A Good Wife

by Samra Zafar

  “Everyone asks me how I can forgive you,” she said to me one afternoon, “after everything you’ve done. But I tell them that I can’t hold grudges. That’s just the way I am, the way my heart is.”

  But there were also dark overtones to the veiled accusations. My misbehaviour had caused people to suffer emotionally and physically. “Of course, I wouldn’t have this high blood pressure and diabetes if it hadn’t been for the stress,” Amma would say after commenting about her powers of forgiveness.

  Abba as usual was more taciturn, but when he did speak, it was devastating. One day I walked into their bedroom to give them my customary morning salaam. Amma was sorting out her pills for the day. Abba was getting ready to go to the kitchen for his tea. First, however, he glanced over at Amma and then at me.

  “Look what you’ve done to Amma. Because of you, she’s now on all of these medications.” But he wasn’t done with me yet. “It’s a parents’ job, of course, to instill the proper values. Yours failed to do that. But Allah is always watching, and he always shows us who is right and who is wrong. And then, he punishes.”

  Abba’s message was clear. My bad behaviour had led to my father’s death.

  * * *

  A little over a week after we got back, Ahmed wished me happy birthday before he left for work in the morning and Amma gave me the usual small gift, but the occasion was marked in no other way. It was one of the blackest days since my return.

  The loss of my father seemed to sweep the solid earth out from under my feet. Back in Canada, I continued to stumble around, as if I were walking half blind, half deaf, through shifting mud. The only thing sharp and clear and solid was the pain in my heart.

  But gradually, my father’s words began to break through: “You don’t need anyone else.”

  And then an idea appeared along with that thought, an idea that helped me push aside some of my despair. I didn’t seem able to bring about the happy marriage I had hoped for, but maybe I could fashion a reasonably happy life for myself. Part of that had to be a university education, but another part lay in a certain amount of autonomy and control over my affairs. No more treading water—I had to swim. And no one was going to help me. I had to find a way to move forward on my own.

  I thought back to my encounter with the man in Tim Hortons. The key to taking control of my life was money. With Aisha to care for and another baby on the way, I couldn’t possibly go out to work, even if I could get Ahmed to agree. But re-establishing the daycare I had run in the apartment would be easy now that I could offer the indoor—and outdoor—space of a comfortable suburban home. And throwing myself headlong into running a business might just keep my misery at bay.

  Ahmed raised no objections, but Amma was concerned. She didn’t want the place overrun with toys and clutter.

  “What about my dinner parties?” she asked.

  I suspected that once more money started coming into the household, her resistance would weaken. When Amma left to visit her son and daughter-in-law in California shortly after I returned home, I recognized my chance to act.

  This time, I wasn’t just trying to earn a bit of extra money to buy plane tickets. This was going to be my career for the time being, and I decided to approach it in as professional a manner as possible. I didn’t bother with flyers on telephone poles. Instead, I put ads on Craigslist and Kijiji. And as prospective clients contacted me, I explained that I wasn’t offering hourly babysitting but a quality, daylong program on par with licensed institutional daycares—at a more affordable price. I researched contracts online and put together my own agreement outlining my services and responsibilities and establishing working terms with the parents. I developed daily menus for the nutritious breakfasts, lunches and afternoon snacks that would be provided. And in the months to come, I would get my police background check done, arrange for insurance for the daycare and earn my CPR certification.

  I built up an impressive inventory of toys and craft supplies. As I began to earn money, I re-invested some of it in outdoor play equipment—a slide, a swing set, a sandbox and riding toys—transforming the backyard into a little park. And I created a weekly schedule to share with the parents, listing our daily outdoor activities, circle time for music and stories, craft and educational activities and, of course, nap time.

  By the time Amma returned from California, I was still in the midst of developing the business, but I already had three children signed up. Creating a home business that was going to be both economically beneficial and sustainable would take one more important step. And that was Amma herself.

  When she had objected to the prospect of her home being upended by children, I had begun to think about how best to limit her push-back. I remembered all too well her complaints about caring for Aisha when I worked at Zellers, and I knew that for everything from cooking to household chores to grocery shopping, Amma was only happy if she was in charge. The solution was to give her that kind of authority—at least in part. If she ran the daycare with me and was able to make her own money, I reasoned, she wouldn’t try to shut it down.

  As soon as Amma got back from her trip, I laid out the financial details. When I told her how much I was already making, her eyes grew wide. If she joined me in the daycare, I explained, she could take on two children and keep all of the money from those contracts. I would do all the planning and organization for our little business, and since my English was fluent I would deal with the parents if she wanted. We could share various tasks, like meal preparation and activities. But as far as diapers and other upkeep—we would each be responsible for our own charges.

  “And don’t worry, Amma,” I reassured her. “Ahmed says we can store all the toys and equipment in his den. Your house will look lovely for your dinner parties.”

  Abba was still working part time as a security guard. And even though Ahmed was paying the mortgage, there wasn’t a lot of extra cash. While Amma was a formidable force in the household, like me she was in many ways hampered in her ability to do as she pleased by a lack of funds. She didn’t hesitate to sign on to the daycare.

