Nothing Was Left

Their prayers succumbed to the fiery depths of Tedim. Next to me lay my lifeless brother Cho. His fists were tightened, hiding nothing but an Arabic scripture that I wrote earlier that day. He seemed to be staring right at my face as if something was lingering next to me. I looked to my right and left and saw absolutely nothing. They were gone too.

The men in red, as brother Cho once said, disappeared into the night. Once again, they left without a drop of blood, without a single show of regret, without a grave for the dead. When they came from the woods, my uncle usually hid all of us in his fruit cellar, but it was gone along with him. He attended many protests and once attacked a man in red. Unintentionally putting himself in danger, they, as my father once described, chopped him up like a cow during Ramadan.

Mother and father left brother Cho and me alone as they meandered around town after curfew. They tried to find a mosque to ask forgiveness for uncle’s sins. The men in red swiftly caught them, but they didn’t beat my parents to death. They only expelled them from Tedim; maybe a fate worse than death. Brother Cho always believed that they would come back one day, forgiven of the mistakes they made. Even at death, brother Cho’s eyes mirrored that same hope. But all hope was gone.

The prayers stopped. Those burning in their homes have finally perished. They, stupidly enough, believed that they were going to be saved by something miraculous; the world was not brought up that way. When we were forsaken to this land, we were never promised the luxuries that once belonged to us. When we had to sweat to cultivate our fields, we learned how hunger, pain, and dehydration felt. When we were taken away our immortality, we played a sick game with death’s puppets. There’s no place for us in this world; just like their prayers, we will all fade away into dust and ash.

My father always told me that Satan was everywhere--that he even existed in our souls. All men are evil; they were born evil. When the men in red attacked, the other villagers were either talking amongst themselves or praying in their homes. Some villagers said that they heard Satan’s whispers beyond the woods, but nobody listened. Tedim was a heaven for all Rohingya Muslims. Satan, unlike my father believed, was non-existent; we were safe. Just as brother Cho and I were about to head home, a fiery sword shot up into the sky. It looked as if hell has finally set upon us. Men in red jumped out of the surrounding bushes and screamed their hearts out. One of them swung a scythe at the man who claimed to hear Satan’s whispers. Satan--just like that-- dragged his soul away, but we were safe.

I grasped brother Cho’s hand and tugged him inside the rice storage room. Brother Cho, shivering from the fire’s heat, began to scream into my shoulder. I covered his mouth, but he didn’t stop. His cries united with the prayers of the burning villagers like the calling for solat. There were no miracles that came that night. Only souls and their devices.

Brother Cho wouldn’t stop screaming, so I clenched my hands around his thin neck. Not stopping until his cries were gone. I tightened my grip until both of my hands touched each other.

His screeches ended with a restless sigh. All was quiet now. The men in red, finished with their devices, retreated to the forests’ dark. It was just me and brother Cho.

As father would say, this world is no heaven; even the blessed are damned. There’s no good. There’s no peace. There’s no hope.

Nothing was left.

(This story barely touches the true plight that Rohingya refugees face today. Pray for them and spread the story.)

Photo Credit: https://financialtribune.com/articles/international/73755/bangladesh-plan-for-mega-rohingya-refugee-camp-dangerous, Financial Tribune, October 8th, 2017