Now I was in a world dominated by war, where I would be the victim of violence. I knew it was all a terrible mistake. I didn’t belong here. And yet my body, at least, was trapped in this place and unable to escape it for the time being.
Only my soul was able to roam freely, hovering somewhere above the room with the two Libyans. The men who were intending to rape Evin and me.
“What’s she staring like that for?” Galib asked.
“No idea. They say she’s a bit crazy, but sweet. I’ll take her,” the Emir said. “I’ll let you have the other one.”
Galib voiced his gratitude again. It was evident that neither he nor his chief had any scruples about giving away another human being or accepting one as a gift. For them we were objects to be used for their pleasure, and which could be bought, sold, or swapped as they liked. It was a custom among the soldiers to offer a woman as a reward for particular achievements. Our feelings had no bearing on the matter.
They pushed us toward the bathroom. “You stink!” they cried. “Why do all Yazidi girls have to smell so bad? Go on, take a shower!”
We resisted as best we could with handcuffs on. “We don’t want to shower,” Evin said. Since our abduction she and I had realized that it was advantageous to appear as repulsive as possible, because that way we became less desirable as sex objects. This is why we never washed. What’s more, we were still wearing the same clothes we’d had on when they took us away before; we’d been wearing them day and night. No surprise, then, that we smelled dreadful. But it was naive to think that this could stop the men from executing their plan.
“Oh yes you are going to shower, you stinking Yazidi whores!” they yelled, slapping us as hard as they could in the face. But I didn’t feel a thing. My only thought was how we could possibly extricate ourselves from this situation.
There was just one way out: I had to kill myself. I’d promised Evin never to leave her alone, and I wouldn’t break this promise. We would depart our bodies and this terrible world together. For there was no other option to escape being violated. I needed a weapon, though, and my eyes frantically scanned the room for an appropriate tool.
The men ripped off our veils and yanked us to the bathroom by our hair. We kicked and screamed. We screamed so loudly that the entire neighborhood must have heard. But no one bothered about what went on in the Emir’s house at night. Only when they’d locked the door did they remove our handcuffs.
“Get undressed!” they barked. Of course we did nothing of the sort.
They whipped out daggers from their belts. With a swift cut from top to bottom Emir Zeyad deprived me of my skirt and blouse.
“Now we’re going to give the two of you a good scrub,” they announced.
As they shoved us toward the shower I suddenly had an idea. “The bulb,” I said to Evin in Kurdish. “Do you see the bulb above the shower? I’ll make a short circuit.” So we could take our lives. “Agreed?”
“Agreed,” she replied in tears.
We allowed ourselves to be pushed under the shower. Evin held me tight. When the men turned on the water my arm shot upward. I took out the bulb. It went dark. As fast as I could I tried to stick my finger in. But the men yanked me away.
“Stop that nonsense!” Zeyad bellowed as he pressed me to the floor with all his weight.
Galib opened the bathroom door, allowing light to come in again. The water was still running. One of the guards brought a gas lamp and went away again, so his chiefs could continue with their game undisturbed. “You goddamn whore!” Zeyad cursed. “I’ll soon teach you who’s in charge here!”
The men were now drenched too, but undeterred. I observed myself as if from a distance, calmly imagining that the girl enduring all of this only looked like me. She was my doppelgänger. I, the real Farida, was floating above her, where the men couldn’t reach me.
I watched them haul us up the stairs and shunt us into a room laid out with expensive rugs. There were also new clothes for us to put on: a red dress for Evin and one in two different shades of blue for me. We hurriedly got dressed.
Trembling, we crept into a corner of the room, hoping that it was all over. Perhaps the men had just been having a bit of fun and were done now.
But they came in after us.
WHEN WE AWOKE the following morning on two shabby mattresses, our bodies were burning and aching. The smell of blood and sperm clung to the dresses that Evin and I were still wearing from the night before. We felt such shame that we could barely look each other in the eye.
The room we were in was very small, hot, and sticky. There was only one window, high up, secured inside with a lattice of thin, close meshed wire, and outside with thick, robust metal bars. The door was securely locked too. We hammered against it, but when we heard footsteps approach we immediately felt frightened.
The door opened and an armed ISIS fighter stood before us, probably one of Zeyad’s guards. “What is it?” he snapped.
“We’re desperate for the bathroom,” we said.
“Okay, come with me.”
He led us across a gloomy hallway to the toilet. I wanted to relieve myself. But it was almost impossible. When I tried my entire abdomen felt as if it were on fire. I think it was the same with Evin. But rather than say anything to me she just cried quietly to herself.
I tried to wash using the tap. For the first time since being taken prisoner I felt the need to clean myself and wash away everything that man had left behind. I even held the dress under the tap. Evin did the same. But no matter how hard we scrubbed the feeling remained that we’d never get clean again. Eventually the ISIS guard thought we’d been in there too long and called out, “Hey, what’s taking you so long?”
