Chanda hugged another dancer, and the friends mimed waving good-bye to each other as Chanda covered her head and face with a gossamer veil and moved into the imaginary street alone. When a male dancer entered the circle, he pulled Chanda into the shadow. The crowd gasped. Then an older dancer appeared at the edge of the circle, and Chanda recognized him—“Baba, Baba,” she cried out joyously. “Help me! Rescue me!” The audience was relieved as the father approached.
“Whore!” the emcee shouted out in the voice of Chanda’s father. Instantaneously, the young man bound her arms behind her back, as the father’s blade glinted in the light and sliced the night in front of Chanda’s face. She fell to the ground as the men ran away and the music stopped. The sparkly patch was gone. A pool of beet-red stage blood dripped into her cupped hand.
A man in the audience stood up, outraged. “Where were the four witnesses?” he shouted, cutting the air with his fist.
“Yes, the Q’ran demands that there be four pious witnesses to a charge of fornication!” said another.
“There were none,” Chanda said in her own voice.
The audience was silent as again Chanda looked into each one’s eyes, and they knew in their hearts the truth of her courage and the truth of her dance.
The next day Lia visited my quarters at the school. Overnight she had learned the truth about Yusuf and me. She had e-mailed him that she and I had met on the bus, and he replied, telling her how I had turned down his marriage proposal.
“You forgot to mention that you shattered his world,” she said. She was hurt that I had not confided everything to her. The truth was that I liked Lia, but I did not trust her.
“Well, shattered is an exaggeration . . . I wanted to marry him,” I said, “but Yusuf never would have been happy without his big family . . . My mother had died. I had responsibility for the children. No, I didn’t break his heart. It was Pakistan that broke both our hearts.”
I could see that Lia understood. Yusuf must have given her the details of our last conversation.
“He hasn’t married yet, Ujala,” she said. “Do you think you’d like to see him again? Just to see what feelings might still be there? Who knows what the circumstances might be with his parents now?” For once Lia was not being a matchmaker or a gossip or pumping me for information. She was being real.
“His life now is so different, so cosmopolitan,” I said, “living in the world’s capitals. Mine is a village life, teaching the poor. How far apart we have traveled from our university days. No, I think it best to leave the past in the past.”
“But will you marry someday?”
“And who will arrange it for me, Lia? This is a different world from yours. And even for a modern woman, it is hard to meet a man to talk to, one I might trust, who might listen and understand me.”
“It’s true. I can feel it myself—the attraction between men and women here is pervasive,” Lia said. “Don’t you feel it?” No one ever had ever spoken to me so frankly about something so personal. “I see how cousins flirt with cousins. The boys take any opportunity to tell the girls they are beautiful. The girls slap them away in play. All that forbidden desire. No wonder people are killed for it.”
“Fulfilled, it would tear our families apart,” I said, trying to close the conversation. But Lia would not let the conversation end.
“I’ve watched how the men control the streets here. How they pierce the community with their eyes, craning their necks, scanning for new females—any unfamiliar shape in a shawl might be a woman, with perhaps a few inches of visible flesh. What is that staring about? Intimacy? Disapproval? Are they undressing women with their eyes, or what?”
“I’m not sure,” I said. “I never look at men on the street. But I know what you are talking about. In the faces of the men I know, it looks like an unnamable longing. I think the men are trapped, too.”
“Especially if they are homosexual,” Lia continued, speaking a word I had read, but never heard spoken aloud. “In this culture of forbidden love, family honor, and violent revenge, I cannot help but notice that the favorite TV sport is wrestling—millions of Pakistanis gazing for hours at dominant, bare male bodies, brawny and sweating, clenching other males, small and slim.”
Now I was irritated. “We are not robots, you know,” I said. The conversation felt dangerous, degrading. “At heart Pakistanis are romantics,” I said. “Like the entire culture of the East. More than wrestling or even football, mostly we love our weddings.”
“Yes, brides dressed like dolls,” Lia continued in the same critical vein. “All the elaborate wedding hoo-ha. Not that it is so different in the U.S., but here there is no sex before marriage. Not even dating. Where does all that repressed sexual energy go, anyway?”
“I have no idea,” I said, gathering the teacups. I wanted to end the conversation, but Lia would not stop. She stood next to me, speaking over my shoulder.
“What happens between the red and gold gown and the first baby’s birth?” she asked. “With all the bedrooms being shared with relatives, how do newlyweds get any privacy, get to know each other that way?”
“Brides get pregnant right away,” I said, feeling relieved to see the teachers were returning so that this conversation would soon end. “So something must happen somehow.”
“Why is it,” Lia asked me, in her rhetorical way, “that the Islamists acknowledge the equality and dignity of women in the sacred texts, but then kindle the fire of every antifemale custom from Afghanistan to Yemen?” Her lips and her tongue seemed to chew on her words. I could tell that Lia wanted to argue. It seemed like her primary mode of relating.
