by Tom Corbett
Chris looked at his wife and daughter. They had turned to gaze at him, their expressions set in a loving smile. Are you sure, he mouthed absent sound? Amar shrugged her shoulders but nodded her head. Azita mouthed her own silent response. I am sure. He thought his heart would burst through his chest.
PART II CHALLENGES
CHAPTER 10
MADTOWN : SUMMER 2016
“I am ecstatic that you could come over to America and spend a few days with me before my internship starts. It is good to have familiar faces at the start of any new adventure.” Azita embraced her older sister. “I don’t know why but I am nervous. It’s like my first months in England again.”
“Stop that.”
“You mean my constant insecurity?” Azita asked.
“Not that, silly. Why worry about that? The Americans will undoubtedly discover that you are a total fraud and send you packing soon enough. I am talking about all this affection in public.” Deena looked about to see if others were on the same path. A couple of joggers were approaching but they appeared totally indifferent. “If you keep hugging me like this, people will think we are lovers and not sisters.”
Azita laughed aloud. “That would be so embarrassing for me. Surely, they will all say that I could do so much better.”
“You think?” Deena scoffed. “You have only been here a few days and already your ego is swollen. Just like all Americans, your head is too big to fit through the door. I suppose I should let you hug me. When I was complaining about you, Kay did tell me recently how much you did to save me right after the shooting, about you not panicking and tending to me right away until she could arrive. But then you blew it by torturing me so during my recovery”
“Hah, you were a horrible patient, always whining.”
“And don’t worry about how you will do. You have fooled everyone so far, that will not change. And I promise not to tell people here that you are a total fraud.” Deena had decided to ignore her sister’s most recent attempt at an insult so that their sibling exchange would not go on endlessly. Instead, she looked about her. “I must admit, this is so lovely, what is this place?”
“Picnic Point,” Azita responded. “As you can see, it juts out into the lake and you can look over to the state capitol and the skyline of Madison. I love it as a place to walk. If you are up to it, we can walk to the end and return to the entrance. Then we can walk all the way along the lake and the campus to Memorial Union where the students hang out, which is also on the lake and very lovely. If we have enough energy and time, we could then walk up State Street which connects the campus to the capitol, a most beautiful building with the second biggest dome after the U.S. Capitol or so I was told. Anyways, they do not permit cars on the street and there are many interesting stores and outdoor restaurants and so many fascinating people. And then we could walk down to the conference complex that was inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright - have you heard of him? He was a world-famous architect, and this is also on the shore of another local lake and...”
“Wait. How long is this walk?” Deena inquired.
“Just a few miles,” Azita mentioned nonchalantly. “Have you become a lazy cow?”
“Sister,” Deena guffawed, “just listen to yourself. Two weeks ago, you were pouting and groaning about agreeing to come to America. Now, you sound like a real estate agent.”
“Well, a couple of weeks ago I was feeling sad that we would be separated by six or seven thousand kilometers but now I realize that is a blessing, with you being such a shit and all.” Then Azita hugged her sister again as Deena let out a groan. “Get used to this, soon, you will be gone from me. I understand you will be heading back to the school sites again.”
Deena beamed. “Yes, everyone has said I am totally cured, 100 percent.”
“Except for your obvious personality flaws.” Azita could not resist.
“Hah, hah, the doctors confirmed that my biggest medical threat was not the bullet to my skull but my obnoxious, bratty little sister who tortured me so during my recovery. They tell me it is a miracle that I survived her so well.” Deena detected a small movement from her sibling. “Don’t, no more hugs.”
Azita pouted. “Sorry, it is just so good to see you and we both know the opportunities will be fewer after this. I will be in training, this endless training, and you will back in your world.”
“It could have been much worse, you know that. Just think if that boy back home were a better shot, we both would have been killed. How would we share things then? How? I would be in heaven and you would be in that other place.” Deena smiled at the cleverness of her own quip.
Azita hesitated for a step or two before registering the sarcasm. “Oh, you really have become such a shit. Where did my good sister go? I thought I had learned such bad things from Chris, but I believe Karen has been a worse mentor to you. Our dear mother would be so disappointed in you. She always thought you were the good girl. And you have me using this bad language all the time. Our dear mother would be disappointed in me as well.”
Deena seemed to absorb her sister’s words with care. “I will tell you one thing. When we were young, I never would have believed we would have hated the possibility of being separated. I could not stand you back then and wished for the day we would go our separate ways.”
“Odd, isn’t it?” Azita mused drily, “you also have grown much more tolerable over time.”
“Well, that makes no sense.” Deena registered surprise. “I was the good sister, just perfect from the start. Everyone agreed on that. You were the spoiled, lazy cow.”
Azita laughed again. “When did you turn into such a jokester? Really, you were such a sourpuss as a teenager.”
“Actually, I do know when it started, well, when I started to grow up.” Deena paused a moment before continuing as if vetting her next thought. “It was the day you were pummeled by the Taliban morality police, that day woke me up. Sure, I felt much guilt for shaming you into going to the market. However, something else happened that awful day. I looked hard at myself and did not like what I saw. I was coasting, just getting by.”