Before he could open the door himself we came out and let him take us back to our cell. Evin and I huddled silently on the mattresses and withdrew into ourselves. Both of us were alone in our suffering and self-pity on that bleak morning. After being used by the men we felt dirty. Now we were sinful women, women everyone in the village would turn their noses up at. And both of us felt guilty too. Why couldn’t we have prevented it? This was possibly the worst thing: the accusations we leveled against ourselves. We did it automatically. I, at least, had been told time and again from a very young age that a woman’s honor stood for the honor of her whole family, and so it was my duty to protect it. But I’d failed. Of course I knew that I was not to blame, not directly at least; I’d done everything in my power to stop it. The men had simply been physically stronger. And yet I was tormented by a bad conscience as far as my family was concerned. Hopefully my parents and brothers will never find out what had happened to me, I thought.
I thought back to our beautiful house with its garden, instinctively recollecting how my brothers would always lurk greedily around the cooker when I was making dinner for them. Then I saw us all sitting around the large table, devouring the delicious kebabs. In my memory, my home in Kocho became ever more like an illusion. Had I really lived in that little paradise?
At some point, perhaps it was already the afternoon, our “owners” came to see us. We heard their footsteps in the hall, and also heard them talking as they approached our cell. “If that little minx speaks even one word of Arabic I’m going to take her back to Libya,” Zeyad said. My heart almost stopped. So the monster wanted to take me to Libya? Over my dead body, I immediately swore to myself. Only over my dead body would he even touch me again.
I felt ill the moment I saw Zeyad’s head in the door and took in his odor. My memory of the previous night returned painfully and I started to quiver. I crept into the furthest corner of the cell, which appeared to amuse him. He followed me and stroked me under the chin with his forefinger. “So, my little one,” he said, “how are you feeling today? It wasn’t so bad, was it?” He laughed as if he’d just cracked a funny joke.
I spat at him, but only caught his clothes, unfortunately. He wiped away the spit with his hand. “Don’t get cocky,” he said, slapping me. “Otherwise I’ll
take you again right now.”
It was meant as a threat. But I can’t say that it particularly frightened me at that moment. Something inside me seemed to have died. I didn’t react and stared obstinately at the floor. “Hey, do you understand me?” he said.
“She doesn’t speak Arabic,” Evin said.
“Who asked you?”
“She’s my sister.”
“So tell me, how come you speak such good Arabic, then? If she’s your sister she must have learned it at school too!”
“I taught myself,” Evin lied. “From the TV.”
The men wondered whether to believe her. They exchanged uncertain glances, but then let the matter rest. “Well, tell your little sister that she made me very cross with her silly games last night,” he said, “and that I’m going to give her a good spanking now.” He loosened his belt in preparation for a thrashing.
“It’s not Farida’s fault,” my friend said, coming to my defense. “She’s ill.”
At that moment the Emir’s cell phone buzzed. The Libyan frowned as he checked the display, and took the call. “What’s up?” he asked.
In a loud, overwrought voice, one of his commanders told him about fighting that had broken out somewhere nearby with a rival jihadi group. At once Emir Zeyad was all ears, demanding to know precisely where this was happening and how many men were on the opposing side. “We’ll be right there,” he promised. “In thirty minutes.”
After ending the call he told Galib, “We’ve got to go this instant. Our boys need help.” He cast me an evil look. “Don’t think you’re getting off that easily. The moment we’re back you’ll get your punishment for last night.”
We breathed a sigh of relief when Zeyad and Galib left the cell. “I hope those bastards get a bullet in their heads and we never see them again,” I said to Evin.
“Maybe they’ll be taken prisoner. That would be the best thing.”
“Let’s hope their opponents have a particularly excruciating death in store for them. I’d love them to waste away as painfully as possible.”
We couldn’t stop fantasizing about the most horrific forms of death we were wishing on our tormentors. This was fueled by the fact that we didn’t actually see Zeyad and Galib again for several days. The ISIS guard who accompanied us to the bathroom gave us the bare minimum of food and water. Each evening he came with a bottle of less than half a liter of water and a few crackers. Apart from him no one checked on us. I think the room in which we were held captive was on a kind of prison wing, for we never saw anyone in the hallway save for the guard. Or perhaps all the men had gone to fight with the Emir.
We stuck it out in the scorching heat. “I really think they have been shot,” I said to Evin at some point. “It’s possible.”
“Yes, perhaps.” She looked thoughtful. “What would that mean? What’s going to happen to us if they’re dead?”
I mulled this over. What, according to ISIS law, happened to a “slave” whose “owner” had died? Would we be “bequeathed” to someone else? Had Zeyad and Galib made provision for this? Later I found out that one of their religious leaders had issued a fatwa regulating these questions. It stipulated that, like all the other “assets” of our “owners,” we would indeed be divided among his men. But luckily we didn’t know this while we were imprisoned in Deir ez-Zor.
As we ruminated we heard shots outside. We listened in anticipation. Had the fighting reached us? For a moment we were hopeful. Perhaps it was the Kurds or even the Americans come to liberate us. But then we heard the words Allahu Akbar and cries of victory from the men. Our tormentors had obviously won the battle and were probably celebrating outside. Our hearts sank.
Shortly afterward four men came to fetch us. They brought us each a black full-length cloak and an extra veil for our faces. “Put that on and follow us,” they ordered. “Your ‘owners’ are asking for you.”
