“We should,” I tell her. “If we shut down the concert now, it only means they win. Besides, people already paid for their tickets. If we have to give back their money all our work be wasted.”
“Malcolm’s right,” Susan says unexpectedly. “If the choir is still willing to perform and people are still willing to stay, we should give them a show.”
“I’m staying,” someone says from behind us. We turn around and see the older blond woman who the boys had heckled earlier in the evening. Another woman stands next to her. “I’m staying, too.” Other voices soon chime in and Mahtab nods at me.
“Let’s do it, then.”
* * *
At the end, ten people ask for refunds. The rest of the audience stays when they hear that the choir is still willing to perform. Once the St. Nicholas Choir starts singing, a hush falls over the auditorium. High voices rise in an original song written by the choir for the concert. I stare at the familiar hand-lettered words on the program, skimming past the Arabic version of the lyrics and reading them in English:
Let me give you my hand when the road is hard;
and let the moon light our way.
Let the wind guide our spirits
and buoy what’s left in our bodies.
The road asks us to look ahead.
Not sideways at barbed-wire walls or back
at the home we lost to a bomb.
One day we will look back, you and I,
hand in hand.
One day, we will find home again.
As the choir continues to sing, I look up, searching, until I finally spot a flash of bright yellow green over a dark gray coat. This time, I don’t hesitate. I quietly make my way down to the middle of the auditorium, where Susan is standing with Ronnie, her hair in its usual ponytail.
She turns around, as if sensing me, before I even touch her shoulder. “Can we talk?”
“Go on.” Ronnie nods at her before she can respond.
We walk out of the auditorium, the backs of our hands brushing. I expect her to move away when we step out the doors, but she doesn’t.
“Why did you do that?” I ask. “You could’ve called the police.”
“They were hitting you. I couldn’t stand there and watch.”
Standing, watching. We both have been doing that, more so than dancing around each other.
“If this was a Bollywood movie, there’d be a song playing in the background right now,” she says suddenly. “Something by Sonu Nigam or Arijit Singh. Something deep and meaningful and depressing.”
I laugh out loud. “I’ve missed you,” I tell her.
“I’ve missed you, too.”
Susan smiles at me and though it’s tired and tentative, it’s real.
“I missed your smile.”
“Stop flirting.”
“Okay.” There’ll be time for that later. “I like your scarf.”
Her smile widens. “I like it, too.”
Yes! I do a low-key fist pump, making her chuckle.
When the laughter fades, awkwardness settles in again. “How are your parents?” I ask.
She’s quiet for a long moment. A song pulses inside the auditorium: a clapping rendition of Pharrell’s “Happy.”
“For years, I thought myself an expert at taking exams,” she says. “Term tests, mock exams, board exams. I knew every trick in the book, never lost a mark for something as silly as not writing out the statement at the end of a math problem. Even with driving—I figured out a way to beat the system. But with my parents … I’ve never felt so helpless.”
I hesitate before answering. “Your parents’ marriage isn’t an exam, Susan. It isn’t something you can fix.” I think of my own parents. How hard Mom tried to get Dad back. “It takes two people to make a relationship. If one isn’t willing, then it doesn’t work anymore.”
She looks up at me, a little frown pricking the skin between her eyebrows. “How are things at home?”
“Freny isn’t as bad as I thought she was. She took care of me when I had the flu and couldn’t go to school. We talk now and then. Without sarcasm.”
A tiny smile replaces the frown. “What about your dad?”
I shrug.
“Have you tried talking to him?”
“Is there a point? I’m not sure if I can forget. Or forgive him for what he did.”
She looks right into my eyes, her lovely face serious. “I am not telling you to forget. Forgiving is possible though. It will only take time. A wise person told me, ‘It takes two people to make a relationship.’”
I step closer, so that only a foot remains between us. “Oh yeah?”
She doesn’t step back, even though her eyes widen slightly. “Yeah. You may not have a conventional father-son relationship, but you still might have a chance at something.”
Now I’m the one frowning, mulling over what she said, trying to match it with the way the old man behaved recently. Always keeping me at a distance; never hitting after what happened with Mahtab the last time.
Yet another part of me wonders … is this enough? Has he truly changed for the better? What if this so-called good behavior of his is just a phase? I voice the last thought to Susan, who shakes her head and says, “That’s unacceptable. Forgiveness doesn’t mean he’s given carte blanche to do whatever. He still has to earn your trust.”
“Yeah,” I say. Then: “Carte blanche? How old are you again?”
“Possibly middle-aged. I’m rumored to occasionally disguise myself as a student and infiltrate high schools.”
We both grin.
“I guess I’ll see you,” she says. I wait for her to add around, a word that will settle things and sever the thread still somehow shimmering between us, turning us again into relative strangers. But at the last second, she presses her lips together, as if biting it back.
My heart beats a little faster, waking up again after a long slumber. “I’ll see you.”
I don’t know who steps forward first. But out of the blue, we’re hugging, my hands curling around her back, her fingers digging into my waist. She breathes out something below my ear, three words I am too scared to confirm right now.
