by Sheba Karim
“I’m here,” I said.
“I’m hungry,” Umar said.
“Shock and awe,” Ghaz replied.
We walked arm in arm to Hillsboro Village, a compact but cute neighborhood with brick-paved sidewalks, and cafés and clothing stores catering to young people with a taste for frills and lace. It was only half past seven, but a lot of places were already closed. We walked until we hit a major intersection. Across the street a sign indicated the start of Vanderbilt University’s campus.
“Let’s eat at that place Fido,” Ghaz suggested. “It has great Yelp reviews.”
As we headed back toward the café, we passed a guy playing guitar in front of Pancake Pantry, which Ghaz informed us was one of Nashville’s most popular breakfast establishments. He was dressed in skinny jeans and boots, indigo geometric tattoos up and down his arms, his long hair parted in the middle.
I kept my secrets because I wanted you to stay
But it was keeping secrets that drove you away
Oh, for cryin’ out loud.
“Hey, guys,” I said, falling back. “I’ll meet you inside.”
I sat down at one of the empty metal tables outside Fido and called my mother. She answered on the first ring, as though she’d been waiting.
“Hi, Mom.”
“Hi, Mariam. All well?”
“Yes, we’re about to have dinner in Nashville.”
“Is it nice?”
“Well, Tennessee has been kind of intense, which I’ll explain later, and so far Nashville is hot and small and quaint, but we haven’t seen much.”
“Good. And Ghazala? How is she?”
“She’s okay. We still haven’t really talked about the stuff that happened with her.”
“She’s reluctant?”
“There’s that, and also because . . . well, I’ve been taking up a lot of space.”
“How so?”
Noting my hesitation, she said, “If you’d rather not tell me, it’s okay.”
Ever since I could remember, even if my door was ajar, my mother would knock and wait for me to tell her to come in. I hadn’t realized how rare her respect for privacy and distaste for emotional intrusion was among desi parents until I’d become friends with Ghaz and Umar.
“I saw Sanjeev Uncle,” I said. “My father’s brother. We had chai with him and his wife at their house in Virginia.”
She was quiet, but only for a moment.
“Was it a successful visit?” she asked.
“That depends on how you define successful.”
“The definition is yours and yours alone.”
I summarized the visit, the perfect house in the perfect subdivision, Sanjeev Uncle the bitter chauvinist, Usha Auntie the kind, obedient computer scientist wife. I told her he had long been estranged from my father but spared her the details he’d revealed—it was nothing she didn’t already know.
Umar stepped outside to check on me. I gestured at the phone and waved him away.
“Did you ever meet him?” I asked.
“Sanjeev? No. It seems I didn’t miss out on much.”
I laughed. “No. But there’s something else. As we were leaving, Usha Auntie came out and told me my father remarried some American woman and was living in Nashville. So, that’s really why we’re here.”
“Ah,” my mother said.
After a moment of fraught silence, she cleared her throat. I hated that sound because it meant she was about to deliver unwelcome news. I know I said we could stop for ice cream but we no longer have time. Alex, the beloved neighborhood stray cat, was hit by a car.
“What is it?” I asked.
“I knew.”
“Knew? You mean you knew he’d come back to the US?”
“I did. An acquaintance emailed me several months ago. I don’t know how she knew.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why would I?”
Why would she, when we never spoke of him, when we’d erased him from our life, our conversations, when I’d never told her I wanted to find him.
“I don’t know. I feel like it’s something most people would tell their kids.”
“I’m not most people, I’m your mother. He knew how to find you if he wanted to reach out. And I didn’t realize how badly you wanted to meet him.”
“Do you remember the book he gave you? The Brothers Karamazov?”
“I’m afraid I don’t,” she said.
Of course she didn’t remember. That was why it had remained on our bookshelf.
“Well, he gave it to you, and signed it, and I found it when I was a kid and kept it in my nightstand drawer, because, I don’t know. It was a piece of him, of the two of you, however far removed.”
“Oh.”
