The Writing on My Forehead: A Novel

by Nafisa Haji

  Her revelations began just after we boarded. I was breathless, having barely managed to lug both of our carry-on bags on board and into the overhead bin, where Razia Nani had decided they must rest.

  “Hanh, Beta. Shabaash. Very good. You see, I must have the room for my poor old legs. Ahh! They are already hurting. They swell up so badly on an airplane. And carrying all that luggage only makes it worse. And my bag is soooo heavy! All those chocolates to carry! I hope they know, in Karachi, all the trouble I go to, bringing them soooo much chocolate. I know how they like it. But still, I don’t think they realize how difficult it is. I’m an old lady, now, and my legs can’t take it. Of course, I love to give people happiness. And if suffering a little, carrying all those expensive chocolates—they’re so expensive nowadays, I don’t think they realize how much I’m giving them—if suffering a little is what it takes to make others happy—well, then, I’m glad for my suffering. Yes, I am glad to do it.”

  Since the only one who had suffered so far was me—I had bruises on my legs, I could feel them, from where the heavy bag kept banging against them—I was rather skeptical about the depth of her sacrifice. Her bag was heavy, that was true, and I worried about the weight restrictions that had been written and displayed clearly at the check-in counter. I had pointed them out to Razia Nani, thinking she may have been unaware of them. But she had waved her hand furiously, worried that the attendant might hear my concern and actually check the weight of the bag, which she told me to carry casually, in a manner that would disguise how heavy it was. I briefly imagined the plane crashing, all because of the weight of Razia Nani’s chocolates, and hoped that her self-described willingness to suffer for the happiness of others would not have to be stretched to lethal limits.

  We buckled our seat belts and Razia Nani made herself comfortable. She took both the armrests and spilled a little into my seat, making me shrink toward the window a bit in an unsuccessful attempt to avoid getting pinned in.

  She issued forth a long, deep sigh, suggestive of much greater burdens than a bagful of English chocolates. “Aré, Beta! How I wish your mother were here! It has been such a long time since I’ve seen Shabana. My heart longs to set eyes on her. But of course, one can understand. I don’t blame her for not coming. I don’t know what your Jamila Khala is thinking.” She shook her head, placed her hand hard on her voluminous chest with an audible whack, approximately where I suppose she thought her heart was, and continued, “It breaks my heart! Breaks my heart, I tell you!”

  I tried my best to give a coolly sympathetic nod, trying to let her know that of course I knew what she was talking about. And hoped desperately that she would elaborate.

  I needn’t have worried. She was only just getting started.

  “Poor, poor Zahida! So disrespectful to her memory, your nanima, you understand. Of course Shabana couldn’t come to the wedding. She’s a loyal daughter, your mother is. Not that Jamila, your khala, had any choice, mind you. Who would have thought that such a thing could happen? That your cousin Zehra would actually become friends with one of those creatures? That she would insist on inviting them to her wedding! Unthinkable! Who would have thought? Not that Jamila’s not responsible, of course. I mean, keeping up with them—with that family—for appearances’ sake is one thing. But to actually allow a friendship to develop between the girls! Tawba! Lord forgive us! Have mercy on us! That such a thing could happen! What would dear Zahida have said, your poor nanima, I mean? Yes, Jamila should have put her foot down. But there is this also, I suppose—that if there was coming and going between the two houses, then what could be done? Order the children not to speak to them? No! That would not be right also.”

  It was a bad beginning and I regretted the decision to pretend to have any knowledge. I was lost in pronouns, innuendoes, and obscure references that only enhanced my appetite for solving the mystery of whom and what my mother had referred to on the phone weeks before. It was like walking into a story already in progress—a juicy story, I could tell—but how could I get Razia Nani to start at the beginning? At the “once upon a time” part?

  “No, you’re right, Razia Nani. Jamila Khala had no choice, I suppose. I guess it’s all really Zehra’s fault?” I don’t think I managed to keep the question mark off of my statement, but Razia Nani didn’t seem to notice.