  * * *

  Before we brought in Amma’s daycare kids, my second child was born.

  The evening of June 15th, 2006, I began to have contractions. By the morning, I was ready to go to the hospital. Ahmed drove me and sat by me in the delivery room. After eighteen hours of labour, our second daughter came into the world. A few hours later, the baby and I were alone in my hospital room. As I cradled her in my arms, I could see a lively, cheerful spirit in her surprisingly bright and beautiful eyes. When I slowly caressed her delicate, heart-shaped face, she smiled ever so slightly and two tiny dimples creased her cheeks. I gasped in delight. I’d always found dimples adorable. And my lovely little daughter had them! I leaned down and kissed her silky hair. I no longer had any illusions that a new baby would bring Ahmed and me closer together, but I took comfort in the knowledge that this new little person would be a source of love and joy all on her own. I silently promised to do everything I could to provide a happy home for her.

  Both the labour and the days that followed were easier and calmer than they had been with Aisha. Amma was attentive, bringing homemade soup to the hospital and then cooking only mildly spiced food for me when I got home. But there was hardly a pause in the bleak rhythm of my marriage. A day after our daughter was born, Ahmed was with me in the semi-private room. I was attempting to get the baby to nurse. As I struggled to get her settled, the blanket I had draped over my shoulder slid off. Just then, a man who was visiting the woman in the next bed peeked behind the curtain separating the two areas. I’m sure he was just curious to see if anyone was in the other bed, and he certainly moved away quickly when he realized someone was, but Ahmed was furious. With me.

  “You have to be a whore in the hospital too?” he spat in Urdu.

  I was still stinging with humiliation and Ahmed was still angry when we got home from the hospital the following day.

  Luckily, however, his dark mood
didn’t move him to oppose me when we met around the kitchen table to settle on a name for the baby. I had wanted “Sonia” for our first-born but had been vetoed. I decided to suggest it again. Perhaps if the baby had been a boy, the discussion might have been more heated, but no one seemed to have any particular interest in choosing a name this time. I was allowed to name her.

  I took a week off after the birth—the parents of my daycare children had been happy to make other arrangements for a while. And then, with my seven-day-old newborn, I started back to the daily routine I would have for the next couple of years.

  * * *

  The workday started early, with the arrival of our first child at 7:30, and ended at about 6:30.

  With up to five toddlers (not all the children were with us for the full week), as well as baby Sonia, Amma and I had our hands full during the day. Amma usually took care of the meals, while I ran around with the kids in the backyard, read them stories, taught them songs, played games and did crafts with them.

  When I first got back to the house with Sonia, I had asked Amma and Ahmed if I could move out of my upstairs bedroom and into the finished basement. I told them that now with two children, I could use the extra space. They agreed. I suspect everyone was somewhat relieved to know that the crying newborn would be several floors beneath them at night.

  I relished the privacy my basement room gave me, but the physical distance between me and the rest of the family underlined that Ahmed and I were living separate lives.

  After the daycare children left the house at the end of the day, everyone had dinner together. Then Ahmed would disappear into his den or go out with his friends. I would clean the kitchen and help Aisha with her homework. Next was bedtime for both Aisha and Sonia, and then I too would disappear into the basement. If I had any energy left at all, I might log on to Facebook to chat with a few old high school friends I’d gotten back in touch with. Or I’d do some studying on my last correspondence course. Some evenings, I paid the bills and did our banking.

  Now that I was bringing in a significant amount of money each month, Ahmed had decided that I should manage our bills and keep track of our money. Even though in practice this meant I had to use my daycare money to pay the Visa bill if Ahmed ran it up by dining out with friends or making purchases we couldn’t afford, taking over the accounts gave me a sense of security, both in the knowledge of our financial state and in the control it gave me. And it allowed me, finally, to do something I had been asking Ahmed to do since the girls were born—set up education savings plans for them. (He had always said, “What’s the point? They’re girls. They’ll just get married when they finish high school.”)

  Running the daycare certainly gave me a greater feeling of agency. And while Ahmed tended to hover by the door during pickup time, making sure my conversations were short and that I wasn’t too friendly with anyone—particularly the fathers—dealing with the parents was always a boost to my confidence. But it was challenging to run an in-home business when I had to wait for Ahmed to come home to take me grocery shopping or to the stores to buy other supplies. I needed to rid myself of this dependence. I needed to be able to drive. And there was only one way.

  “Amma,” I said one day while we were cleaning the kitchen after supper, “wouldn’t it be so much easier if you and I could take the car out at night or on the weekend to get groceries for the daycare? Have you ever thought about driving lessons?”

  “Driving lessons are expensive,” she replied.

  I was prepared for that objection. “Yes,” I said, “but I’ve been saving money. I think I could afford to pay for lessons for both of us, if you were interested.”

  Amma didn’t say anything, but I could tell she was intrigued. The next day, while we were feeding the children breakfast, she looked over at me. “So, how do we do this? How do we get our learner’s licences?”

  My heart skipped a beat. We would be learning to drive!

