by Nawaaz Ahmed
It’s a subdued Amina who lets slip the news to her, in a roundabout way: They were not allowed out during play period that morning. The playground was closed for the day. She’s sad because her favorite swing is burned. Then, clearly prompted by Ismail, she tells her mother not to worry, she’s not going to cry, she’s going to be brave.
“But how did the swing burn?” Tahera presses Ismail.
“I told Amina not to tell you, afraid you’ll be worried.” There had been a small fire in the children’s play area the night before.
“Do they know how it started?”
“Nothing for sure yet.” He’s deliberately vague. Only when she persists does he admit that the police may be investigating it as a case of suspected arson, and a possible hate crime—it is an Islamic school, after all.
9
Seema is roused from her listless post-lunch nap by a call from the campaign office.
The campaign has just obtained reliable intel that supporters of Kamala Harris’s Republican opponent are planning a blitz of ads the week leading into the election: a huge buy, upward of $10 million, flowing in from outside the state. They want to revive Prop 8 as a campaign issue in a bid to energize the demographic that voted to ban same-sex marriage. The same groups that worked to pass Prop 8—including the Mormon Church—were apparently getting involved in the attorney general’s race.
Can Seema come in for an emergency meeting?
Seema’s backache hasn’t improved. Ammi will make a fuss about her going, but she can’t say no. Only one concern gives her pause: “Is Divya there?”
Divya will be at the meeting, but she can’t hide from her forever. Seema consents and gets ready.
Thankfully, her mother is too caught up in dinner preparations to do more than cluck her tongue and suggest, “Why don’t you tell them you’re not feeling well?”
“This is important, Ammi,” Seema says, hunting around the apartment for her laptop accessories. “There’s a lot at stake.”
She hopes that either her mother or sister will inquire into what exactly is at stake—this would be a good opportunity to introduce the topic of same-sex marriage without exposing herself directly—but neither is paying attention to her.
Seema had not taken part in any of the protests and candlelight vigils held in San Francisco after the same-sex marriage ban was added to the California constitution. She’d been too preoccupied with her own grief, and guilt. Obama had won, but he’d thrown the gay community under the bus to secure his victory. Issuance of marriage licenses to same-sex couples was stopped that very day.
Seema also had to deal with the repercussions of her feckless night with Divya.
She’s not proud of her cowardly evasions during the year that followed, keeping both Bill and Divya dangling, until she’d felt able to take control of her life again. She’d not confessed to Divya that election night was a mistake of judgment but instead had simply insisted that nothing further could happen between them while she was still married to Bill.
One consolation: Obama is certainly as craven as she is. Two years after his election, he still hasn’t come out in support of same-sex marriage. He still supports only civil unions for gay and lesbian couples, even after a federal court ruled Prop 8 unconstitutional, two months ago. He’s worried now about his reelection prospects, perhaps waiting for the political winds to turn more favorable—only four states have legalized same-sex marriage, and opinion polls have yet to show a majority of the nation in support, despite rapidly changing attitudes of the younger generations. Meanwhile, he has left himself open to his views “evolving.”
As she climbs down the stairs, the exacerbated pain makes her wince and groan, a clenching that I respond to by kicking. But she’s been given a chance to make up for her previous nonparticipation in the marriage war, and surely that is worth some minor suffering.
10
Grandmother, you’d like an early start on the preparations for the feast tomorrow, but without the groceries there’s not much you can do. You go through Seema’s cabinets and cull what you can. You earmark which of her pots and pans, spoons and ladles, to use for which dish—you need an extra-large pot for the biryani, for example, one that can be sealed to hold the steam in. Thankfully Seema has an old pressure cooker that will do. You rinse Seema’s dining china and glasses, even though Tahera has said she’ll take care of them, warning you not to overexert yourself.
