Unborn Brothers and Estranged Sisters

April 17, 2008 3pm — Glendale Memorial Hospital

I’ve been in the waiting room of the maternity ward for over two hours. My dad’s new wife has been in labor since the night before. As my father paced back and forth in overwhelming anxiety, I sat in my place with the calmest sense of both peace and fear. “I’m going to have a baby sister”, I repeated softly to myself. This was a day I had been waiting for for most of my life. I’m an older sister to a brother who is less than two years younger than me, and I had always wanted a baby sister. Heck, I just wanted a baby in the family — a baby I could hold and cuddle and love, a baby I could play with and change its diapers and feed soft purees while it spit half of it out as I laughed. My mother had always told me that ever since I was in the 3rd grade, instead of calling me away from my friends to go home, she would find me pushing a child at least 3 years younger than me on a swing, or sitting them on my lap as I hugged them and played with them. I think my love for younger children goes back farther than that.

I always prayed to God for Him to send me a baby sister, and that day, He was answering my prayers.

March 1997 7:30pm — Monterey Park Home

My mother is across the room lying on the couch, clenching her swollen stomach, releasing the loudest piercing scream of pain that I had ever seen. I sat on the last two steps of the stairs crying. I had just turned 8, and four months ago we had found out that my mother was pregnant again. She had already had 2 miscarriages — one of them with twins — and we were all scared she would lose this one as well. But when the first trimester had ended, and she approached the end of her fourth month of pregnancy, we became hopeful. Yet, there she lied, a wet face, a look of dispair that was also filled with fear of loss as she screamed to the heavens for mercy.

My grandmother sat on the side watching my mother clutch her gown so as to prevent the blood from running, so as to prevent her baby from coming out, and she did not move a muscle. My grandma never had any sympathy or love for her daughters-in-law. She had gone through much pain in life. She had suffered abuse from the hands of both her father and husband that instead led her to believe that unhappiness and pain is every woman’s purpose. And so, she sat there, quietly, looking down at her wrinkled hands with no intention to help.

My brother was upstairs in our room. He had heard my mom’s screams, and I had ordered him to stay inside. My dad was on his way from work driving as fast as he could with no intention to slow down, and I had dialed the three numbers my parents had taught me to dial in case of an emergency. Mommy was screaming, and as her white nightgown had started to turn red between her legs, I dailed 9–1–1.

My hands grabbed on to the house phone like my life depended on it. I swallowed my sobs but couldn’t control my tears. I didn’t want Mommy to worry about me. I didn’t want her to know I was scared, that I didn’t know if she was dying, too. I wanted to be strong for her and my little brother.

I stayed there near the main entrance of the house. It was pouring rain outside, but I opened the door so that I could see the ambulance or Baba pull up outside and not delay their getting in. Thankfully, both my dad and the ambulance arrived within minutes of each other. After that, it was all a blur. In the next ten minutes, they would strap my now-passed-out mom on the wheeled stretcher, and carry her into the ambulance, not knowing if I will ever see her again…

Sleep never came that night, but I was a child of a Lebanese household. We are a people that have survived several wars and occupations. We snuck through streets rigged with bombs and corners hiding enemy soldiers waiting to shoot civilians on site, just to go to school and continue our education. My mother being in the hospital is no better of an excuse to miss a day of school. Daddy had come back from the hospital early enough to take us to school. When he came in, I ran into his arms as if I was escaping those same dangerous streets that my parents had when they were younger for sanctuary. He held on tight as my sleepless eyes streamed endless tears, and he hushed me softly, “It’s okay, habibe. Mama is safe. She’s going to be okay, and she’ll be home tomorrow.” Through my hiccups and sniffles, I asked, “ What-what about the-the baby Baba? Is it okay?” He held me tighter and buried my head in his chest as he rested his chin on me and kissed my head tenderly, “ He’s gone. He decided he wanted to go to Heaven and become an angel.” Curiously, I asked, “He?” “Yes. The baby was a boy. We named him Hussein. And just because you won’t get to meet him, it doesn’t mean he won’t be there for you. God saw it better for him to watch over you and protect you forever, because you don’t have an older sibling to do that.”

An angel. God made him an angel. But I had told God that I wanted him here, not away. I can’t carry him now and kiss him. I didn’t want an angel watching over me. I didn’t need watching over.

I wanted a baby sibling to watch over myself.

August 2008 5:30 am — Koreatown Home

I had been sitting on the floor all night in my dad’s room next to the bed. He had been running a fever, and his wife, Nasreen, had not slept for days. The baby had become dependent on being held constantly, even while asleep. Nasreen needed sleep, and I had offered to sit on the floor carrying baby Nour while she got some shut-eye. I had both a full shift at work and school the next day, but that didn’t matter to me. It was an excuse to get time to carry Nour who was now 4 months old, whom I had not carried more than 10 times since she was born.

