PIOUS WIFE FATIMA

[Lordsnow]

The abaya hung on the back of the bedroom door like a decision that had already been made.

Fatima stood in front of it for a long time that evening, the black lace set and sheer stockings already on her body, the ordinary cotton salwar-kameez still waiting on the bed. Sameer sat on the floor mattress watching her. The flat was quiet except for the ceiling fan and the distant sound of a television in the next building. Everything was ready. The spare room was neat. The towel and glass of water were in place for a night that would not happen inside this house. Rakesh’s last message from the afternoon still sat on her phone:

*Nine o’clock. Do not be late. Sameer holds the abaya.*

She had just picked up the salwar-kameez to pull it over the lace when the doorbell rang.

Both of them froze.

It was too early for Rakesh. He never came to the door. The sound came again — longer, impatient.

Sameer looked at her. Fatima’s mind moved quickly. She dragged the cotton salwar-kameez over her head, yanked the fabric down so it covered the black lace and the tops of the stockings, and pinned her veil with hands that were not entirely steady. The abaya for the poker night still hung openly on the door. She snatched it down, rolled it into a rough bundle, and pushed it into the bottom of the almirah behind her ordinary clothes.

“Stay in here,” she told Sameer. “Do not come out until I call you.”

She closed the bedroom door behind her and walked to the front door. Through the peephole she saw the familiar shape — the long dark abaya, the strict line of the shoulders, the small suitcase standing at her feet.

Amina.

Fatima opened the door.

Amina looked tired from travel, but her eyes were as sharp as ever. She stepped inside without waiting for a formal greeting, the way family did.

“The train was changed at the last minute,” she said, already removing her shoes. “I told them there was no point in waiting another week when I could come now and see that everything is proper before the real visit. Why is your face like that? Are you unwell?”

“I was resting,” Fatima answered, keeping her voice soft and even. “I didn’t expect you tonight.”

“That is why it is better I came. Surprise is a good teacher.” Amina’s gaze moved over the front room, the tidy shelves, the curtain, the closed bedroom door. “Where is Sameer?”

“In the bedroom. He has a small headache. I told him to lie down.”

Amina made a small sound that could have been acceptance or doubt. She set her suitcase near the wall and sat on the sofa, arranging her abaya carefully around her legs.

“Bring water,” she said. “Then tell him to come out. Headache or no headache, he should greet his elders properly.”

Fatima went to the kitchen. Her hands were steady when she poured the water, but the black lace under her salwar felt suddenly loud against her skin. The stockings brushed with every step. She returned, gave Amina the glass, and then opened the bedroom door just enough to speak.

“Sameer. Amina Auntie has come. Wash your face and come out.”

She gave him three seconds of eye contact — enough for him to understand that the night was dead — then closed the door again.

Sameer appeared a minute later, hair slightly damp, expression carefully respectful. He touched Amina’s feet. She accepted the greeting with a small nod and began asking the usual questions about his work, about the house, about whether Fatima had been keeping the accounts correctly. Fatima sat on the edge of a chair and answered when required, her voice the same soft, obedient voice she had used for years. Under the cotton salwar the lace was damp. The cancelled night sat in her chest like a stone.

When Amina finally said she would sleep in the spare room and asked for fresh sheets, Fatima rose at once.

“I already prepared it last week,” she said. “I will just check the pillow.”

She went into the spare room, closed the door most of the way, and took out her phone.

The message to Rakesh was short.

*Amina has come. Tonight is not possible. She is staying.*

The reply came in under a minute.

*How long?*

*I don’t know. At least a few days. Maybe a week.*

There was a longer pause. Then:

*You allowed this to disrupt what was already arranged. When she leaves, the night will still happen. It will not be the same night. It will be harder. You will not argue when the time comes.*

Fatima stared at the words until the screen dimmed. She typed only:

*I understand.*

She put the phone on silent and slipped it under the mattress of the spare bed. When she came out, Amina was already standing.

“I will wash and sleep,” the older woman said. “Tomorrow we will look at the whole house properly. There are things that need correcting.”

Fatima nodded. “I will bring your towel.”

Later, after Amina had closed the spare-room door and the flat had fallen into a thick silence, Fatima and Sameer stood in their own bedroom. The rolled-up abaya was still hidden in the almirah. The black lace and stockings were still on Fatima’s body under the ordinary clothes. Sameer’s eyes asked the question he did not speak.