“Are you upset?”
“Why would I be upset? I can understand why it’s important for you to meet him. When are you going to see him?”
“Tomorrow.”
“Are you feeling strong about it?”
“I feel strong and utterly terrified at the same time. Sometimes I think nothing makes any sense.”
“So little of the world makes sense. It’s only that most people either construct a narrative in which it does or try to ignore it.”
When it came to my father, both options seemed impossible. “Are you going to tell Shoaib?”
“Would you like me to?”
“He’ll freak out. He hates our father.”
“I’ll leave it to you to tell him when you think the time is right.”
“How is he?”
“Shoaib? He has a new girlfriend, and has started drinking a protein shake that smells like old socks.”
I laughed. “I miss you tons.”
“I miss you. Take care. And don’t forget to take care of Ghazala.”
“I know. I’ll call you soon.”
I arrived at the table at the same time as the food.
“We got you a veggie burger,” Ghaz said.
“Did you tell your mom you’re meeting your dad?” Umar asked.
“Yup. She says she understands.”
Ghaz shook her head. “I’d love to hear my mother say that to me, just once. ‘It’s okay, beta, I understand.’ Anyway, it’s good you got that secret off your chest. I know how open you and your mom are.”
“What if, after all this, my dad isn’t even there?” I ventured. “He might have already abandoned Hannah Rae Tipple.”
“Wouldn’t that be anticlimactic,” Ghaz said.
“This veggie burger is delish,” I said.
“Please, how good can a veggie burger be?” Umar said.
“Try it,” I countered, but he refused.
“So are we hitting the town tonight or what?” Ghaz said.
I shook my head. “I need to crash soon.”
“So do I,” Umar said.
“Not even a movie?” Ghaz protested. “There’s an independent cinema across the street. Ten bucks says they’re playing a film about a white hipster couple with a broken marriage, or something depressing with subtitles.”
“Sounds like a scream,” Umar said. “I’ll pass.”
“Me, too,” I agreed.
Umar was asleep on the couch in front of the TV before I’d even finished brushing my teeth. In the morning, he would be annoyed that he’d forgotten to floss. Ghaz and I shared the double bed, which took up most of the bedroom. She smelled like the jasmine ittar Umar wore every day. It was a subtle scent that revealed itself in close proximity, which is why Ghaz liked to say that you wore ittar for your lover.
And if not for your lover, then for your best friend lying tucked against you in a strange bed in a strange city which your estranged father now called home.
I’d thought she was asleep, but after a while she said, “Mars?”
“Yeah?”
“I swear I wasn’t actually going to hit the pickup truck with the bat.”
“I know,” I assured her. “Though you might need to reassure Umar. You know how s
ensitive he is, underneath all those jokes.”
“Yeah. I’ll talk to him tomorrow. But I’ve been thinking, picking up the bat, holding it in a menacing way, that’s not me. That’s something my mother would do, except she usually does it with a frying pan or a shoe. Or maybe it is me. Maybe my true self is emerging.”
“You are not like your mother.”
“If you’re worried you’re like your father, can’t I be worried I’m like my mother?”
I propped myself up on an elbow. A party had commenced down the street, an urgent bass line, youthful voices drunkenly hailing one another. “It’s different. My father remains largely a mystery. You know your mother well, and therefore you can also know you’re not like her.”
She sighed, throwing her arm over my waist. “Then why did I do it? The road trip effect?”
“You were angry about Sylvia’s bumper sticker. But maybe it was more than that. Maybe you’re angry at your parents, too.”
Ghaz murmured noncommittally into her pillow.
“Ghaz. Of course you’re feeling anger and resentment. They shut you up in your room and said terrible things. And you haven’t talked to us about it at all. You’re keeping it all inside.”
She lifted her head from the pillow, burying her face into my shoulder instead. “I’ll talk about it later, but not now. I don’t want to, really, I don’t. The bat thing was weird, but it won’t happen again, I promise.”
“All right,” I said, stroking her hair.
