The Delegation
"Three aunts arrive to negotiate his marriage. But the bride's family has one condition: proof of the groom's capabilities. The aunts volunteer to provide the evidence themselves."
The delegation arrives on Thursday.
Three of my aunts—Shangazi Fatuma, Shangazi Maryam, and Shangazi Hadija—come to negotiate my marriage. They're here on behalf of my mother, who's too ill to travel, to secure the hand of Nasra bint Abdullah for her only son.
I'm twenty-eight.
The aunts are fifty-five, fifty-two, and forty-nine.
And they're about to test me in ways the family never intended.
The Abdullah family receives us in their Lamu compound.
Nasra's father is a trading magnate—dhows, spices, the old routes to Oman. His daughter is beautiful, educated, and comes with a dowry that would make a sultan jealous. Everyone wants her.
"Your nephew is young," Abdullah says. We're in his diwan, the men separated from women, the negotiations formal. "And untested."
"He's a good man," Shangazi Fatuma replies. She leads the delegation—the eldest, the most commanding, two-sixty of authority. "Hard-working. Devout. He'll care for your daughter."
"I don't doubt his character." Abdullah strokes his beard. "I doubt his... capabilities."
"What capabilities?"
"A father wants assurances. That his daughter will be satisfied. That she won't be neglected."
The implications hang in the air.
"You want proof of his virility," Shangazi Maryam says flatly. Two-fifty, the sharpest of my aunts. "Before you agree to the marriage."
"I want assurances. How you provide them is your business."
The aunts confer in private.
I'm not present for this discussion. I wait in the guest quarters, sweating in the Lamu heat, wondering what impossible condition Abdullah has set.
When they come to me, their faces are strange.
"There's a way," Fatuma says. "To satisfy his conditions."
"What conditions?"
"He wants proof you can please a woman." She pauses. "Before he gives you his daughter."
"How am I supposed to prove that?"
The aunts exchange glances.
"He's left that to us," Maryam says. "As the delegation. As your representatives."
"Meaning what?"
Hadija speaks for the first time. The youngest aunt, two-forty, always the quietest. "Meaning we provide the testimony. That you can—that you're capable—"
"But you can't testify to something you haven't witnessed," I say slowly.
Silence.
"Unless," Fatuma says, "we witness it ourselves."
This is impossible.
My aunts—my father's sisters, the women who raised me when my mother was ill—are suggesting they test my sexual capabilities. That they become the proof Abdullah requires.
"You can't be serious."
"We're very serious." Maryam sits beside me. "The Abdullah marriage is everything for this family. The connections, the money, the status. Your mother has been planning this since you were born."
"But what you're suggesting—"
"Is forbidden. Haram. Against everything we were taught." Fatuma's voice is hard. "But so is letting this opportunity slip away because of a technicality."
"It's not a technicality—"
"It's survival." Hadija's hand finds my arm. "The family's survival. Your mother's happiness. Everything depends on this marriage."
"And you're willing to—"
"We're willing to do what's necessary." Fatuma stands. "The question is: are you?"
I should refuse.
Walk away from the marriage, from the delegation, from the impossible choice they're presenting. But I think of my mother, dying slowly, dreaming of seeing me married to Nasra Abdullah. I think of the family's future, tied to this alliance.
And I think of my aunts—three women who've sacrificed everything for this family. Who are now willing to sacrifice even more.
"How would this work?"
Fatuma's relief is visible. "Tonight. All three of us. We'll provide testimony that you are... adequate."
"Adequate?"
"More than adequate, ideally." Maryam's smile is thin. "Abdullah wants assurances. We'll give him assurances he can't question."
The guest quarters have one large room.
The aunts lock the door. Draw the curtains. Light incense to cover what's about to happen.
"This stays between us," Fatuma says. "Forever. After tonight, we never speak of it."
"Understood."
"Good." She begins removing her hijab. "Then let's begin."
They undress together.