“Originally, Pakistan had no seclusion and no veil,” I said, “Just like Egypt had no genital mutilations. When Islam expanded, the religious leaders absorbed the customs they found. The Arabs had certain customs—”
“I know. I know. It’s all the Arabs’ fault,” she interrupted. “Why is Islam so violent?”
“Tribal life can be violent,” I said. “Poverty and hopelessness can provoke violence. Islam is peace. Understand the difference.”
But Lia was not listening. She looked disgusted. Again she had put me in the position of seeming to defend what I did not believe in. I raised my voice and wagged my finger like an old auntie.
“Your Western biases are showing,” I said. “We have heard of forced marriages in your Christian state of Utah. Was that the fault of Christianity?”
“—a sect of Christianity,” she said.
“And what about that football player on trial for slashing up his wife and her boyfriend? Perhaps you should write about American girls.”
“You’ve got a point,” said Lia with a sigh. “Americans are no better.”
But now I was on the offensive against her arrogance.
“Did you hear about the American Christian who came to Chitral, declared himself a Muslim, and bought a Pathan girl?”
“Yes,” she said, “the girl had to be rescued by Amnesty.”
“And returned to Pakistan,” I said. “Was that the fault of Christianity?”
“What difference does it make if the man was Christian or not?” she asked. “What does Christianity have to do with it?”
“Exactly! And in the same way it is unfair to blame Islam. Cultural politics went hand in hand with religion in the ancient Islamic world—as it did with the Romans, the British, or with the American empire today.”
“American empire?” Lia said. She did not like to hear me call her country by the term the rest of the world used. “Now you sound like a fundie.”
“Just a turn of phrase,” I said, “but empire does signify something. You know what I mean?”
In winter the pace of life in Chitral slowed like the pulse of a bear, as everything submitted to the twin fates of climate and altitude. The river froze over, and blocks of ice littered the riverbanks like boulders. Snowdrifts blocked the roads.
My life became a constant effort to stay warm. I wore homespun leggi
ngs, mittens, and shawls everywhere. All the woolen layers left me feeling heavy. I collected snowmelt for cooking, drinking, and washing. We ate oil and grains, dried fruit, peas, and beans, and I began to put on weight. Religious practices gradually became part of my daily routine. Women were not permitted inside the mosque, so I prayed at home. It was new to me, a quiet, naturally contemplative life. I decided to fast during Ramadan. I realized that for the first time I was fulfilling four of the Five Pillars—faith in God, daily prayers, fasting during Ramadan, and service to the poor. The only one left was the Hajj, the pilgrimage to Mecca I was obliged to do once, if I was able. But I was not eager to join a throng of two million and their patriarchs.
“Maybe it’s the long winter,” I said to Tahira, “but in this isolation, with our daily life centering on simple practices, the core of Islam means so much.”
Tahira smiled.
“It’s the closest we Muslims get to living in a monastery.”
My brother arrived in Chitral on the day that the first impassable snowstorm began. Amir had collected donations of used computers while in the U.K. and then shipped them to us. He offered to install them at the school. I could hardly wait to see him. It was a double blessing!
“You know I wouldn’t be here if Abbu had not insisted,” Amir told me impatiently after we climbed into the backseat of the car. “Computers need a dry, temperate climate for their survival—and, by the way, so do I.”
“You always were a bit spoiled,” I teased.
The city was hushed. The only sound was the Toyota’s tires crunching the snow beneath them. On the streets the loudspeakers that hawked blankets and prayers had shut down. The air was cleared of the stench of diesel. Wood smoke hovered then dissolved into the river. Day and night, the valley wore every shade of white. All of the city’s sharpness had softened and rounded, except one.
“There it is, Amir—” I said, as the car crawled along the main street. I hooked my arm into his and hugged while I pointed. “—Shahi Mosque, its minaret is a needle that pierces this cottony world. On clear days its blinding light is magnetic.”
“You are going to the mosque?” he asked.
“I pray at home now,” I said. “But just wait. You’ll see what happens to you here.”
By spring, the teachers’ father, Syed, had returned home from Peshawar where he had been teaching at the university. Nothing gave Sabira, Tahira, and Asma more pleasure than seeing their father happy. Syed and Amir spent the day hauling cedar logs into the compound to build a new wall for the school, while Aga Ji directed their work. The women watched, picking their teeth with poplar wood.
“Put the wall over there,” Aga Ji insisted, pointing to his mud hut on the opposite side of the courtyard.
“But, Father, the school is over here. We are building a wall for the school,” Syed reminded his confused father.
“Of course, the school is over there,” he replied, hesitating. “I knew that. Well, put it over next to the school’s other three walls, you idiots,” he shouted. “Why in the world would you put it over here by my room?”