But Tahera has been unavailable for much of the afternoon, on the phone with Irvine. At first with her clinic, and you don’t want to disturb her. You are proud of what she has managed to create—you know the struggle it has been, the initial scarce years at her clinic with barely any patients, and how she slowly built up her practice by making house calls to the Muslim women in her community. You listen to the authority and assurance in her voice with pleasure.
But later with her family, you know something is wrong—she lowers her voice whenever you enter the living room, but there’s no mistaking the tension and urgency. Whatever is being discussed between husband and wife is surely causing the strain on her face.
Are they quarreling? You blame your son-in-law: Why did he have to spoil what was turning out to be a sweeter time than you’d imagined? You’re worried, too, about the time—doesn’t Tahera need to finish her asr namaz before Fiaz arrives?
When Fiaz buzzes, Tahera is still on the phone, almost scrunched over it in her seat by the window, keyed up like a spring-wound toy. You hover around her in a fret of indecision.
“What?” She looks up, exasperated.
“Fiaz is here, he’s waiting downstairs.”
She gazes blankly as if she doesn’t remember her commitment. But then she takes a deep breath and signals you to hold a minute.
You back away to give her some space. She concludes the call in a whispered consultation and snaps her phone shut. She dresses as you watch, hurriedly pulling on her jilbab and fixing her hijab. You hand her the list, relieved.
“Everything okay?” you ask, though you don’t want to bring up anything that might cause her to change her mind.
Just some matter with the children’s school, she says, giving you a forced smile before heading down.
With both your daughters gone, you can finally admit it to yourself: the afternoon’s activities have exhausted you. You try napping, but you’re too wired—perhaps the excitement of planning, perhaps that extra cup of chai. You sit down and wait for your daughters in the quiet of the living room.
You feel bad that you’ve paid so little attention lately to Tahera’s life. Surely whatever’s the matter with the children’s school can’t be too concerning? Perhaps Tahera’s right—you’ve been so caught up in Seema’s pregnancy that you have ignored Tahera and her family. You’ve barely spoken to your grandchildren and Ismail since you arrived. But what can you do? You have only so much energy, and time, left.
You’ve been pondering Bill’s request at odd times of the day since his visit. But with Tahera around, you’ve been unable to catch Seema alone. Or perhaps you’ve been using Tahera’s presence as an excuse to put the conversation off.
Last night on the rooftop, when your daughters told you of their guardianship plans, you could have seized the opening. But their offering had meant so much to you, so much to them, how could you have spoiled the moment and told them then what you’ve come to think:
No matter how good Seema is going to be as a mother, you cannot approve of keeping a willing father away from his child. Perhaps Seema is letting her feelings toward her own father blind her to her child’s needs. If the baby is Black—and seeing Bill the other day has reminded you that I’m not just Seema’s child but his as well—then he needs his father to help him navigate what you know of America’s tortured path to the present. Yes, America has finally elected a Black president, but if Seema is to be believed, half of America cannot tolerate being governed by him. And Seema speaks of protests in Oakland, even at this moment, against the shooting of that poor
Black boy by White police officers in a train station. Also, if Tahera and Ismail were to become the child’s guardians—heaven forbid anything happen to Seema—no matter how hard they try, they will still not be able to offer him the same kind of love and guidance his father can.
But, perhaps, you can still do something about it.
You call Seema and ask when she’ll be back. In about half an hour, she says. You give Bill a call next, extracting his number from where you’d squirreled it away. Without allowing time to second-guess yourself, you ask Bill if he can come over to Seema’s apartment within the next half hour, as quickly as he can—you’ll explain when he gets here.
Yes, he says, a little surprised, and promises to leave immediately.
You want him here before Seema arrives, so she can’t deny him entry. And afterward—
Seema will no doubt be very angry. But she’ll have to forgive you, won’t she? And you’d have at least made an effort—and not kept putting it off for later. For who knows what tomorrow holds?
