My Lips Are Taped. I’m Listening

By Sabina Malik

When a person can’t speak, their senses become heightened, especially their sense of hearing. I never paid close attention to all the intimate sounds in the world, until my country stole my voice. The sound of my husband, Theo’s breath in my ear whenever we made love. My nineteen-year-old daughter Zoya’s forever girlish laugh.

The dark hours had their own distinct noises, which left me feeling helpless. Without a voice, I was defenseless to protect my family.

As the dusk prayer bells rang, the heavy thump of police boots echoed on our front steps.

An officer about Zoya’s age held a pistol to my daughter’s back. The holographic Doberman beside him growled in my face. A cheap intimidation tactic, but it still shook me.

The officer made her kneel as he read her charges. “Inciting women, destabilizing the Republic, …”

Zoya spit on the young man’s boots, but he held all the power.

He delivered a swift kick to her stomach.

She silently curled into a round ball of pain.

“By order of the Republic, I decree your voice taken,” he finished with a satisfied grin.

I collapsed onto the dusty floral rug and tore my fingers through the fabric.

Zoya knew what could happen, but she hadn’t been careful.

I’d been among the first women in the Republic to have my voice taken. Women’s voices were rising, and mine was the loudest. Our country seemed so liberal—nobody could have predicted its future.

A bomb exploded outside the capitol during a reproductive rights rally. The government declared all female activists in the country terrorists and sentenced any female dissenters to life without speech.

And now Zoya and I were both voiceless.

~

The whistling tea kettle pierced my thoughts, and I made a mental note to turn the stove off. Outside, air raid sirens wailed, signaling an 8:00 p.m. curfew.

The electronic listening bugs crawling inside the walls emanated a low buzz.

Theo rushed in and yanked the iron kettle off the stove. “I came as soon as I heard. Where is she?”

I motioned towards Zoya’s bedroom.

“Did she attend the Free Speech rally in the square?”

I shrugged.

I didn’t dare speak. They monitored our homes, offices, public spaces. People reported on friends and neighbors. The police always knew when those silenced had spoken, and the punishment was death.

He planted a tea mug in my hands and squeezed my fingers. “Rabia, we’ll get through this.”

Theo had married an orator—someone who inspired crowds with her voice—not a woman who couldn’t return his simple verbal affection.

Zoya walked into the kitchen wearing a black wool coat. “I’m going to teach my sign class.”

Theo paled. “Hush. They might hear you.”

Our daughter taught sign language to “voiceless” women at a deserted women’s shelter downtown.

I wrote a note and shoved it into Zoya’s hand. Do you want to die a martyr like your cousin?

Zoya snatched the pencil away and scribbled back. We’re dead already. Can’t you see that?

I shook my head.

Zoya crumpled the note in her fist. “Mom, you were my hero. What the hell is wrong with you?”

Her question stung like a slap.

“You don’t talk to your mother like that,” Theo snapped.

After I lost my voice, I’d crumbled. I thought I was stronger; I wasn’t. I thought I’d fight back; I didn’t. Not having to struggle for others, I’d felt at peace for the first time in my life.

The world was imperfect and unjust, but I selfishly wanted to live.

Zoya slammed the front door on her way out.

I tried to follow her, but Theo blocked my path. “Let her go, Rabia. Just let her go.”

~

I wrestled with sleep in Theo’s arms as surveillance birds flapped their metal wings outside our window. I prayed Zoya had made it safely to class. Theo’s fitful breathing indicated he was also awake, worrying.

I’d missed Zoya’s childhood, leading marches to decriminalize sex work instead of attending her ballet recitals. I’d always assumed she’d been resentful when she’d actually been proud.

I swung my legs off the bed and reached for my leather boots.

“I can’t lose you both,” Theo whispered.

I squeezed his fingers. “I have to go get our daughter.”

Outside, bells chimed across the moonlit city, commencing the daily midnight prayer.

I passed by walls papered with cautionary posters of women with no mouths.

I’d only gone a few blocks when I encountered a police officer interrogating a young woman.

“You there,” he yelled. “Stop!”

But I didn’t stop.

I ran until I reached the town square.

The severed concrete heads lying on the asphalt stopped me.

The grand piazza once housed Michelangelo-like sculptures of renowned female leaders. The city had demolished the monuments, their mouths spray painted shut red with derogatory graffiti.

A red-eyed spy bird whirred above. I hurled a rock, and the bird sputtered to the ground. It lay on the sidewalk, taking its last electronic breath.

Zoya was right. I was barely living. I died the day I lost my voice because my passion disappeared with it. My work meant everything to me. I was just too proud to admit it.

My family needed me, but I couldn’t remain silent while other women were at risk.

The mutilated statues of great women in the plaza would be my audience. Their cracked stone ears listening to my prose in quiet admiration.

“Our silence is their greatest weapon,” I shouted, my voice echoing in the darkness.

Lights came on in the surrounding apartment windows.

“Rip the tape off your mouth even if it stings,” I continued.

The windows filled with black silhouettes.

“This is our country! Not their country.”

People banged on their windows and cheered.

The five policemen dragging me out of the piazza were all shouting, but strangely, I couldn’t hear them. I could only hear women’s voices singing about freedom. I bet Zoya could hear them too.