  “Zehra’s fault?! Of course not! How could it be your cousin Zehra’s fault? No, no, of course there is only one person to blame after all, isn’t there? Or maybe there are two? Well, I’m sure it’s not Zehra’s fault, at least. If anyone, it has to be your grandfather’s fault. Your nana.”

  “Nana?” My voice croaked a little, but she didn’t notice. “But he’s dead.”

  “Yes, yes. And you’re quite right. One shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, I know, but what that man did to your grandmother!” Another whack to the chest. “It broke my heart to see Zahida so humiliated. And now your mother won’t even attend the wedding of her dear sister’s daughter. All because your grandfather had to go off with that Englishwoman—that witch, that flower huppie! Gone off and had children, too, would you believe? And Zehra—befriending one of those girls, her own khala, isn’t she? Chee, chee, chee…such a shameful thing. Bap re bap, it happened so many years ago, so many…and it’s still so shocking! The whole of Bombay could talk of nothing else for months and months, you know. Mind you, not that I was surprised…Kasim Bhai was always like that, you know. Causing scandals here and there and everywhere! From the very beginning I could see how it would turn out. And poor, poor Zahida! Such a good wife your grandmother was to him, so very beautiful! And the way she put up with his mad whims for all of those years…wearing whatever shameless clothes he bought for her, cutting off all of her beautiful hair just to suit his tastes! Going ballroom dancing also! She suffered so much for him…everyone blamed her for it, you know, when all she did was try her best to please him!”

  “Ballroom dancing?” I knew then, with the kind of knowledge that comes upon you suddenly, followed by a disbelief so strong that acceptance takes a while to achieve. That the old man from Bombay of my mother’s story was her father. I’m not sure what, if anything, I might have said next. Thankfully, the conversation halted for a few minutes when the flight attendant reached our row of seats to ask our beverage preferences.

  “I’ll have a tea, please,” said Razia Nani to the flight attendant, in a thick, desi accent that I had failed to notice before. “With sugar and milk, too. And can I have two teabags also?” She waited for the flight attendant to serve her the tea and me my soda before turning to me in explanation. “These white people don’t know how to make tea. Chee! It tastes like muddy water, the way they make it. Sooo weak! Akh-thoo! But what choice do I have only, nah?”

  I sipped my soda slowly, eating a few of the bite-sized cubes of ice as I chewed over what I had learned and tried to fit my unfamiliar grandfather into the familiar story of dance and downfall that my mother had told me when she refused to let me go to the eighth-grade prom. I was fascinated, I remember, struck by the scandalous glamour of what my grandfather had actually dared to do. That he had survived the consequences of his actions, at least long enough to have fathered more than one child—I was shocked at the realization as the meaning of what I had learned started to sink in—seemed to lend him a victorious light. As if he had fought a battle with fate, broken the rules of culture and convention—and won. It certainly cast a whole new light on the story my mother had told. Where were his just deserts? What else was there that I didn’t know?

  My mouth was cold, now, from the ice my tongue had flirted with, and my mind, too, had settled a bit when I decided to try and steer Razia Nani back to the course she had begun before we were interrupted, jointly, by my shock and the flight attendant’s service.

  “Her khala? Zehra is friends with her aunt, Razia Nani? I’m so bad with understanding these things. How exactly are they related?”

  “Well, it’s simple, nah? The English witch’s children—t
hat is, her children with your nana, your grandfather, are the brothers and sisters of your mother. And of Zehra’s mother. Of course, they are not full brothers and sisters. Only sautella.”

  I wasn’t as ignorant, when I was paying attention, as I had claimed. And I knew that in Urdu, sautella was a word used for relatives and siblings who were not full or real—that there is no distinction, in the translation of that word, between step- and half-. But if my grandfather was the father of these children, then they were the half-siblings, not step-, of my mother. Which made them, as Razia Nani had pointed out, my aunts? uncles? How many were there?

  Razia Nani started fumbling in her giant purse, in search of something. “Aré!” She was clicking her tongue between her teeth in dismay, her hands getting more desperate in their quest. “Oh, no! I’ve left my paandan in my hand luggage. Beta, please get my bag down for me. I must have it.”