11
Picture Bill in the chair by the window, Nafeesa in the futon opposite, both looking to the door as the key turns in the lock. The hardwood floor is ablaze in golden bands, light slashing in through the slats in the drawn blinds, but the room itself is shrouded in the gloom of twilight, with the occasionally dazzling mote of dust. It’s nearly dusk, and Nafeesa has not yet turned on the lights.
As the door opens, Bill makes to rise, but Nafeesa gestures—wait—and he remains seated. Seema lumbers in, hands bracing her back, as if to counterbalance the massive globe containing his son. He hasn’t seen her up close recently, and the size of her comes as a shock.
She heads straight to the futon, sighing and grimacing, exclaiming, “Ammi, I’m so tired. And my back feels like a thousand knives.”
It’s a voice he hasn’t heard her use before, a child’s voice pleading for things to be made better, and watching her labor across the room he feels a spurt of regret and shame at his absence from her side. He swallows and keeps still, as if that would allow him to disappear into the shadows.
“I told you not to go,” Nafeesa scolds.
Seema hasn’t noticed him yet. She sinks down to the futon and Nafeesa wipes Seema’s face with the edge of her saree—like the way Mame would clean his face with a wet rag when he’d come in from playing outside, though Nafeesa is far more gentle.
“That feels so nice, sweet Ammi.” Seema leans back with closed eyes, and Nafeesa gets up to massage her face and brow, then her shoulders, bending over her.
Bill has seen Nafeesa and Seema together just once, at the dinner at the aunt’s house in Chennai. Nafeesa hadn’t been overly demonstrative then: apart from the long initial embrace, she’d seemed guarded, almost reluctant to show affection. The aunt had to coerce Nafeesa to allow Bill and Seema to touch her feet—a ritual explained to him as asking for Nafeesa’s blessing—and even when she’d agreed, she’d sounded flustered as she uttered the words—Jeete raho: live long and prosper—that accompanied the ritual.
And this evening, waiting for Seema, Nafeesa had sat up straight the entire half hour, rigid and unbending, reminding him so much of Mame that he’s surprised now at this other side to Nafeesa, her maternal ministering.
It’s hard to reimagine Seema as being close to her family, as even having a family, so little had she spoken about any of them in all their years together. It had only been the two of them. Seeing her now with Nafeesa, allowing herself to be tended to, a sudden pang: for what they could have been, for what they never were.
He’s anxious now to make his presence known, afraid that if he were to wait any longer, he’d become privy to some further intimacy that would blunt his ability to face Seema. He clears his throat.
Seema looks around the room and sits up with a jerk. In the half light, her eyes flare, larger every moment as if taking over her face, and he’s transfixed by them. He stands up and takes a few uncertain steps toward her, stopping in a vague panic when the room darkens further, the shadow of some intruder cast on it. Except he’s the intruder, blocking the light through the window.
“Seema, I asked him here.” Nafeesa cuts in, imploring. “Don’t be upset.”
In response, Seema pushes herself up and trudges past him to the apartment door. Does she mean to leave or to insist he does? Nafeesa scurries after her.
Bill finds his voice: “Seema, wait, please listen to me just this once. I promise I won’t bother you again.”
As if she hasn’t heard him—“Why were you sitting in the dark, Ammi?”—Seema flicks on the switch by the door.
The room flashes, the walls spring forward, then steady themselves. Bill blinks. Seema’s apartment feels less menacing now, but he is in the spotlight. Seema stands by the door, one hand on the doorknob, ready.
“Seema, come sit down.” Nafeesa takes her by the elbow.
Seema shakes her off. “I can listen from here. What does he have to say, Ammi?”
She’s looking at Nafeesa, not him. He looks to Nafeesa too, who opens her palms in a sudden gesture of resignation: it’s up to him now.
He paces once around the room. Everything he’d tried to rehearse still feels inchoate, incoherent. What can he say that he hasn’t said to her in so many emails and messages before?
He realizes he must appeal to her mother, get her to continue playing a part. She’d gotten Seema to at least accept his presence.