  As the cooler temperatures blew in and the leaves began to fall, Amma and I took the test for our learner’s permits. I found a female driving instructor who spoke Urdu for Amma so that on the weekends, or while the daycare kids napped, Amma and I could take turns driving through the wintry streets of Mississauga while she taught us to parallel park or showed us how to avoid sliding on the icy roads. Once the snow had melted, I went for my test and got my licence. Amma, however, didn’t pass; and I didn’t offer to continue paying for extra lessons.

  * * *

  As the summer months rolled into view, I made my next move. I began to talk to Amma about buying a car.

  “If I had a car,” I said, “we could go shopping whenever you wanted”—Amma loved to shop—“or we could take the kids to the park for a change of scenery.”

  Since Amma seemed pleased with idea, I brought it up again when Ahmed was with us. I had been saving my daycare money carefully for over a year. While I’d also been paying some of the household bills, the only major purchase I made was a laptop so that I didn’t have to use Ahmed’s computer when doing our banking or working on a course. I knew that having the money to pay for a car would make all the difference to him.

  “I have enough money to buy a used vehicle,” I suggested to him. “If we could find a cheap second-hand minivan, I wouldn’t have to use your car.”

  Ahmed agreed to help me look for something.

  After a few weeks of visiting used-car lots, we found a four-year-old dark-green Dodge Caravan. It was, in truth, a tired-looking family van, but to me it was the most beautiful vehicle I had ever seen.

  I proceeded with caution in the early days. Since I didn’t want to be accused again of “roaming around,” I made sure always to take Amma with me wherever I drove. But as the family got used to my driving, I began to go out on my own—to the grocery store or to do little errands—pushing my boundaries bit by bit.

  It was an extraordinary feeling to navigate the busy streets that used to frighten me so much, to park the car in a lot and stride into a grocery store with my debit card in hand, knowing I could make my own choices, that I could even buy myself a treat or two without anyone at home raising an eyebrow. I had been right; earning money had finally given me some leverage in the family and made at least some personal freedom possible.

  I still felt a little pang every time I spotted one of those blue-and-white University of Toronto signs. But at least now, I thought, I was sitting in the front seat as I passed them.

  * * *

  We were on our way home from a dinner party thrown by family friends. As we got in the car, I could tell Ahmed was fuming about something. My heart began to race. I had no idea what he might be angry about now.

  After everything that had happened in Karachi and Ruwais, I no longer looked to him for affection, support or comfort. And I had given up the idea that we might fall back in love. The fact that I no longer looked to him for anything, even money, seemed to put Ahmed more at ease in the house, and his rages became less frequent. But they did not stop entirely. I still walked on eggshells whenever he was around. So it was a relief to see his back as he headed out the door to work in the mornings or to hang out with his friends in the evening.

  In fact, these days what I wanted from him was absence. An absence of anger, an absence of violence, an absence of suspicion. And yet here we were again. A perfectly pleasant evening with friends had mysteriously ignited something in him.

  Ahmed didn’t say a single word the whole drive home. When we got in the house, I said good night to Amma and Abba and went down to my room in the basement. Ahmed followed me. As I began to take off my hijab and get undressed, he grabbed me by the arm and spun me around to face him.

  “When are you going to stop being a whore?” he shouted as he slapped me across the face.

  “What are you talking about?” I said, holding my hand to my stinging cheek.

  “You were hugging in front of men.”

  When we left the party, I had given a couple of women a hug goodbye. “They
were women,” I said.

  “All the men could see your chest pressed against their chests. They were probably getting hard-ons.”

  I protested: it would have been rude to have refused to hug. This is how women say goodbye. This is how Amma says goodbye to her friends.

  “I don’t care what other women do. They aren’t my property. I don’t want other men to look at my property. It’s your job to protect my honour.” With that he stormed out of the basement.

  * * *

  While my relationship with Ahmed settled into a chilly détente, life with Amma was better now that we were truly dependent on one another because of the daycare. She told me repeatedly that she considered me her daughter and sometimes accompanied these words with acts of genuine affection. For my most recent birthday, she had presented me with an eyeshadow compact she had noticed me admiring on one of our shopping trips. It was the first time I felt that one of her birthday gifts had been chosen specifically for me. Still, from time to time, she seemed to find it necessary to needle me or to comment about my lack of wifely behaviour.

  She sometimes brought up information that she should have had no way of knowing. “So, you still want to move out, do you?” she said to me one morning as we got breakfast ready for the daycare kids.

  I sputtered some sort of denial.

  Another time, she sniped, “Why do you want Ahmed to get more certifications? Is his job not good enough for you?”

  At first, I was baffled. How did Amma seem to know the content of my rare private conversations with Ahmed? And then one day I looked over at her sitting on the couch, cuddling up next to Aisha. Their heads were close, and Aisha was whispering in her ear. My heart dropped.

  Amma adored her granddaughter, I knew. But it seemed that wasn’t going to prevent her from using Aisha to get information. I was angry that Amma would turn my daughter into a pawn in her battle to keep Ahmed and me under her control. But I also felt guilty—guilty that my children were trapped in an unhappy marriage along with their parents. I hadn’t been able to prevent them from witnessing the fights and the violence, but I would have to try my best not to expose them to anymore than I had to. And I would be careful what I said around them—for their sakes and mine.