“It is cancelled,” she said quietly. “He is angry. When she leaves it will be worse for me. That is all we know tonight.”

She made him kneel and check that the lace was still in place, the same way he had checked every day for the past week. Then she pointed to the floor mattress.

“Sleep. Tomorrow she will be watching everything.”

Sameer lay down. Fatima switched off the light and stood for a long time in the dark, listening to the unfamiliar sound of another person moving in the spare room. The countdown that had ruled the last two weeks had been cut off in a single doorbell. In its place was a different kind of pressure — Amina’s presence on one side of the wall, Rakesh’s cold promise on the other, and the black lace against her skin reminding her of exactly what had been taken away for now.

She sat on the mat, whispered the old words more carefully than usual, and stayed there long after the final line was finished.

Outside, the lane was quiet.  
Inside the flat the three of them breathed under the same roof, and the night that was supposed to open Fatima completely had been postponed into something sharper and more dangerous.

The aunt had arrived.  
The plan had broken.  
And nothing in the house would be simple again until the door closed behind Amina once more.


Morning arrived with the sound of the spare-room door opening.

Fatima was already awake. She had slept only in short, shallow stretches, the black lace and sheer stockings still on under her night clothes, the knowledge of Amina on the other side of the wall pressing against every hour. When she heard the older woman move, she rose at once, pinned her veil properly, and went to the kitchen to start the stove before she could be called.

Amina came out in a fresh abaya, face washed, hair completely covered. She looked at the kitchen with the same assessing gaze she used on everything.

“You rise on time,” she said. “Good. Many girls forget once they have their own house.”

Fatima kept her eyes lowered. “I remember what you taught me.”

They prayed together in the front room. Amina’s voice was steady and precise as she recited. Fatima followed, the black lace under her salwar feeling like a second skin that did not belong to the words she was speaking. Sameer joined them late, still adjusting his cap. Amina noticed.

“A man should be ready before the women,” she said mildly, but the mildness carried weight. Sameer apologised and took his place.

Breakfast was quiet. Amina asked about the quality of the flour, about whether Fatima still measured spices the way she had been shown, about the last time the whole house had been properly deep-cleaned. Fatima answered each question in the soft voice expected of her. Under the table her stockinged thighs pressed together. The lace was already slightly damp from a night of unfinished hunger and broken sleep.

After breakfast Amina announced she would inspect the rooms.

“It is better I see everything now. When I come for the longer stay I will not have to correct the same mistakes twice.”

She began with the front room, then the kitchen, then the bathroom. Fatima followed a step behind, answering when required. The black lace moved against her with every step. When they reached the main bedroom Amina stood in the doorway and looked for a long time at the bed, the almirah, the mat in the corner.

“The mat is good,” she said. “You still use it.”

“Every day.”

Amina opened the almirah without asking. Fatima’s heart tightened, but the poker-night abaya was buried at the bottom under winter clothes and the lace set she was currently wearing was on her body, not in the shelves. Amina ran her hand over the neat stacks of ordinary salwar-kameez, nodded once, and closed the door.

“Acceptable. Now the spare room.”

While Amina checked the spare bed and the window latch, Fatima’s phone vibrated once in the deep pocket of her salwar. She did not take it out. She already knew it would be Rakesh. The single vibration felt louder than it should have.

At midday Amina sat on the sofa and said she would make a few calls for work.

“The centre is sending two of us to check on the widows’ ration distribution next week,” she said while scrolling through her phone. “I told them I am with family, but they still ask questions. Social work does not stop because an old woman wants to see her niece.”

It was the first clear mention of her job. Fatima filed it away.

“You still do the field visits?” she asked carefully.

“When they need me. Most of the younger women only know office work. Someone has to go into the actual houses.” Amina’s voice carried a quiet pride and something harder underneath. “Women who have been left with nothing cannot wait for committees.”

She made her calls in a low, efficient voice. Fatima stayed in the kitchen, but the tension in her body did not ease. Every time she moved, the sheer stockings reminded her of the night that had been taken away. Sameer passed through once to drink water. Their eyes met for a second. He looked as if he had not slept either.

In the afternoon Amina said she would rest for an hour. The moment the spare-room door closed, Fatima went into her own bedroom and locked it. She lifted her salwar, looked at the black lace and the dampness already present, and pressed her forehead against the almirah door for a long moment. The addiction was no longer a low heat. It was a demand that had nowhere to go.

