The Somali Mosque Caretaker
"She cleans the mosque on Franklin Avenue—a thick ebony widow who's been caring for the community space for decades. When he volunteers to help, she shows him corners of the mosque no one else sees. Some devotion happens in private."
The Franklin Avenue Mosque is quiet at midnight.
The prayers are done. The faithful have gone home. Only Suad remains—the woman who's cleaned this mosque for twenty-seven years.
I come to volunteer.
"Warya—it's late. Go home."
"I want to help."
"Help?" She looks me over. Sixty years old. Two hundred and forty pounds. Ebony skin weathered by decades of work. "No one wants to help with cleaning."
"I do."
"Ilaahay." She hands me a mop. "Start in the prayer hall."
We clean in silence for an hour.
She shows me how—where the dust collects, where shoes track dirt, where the carpets need extra care.
"You're good," she says finally. "Most men are useless."
"My mother taught me."
"Smart woman." She sits to rest. "My husband never cleaned a day in his life. Said it was woman's work."
"Where is he now?"
"Dead. Fifteen years." She says it matter-of-factly. "Left me with this mosque and nothing else."
"Why do you stay?"
"Because it's holy." She looks at the prayer hall. "Because cleaning God's house is ibaadah—worship. Because someone has to."
"You're devoted."
"I'm tired." She stands. "But I keep going. That's all we can do."
I come back the next night.
And the night after.
Suad starts talking more. About Somalia before the war. About her husband who was the imam. About the weight of keeping this place sacred.
"The community doesn't see me," she says one night. "They see clean floors, fresh air, working lights. They don't see the woman who makes it happen."
"I see you."
She looks at me for a long moment.
"Subhanallah." She shakes her head. "You're young enough to be my grandson."
"And yet."
"And yet." She sets down her cloth. "Come. There's a room I want to show you."
The basement has a small apartment.
"For the caretaker," she explains. "My home for twenty-seven years."
It's simple. Clean. A bed, a kitchen, photos of Mecca on the walls.
"No one comes here," she says. "No one asks about me. No one wonders where I sleep."
"That's wrong."
"That's life." She turns to face me. "But tonight—tonight you're here. And I'm tired of being alone."
"Suad—"
"I know it's xaaraan." Sin. "I know this is the last place it should happen. But I've been holy for sixty years." Her voice cracks. "Can't I have one night of being human?"
"You're human," I tell her.
I cross to her. Take her weathered hands.
"You're beautiful. And you deserve to be seen."
She starts to cry.
I worship the caretaker.
Slowly. Reverently. Her body is old but magnificent—ebony skin marked with decades of work, breasts heavy, belly soft. She gasps as I remove her clothes.
"Fifteen years—" She's trembling. "No one has—"
"Let me."
I lay her on her small bed.
I kiss every inch of her.
Her face, her neck, her breasts. She moans as I move lower.
"Alla—this is—"
"This is worship," I tell her. "Worshipping you."
I spread her thick thighs.
Taste her.
"ILAAHAY!"
She screams, her voice echoing in the basement. Her hands grip my hair.
"Fifteen years—" She's shaking. "So long—"
I lick her through two orgasms. Three. She's crying and coming at the same time.
"Inside me—" She's pulling at me. "Ku soo gal—please—"
I strip. She sees me and breathes a prayer.
"Subhanallah—"
"Is this okay?"
"It's everything."
I position myself.
Push inside.
She cries out.
Fifteen years of loneliness filling with me.
"So full—" Her arms wrap around me. "Don't stop—"
I make love to the caretaker.
Slowly. Tenderly. She deserves tenderness after so many years of none. She comes twice more, each time whispering prayers.
"Ku shub—" She pulls me close. "Fill me—please—"
I release inside her.
We lie in her small bed.
Above us, the mosque stands silent. Sacred.
"Xaaraan," she whispers. "What we did is sin."
"Then let me sin with you again."
"Wallahi?" She looks at me. "You'd come back?"
"Every night."
She cries again. Happy tears this time.
One Year Later
I still volunteer at the mosque.
Still help Suad clean every night.
And when the faithful have gone home, I go to her basement apartment.
"Macaan," she moans. "My sweet, sinful boy."
The caretaker of God's house.
The woman who finally let herself be cared for.
Our secret devotion.