  I stood up, squeezing myself past Razia Nani and into the aisle, and brought her bulky bag down for her. I waited, standing awkwardly exposed in the aisle, while she searched her bag for the round stainless steel box in which she kept all of the ingredients and paraphernalia she needed for the creation of the homemade paans, laced with tobacco, which she ate at regular intervals. When she had found and removed it, I put the bag back into the overhead bin before making the return trip to my seat in eager anticipation of hearing more.

  I had to wait for a few minutes while Razia Nani used little spoons and spatulas to sprinkle and brush mysterious and strangely aromatic powders and pastes onto the shiny green paan leaf that she prepared. She hummed to herself a little as she scooped a pinch of finely cut betel nut onto the leaf and folded it up expertly into a triangular kind of pocket. I watched her stuff the triangle into her mouth, tongue it over to one side, and park it, before finally prodding her back to the beginning of the story, which I had heard already from my mother. And then on, through it, to the end, which I had not.

  “So, after Kasim Bhai left Zahida—your grandmother—she moved to Pakistan. To live with her older sister, Adeeba.”

  “With Big Nanima.”

  Razia Nani nodded. “Exactly. It was good for Adeeba. She had no children who would have visited, bringing little ones. So she was able to share Zahida’s. And your grandfather? Well, he lived out the rest of his life with his Englishwoman—Belle—and the children she bore him in London.” Razia Nani’s voice, after having run a monologue of marathon proportions, came to a sudden halt.

  I was silent for a moment. Then, all of the questions that I had been stifling, in a way that I would have been incapable of during the course of one of Mummy’s stories, came pouring out. “But Nanima’s home was in India. Didn’t she ever go back?”

  “Never.”

  “Why not?”

  “At first, it was because she couldn’t face them, poor thing—the rest of the family in Bombay, Kasim Bhai’s younger brothers and their wives. Before, it was her house that they all lived in together. I remember visiting her in Bombay. Before it happened. With what grandeur she used to live…so many, many servants she had. And your grandfather kept her like a queen! She was the begum sahiba of the house. Now, with no husband, she had nothing and no place in that home. Oh, they made a lot of noise on her behalf in the beginning, the family in Bombay, swearing up and down that they would never forgive their older brother for what he had done to Zahida. But Kasim Bhai was the head of the family. And the business. So, when he brought Belle to India a few months after he took up with her, they had no choice but to accept her. It was a humiliation for Zahida. What a fall she took. From where she started and where she ended up! She never went back to India. And neither did your mother, who was furious with her father’s family for accepting what her father had done.”

  It had never occurred to me to wonder why we visited Pakistan and never India, where my mother and father were actually from. Now, I knew. That Mummy had forsaken her country because of her anger at her father. That in breaking ties with him, she had also broken off with the rest of his family.

  “Did Nana ever go back to India with Belle? After that first time?”

  “Every year. With their children.”

  “Are they all coming to the wedding, Razia Nani? All of the children? Have you ever met them?”

  “Well, of course! Many, many times. They are beautiful children, of course. Fair and beautiful. But then, they would be, wouldn’t they? Being half-white as they are, chee! Let’s see…Tara is the oldest.” Razia Nani held up her finger, bending it backward with her other hand at a painful-looking angle as she spoke. My eyes focused on the finger, associating her words with it as if it truly represented, as she meant it to, the person she was describing.

  “She has light eyes…not blue, but light-colored. She is your cousin Zehra’s friend. I think she is a year, maybe two, younger than Zehra. Though, who knows what the truth is?” Razia Nani’s brows lifted suggestively.

  Her second finger went up, alongside of the first, and she subjected it to the same awkward contortions that the Tara finger had gone through. “And the middle one is a boy. I think he’s about sixteen years old.” Razia Nani nodded. “I remember the shame of it, your grandfather having children at the same pace that his grandchildren were being born! His name is Adam. Only they say it in the English way, chee, chee. He’s a very quiet boy. Tall. His hair is golden.”

