It was 2:00 in the morning. I couldn’t sleep. Sarah, my wife was lying beside me. She had been so worried about our daughter, Osama, but she was asleep now. She must be tired. Osama was in the hospital for a whole week last week, and she had seven sleepless nights with me. So I had decided to take our daughter to see the doctor myself today and give her a weekend to take a good rest. I got up, walked out softly, trying not to wake Sarah up, and now standing outside our daughter’s bedroom,. I suddenly stopped, and started to think in the quiet. Something in my mind, or from somewhere else, caught me, I did not know what it was, but I was kind of lost in my own world, trying to find a way out, or heading to the unseen place ahead. Osama was our only daughter. In a country like Afghanistan, parents were more sensitive and concerned about if it was a boy or girl. The discrimination on sex had its deep root in tradition and Islam religion. People now in our country had had much more freedom than twenty-some years ago when Taliban was in power of this land. But it was just like the memories, the old way of life was always somewhere around. That was a normal and so abnormal experience ever happened in this place long time ago, and it was a dark corner that I was not always brave enough to look beck at, but I knew it was always there.
It was a story about a girl I used to know, she was the one I named my daughter after. At that time, the world was totally different, nobody would know how Osama’s life would continue. Maybe she had been dead for long, which was not really a bad thing for her, because otherwise, God knows how miserable her life could be.
I could never forget her. Memories are liars. You can hardly figure out if it was real or just ever happened in your imagination. We were about the same age, twelve or thirteen, at that time. I didn’t remember when was the first time that I met her, but I did remember that I saw her and her Mother once on the street and Osama was short-haired and dressed just like a boy. That was what she was doing, pretending to be a boy. Then after that we were in the same school. The school was a place where Taliban used to train young boys for their future, for the wars. They thought Osama was a boy, so there she was. I was the only friend she got. I always thought we were friends, because I was the only one who knew the truth that she was actually a girl and the only one who tried to protect her from being caught. After all these years, it was still so clear in my mind that how they took Osama way from me. She was trying to run away, beck to her Mom, or just to get out of that evil place. But they caught her and send her into prison. I saw it all, but could not do a thing. I was crying there, feeling so sad, for Osama, and for myself. I did not really know what was happening in our country at that time, and could not imagine what a condition that many girls, along with their sisters and mothers were under. Later, I heard that they did not kill Osama, but gave her to an old man as a punishment. I hated that old man, I hated those men with guns and I hated that school.
Tears coming down on my face, I was sitting on the floor next to the wall. I never blamed myself for what I saw, because I knew that as a boy like me, I could do nothing about it. But now as a man, one of the millions standing on this land, I would do anything it was going to take to make sure that our Mothers, sisters and daughters won’t get treated like Osama in this country any more.
I opened the door. The moon was shining through the window, and her beautiful face was covered with silver moonlight. I saw my little Osama, my sweet angel. She was sleeping in bed peacefully. I knew she was having pain in her body, just as how I felt in my heart for her right now. She was only ten years old, an innocent and pure little girl. I could not give any thought on what if what happened to Osama was now happening to her. But as a father, I could totally understand what Osama’s Mom would have been through when she heard what had happened to her daughter. My mind turned blank for a minute, when I was staring at my little girl. I couldn’t tell what kind of feeling was there in my heart at that moment. I kissed Osama on the cheek very softly. I love you, my dear. Have a sweet dream. And to you, too, Osama, no matter where you are now, good dream tonight.
