Mogadishu Textile Merchant
"She sells fabric in Mogadishu's Bakara Market—a thick ebony widow who dresses the city. When he comes sourcing traditional textiles, she offers access. Some fabrics are unwrapped in private."
Bakara Market never dies.
Through war, through bombs, through everything—it survives. Shamso's textile stall has been there forty years. Her fabric dresses half of Mogadishu.
I come sourcing traditional textiles.
"Diaspora fashion business?" She measures me with her eyes. Fifty-six years old. Two hundred and fifty pounds of market survival. Ebony skin, colorful dress, the resilience of someone who's sold through civil war. "What do you need?"
"Authentic fabrics. The patterns tourists don't see."
"Mashallah." She pulls bolts from hidden shelves. "Finally someone who wants the real thing."
She shows me everything.
Traditional weaves, hidden designs, patterns from before the war. Her knowledge is encyclopedic.
"How do you know all this?" I ask.
"My mother taught me. And hers before. Five generations of this stall." She strokes a fabric. "My husband helped expand it. Then the war took him."
"When?"
"1991. First day of fighting. I kept selling the next day."
"The market is my life."
We're having tea in her stall's back room.
"Thirty-four years of widowhood. Thirty-four years of this market. I've seen warlords come and go. The market stays."
"You're a survivor."
"I'm Mogadishu." She looks at me. "We don't know how to give up."
"That's beautiful and sad."
"Everything here is."
"Come to my home."
Outside the market. A modest house that's survived everything.
"I want to show you the archive," she says. "Fabrics I don't sell. Family treasures."
But when we arrive, she shows me more than fabric.
"Thirty-four years." She touches my face. "Thirty-four years without a man's hands on something other than money."
I worship the textile merchant.
In her home filled with fabric treasures. Her body is the finest cloth—ebony curves, heavy breasts, soft belly.
"Thirty-four years—" She gasps as I undress her. "Afar iyo soddon—"
"Tonight I unwrap the best fabric."
I lay her on layers of silk.
Her life's collection beneath us. Her body is the masterpiece.
I spread her thick thighs.
Examine the weave.
"ILAAHAY!"
She screams—thirty-four years of market survival finally receiving gentleness. Her hands grip my head.
"Don't stop—" She's shaking. "Dhakhso—"
I tailor her pleasure until she's complete. Three times.
"Inside me—" She's pulling at me. "Ku soo gal—stitch me whole—"
I strip. She watches with those measuring eyes.
"Subhanallah—premium thread."
"Custom fit."
I push inside the textile merchant.
She screams.
"So full—" Her legs wrap around me. "Don't stop—"
I weave myself through her.
Her massive body shakes. She comes twice more.
"Fill me—" She's begging. "Complete the pattern—"
I release inside her.
We lie on silk and memory.
"Your business," she murmurs. "Will it honor our fabrics?"
"It will tell their stories. Your stories."
"Wallahi?"
"Every thread. Every pattern. Every survivor."
One Year Later
Somali textiles sell worldwide now.
Fair trade, authentically made, properly credited.
"Macaan," Shamso moans in her fabric-filled home. "My best pattern."
The merchant who dresses Mogadishu.
The woman I'm wrapped in forever.
Perfectly tailored.