  It was the third finger’s turn to be punished. “And the last one is Ruksana. But they say it the English way. Roxanna.” Razia Nani’s lips were pursed in disapproval and her pronunciation was an unconscious parody of the English one. “She’s very sweet. The most like your grandfather. Round and plump. And darker than the others, though, of course, she’s still very fair. I think she’s twelve? Eleven? No, twelve, I think.”

  “She’s younger than me?” For some reason, this was the most shocking news of all.

  Razia Nani seemed surprised. “Well, yes, I suppose so.” She was quiet for a long moment and I regretted my outburst, fearing that she might be reflecting on my age with regard to the appropriateness of the subject. She gave a little shrug, finally, and said, “Well, you will meet them all yourself soon enough. They will be at the wedding, after all. With their mother.”

  “The reason Mummy’s not coming to the wedding.” I managed to say it with confidence, leaving off the question mark.

  “And who can blame her, after all? Shabana—your mummy—is a very strong woman, you know. She decides what is right and what is wrong. And she sticks with it. Very strong. Like her mother. Your Jamila Khala is different. She likes to make people happy. Likes there to be peace. Your mummy said she would never forgive her father. That he was dead to her. And she kept her word. Never spoke to him again. I suppose it was more difficult for your Jamila Khala. They lived in London, after all. And he was her father. She didn’t want to tell your nanima—when she started to keep up with them. With your nana and Belle. She didn’t want to hurt her, after all.”

  Over the course of her story, Razia Nani’s betel nut had softened and marinated to a consistency that she found quite enjoyable. I could tell by the way she swished it around in her mouth, lingeringly, and by the maroonish-red hue of the spit that she collected and cradled in a pool between her lower lip and gums, which spilled over, from time to time, and stained the crevices at the corners of her mouth. I remember, quite vividly, thinking how ghoulishly like blood the stains on her mouth appeared to be. The darkened lights of the airplane cabin and the shadows they cast on Razia Nani’s face did nothing to detract from the vampiric impression. Her mouth was full, which caused her words to be muffled, and though I had found it more and more difficult to follow her story as the plot and the paan progressed and developed, I worried less about eavesdroppers because of it.

  I watched her manipulate her mouth with her tongue for a few seconds more and then prompted Razia Nani again, “You were saying about Jamila Khala not wanting to hurt Nanima?”

  “Of course she was hurt, your nanima, very b
adly, when she found out that her own daughter had betrayed her.”

  “How did she find out?”

  “Who knows how? People talk. God knows I am not one to speak about other people’s business or to break a confidence. But there are some in this world who like to talk—to gossip—regardless of who they’re hurting and without thought to the damage their words can do.” She said this, endearingly enough, with a wholly convincing kind of sincerity that left no room for any level of self-consciousness.

  “Did Lubna Khala”—I was referring to my mother’s younger sister—“keep in touch with Nana?”

  “No. But then, she was so far away, settled in Pakistan. Far away, like your mother. Who was furious with Jamila, when she heard that they were in touch. But Zahida interfered. She told your mother that it was wrong to fight with her sister.”

  “And what about Nana? When did he really die?” I remembered that my ignorance was something I had tried to cover before, and quickly added, “I mean, when exactly? I forget.”

  Razia Nani was too busy riding the wave of her own knowledge to notice my slip. “Oh? Let’s see, was it May? June? Yes, June. Of last year. A massive heart attack. Your nanima had a stroke and died one week later. Poor Zahida. As if she was still waiting for him. As if, when he died, there was nothing left to wait for. So now Adeeba is alone again.”

  “I never met him. Nana.” This was not a question.

  Razia Nani glanced at me for a second, probably looking for material for her next news hour. I kept my face blank. Disappointed, she said, “No, well—your mother never forgave him, ever. She said she wouldn’t and she didn’t.”

  I leaned back in my seat and yawned, falling asleep to the sound of Razia Nani’s voice, which had moved on to lament other scandals and tragedies involving people I was less interested in.