When we refused, two men held each of us and forcibly put the cloaks over us. But as we belonged to their chiefs, they took great care to avoid touching us in an inappropriate way, especially with witnesses present. When they’d packaged us up, two of the men took Evin away. I kicked up a fuss, demanding to stay with her; the two remaining men yelled at me to shut up. Then they took me down some stairs and out into the street. I blinked. For the first time in ages I could see the sun again—albeit through the black veil—and I felt its pleasant warmth on my shoulders. Yes, I thought, that other world does still exist. I secretly bowed to the mighty celestial body and begged my Lord Melek Taus to save us. “Amen, amen, amen,” I whispered.
Taking me by the arm through a chaotic mass of military vehicles and ISIS fighters who’d just returned from the battle, the men led me to a house on the other side of the street. I wondered whom it belonged to. Perhaps it was Emir Zeyad’s private house, or more accurately, the house he’d appropriated from someone else. Among all the beards I hadn’t noticed him yet.
They shunted me through the entrance and hallway into a bedroom. Yes, it was a perfectly normal, homely bedroom. It had a double bed, a wardrobe full of clothes that the original owners must have left behind, and a large mirror in which I saw myself as a dark ghost. My eyes staring through the slit were unnaturally wide. I couldn’t stand the way I looked and quickly averted my gaze.
“Get ready,” the men told me. “The Emir will be with you very soon.” Then they went out, carefully locking the door behind them.
I was perfectly calm and thought about the options still open to me. I didn’t doubt for one minute that after the victorious battle Zeyad would be in the mood for a woman. He’d had me brought here to rape me again. There was no reason to assume anything else. So what was I to do? I couldn’t just wait for him to come and inflict more pain on me, even though it wasn’t the pain that horrified me most; it was the idea that this man was satisfying his desires with me, that he was using me. No, I would not allow that to happen a second time.
Looking around the room, I caught sight of a hook in the ceiling. The fan, which had probably once been attached to it, was missing. Perfect! A hook, a veil, I calculated coolly, what else did I need to take my own life? This time I wasn’t thinking of escape. Although there was a window, I didn’t even entertain the idea that I might use it to get away. I was just too depressed for a cunning plan like that. I lacked the energy and the confidence. For now that I’d lost my honor, what use was taking flight? I’d only bring disgrace on my parents. It would be better if I was dead.
So, taking the veil from my head, I climbed onto the bed and tied it firmly with a knot to the hook. I can’t say I was sad when I put the noose around my neck. My life was no longer worth feeling sorry about. I felt extraordinarily lonely. What a shame not to be able to say goodbye to my parents at least. Would they ever know what I had done? Would they be proud of me? How about Evin? Would they show her my body? Would she be angry with me? No, I decided, Evin would understand me better than anyone else in the world. Goodbye, world! Goodbye, dear friend! Look after yourself, Evin!
I leapt, yanking down the veil, and hit my head on the side of the bed. I felt a stinging pain before passing out.
Later, when I awoke, Evin told me that the Emir had been irate when he brought me back. He must have come into the room soon afterward and found me on the floor. He’d carried me across the street wrapped in the black cloth, and of course all his subordinates had seen what had happened: I’d thwarted their chief’s plans. So the Emir was in a foul mood when he dumped me next to Evin in the prison. In spite of the injury to my head, he didn’t consider any medical treatment.
Evin had cleaned the cut on my head with water. My skull was still throbbing. But my friend took me severely to task. “You did it again. Once again you tried to abandon me!”
“You know I didn’t have a choice.”
We held each other in our arms. I didn’t ask Evin what had happened to her. Her tear-stained face and the bruise under her eye told me more than I wanted to know. Now she gave free rein to h
er tears. “Farida, I’ve got bad news: Galib’s planning to sell me,” she sobbed.
“What? How do you know?”
“He told me today. I think he was furious because I resisted.”
“I’m sure he was just trying to intimidate you,” I said. The idea of being separated from Evin was a nightmare for me. Amid all the horror we were experiencing, her presence afforded me some comfort at least—the last I had.
“I don’t know,” she said. “Perhaps you’re right.”
We clung to this hope. I think we both felt the same. We were ashamed to be seen by each other in such a miserable state; ashamed too that the other had witnessed things nobody should ever see (or at least that’s what we thought at the time). On the other hand, we were the last tie for each other to our former world. The world in which she and I had been normal young women with a home and family. I was afraid of going mad if I lost Evin as well.
“I’ll tell him I have to look after you,” she promised. “I’ll do everything he demands. If Galib possesses even a vestige of humanity he’ll understand that I’ve got to stay with you.” But both of us had our doubts.
“If Zeyad tries it with me again I’m going to kill myself,” I told her.
“You can’t!” she implored. “You promised!”
“If you’re not with me anymore it doesn’t matter, does it?”
“Even if I’m not with you, you must never give this man power over your life like that. No matter what he does. We’ll find a way out of here. I promise you.”
But I wouldn’t change my mind. “I can’t go on anymore. Please understand me,” I begged her. “We might not see each other again.”
The Girl Who Escaped ISIS Page 12