“Mrs. Hussein, I want you to know how sorry I am for behaving so badly toward your daughter. Seema deserves better. She’s the best thing that ever happened to me, and I let her down. You can’t imagine how many nights I’ve laid awake wishing I could roll back the past year. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to go back to where we were. And there’s nothing I want more than to be a good father to my child.
“Mrs. Hussein, I know the part elders play in your culture. They do in mine too. You are honored and respected for how much you sacrifice for your children, for how you love and guide them throughout their lives. You’re the only elder Seema and I have left now. I promise in your presence that if Seema were to forgive me, I will never give her any reason to regret it. I promise—”
And most naturally, as if he’s done this all his life, he bends down to touch Nafeesa’s feet. He doesn’t know how he came to do it, but it feels right. “Please forgive me.”
Nafeesa pats his shoulders unsteadily, urging him up.
He can’t meet her eyes now, or Seema’s, for he’s afraid he’ll tear up. He steps back and picks up his jacket from his chair.
“Seema!” Nafeesa’s voice is a sharp command. “You must listen to what he has to say. I don’t know what happened between you two. Things always happen between husbands and wives. I know you pride yourself in making your own choices, but this one time I want you to consider carefully what Bill says. For your son’s sake, if not for your own.”
Bill glances at Seema’s face. At first he thinks she wears the same intransigent expression he knows so well, but now there’s something else there too—a crumbling: doubt, and weariness. The authority in Nafeesa’s voice had startled him too.
“I’m exhausted, Ammi.” Seema shuffles away from the door. “Can we do this some other time?”
Nafeesa hesitates, throwing him a questioning look as she helps Seema back to the futon. He’s sure Nafeesa understands there won’t be a better time. “I can come back later, Mrs. Hussein.”
“Please sit,” she says, slipping a cushion behind Seema. “Tahera may be back soon. Seema, would you like something to eat? That will make you feel better. Bill, you’ll have something too.”
She hurries out before he can demur.
He pulls his chair to the middle of the room, closer to Seema. There’s an air of the reprimanded child about her, a shrinking, a sulking—she is the one now who refuses to meet his gaze.
They haven’t been alone in a room together for more than half a year.
He squeezes his hands together and begins in an u
ndertone: “Your mother tells me you’re volunteering for the Harris campaign. How’s it going?”
It’s the right opening: she lets out a sigh, as if she’s been holding her breath, and turns to face him. They’d always started this way, he recollects, discussing political matters before venturing into the personal, even the evening they’d decided to separate. At least that has survived between them.
She matches his quiet tone. “The race is tight, it’ll be down to the wire. What do you lawyers think of her candidacy?”
“Her ‘Smart on Crime’ slogan is good.” He smiles at Seema. “She could be the next Obama.”
“Let’s not talk about Obama. He’s managed to keep one promise. He’s united the country as he said he would—only it’s against himself.”
“You’re still disappointed.”
“I had high hopes. And you’d think I’d have learned a lesson from that, but no.” A quick smile and a shrug. “But Kamala is half-Indian, and a woman.”
“You’ve only given up on men then?” He hadn’t meant to raise this, but his recent nights have been tormented by sightings of Seema with the girl in the hat. There’s no mistaking the nature of their relationship.
Seema stiffens, scanning his face. He can’t hide from her that he knows. She casts an anxious glance toward the kitchen, as if worried her mother may overhear. But doesn’t Nafeesa know?
“Why are we wasting time like this?” she hisses. “What did you want to say to me?”
He fears he’s lost her with his misstep. He stammers: “You never replied to my emails and messages.”
“I’ve been busy.” She points to her belly. “I’ve been having a child, as you can see.”
“Seema, I understand why you’re angry. What I did was wrong.” He’d like to pull his chair closer, but even leaning forward makes her retreat. “There’s no excuse for what I put you through. Punish me if you want. But don’t punish my child.”
“What do you mean punish your child? My son is no longer your child, remember?”
