Nikah Mut'ah
"A temporary marriage contract. Renewable monthly. Between an aunt and nephew who've found a loophole in tradition. Some marriages are meant to expire—and be renewed."
"It's called nikah mut'ah."
My aunt Rashida spreads the papers on her kitchen table. Legal documents. A marriage contract. My name and hers.
"Temporary marriage. Some scholars say it's halal. Others say haram. But it exists."
"You want to marry me?"
"For one month. Renewable." She looks at me with eyes that have calculated every angle. "Think about it, Kareem. You need somewhere to stay while you finish your degree. I need... companionship. This makes it legal. Makes it halal—or at least defensible."
"We're related."
"By marriage, not blood. Your mother was my husband's sister. After he died, we're not technically family anymore." She slides the papers toward me. "I've had a scholar review it. It's permissible."
"And what happens during this... marriage?"
"Whatever we want." Her voice drops. "Whatever we've both been wanting."
I've been wanting Khalti Rashida since I was eighteen.
She was married to my uncle then—a cold, distant man who didn't deserve her. I'd watch her at family gatherings, thick and beautiful in her kangas, and imagine things a nephew shouldn't imagine.
Now I'm twenty-four. My uncle is dead. And she's offering to make me her husband.
Temporarily.
Renewable.
"The terms," she explains.
We're in her sitting room. The contract between us.
"One month duration. At the end, we either renew or dissolve. If we dissolve, there's a waiting period before either of us can remarry elsewhere. Standard mut'ah conditions."
"And during the month?"
"You have full rights as a husband. I have full rights as a wife." Her eyes hold mine. "We share a bed. We share... everything."
"What made you think of this?"
"Six years of widowhood." She stands, moves toward me. At fifty-one, she's thick everywhere—two-fifty of Swahili woman, heavy-breasted and wide-hipped. "Six years of sleeping alone, wanting, having no halal outlet. And then you came to stay for your degree, and I saw how you looked at me—"
"I tried to hide it."
"You failed." She's in front of me now. "Sign the contract, Kareem. Be my husband. Make an honest woman of both of us."
I sign.
The marriage is registered privately. A willing imam, a reasonable fee, paperwork filed in ways that won't raise questions.
Khalti Rashida becomes my wife.
Aunt becomes spouse.
The wedding night is in her bedroom.
No ceremony. No guests. Just her, unwrapping herself from her evening clothes, revealing what I've dreamed about for years.
"Your wife," she says, standing naked before me. "For one month."
"Longer if we renew."
"Let's see if you earn a renewal first."
She's magnificent.
Six years of solitude have made her soft—softer than I imagined. Her breasts hang heavy, dark-nippled, swaying when she moves. Her belly is round and marked with stretch marks from children now grown. Her thighs are thick, pressing together, hiding what's mine now by contract.
"Touch your wife," she commands.
I touch.
I worship her that first night.
Every inch. Every fold. Every place her late husband probably ignored. When I spread her thighs and taste her, she weeps.
"He never—in twenty years—"
"I will. Every night."
I make her come with my mouth. Then my fingers. Then I slide inside her and feel her sob with relief.
"Husband—my husband—"
The word does something to me. I fuck her harder, claiming her, making her mine for this month and—if I have anything to say about it—many months to come.
The first month ends.
"Do we renew?" she asks.
We're in bed. We've barely left it in thirty days. My classes have suffered. My sleep has suffered. Everything has suffered except her pleasure and mine.
"Obviously."
She smiles. Signs the renewal.
Month after month.
The mut'ah continues. We tell no one—officially, I'm just her nephew staying for university. But behind closed doors, I'm her husband. I have rights. I have access. I have her.
"Some scholars say mut'ah can last years," she murmurs one night. "Decades, even. As long as both parties keep renewing."
"Then let's renew forever."
"You'd want that? A permanent temporary marriage to your aunt?"
"I'd want you. However I can have you."
I graduate.
Should leave. Get a job somewhere else. Start a real life.
Instead, I take a position in Dar. Close to her. Close to our arrangement.
"People will wonder why you don't marry properly," she says.
"Let them wonder."
"They'll try to match you with young girls."
"I'll refuse."
"Kareem—"
"I have a wife." I pull her close. "A beautiful, thick, perfect wife who I married by contract and keep marrying every month. Why would I want anyone else?"
Years pass.
The mut'ah renews each month like clockwork. We've signed so many contracts they fill a drawer. Each one a testament to what we've built.
"You know this isn't normal," she says on our fifth anniversary. We don't celebrate officially—can't—but we know the date.
"Nothing about us is normal."
"Your mother suspects. She asked why you never bring women home."
"What did you tell her?"
"That you're focused on your career." She laughs. "She doesn't know the focus is on her sister-in-law."
The arrangement holds.
In public, I'm the devoted nephew who cares for his widowed aunt. Who helps with her shopping, her repairs, her loneliness.
In private, I'm her husband. Have been for years. Will be until one of us decides otherwise.
Neither of us decides otherwise.
"Next month?" she asks, contract in hand.
"Next month. And the one after. And the one after that."
She signs. I sign.
Nikah mut'ah.
Temporary marriage.
Permanently renewed.
Halal.
Or close enough.