Amir laughed out loud.
“Do whatever he says, Amir,” I shouted. “He’s the head man.”
One day Aga Ji made Amir an honorary Pathan. Amir was recovering from the hour he had spent pulling a wagon full of bricks and mud. The clouds were playing a game with their humans, drifting in front of the vanishing then reappearing face of the sun. He was chilled and putting on a puffy ski jacket when he saw Aga Ji approach. The old man moved with purpose, muttering and flapping his arms like a chicken. His red dog ran far ahead, returning to Aga Ji’s side again and again.
“I must talk to you, young man,” Aga Ji said with authority. Amir rose from the pile of wires that circled his knees. “Syed is away for the day, and I am too old. You are the oldest, so you must take this responsibility for the men of the family. We are Pathan. If anyone asks for our protection, we must give it—even at the cost of our lives. And it is our first duty to protect women—even those who are not of our blood.”
Amir’s eyes popped open as Aga Ji continued.
“In the coffeehouse they say that the mullahs are discussing Chanda Khan again. Although they have no witnesses, they say she is a fornicator, and they have issued a fatwa, a religious ruling. The mullahs say to kill her on sight.”
That afternoon Amir knocked on my door.
“A fatwa.” I said when he told me what had happened.
I imagined more bloodshed coming—to Chanda, maybe to all of Farhada’s Daughters. Was there no end to it? At once I knew what had to be done. I prayed that my plan would work, but I no longer relied on prayer alone. I still had my gun. If necessary, I could slip my intention into the crook of my finger and watch the world explode. In all this time, I had not felt the bullet heat myself, nor its burrowing burn, but the shockwave that had rocked Taslima’s body that day in her lawyer’s office had shocked my own. I was determined that Chanda’s name would not be added to the list of blown-apart bodies that fly in this war. Imagine a hot bullet piercing something you love, say your sister’s hand—so like your mother’s—or shattering your baby’s belly that you pucker up to kiss and blow on lustily to make him giggle—or can you imagine your own splintered backbone? Look at yourself lying there forever, inert. There is no end to what that piece of metal can do.
Then there were no more images. No more heat. There was only a cold, loaded gun. I prayed that my life would become a power like that, one I could burrow deep in my pocket. My quiet, stupid life would be over. Instead, it would be like that gun. Now it would explode.
“I will go to town now to talk to Chanda,” I told Amir. “She can leave on the morning flight to Peshawar with you. If she travels as your wife, and if she wears a full burqa, it should raise no questions.”
“She can stay with my friends in Islamabad,” he said.
“One thing is important, Amir—what Faisah and I call rule number 1: Tell no one. No one must know how Chanda escaped. Not your friends in Lahore. I will impress on Chanda also how dangerous it would be if our part in this is known. How it would make it more difficult for us to help others. You must understand this, Amir. Do not tell even Abbu or Meena.”
He nodded like an obedient child.
“What about Lia? She knows about the fatwa.”
“Especially do not tell Lia. I love her dearly, and she loves Chanda, too. But Lia is a journalist, and an American. Hers is a different world than ours. No, she will figure it out on her own after Chanda has disappeared.”
“Baji,” said Amir. He looked frightened.
“Remember what I said?” I asked, grabbing his upper arms. “Rule number 1?”
“Tell no one,” he said, mouthing the words without a sound.
“My clever boy.” I laughed and held him to me.
And, sure enough, when we met for tea, Lia demanded to know where Chanda and Amir were.
“Who?” I asked her.
“Don’t be coy with me—where are they? I was up with the birds this morning, and she was gone.”
I wondered if Lia was dense or only pretending to be dense. Amir said that Lia knew about the fatwa. Couldn’t she figure out what happened?
“Maybe they eloped,” I said. “Let’s change the subject.”
“Change the subject! There is a fatwa against Chanda, Ujala. Maybe some zealots kidnapped her.” The hotel waiter brought us tea and sweetmeats, and we stopped talking until he finished serving. “Now I get it,” she said. “Amir and Chanda took the morning flight to Peshawar—for her protection. If she were missing, you’d have your feathers all ruffled. That’s it, isn’t it?”
“My lips are sealed.”
“You mean you will not confirm nor deny. I hate that about you,” Lia said. “You always leave me out when something exciting is going on. You think I can’t be trusted because I’m American, isn’t it? Because I’m not a Muslim.”
Lia’s frustration spilled open. She sat there fuming.
“Don’t be angry,” I said. “And let’s drop our stereotypes and be glad Chanda is nowhere around. After all, you still have her story to tell the world.”
“But now I won’t know how it ends,” Lia said. I was so tired of her complaints.
“Create any ending you want.”
My Sisters Made of Light Page 16