We hug for what feels like too long and yet not nearly long enough. I feel the pulse at the base of her neck with a finger and foolishly try to sync the beats of my own heart to it. You are not alone, I want to tell her. And maybe she can hear what I’m thinking because that last bit of tightness leaves her shoulders and she relaxes into the hug. Into me.
Susan
I need time, I told him.
Three simple words, which might well be more important than I love you.
I’m not ready to start dating Malcolm again. But I don’t want us to be just friends forever either. It’s a truth I haven’t said out loud, but something both of us must have understood on some level because when I get back home after the (very successful) concert, my phone pings with a text from him. it was good to talk to you again. can we talk more?
Yes, I text back. It’s almost embarrassing how quick I am to do so. But then three big grinning emojis flash in reply nearly a nanosecond later and I can’t help but smile a little.
I use the time I have to study for the upcoming finals at the end of this month and work on my final art project for Ms. Nguyen. In some ways, I’ve turned back into the girl I used to be in Jeddah, focused and determined. But I’m no longer the same person. Not quite. This becomes clearer as I draw and paint with watercolors on the canvas. Somehow I never truly understand what’s going on in my life until I draw it out and see it with my own eyes.
The day before the project is due, I’m in my room, placing finishing touches on the painting when Amma enters, pausing a few feet away. She stares at the canvas, starting at the upper-left corner, where the city of Jeddah is perched on a cliff, familiar landmarks like the Floating Mosque, the Red Sea Mall, and King Fahd’s Fountain crowding the space. At the very edge of the cliff, a cartoon girl in a ponytail in a roller coaster car is
zooming into the lower-right corner of the canvas—into Mississauga, with its curvy Marilyn Monroe Towers, the lakeshore in Port Credit, the ice skating rink where a boy circles alone, wearing a Blue Jays jersey. The roller coaster track has steep rises, sharp falls, and then a gentle descent near a building, where a man and woman stand talking, their faces in shadow, the woman’s red coat the only splash of color at the end.
“Last Days, First Days.” Amma reads the title of the painting out loud.
“It’s my final project for art.”
“It’s beautiful.”
“You’re only saying that.” But my heart grows full at the praise.
“Your mother is right. It is beautiful.” Appa’s slippers lightly slap the tiles in the corridor before quieting against the carpet in my room.
I turn to face both of them, standing side by side, as they normally do these days, always a good three feet of space between them.
“We’ve come to a decision, Suzy,” Appa says. He turns to Amma, who nods at him. “We aren’t going to file for divorce. Your mother and I … well, we’ve had a long life together. But I will go back to live in Jeddah. You can come visit me on my iqama from time to time. Your mother will keep getting an allowance—”
“Until I find a job here,” Amma interrupts. There’s a determined look in her eyes. “I’m going to apply to those adult education courses on Elm Drive. Once I finish there, maybe upgrade my degree.”
“So you are separating,” I say.
“Suzy—”
“Please, Amma. I need to know.” I can no longer cling to false hope.
She exchanges a glance with my father. That look tells me more about this decision being mutual than the words that follow. “Yes. We are.”
A hollow truth. But at least they’re no longer beating around the bush with me and that’s progress where my parents are concerned.
“Suzy, I have some good news for you,” Appa says suddenly. My father, who can dissect problem after problem with the human body, but can barely tolerate human sadness. “Do you know Thomas Chacko from church—Joseph’s brother-in-law? Well, Thomas used to be a professor at McMaster University and knows the dean of admissions there. I told him about how much you wanted to be a doctor and—”
“I don’t,” I cut in.
Appa blinks. “What do you mean you don’t?”
Amma says nothing, watching us both in silence.
“I mean, I don’t want to be a doctor or an engineer. And I’m tired of hearing you and Amma argue about this.” I realize belatedly that I’ve pronounced tired differently, emphasizing the t, extending the i, rolling out the r the way the others at school do. “You can’t live your dreams out through me.”
“We aren’t trying to—”
“I want to be an artist.” It’s probably the scariest thing I’ve said out loud. “I know it’s not something that may make me a lot of money. But I don’t care about that. I hate science!”
My parents look at me as if I’m from another planet.
“I’ll do an arts degree, okay? I have good grades—I can apply for a loan and get a job on the side if you don’t want to pay for my tuition. When I graduate, I could work in graphic design or become a teacher. Ms. Nguyen said she’ll be happy to advise me about scholarships. I’ll figure something out.”
Amma presses her fingers to her skull and I’m sure she’s about to spit out Arts degree? like it’s a swear word, but she doesn’t say anything.
“Figure something out—that is not a career, Susan,” Appa says.
“What you both have right now isn’t a marriage, either,” I say. “It was supposed to last. You both were supposed to be forever. But you aren’t and I’m going to have to accept that. As you’re going to have to accept me and my decisions.”
Appa is silent for a long moment. “Think again, Suzy. Who knows if you’ll even get a scholarship? There will be many people competing for the same spot. You’re good, no doubt, but are you that good?”
I’m not sure. There’s a part of me that still wonders if this is one giant mistake. But underneath the fear, there’s another emotion. A slow-burning anger that, after glowing red like iron for the past several months, maybe even years, miraculously finds shape.