“I don’t understand,” Azita murmured, realizing their conversation had taken a serious turn.
“Think about it. Everyone said how beautiful I was, so I thought that I didn’t need to try. I would be taken care of…by some man. Then, a funny thing happened. Increasingly, the image of a man taking care of me had faded from my mind. It no longer fit with my…feelings. The thought became rather repulsive. Nothing real had replaced it but that future of being the pampered wife was simply going away, not that many wives in our country are pampered. Then, father had come to me that day of your beating and talked about how special my beauty was. He was saying that was a good thing and that you were not so blessed.”
“Wait…what?” Azita wondered if she should feel insulted.
“Just shush,” Deena cut her off. “He was simply trying to make me feel better. It was his way of saying that each of us had a special gift but, at the same time, each gift contained its own burdens and responsibilities. Your life was not as easy as it had looked to me. I should not have been so jealous of you. There were so many obstacles in your life that I never considered. Of course, I had never considered such things. I thought you were just a pampered little brat who only thought of herself.”
“You were not wrong,” Azita inserted quickly. The path that wound its way through the peninsula was shaped by trees on both sides, occasionally offering a canopy overhead to provide shelter against the late spring sun. They had come upon a spot where an opening in the trees permitted a view of Lake Mendota. They looked over the waters, roughed up with a rather brisk breeze. In the distance, sailboats skipped over the surface as university student sailors honed their new skills. “We are so far from Kabul and home.” Azita’s private thought escaped her.
Deena didn’t respond. She yet embraced her own dialogue. “That day, father helped me in a different way, perhaps in a way he had not intended. He he
lped me realize that physical beauty is as much a curse as a blessing. If I were not careful, I would use this…this accident of birth as a crutch to avoid doing anything with my life. And that was what I was doing.”
“No…” Azita tried to protest.
“Yes, I was. Listen to me. I had felt sorry for myself all those years. It started with Majeeb, our sweet brother. He was a boy and, by definition, therefore special. His world was open to him, at least it seemed that way. Of course, by the time I was aware of him as a person, his goal was to fight the Taliban even when he could not. Do you realize how gentle and wise father was? Of course you do. Pamir never betrayed that he was disappointed in his eldest child, his only son. He must have realized early that Majeeb did not have any interest in medicine, nor talent for it. It did not matter. In my eyes, he was spoiled as the heir apparent to the family name. I thought that unfair. I knew I was much smarter than my brother, but I was to be the pretty one. I didn’t know what to do. I also had no interest in medicine and following mother into teaching was just a dream during the Taliban years. It was as if I just existed, helping mother with the domestic chores and drifting further and further into a haze of depression. I played as if I embraced this vision of future domesticity and motherhood when the thought of being forever with a man loomed as a lifetime in hell. Did you never see my anguish?” She looked to her sister.
“No…I am so sorry. I was too young, too self-absorbed, too…” Azita wanted to embrace her sibling but decided Deena might whack her. “I thought you were confident of who you were while I despaired at my foolish wish to follow in father’s footsteps. It was hopeless, but I could not shake it. I had become obsessed.”
“Yes, of course,” Deena said softly as if she had never lost her reverie. “When you were young, I thought that you were a godsend for me. You were not pretty in any classical sense. You were kind of fetching with those large eyes, but I thought that at least I would be the beautiful one and you my plain younger sister. That seemed important then, how odd. Then, one day, you turned out to be this brilliant little spoiled shit, the family prodigy.”
“You are…”
“Shush, or I will beat you just like the Taliban did.” Deena scowled. “You came along and then betrayed me by becoming Papa’s favorite. At first, we all thought it cute the way you followed him around like a pet. This will not last, we said behind your back. Even Mama told me not to yell at you for skipping on your chores since this was merely a fad that would soon pass. But it never did. Worse, Papa began to take you seriously. That crushed me.” Deena suddenly looked into her sister’s eyes. “That really was such a crushing blow. Now, I felt like nothing. Majeeb was the crown prince and you would carry on father’s work and I would be nothing. The fact that you becoming a doctor was impossible at the time escaped me. What I saw was Papa taking your dream seriously. Never, not for one moment, did I ever really understand your own anguish or doubts. You seemed so self-assured.”
“I was not.”
“Of course. Now that is clear to me. You had a passion…no, an obsession and no way to satisfy it. That is a true definition of hell. But that day, when Papa came to soothe me when I grieved that my selfishness almost got you killed, he awakened me in a way. He got me to come and talk to you without asking. Maybe that day woke me up, finally got me to be honest. I think…I think that it was then that I first appreciated what you were going through. We started talking after that. No, not just talking but sharing. You know what - inspiration replaced jealousy. I didn’t just mope around with envy. I even convinced myself that you were not that smart, you just tried harder. One day, shortly after, I got up the courage to ask Mama if she would tutor me. She had done so when I was younger, but I never encouraged her to continue. Now, I asked her. I was so fearful she would say no, that I was not smart enough, not like her prize student, you. Do you know what happened?”