“Mars?”
“Yeah?”
“Yesterday in the car, remember you said whenever you were feeling stressed about something, Doug would sing you some song from Monty Python?”
“‘Galaxy Song.’”
“Will you sing it to me?”
“Whenever life gets you down, Mrs. Brown . . .” I sang, even tra la la’ing the waltz part like Doug used to. By the time I finished, Ghaz was asleep. I kissed the top of her head, willing her dreams to bring the peace her heart wouldn’t allow.
Twenty-Three
FOR A MERE THREE dollars ninety-five cents, a website had provided me with Hannah Rae Tipple’s address, phone number, and date of birth.
“That’s some serious stalker shit!” Ghaz exclaimed.
“It’s all from public records,” I said, but she was right. First, I invaded Hannah Rae Tipple’s privacy, and now I was about to show up at her house, with my two best friends in tow. That morning, Umar and Ghaz had taken an excruciatingly long time deciding what to wear. Ghaz tried on three outfits, all black. Umar finally settled upon navy pants, an ivory short-sleeved ikat shirt, his lucky navy butterfly scarf, a red slim-fitting corduroy jacket, and his cherry-red sunglasses.
“A corduroy jacket?” Ghaz objected. “In the middle of summer?”
“Don’t hate me because I’m stylish,” he shot back.
“Are you saying I’m not?” she said, modeling her dress. It was black, ankle length with a cinched waist, embellished throughout with lace, with a high lace neck.
“Um, what is that?” he replied. “A black doily? How do they market it? Goth tea party to funeral wear?”
Ghaz stuck her tongue out. “It’s modern Edwardian, thank you very much.”
“So like . . .” Umar considered this. “A Room with a View meets Edward Scissorhands?”
Ghaz responded by hurling a pillow at him.
“Are you guys ready yet?” I demanded.
They turned toward me. “Are you ready?” Umar asked.
I was wearing the same interview outfit I’d worn to meet my uncle.
“Please,” I begged. “Can we go?”
“One sec,” Ghaz requested. She went into the bedroom and came out with a long string of pearls. “Put this on. Ah—très chic.”
Forgetting how slowly the South moved, we made the mistake of getting into the drive-through line at Starbucks.
“God,” Umar complained. “They should call it a Drive and Wait Forever to Get Through.”
Ghaz let out a loud laugh. “They should call it, Coffee Insha’allah.”
“Which means we’ll never get our coffee.” Umar looked back. “Should we bail?”
“There are only three cars ahead of us,” I snapped. I usually enjoyed The Ghaz and Umar Show, but one, I was nervous, and two, there was something frenetic and slightly desperate to their interaction today. I suspected that it had to do with yesterday’s incident, like they were trying to prove that Grandma Bigot hadn’t dampened their style, as if the more jovially they behaved, the less it would hurt.
“Okay, sorry. No more jokes,” Ghaz said.
“On the bright side, whoever your dad is, at least he’s going to be interesting,” Umar offered. “I mean, art school, your mom, tea plantation, Hannah Rae Tipple in Tennessee? This is not the typical life of a desi uncle.”
“Yeah,” Ghaz agreed. “It’s like that ad campaign—the Most Interesting Man in the World. Your dad is the Most Interesting Desi Uncle in the World.”
“Do you get to hold that title if you abandon your family?” I said.
“Hmmm. Good point. Correction—he’s the Most Interesting Desi Uncle Dickwad in the World.”
“In the world?” Umar said.
“Okay,” she conceded. “The Most Interesting Desi Uncle Dickwad in Tennessee.”
“Try putting that on a sash,” Umar said.
We sipped iced lattes and ate muffins as we headed south through Nashville. To my anal-retentive driver chagrin, the drivers in Nashville seemed not to realize when the light turned green, or that their cars were equipped with turn signals. After a while I realized it was because half of them were too distracted texting or talking on their cell phones.
“Idiots,” Ghaz swore when I pointed this out. “Who texts and drives?”
