding his shattered gaze, staring instead at a vibrant Kordofan tapestry on the wall. "It’s ugly. Poisonous. What he did to her on that call…" She swallowed, the memory raw. "It was vile. Degrading. But Ran… she went back for more."
"He owns her!" Mustafa wailed, looking up, his eyes red and swimming. "Like a fucking dog with that collar! She lets him!" The image was seared into him. "She comes home smelling of him… his fucking cigars, his sweat… his come!" He spat the last word, revulsion twisting his features. "And I… I tried, Nada. After she told me… I tried to…" He gestured helplessly, the memory of his own pathetic, tearful rutting against her indifference flooding back, hot with shame. "She just… lay there. Like I was nothing. Less than nothing."
Nada sighed, the sound heavy with shared defeat. She finally sat on the edge of an armchair across from him, the white leather cool beneath her. "I know," she murmured, the admission tasting bitter. "I saw her after. That choker… the bruises… the look in her eyes." She met his desperate gaze. "It’s a sickness, Mustafa. What he gives her… it’s twisted, but she craves it. She says he makes her feel… powerful. Alive. After feeling…" She trailed off, unable to voice the comparison to Mustafa’s inadequacy hanging thick in the air.
Mustafa flinched as if struck. "Powerful? Alive? While he treats her like a whore? While he fucks her in dressing rooms and makes her sister listen?!" His fists clenched on his knees, knuckles white. "She’s not safe! That man… he’s dangerous! He could hurt her! Really hurt her!" The fear broke through the heartbreak, sharp and primal.
Nada leaned forward, placing a hesitant hand on his trembling forearm. The touch felt alien. "She’ll come back to you, Mustafa," she said, the words feeling hollow even as she spoke them, a flimsy raft tossed into his sea of grief. She forced a semblance of reassurance she didn’t feel. "She will. This… fever… it has to break. And…" She took a breath, grasping for the one sliver of practicality she could offer, the one thing she’d desperately asked Ran. "Don’t worry. She’s safe. They’re… they’re using protection." It was a pathetic consolation, a tiny bandage on a gaping wound, but it was all she had. Mustafa stared at her hand on his arm, then up at her face, fresh tears welling, the awful knowledge of his wife being fucked raw by another man – safely, cleanly – etching deeper lines of agony into his features. The radio played a mournful Sudanese melody, the incense burned, and Mustafa’s broken weeping filled Nada’s carefully curated space.
The radio played a mournful Sudanese melody, the incense burned, and Mustafa’s broken weeping filled Nada’s carefully curated space. He clung to Nada’s words – protection – like a drowning man clutching driftwood, a fragile raft in the churning sea of images tormenting him: Fahad’s thick cock plunging deep into Ran, the wet slap of skin, the raw sounds ripped from her throat. That single word offered a sliver of sterile distance, a thin barrier against the visceral horror of Fahad’s seed flooding his wife’s cunt. He mumbled incoherent thanks, the lie a temporary balm smeared over his gaping wound, before stumbling back out into the humid Kuwaiti night, the phantom scent of Fahad’s expensive cologne clinging to his nostrils.
Mustafa waited three agonizing days, the lie about protection festering, morphing from comfort into gnawing suspicion. He cornered Ran as she emerged from the shower, a towel wrapped tightly around her, droplets clinging to her collarbone above the diamond choker. "Habibti," he stammered, blocking the bathroom doorway, his voice thick with desperate hope, "Nada said… she said you and… him… you use protection?" Ran paused, water dripping onto the cheap tiles, her expression utterly flat, bored. She met his pleading eyes without flinching. "Protection?" she echoed, a cold, dismissive laugh escaping her lips. "Fahad?" She shook her head slowly, water flicking from her damp hair. "He hates how condoms feel. Says it’s like fucking a plastic bag." She shrugged, the gesture casual, brutal. "He always comes inside me. Raw. Fills me up." She pushed past him, her damp shoulder brushing his chest. "Every single time."
The words hit Mustafa like a physical blow, driving the air from his lungs. Raw. Every single time. The fragile raft Nada offered shattered instantly, plunging him back into the drowning depths. "No!" he choked out, staggering backwards, his hand clutching his chest as if stabbed. "Ran… Habibti… no protection? At all?" Panic, cold and sharp, sliced through the heartbreak. "What if… what if you get pregnant?!" His voice rose to a shrill pitch, eyes wide with primal terror. Ran paused near the small fridge, pulling out a bottle of water. She took a long, slow sip, utterly unmoved by his escalating hysteria. "So?" she stated flatly, meeting his horrified gaze over the bottle. "If it happens, it happens." She turned away, dismissing him completely, leaving Mustafa trembling, his mind spiraling into visions of Ran swollen with Fahad’s child, the diamond collar still gleaming above her rounded belly. He slumped against the fridge, the cold metal seeping through his shirt, his breath coming in ragged, terrified gasps.
The cold metal against his back offered no relief; only the dizzying image of Ran swollen with Fahad’s child, the diamond collar mocking him above her belly, filled his vision. Panic, colder than the fridge, seized his throat. Protection. That single lie from Nada had shattered, revealing the raw truth: Fahad’s thick cock pumping his seed deep inside Ran, claiming her womb, over and over. "Every single time," her flat voice echoed, a death knell for his fragile hope. He pushed off the fridge, sweat slicking his palms, driven by a desperate, primal urge – he had to stop it. He had to.
Mustafa fled the suffocating apartment, the humid Kuwaiti air thick in his lungs, stumbling towards the blinding fluorescent glare of the 24-hour pharmacy down the scorching street. Shelves of brightly packaged medicines blurred as he scanned frantically, his breath shallow. "Emergency contraception," he finally choked out to the bored pharmacist, his face burning under the harsh lights, unable to meet the man’s eyes. "The day-after pill." The words tasted like ash. The pharmacist slid a small box across the counter; Mustafa fumbled with crumpled notes, snatched it, and fled back into the oppressive heat, the little box burning a hole in his pocket.
Back in the cramped kitchen, the air conditioner’s futile whine was the only sound. Ran sat at the small table, scrolling her phone, the diamond choker catching the dim light. Mustafa slammed the small white pharmacy box down beside her half-empty water bottle. His hand trembled violently. "Take this," he pleaded, his voice raw, cracking. "Please, Ran. After… after he… fucks you. Take it. So you don’t…" He couldn’t say get pregnant with his child. Ran slowly lowered her phone, her gaze traveling from the box to his sweating, desperate face. Utter contempt twisted her beautiful features. She picked up the box with two fingers, like it was soiled trash. "You pathetic little man," she sneered, her voice icy. With deliberate slowness, she tore the box open, shook the single pill into her palm, then dropped it onto the dirty linoleum floor. She ground it under the sharp heel of her sandal, crushing it into white dust. "Fahad’s seed belongs inside me," she stated, watching the powder smear. "Not some fucking pill you bought." Mustafa stared at the crushed remains on the floor, a sob ripping from his chest as his world crumbled.