She took out the phone.

Rakesh’s message from the morning was waiting.

*She is still there. Confirm.*

Fatima typed: *Yes. She is resting now.*

The reply came quickly.

*Every day she stays makes the next night harder. Remember that while you sit properly in front of her.*

Fatima deleted the thread after reading it, the way she had learned to do, and slipped the phone back into her pocket.

When Amina came out of the spare room her eyes looked slightly red, as if she had not actually slept. She asked for tea. While Fatima prepared it, Amina stood in the kitchen doorway and watched her.

“You have become quieter,” she said.

Fatima kept her hands steady on the cup. “I am the same.”

“No. Something is different. The way you move. The way he looks at you when you are not speaking.” Amina accepted the tea but did not sit. “I am not blind.”

Fatima said nothing. The lace under her clothes felt suddenly obvious. Amina’s gaze rested on her for another few seconds, then moved away.

“Tomorrow we will go through the accounts,” the older woman said. “And the clothes. Some of the things in your almirah looked too thin for a married woman in this family.”

She carried her tea to the sofa. Fatima remained in the kitchen, heart beating once, hard, against her ribs.

Evening prayer was performed together again. Amina corrected the way Sameer stood. She corrected the placement of Fatima’s hands. Each correction was delivered in the same calm, absolute tone that had ruled Fatima’s childhood. Afterward they ate in near silence. The only conversation was Amina speaking about the charity centre — the women who came with no papers, the ones whose husbands had simply left, the ones who still tried to keep their dignity while asking for rice.

“I understand them better than the girls who work only for salary,” Amina said. “I have been where they are.”

It was the closest she had come to speaking of her own past. Fatima looked up. Amina’s face gave nothing away, but the bitterness sat quietly under the words.

Later, after Amina had gone to the spare room for the night, Fatima stood in the bedroom with Sameer. She made him kneel, lifted her salwar, and let him see how wet the black lace had become over the course of the day. She did not allow him to do more than look and then clean the evidence with his mouth once, carefully, while she stared at the closed door that led to the rest of the house.

“She is already watching,” Fatima said quietly when he finished. “And Rakesh is waiting. Both of them are in this house with us, even when only one is sleeping in the next room.”

Sameer stayed on his knees. Fatima lowered the salwar, adjusted her veil, and sat on the mat for the final prayers of the day. The words came out correctly. The black lace stayed damp against her skin.

Outside, the lane was ordinary.  
Inside the flat the three of them breathed under the same roof, and the first full day of Amina’s early stay had already drawn the tension tighter than the night before.

Two different futures pressed against the walls:  
the harsher night Rakesh had promised,  
and the aunt who had begun to notice that something in the house no longer sat exactly as it should.


The third day began with rain.

It started before dawn, soft against the windows, then heavier by the time the three of them stood for morning prayer. Amina’s voice did not change with the weather. She recited with the same precise rhythm, correcting Fatima once when her hands shifted a fraction too early. Sameer kept his eyes fixed on the mat. The black lace under Fatima’s salwar had been damp since she woke, and the sound of the rain only made the quiet inside the flat feel more closed.

After breakfast Amina said she needed to visit the local branch of the women’s support centre for one hour.

“They have a problem with the new ration cards,” she explained, already pinning her outer abaya. “The girls there cannot handle the older women when they become angry. I told them I am in the city, so they asked me to come.”

Fatima looked up. “You are going alone?”

“It is ten minutes by auto. I will be back before midday.” Amina’s eyes rested on her for a moment. “The house will not burn in one hour.”

The moment the front door closed and the sound of Amina’s footsteps faded down the stairs, the air in the flat changed.

Fatima stood still in the centre of the room, listening. Then she turned to Sameer.

“Phone,” she said.

He brought it. She unlocked the screen and typed quickly.

*She has gone out for one hour. Only one hour.*

The reply from Rakesh came almost at once.

*Address. Now.*

She sent the location of a small, quiet guest house fifteen minutes away that he had used once before. Then she looked at Sameer.

“If she comes back early, you will say I went to buy fresh vegetables because the rain was spoiling the ones we had. You will not open the door until you check through the peephole. Do you understand?”

Sameer’s face was pale, but he nodded.