“I don’t know,” I tell him. “But I’ll never know unless I try.”
My father scowls. “You will have to be able to work and take care of yourself in the future. We won’t be around forever, you know.”
“I know.”
I guess I always did.
* * *
That evening, I draw a caricature of Ravana, the king of Sri Lanka, who was reputed to be a demon with ten heads, according to Hindu mythology. Our Hindi teacher at Qala Academy told us that the ten heads represented Ravana’s knowledge of Hindu scriptures: the six shastras and the four vedas. Dashanan, Sharma Madam told us. He who has ten heads.
I draw my anger into one head, my grief into another, then I add pain, and anger, more anger. Betrayal and heartbreak take up two faces, one each for my father and Malcolm. By the time I reach the last head, I am so exhausted that I am almost numb to all feeling. I leave it blank and close my eyes, resting my forehead on the cool surface of my desk. Moments later, I feel my mother’s fingers in my hair, undoing the ponytail and stroking it out.
“You are not going to apply for a loan when you are still in college,” she says. “Your parents are not dead yet.”
I sigh and raise my head. “Amma—”
“I know I haven’t been the best mother.” She shakes her head. “I was thinking more of myself than I was of you.”
“Well, you’re my mother,” I tell her. “And I’m still willing to keep you.”
She pinches my cheek. “You will be okay. We both will.”
I can tell she doesn’t fully believe her words. But I don’t point this out. I allow myself to accept what she says for a minute, the way I would when I was four and woke up screaming from a nightmare, only to fall back asleep after listening to my mother scare away the shadows from my bedroom.
Malcolm
I need time.
The words for some odd reason gave me hope when Susan first whispered them to me, give me hope now after she texts me an emoji with its tongue stuck out. Talking, for us, is still limited to texting. At school, we only nod or say hi, hanging out with our separate sets of friends. Which is okay, I guess.
For now.
“I don’t get your logic behind not dating, though,” Steve says one Saturday afternoon, while we’re studying for the English final.
“I don’t want to,” I say with a shrug.
“Let it go, Steve,” Ahmed says from the sofa, without looking up from his copy of Alias Grace. “He’s giving her space. That’s important, too.”
Steve rolls his eyes. “He’s not going to be a monk. There are other girls out there.”
“Like Isabel, you mean?” I grin at him. To everyone’s surprise, Isabel and Steve got together at the end of the concert in January. She told me that Steve made her laugh. “Maybe I should ask her out when she dumps you.”
But I’m not serious and Steve, who knows this, grins back and tosses a pencil at me.
It’s strange how, suddenly, everyone I know is pairing up. Ahmed, who I thought was still hung up on Noorie, is now seeing a girl from his mosque. Jay, my boss at Michelle’s, has a new boyfriend. Steve told me that Afrin and Justin are getting back together. Though I don’t know how Afrin managed to win over Justin’s mom, the news made me smile. For real.
I haven’t dated since Susan and I broke up, but I have wondered at times if I should. I’ve looked when a couple of pretty girls passed me in the mall, smiled when one winked at me at Michelle’s Coffee House. But I’ve done nothing else. There’s always a sort of distance now, an invisible barrier that prevents me from moving further. I’ve become a connoisseur of looking and not touching.
Ahmed must have a better idea of what I’m going through because he glances my way once and ligh
tly bops Steve on the head with his book. “Quiet, you two. I need to finish reading this.”
I study for finals as well, even though doing this for long hours gives me a headache. Mahtab and Ronnie email the committee members a final report, showing that we managed to raise $4,250.25 at the concert and that the school has sent the money to the Red Cross. Mahtab also sends us a list of aid organizations and community centers in Toronto that we can volunteer at, once exams are done, to further help Syrians harmed by the war. She’s surprised when she finds me filling out a volunteer application form one evening.
what universities are you applying to? I text Susan a day before the exams. I copy the list she sends my way and save it in Notes. It’s not like I’d get into any of those places. But what’s the harm in trying?
Why? she asks.
I avoid the question by asking another one: all set for med school then?
No, Art
what the … WHAT??
Surprised?
UH YESSSSS.
“Ugh.” I switch off the caps. sorry for shouting. but how’d your parents take it?
They’re not happy. They’re still trying to convince me what a bad decision this is. But I’m applying for scholarships so that I don’t have to rely on them for tuition. Our talk helped me a lot you know.
I blink. Then, without thinking, I press Call. After a couple of rings, she picks up. “Hello?”
“What do you mean our talk helped?” I blurt out. Then, as quickly, I realize what I’ve done. “Sorry, is this too soon? Should I not have called?”
“No, no, it’s okay,” she says softly. “I … I’m glad you called. And yes, our talk did help, sort of. It helped me realize that my parents weren’t going to get back together. That they didn’t love each other anymore. But it didn’t mean that they don’t love me. In a way, it helped me put into perspective that nothing in life has guarantees. When it came to picking a career, I could go the safe route and apply for a degree in medicine or engineering. But who’s to say that I’ll even find a job with the degree?”
The Beauty of the Moment Page 28
