The Water Seller | NEON LIT

Mama Aziza delivers water to twelve homes.

Every morning, her cart winds through Masaki—the wealthy neighborhood, where piped water is unreliable and bottled alternatives are preferred. She's been doing this for twenty years, carrying jugs up stairs, filling tanks, keeping the houses running.

At fifty-eight, she knows every kitchen, every bathroom, every bedroom in her territory.

And she knows what happens in them when the husbands are away.

"Maji," she calls at my door. Water.

I open to find her waiting—two-sixty of service industry authority, wrapped in practical clothes, jugs balanced on her cart. She's delivered to this house since before I was born. Since before my father married his third wife.

"Mama Aziza. Come in."

"Your stepmother is expecting me." She pushes past with the cart. "Third floor, yes?"

"As always."

Mama Zubeda is my father's youngest wife.

Fifty-two, beautiful, alone in a mansion while my father spends his days at his office and his nights with his first wife. She's been here five years, watched my father's attention wane, learned the particular loneliness of being a wealthy man's third wife.

"The water," Mama Aziza announces. "Fresh from the springs."

"Put it in the usual place." My stepmother doesn't look up from her phone. "I'll pay you after."

The usual place. The bedroom.

I'm supposed to leave.

This is what happens when Mama Aziza comes—I greet her, she goes upstairs, she does whatever she does. But today, something makes me follow.

I climb the back stairs. Position myself where I can see the bedroom door.

And I watch.

The bedroom door is open.

Mama Aziza isn't filling water tanks. She's sitting on the bed while my stepmother undresses.

"Three weeks," Zubeda is saying. "Three weeks without him touching me. I'm going mad."

"That's what I'm here for." Aziza reaches for her. "Come. Let me help."

I watch my stepmother kiss the water seller.

Watch them undress each other—Zubeda's expensive clothes falling next to Aziza's work clothes. Watch Mama Aziza's heavy body press against my stepmother's softer one.

"I need—" Zubeda gasps.

"I know what you need."

Aziza's mouth moves down my stepmother's body. Her fingers spread Zubeda's thighs. And the sounds that follow—

I shouldn't be watching.

I can't look away.

"You can come in."

I freeze. Aziza's voice, clear and amused.

"I saw you on the stairs. Watching. Did you like what you saw?"

My stepmother covers herself. "Aziza—"

"He's not going to tell anyone. Are you, boy?" Aziza looks at me. "You want what she has. I can see it."

"I don't—"

"You do. You've wanted your stepmother since your father married her. Don't deny it." She gestures. "Come in. Close the door. Join us."

I close the door.

Zubeda stares at me. "This is—he's my stepson—"

"He's a man who wants you. And you're a woman who wants someone. Does it matter who?" Aziza moves toward me. "I serve twelve houses. In every one, there's a lonely wife and a frustrated man. I bring them together."

"You—"

"I facilitate." She begins undressing me. "Water is just the excuse. What I really deliver is connection."

She guides me to the bed.

My stepmother is still there, naked, uncertain. Aziza positions me beside her.

"Touch her. The way you've wanted to."

I touch. Zubeda gasps—her stepson's hands on her body, the forbidden made real. But she doesn't pull away.

"Good." Aziza watches. "Now show her what her husband doesn't provide."

I take my stepmother while the water seller watches.

Zubeda comes twice—crying out, gripping the sheets, releasing years of frustration into the bedroom air. And when I finally spill inside her, Aziza nods approval.

"He's good," she tells Zubeda. "Better than your husband, I imagine."

"Much better." My stepmother is catching her breath. "How did you know—"

"I know all my customers. Their needs. Their hungers." Aziza stands, begins dressing. "I'll leave you two to... continue. Same time next week?"

"Same time."

The water deliveries become our cover.

Every week, Mama Aziza comes with her cart. Every week, I meet her at the door. Every week, I climb the stairs to my stepmother's bedroom.

"Your father suspects nothing," Zubeda tells me one day. We're tangled in her sheets, satisfied, safe. "He thinks Aziza is just delivering water."

"Isn't she?"

"She's delivering you." My stepmother pulls me close. "The best thing that ever happened to his third wife."

Months pass.

My father never learns. How could he? A water seller? His own son? Impossible.

But every week, the cart comes. Every week, I answer the door.

"Maji," Mama Aziza calls.

And I know exactly what kind of water she's delivering.

Maji.

Water.

The excuse.

The cover.

The connection.