We drove through a long stretch of congested shopping district, upscale strip malls with parking lots that seemed too small for the number of cars clogging the road. The traffic finally calmed and the landscape opened up to gated complexes and stately churches on large, corner plots, transitioning to wealthy country estates, wooden fences running along manicured rolling hills, grand mansions set so far back that from the road you caught only a teasing glimpse of their glamour.
“This is serious old money,” Ghaz said as we turned into Hannah Rae Tipple’s pinkish-red gravel driveway and drove up to the wrought iron black gate. I rolled down the window and stared at the fancy intercom.
“Are you sure we shouldn’t have called first?” I said.
“And what if your father had told you he didn’t want to meet you?” Ghaz replied.
“He could still say that.”
“Well, we’re here now,” Umar said. “At least he’ll have to say it to your face.”
“Right,” I said.
“Just press the buzzer and say you’re here to see the Most Interesting Desi Uncle Dickwad in Tennessee,” Ghaz instructed.
“What?”
“Kidding! Ask for Hannah Rae Tipple. It’s her house. But first, deep inhale, hold it one, two, three, now exhale it all out. One more time. Okay. Go.”
I pressed the red button. Nothing.
I was about to press it again, when the voice came through.
“Who is it?” it demanded. The voice was female, the tone unmistakable. Hannah Rae had a sullen teenager in the house.
“We’re here to see Ms. Tipple,” I said.
“I’m Ms. Tipple,” she said. “You mean you’re here to see Mrs. Tipple.”
“Well, you’re technically both Ms. Tipple,” I said.
“Politically correct, I got it.”
The voice withdrew, and the gates slowly opened.
The long, picturesque driveway, bordered with shade trees, led us past well-tended meadows and a stretch of lush, emerald lawn before coming to a split. To the right was a circular driveway in front of the main house. It wasn’t as large as you’d expect based on the size of the property, but impressive nonetheless—pristine white with a pillared
entrance and tall windows with dark green shutters. To the left was a massive barn, whose white and green palette mimicked the main house.
“Dude, this is like a proper estate,” Umar said. “The kind of places with horses and a guest house.”
I parked at the far end of the circular driveway. As we exited the car, Ghaz stopped and said, “Listen.”
In the near distance, you could hear a mad cacophony of bird sounds. Curious, Ghaz began walking toward it, while I called for her to come back. But then Umar decided to follow, so I did, too. It didn’t take long to discover the source. Between the house and the barn were a series of huge, domed white aviaries, housing a variety of exotic birds. The aviary closest to us was home to a green parrot. He had his own fake tree and an elaborate wooden structure with ladders and hanging toys.
As we approached, a few of the birds began making weird croaking noises.
“Look,” Umar said, pointing at one with a large, colorful beak. “That one’s totally Toucan Sam.”
“Toucan Sam isn’t a real bird.”
We spun around. A teenage girl stood behind us. Her hair was dyed a striking platinum white. She was tall and skinny, dressed in frayed cutoff jean shorts that barely covered her butt, ankle-length cowboy boots, a ribbed white tank top with a black string bikini top underneath.
“Who the fuck are you guys?” she said.
“I’m Mariam, and this is Ghazala and Umar. We’re here to see Mr. Sharma.”
“No shit.” She stepped forward then stood with her feet in first position as she assessed me. Her mouth kept making a clicking noise, and when she spoke again I realized it was the sound of her tongue piercing striking against her teeth. “And here I was thinking this was going to be another boring-ass day. Follow me.”
“She’s, like, a trashy Taylor Swift,” Umar said as we walked behind her, maintaining enough distance so we could talk. “But rich trashy.”
“Do you think they had slaves here?” Ghaz asked.
“I doubt there were any cotton fields,” Umar said. “The property line is right over there.”
“But they had to have domestic slaves,” she insisted.
“Okay, Ghaz, there’s enough complicated history in this situation as it is,” I said. “I really don’t also want to be thinking about the ghosts of enslaved people on top of everything else.”