Fatima went into the bedroom, locked the door, and stripped off the cotton salwar-kameez with shaking hands. Underneath, the black lace and sheer stockings were already dark in places. She pulled the ordinary abaya over them, pinned the veil with less care than usual, and left the flat within four minutes of Amina’s departure.

The rain was still falling. She kept her head down in the auto, the wet air coming through the open sides. Every red light felt longer than it should have. When she reached the guest house Rakesh was already waiting in the small ground-floor room. He locked the door behind her, took the abaya and veil off her himself, and pushed her onto the narrow bed without speaking.



There was no slow build. He pulled the lace panties aside and entered her in one hard thrust, one hand covering her mouth to keep her quiet. Fatima’s back arched. The sheer stockings scbangd against his hips. He fucked her with short, deep strokes that seemed designed to remind her exactly what she had been denied for three days. She came once with his hand still over her mouth, then again when he turned her onto her stomach and held her there until he finished inside her.




The entire meeting lasted twenty-three minutes.

He did not kiss her. He only wiped her carefully with a towel, watched her put the abaya and veil back on, and said,



“Every day she stays adds something to the night you still owe. Go home.”

The return auto smelled of wet vinyl and rain. Fatima sat with Rakesh’s cum still inside her, the black lace wet against her skin, and counted the minutes. When she opened the door of the flat, Sameer was standing near the window. His eyes asked the only question that mattered.

“She is not back,” he said.

Fatima nodded once, went into the bedroom, and cleaned herself properly with his mouth before changing into a fresh cotton salwar. The lace and stockings stayed on. She had just finished adjusting the veil when the front door opened and Amina’s voice called from the entrance.

“Fatima.”

She walked out. Amina’s abaya was damp at the hem. Her eyes moved over Fatima’s face, then over Sameer, then back again.

“The rain is worse,” Amina said. “The meeting was useless. The girls have no spine.” She removed her shoes slowly. “You went out.”

It was not a question.

“The vegetables were spoiling,” Fatima answered, the soft voice steady. “I thought it was better to replace them before the evening.”

Amina looked at the plastic bag Sameer had quickly placed near the kitchen door — the bag Fatima had bought on the way back as the thinnest possible cover. She said nothing for a moment. Then she walked past both of them into the kitchen and began checking the contents of the bag with deliberate care.

“Next time,” she said without turning, “you will wait until I am here. A married woman does not need to run into the rain alone for vegetables.”

The rest of the afternoon passed under a different weight.

Amina did not accuse. She simply stayed in the front room, reading from a small religious book, while Fatima moved between kitchen and bedroom under her occasional glance. The black lace remained damp. Every time Fatima sat, she felt the evidence of the twenty-three minutes that had just been stolen.

In the evening, while they prepared for prayer, Amina spoke without looking up from the mat she was straightening.

“I started the centre work twelve years ago,” she said. “After my husband left. People think a woman in this family does not speak of such things, but you are no longer a child. He left when my daughter was six. I had nothing except the house my father gave me and a child who asked every night when her father was coming back. The centre gave me work when no one else would. That is why I still go when they call.”

Fatima kept her hands still on her own mat. It was the most Amina had ever said about her own life.

“I learned that a woman who loses her place has only two choices,” Amina continued, voice calm and absolute. “She becomes careful, or she becomes lost. I chose careful. I made sure you would choose the same.”

She finally looked at Fatima.

“Something in this house has become less careful. I can feel it. I will not ask again today. But I am not leaving until I understand what it is.”

The words settled between them like a third person in the room.

Night prayer was performed in silence. Afterward Amina went to the spare room early, taking her religious book with her. When the door closed, Fatima stood in the bedroom with Sameer and let him see the state of the black lace once more. She did not need to tell him what had happened during the hour Amina was gone. The smell and the wetness told him enough.

“She knows something is wrong,” Fatima said quietly. “She does not know what yet. And Rakesh is counting every day.”

Sameer knelt without being told. Fatima allowed him to clean her, slowly and thoroughly, while the rain continued against the windows and the spare-room light stayed on under the door.

When he finished she sat on the mat alone, the ordinary cotton salwar covering the lace that still held the memory of the afternoon. The old words came out correctly, but the body beneath them was already calculating how many more days of this closed, watchful quiet she could endure before the next risk became necessary.

Outside, the rain softened.  
Inside the flat the cracks had begun to show — in Amina’s suspicion, in Fatima’s addiction, and in the carefully built walls that had once kept every locked room sealed.