Three women I've known all my life, revealing themselves. Fatuma first—the eldest, the heaviest, two-sixty of maternal authority turned offering. Her breasts hang nearly to her waist, her belly soft with decades. "Don't stare," she says. "This is a test, not a wedding night."
Maryam next—two-fifty, leaner, harder. Her body shows a life of work and worry. "I haven't been touched since my husband died. Be gentle."
Hadija last—two-forty, the youngest, still somehow soft. "I've never—" She stops. "My marriage was arranged. Consummated. But never... pleasant."
I look at them. Three aunts. Three women who raised me.
"This is really happening."
"This is really happening." Fatuma steps forward. "Now. Show us what the Abdullah girl will get."
I start with Fatuma.
She's the leader, the decision-maker. If I can satisfy her, the others will follow. I lay her on the bed, worship her body the way I've learned to worship women—slowly, thoroughly, without rushing.
"He knows what he's doing," she gasps at one point.
"I told you," Maryam says from the side. "I saw him with that Mombasa girl last Eid. He knows."
I make Fatuma come with my mouth. Then my fingers. Then I enter her—the first time I've been inside a woman of my blood—and she cries out.
"Yes—ndio—this is—Abdullah will be satisfied—"
Maryam is next.
She's harder, more reserved, armored by years of widowhood. But I find her weaknesses—her neck, her inner thighs, the spot just below her navel that makes her gasp. When I finally take her, she's wet and ready and desperate.
"I forgot," she whispers. "I forgot what this felt like—"
"Remember," I tell her. "This is what you're testifying to."
She comes twice before I finish inside her.
Hadija is last.
The youngest, the shyest, the one who's never known pleasure in marriage. I take my time with her—longer than the others, gentler, teaching her what her husband never bothered to learn.
"This is—this is what it's supposed to feel like?"
"This is what it's supposed to feel like."
"Then I've been cheated." She laughs, half-crying. "My whole marriage. Cheated."
I make sure she's not cheated now. Three times she comes before I finally release—and when I do, she holds me like I'm the husband she deserved.
Dawn breaks.
The three aunts lie around me, spent, satisfied, marked. The room smells of incense and sex and the impossible thing we've done.
"Well," Fatuma says. "Abdullah will have his assurances."
"We testify," Maryam agrees. "Unanimously."
"Enthusiastically," Hadija adds, and the word makes them all laugh—the tension of the night releasing in humor.
"What do we tell him?" I ask.
"The truth." Fatuma sits up. "That we tested the groom personally. That he exceeded expectations. That Nasra will be well cared for."
"And if he asks details?"
"We'll provide details." Maryam's smile is sharp. "Women talk, Hamid. Abdullah knows that. He'll believe us because he knows what female testimony sounds like."
The negotiation resumes that afternoon.
I'm not present for this part. The aunts go alone, speak to Abdullah and his senior wife, provide their testimony.
When they return, they're smiling.
"Done," Fatuma announces. "The nikah will be in three months. Nasra is yours."
"What did you tell him?"
"What he needed to hear." She kisses my forehead—the same forehead she kissed when I was a child. "You performed admirably. The delegation is satisfied."
"And Abdullah?"
"Is satisfied that his daughter will be satisfied." Maryam pats my cheek. "You should thank us, you know. We've sacrificed a great deal for this family."
"What you sacrificed—"
"Is done. Forgotten. Never discussed." Hadija's voice is firm. "We go back to being your aunts. You go on to marry Nasra. Life continues."
Life continues.
I marry Nasra three months later. She's beautiful, kind, everything a wife should be. Our marriage is happy—genuinely happy—and she never suspects what it took to secure it.
But sometimes, at family gatherings, I catch my aunts' eyes across the room.
Fatuma, smiling like a matriarch with secrets.
Maryam, watching with that sharp assessment.
Hadija, blushing when she thinks I'm looking.
They never speak of that night in Lamu.
Neither do I.
But we all remember.
Wajumbe.
Delegates.
Negotiators who gave everything to close the deal.
And closed it perfectly.