by Samia Ahmed

A red gash had appeared where the missing necklace used to be. A thick gold chain with a star shaped pendant. I had only noticed that it was missing when my mother had pointed towards my neck. It was after the riots. We were huddled together on the floor in the back room of our house. Whispering to each other, passing day-old rotis amongst ourselves. Must have fallen off, I said. The necklace was a gift given to my grandmother by the ruler of Multan. Back then it was a big thing, Kings mingling with the commoners and all that. I tried reasoning with her that it wasn’t important, but my mother was a sentimental woman, one of her significant flaws. It was always difficult to reason with her when sentiments overtook. So, I planned to retrace my steps and find that stupid gold chain.

When the gunshots had settled down and it was relatively easy to walk down darker alleys, I took off. The smell of burning wood overpowered me. Flames danced on the rooftop of my dance studio. I felt like someone was following me; I felt a presence move in front of me and around, so I started running. When I found the courage to look back, I realized that it was just my shadow. I sat down at one of the stone slabs in a corner to catch my breath. I never understood why the necklace was passed down to me, it wasn’t like I was good at keeping things safe. I seemed to lose everything I ever loved. As the partition fire burned around me and engulfed Manju’s Sweet Shop, I thought that that’s just how it was, you lose things you love. Someone must have loved the gulab jamuns in sweet shop and now it was in flames because someone else loved their religion more than human lives.

Then I saw it, sparkling behind a grey plastic bag. I pulled at the necklace in the dark, it seemed stuck. I remember the day my mother had given it to me, she was so proud to hand it down to me. It’s a family heirloom, she had said. And honestly, to me it looked more like a sad reminder of our relationship with the aristocracy, a false promise of safety and all that.

Not that I care for it now, but I knew if I went back without the necklace my mother would freak out. So, I pulled at it harder, and it moved. Something moved. I realized the grey plastic wasn’t plastic but rubble. As stones fell and rolled away from me, I saw a hand attached to my necklace. My stupid star shaped necklace my mother thought was so unique was tied around what seemed like a woman’s hand and the woman was not moving. She was dead. For sure she was dead.

A scream escaped me. I knew I’d be found if I stayed longer. So, it was a decision, to pull the stupid necklace off a dead woman or run for my life and I chose the right thing. I ran with the necklace towards my house, blood still fresh on my gold chain, her gold chain, thick, strange reminder of our relationship with the king.

Samia Ahmed is originally from Bhopal, India but now lives in New York where she is enrolled in the PhD Creative Writing Program at Binghamton University. She is the recipient of Marion Clayton Link Fellowship in Creative Writing. Her work can be found in The Kenyon Review, Bluestem Magazine, Coffin Bell Journal, deLuge Literary and Arts Journal and more. She holds an MFA from Old Dominion University. She has been nominated and has won several awards.