Nour had also become dependent on sleeping with a pacifier and couldn’t fall asleep without one. Around 6am, Nasreen got up to use the restroom, “Whatever you do, don’t give her the pacifier. I’ll be back in five minutes.” By the time Nasreen had closed the bathroom door, Nour began to cry hysterically. Dad was passed out in bed to the point where not even a bomb dropping would wake him. I had been up all night, and shaking her, or singing to her was not doing the trick. One minute in, and her cry was so intense that she wasn’t taking any breaths and started turning blue. I panicked, grabbed the pacifier and put it in her mouth. Within seconds, Nour went back to her silent, angelic state, succumbing to the lullabies I sang to her as she sucked on her binky. She had fallen asleep, and I would finally be able to shut my own eyes as I carried her.

“WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO?!?!”, Nasreen had walked in and woke us up. “I told you not to give her the pacifier!” “I didn’t know what to do. She was crying so much and nothing worked. I didn’t want her to stop breathing!” She wasn’t listening to me, “ That pacifier had fallen on the ground! It’s dirty! You put a dirty pacifier in my baby’s mouth!!! YOU WANT TO KILL MY BABY!!” I was taken aback, “I didn’t know! Why didn’t you tell me it fell? I could have washed it!” She snatches Nour out of my hands, “ I don’t NEED to tell you anything. When I tell you to do something, you do it. No questions asked. But I know you want to hurt her so you can get rid of me.” “You know that’s not true and I love her!!” She stood with pride, “I’ll make sure everyone knows what you tried to do, baby killer.”

Baby killer.

For months afterwards, I dealt with questioning looks from adults and hesitant cousins who became afraid of me. My dad’s wife had went around spreading the news of my “attempted murder”. Many did not believe her, but some others did, and that night would become the last time I would ever carry my baby sister.

May 2009 3:30pm — Koreatown Home

It was my day off from work. My aunt Sarah had come to visit us, and my dad was getting ready to leave for work in the afternoon. Things at home were getting worse by the day. Nasreen had worked hard to ensure that I would not be allowed to go in any rooms in the house aside of my own. My room was next to the entrance of the apartment. Every time I entered the house, I took a sharp left and opened the accordion door that led to the small hallway toward my bedroom. As the days would go by, baby Nour became aware of her surroundings, and every time I entered the house, she stared with an inquisitive look at the stranger who went behind the door she wasn’t allowed to go near. But one-year-old babies don’t work that way. They grow up and start to crawl. They plant their palms and knees on every inch of ground they see. They grab every table, every couch, every wall they can reach. Their minds have not yet learned to set limits and boundaries, to understand that Mommy doesn’t want you to discover the one thing that your beautiful, positive-filled, curious-hungry mind wants to know. So, they make their way to accordion doors that hide unknown faces they wish to discover.

I had been cleaning around, and my aunt’s back was facing me as she carried the baby. My dad walked out of the house heading to work. Before I knew it, Nour’s eyes had met mine. They were filled with questions and wonder. And for the first time in months, I didn’t look away. I kept my eyes on hers, and made funny faces. And yes, I made my baby sister smile.

Minutes later, as I walked around my room, Nasreen barged in slamming the door open, “How DARE you look at my daughter! How many times have I told you not to even look at her?! You think I didn’t see that?! You’re going to pay for this, you snake!” Before I knew it, she pushed me to the ground. Her fists of fury came full force at me as I laid defenseless on my bedroom floor, every blow harder than the one before, slowly feeling my body acknowledging what was happening to it, and the impact of fist to skin turn into pain.

My aunt, still having Nour in her right arm, tried to pull my dad’s wife off of me while trying to keep the now-crying baby balanced in her arm. My brother barged in, grabbed my dad’s wife and removed her off of me to the living room as she fought him back. All I could remember was getting up and locking my bedroom door as my aunt called my dad to come back upstairs. I sank next to my bed, and screamed out a cry that was not filled with fear, but instead, anger. After that, my bedroom door would never remain unlocked again.

January 24, 2017 — Wednesday Evening

I’m on the phone with S. as I am driving home. Earlier that day, he had posted a photo on Instagram of his 4-year-old son, signaling hard his desire for a baby sister. “My daughter has been wanting me to give her a baby sibling, and talks about it often lately.” S. has an 8-year-old daughter who is just as affectionate as I was at her age, if not more. She desires a sibling from either of her parents more than many other things right now, and through his words, I remember my desire for the same thing. Nour will be 10 years old this year. I have not seen her in 8 of those years. My dad had 2 other kids after her, who I have not met, yet live 30 minutes away from me. Every memory mentioned here, and more, had become nothing short of a dream for me the past few years, but when S. spoke about his daughter, my heart stopped momentarily, missing a beat and causing it a brief moment of pain. The memories of yearning and longing for a sister came back to me, and I prayed that his daughter would not experience the same thing I have. I knew after that prayer that she would never be a 28-year-old girl who secretly craves to carry her baby sister, give her kisses, play with her and watch her smile. If she ever became a big sister again to a new child, she’ll carry that baby with love, push them on a swing one day, and sit them on her lap as she holds them in her arms, oblivious of a world where they could have been either angels in heaven, or strangers on earth…