“She agreed of course.”
“She said not a word. I saw the most wonderful expression in her eyes, and tears. I saw tears. She merely put aside her things and pulled out a book. I think she and I had a very difficult time that first day, reading the lesson through our tears.”
“Funny,” Azita responded when her sister seemed to pause in memory. “I was not even aware of the change at first.”
“Of course not, you were still a selfish brat and, besides, you were following Papa around even more as you got older. That gave Mama and I plenty of time to be alone. She knew I wanted to do this quietly. I think she knew that to make this a big thing in the family might scare me off. I felt so insecure and she was so sensitive…I miss her.”
Azita looked up through the trees to the crisp blue sky, as if the answer to her internal debate might be found there. “You remember that book that saved me?”
“Of course. The bullet that glanced off my skull struck it in your blouse. Talk about Allah’s protection. You had just found it in mother’s possessions. Am I remembering these things in the right way? Some memories from that time seem real, some I am not sure about.”
“Yes,” Azita said softly. “You are remembering perfectly.”
Deena now looked very interested. “You were going to show it to me but never did. Given my memory problems back then, it slipped my mind.”
“Just listen to me.” Azita took a big breath. “That was not just any book. It was mother’s private journal. Perhaps that is why I stuffed it into the front of my blouse, that I felt some guilt just taking it. Good that it was thick, in any case. It stopped the bullet headed for my heart, and I do have one by the way.” But Azita saw that her preemptive strike was not necessary, her sister was staring intently into her eyes. “I think you are ready for Mother’s journal though it takes some talent to get around a big bullet hole. Mother loved you so deeply. She saw your talent even if you did not. She knew you were destined to be an educator, like her. I was to be like Papa, the doctor.”
“But she never said anything,” Deena protested.
“Don’t you see? She knew you had to make that decision on your own. She had been dropping hints, but you never seemed to respond. It had to be your choice. No one can give an obsession to another, it has to have been put inside them by God.”
“Oh my God, I think I remember that. I was just too wrapped up I my own self-loathing to hear anything back then.”
“She talks about the day you finally came to her as being one of the happiest in her life. She could never again be an educator, which she so loved, but she now could pass that on to her beloved daughter…you.”
Rather than embrace, the two began walking again, engrossed in their private thoughts. Azita kept looking up through a break in the canopy of trees overhead, mostly to avoid acknowledging the tears that had run down her sister’s cheeks. The sky seemed a brittle blue suggesting air that was dry and on the edge of bracing. She enjoyed the intermittent ripples of breeze on her skin. Still, perfect weather could not quite erase a heaviness that poked at the edges of her heart. “Sometimes, I wish we could go back to where we were, have a do-over as I have heard the kids here say. Of course, I would want my head to be filled with the things I now know and maybe some of the confidence I now feel, at least on occasion.”
“You always looked confident,” Deena noted.
“Hah,” Azita laughed. “that is how little we knew one another back then. Think about it. We spent so much time together since, as youngish girls, we were rather prisoners in our homes and yet we hardly knew one another. I so wish to make up for lost time and yet, we are to be separated again.”
This time Deena stopped walking and took her sister’s hands. “Dear Azita, we will never be parted. No matter the physical distance between us, our hearts will beat as one. Besides, we also possess the wonder of today’s communications devices. We will speak to one another always, share all the details and agonies of our lives. And we will do so even with more intensity than we do now. Why? Because we shall be aware of that very physical distance between us. When we were in
England, separated by just dozens of kilometers, days went by without any contact between us. We were busy and somehow knew that there would always be tomorrow so connecting was not such an urgency. That will not happen now, that will never happen again. Now, we know something that shall never be forgotten.”
“What is that?” Azita asked.
“Now we know, completely, just how precious each day of life is. That boy in our village did me a favor; too bad I cannot thank him.”
“Some favor, putting a bullet into your head.”
“No, no. How many people go through life never being in any danger of having it ripped away from them? Once you have experienced that, you never go back to taking things for granted. When I was laying in my bed after I realized I would not die and, of course, after I would finish yelling at you, I would think about things. There was little else to do. Silly, I suppose, but I made two vows. Now, don’t you laugh.”
“I won’t…unless you say something really stupid, which I am sure you will.”
Deena glared at her for a moment before accepting her sister’s jest. “First, I would, no matter what, make my life count. And don’t say that I already was doing that. What I vowed to myself was that I would not back away from danger. I will always be a target because I advocate and work on behalf of the education of our young girls. It would be easy to do that from a distance, from a place like this I suppose. But I vowed that, when necessary, I would go back, I would not let them intimidate me. I must read our mother’s journal. If you are being honest, she did see me as her legacy. Now, I have no doubt at all. If I cannot live the life our mother, Madeena, prepared me for, I will have disappointed her. I will not do that. I cannot do that.” With that Deena paused.
“Yes, I understand that pledge, entirely. And the other?”
