by Nawaaz Ahmed
“Jemaal, we must do something, you and me,” Arshad cries out in sudden anguish. “Nobody else will do anything.”
14
“Tahera knows about me,” Fiaz announces in a stage whisper. Having helped carry the groceries in, he has stopped by Seema’s room, knocking conspiratorially on her door. “She saw me with Ben and Percy at the Safeway. Not very difficult with those two.”
My mother is in bed, working with her laptop on her belly, the extra warmth spread like a cozy comforter over me. She gestures to Fiaz to pull the door shut behind him. She’s half-relieved, half-aggrieved: one less deception, one more complication to deal with. Should she have, as Leigh has held, been completely open with her mother and Tahera from the start? But it hadn’t seemed possible before their arrival: Would her mother have come, would her father have let her mother come if he too found out? “How did Tahera react?”
“She has barely spoken to me since.” Fiaz smiles ruefully. “We were getting along very well before that.”
Seema sighs, puts the laptop away. She’s not ready yet to give up the lurking hope that Tahera has moderated since sending her that letter twelve years ago, just as America itself had, to at least tight-lipped tolerance. “I was going to tell you, I’ve asked Tahera to be my son’s guardian.”
He raises both eyebrows. “Tahera, really, why?”
“Who else? You’ve already said you can’t, and I’m assuming you haven’t changed your mind.” The shamed look on his face is confirmation. “And it’s too early with Leigh. There’s no one else.”
“Why not Bill? He’s the father, after all.”
“You know why not Bill,” she snaps. “Everyone keeps pushing Bill on me. Has he gotten to you too?”
“Ouch. What’s going on, Seema?”
“I’m sorry, I’m dealing with a lot.” She pats the space beside her. “Come sit by me for a minute? Bill was here. My mother had some crazy idea of bringing us together. They just ambushed me.”
“That sounds horrible.” Fiaz sits down, massages her shoulders. “How did it go?”
Two memories arise: when she’d first set eyes on Bill that evening, and when she’d hid behind her mother. She’s ashamed of her reactions to both moments: the instinctive desire to welcome his reassuring presence into her life again; the despicable cruelty with which she’d repulsed him, afraid he’d betray her to her mother.
“He left threatening to void the consent form,” she says. “He could fight for custody.”
“Don’t worry about it now. We can deal with it if it happens.”
“One silver lining: my mother stood up for me in the end. I was so relieved, I couldn’t even be angry with her for setting it up. But I need to have something signed about guardianship before I go into delivery, just in case. Isn’t it sad that after all these years living here my only two options are an ex who wanted me to get rid of my baby and a sister who still probably doesn’t approve of my lifestyle?”
“You do know, Seema, that if I didn’t have Pierre—?”
“Do I know?” Her smile is inquiring, a little bitter. “But you do have Pierre. At least Tahera agreed. I can always change it later, depending on what happens with Leigh.”
Fiaz stretches himself on the bed alongside her and drapes his arm over me, as he’s done before. “I’m ready to sign up for diaper duty whenever Ishraaq needs me.”
“Guess what? My mother thinks you and I are together. After Bill left, she asked if there was anything between us. I suppose after her plan with Bill misfired, she decided to settle me on you. I said we’re just friends, but I don’t think she believed me. And she won’t, if she sees us like this.”
“Uh-oh, dinner’s going to be awkward tomorrow.”
“I’ll think of some way to disabuse her by then,” Seema says. “And don’t worry, silly—I won’t tell her all your secrets.”
Fiaz laughs uneasily. “I got these CDs for her. Hopefully that’ll be enough to keep me in her good books.”
15
Grandmother, you’re inspecting the mutton when Fiaz offers you the CDs. Preoccupied with the meat—the butcher should have made the pieces larger, so they won’t fall apart in the biryani—you thank him cursorily. Only after he leaves, and you and your daughters are done with your simple dinner of rice and rasam, do you examine them.
“Arre, where did he find these?” You flip through them, excited. You’ve been searching for these discs for many years, the cassettes you owned not playing anymore. You try to remove the cover of the Noor Jehan CD, but your hands shake too much. The collection has the very best of Noor Jehan’s songs and ghazals.
Tahera takes it from you and turns on Seema’s music system, lying dusty on the lower shelf of the bookcase in the living room. Seema has returned to her bedroom, claiming she’s working on something for the campaign, though you suspect she’s avoiding you for having forced Bill upon her.
The lilt and melody of the opening song transports you immediately to your childhood home in Coimbatore, to the hiss and crackle of the LPs playing on your father’s—my great-grandfather’s—gramophone, and to the jasmine-scented, song-silenced evenings in your parents’ bedroom, your father in the rocking chair by the window, your mother cross-legged on the floor, stringing buds plucked from the garden. And you, on your father’s lap, rocking with him, or sprawled on the bed doing your homework with your sister when you were older.
You are aware of the years that have intervened since that past. You clasp the empty plastic case to your chest to steady yourself. What a precious gift from someone you’ve scarcely known for a week. Only a friend, Seema insisted. “So thoughtful of Fiaz, and I didn’t even thank him properly,” you say. “Come, sit and listen with me, Tahera.”
Tahera says she’ll clean up in the kitchen and then join you. Unfortunately, your daughters were never admirers of these old classics. You rest your head against the futon, close your eyes, and let Noor Jehan’s voice steal its way back into your dying body. It’s an unexpected pleasure, something you hadn’t imagined finding here on this trip or, for that matter, ever again.
Now here’s Noor Jehan singing, “Mujhse pehli si muhabbat mere mehboob na maang.” You’ve been both waiting for and dreading this song, for all the memories it holds for you. You had recited that Faiz Ahmed Faiz poem, one of your favorites, at a jubilee celebration at your college. How different your life would have been if your husband hadn’t come to that event with his friends. He said he’d fallen so in love with you that evening, he’d moved heaven and earth to find out who you were and forced his parents to approach yours for an alliance. And you were so charmed, you allowed yourself to be swept off your feet and forget everything, including the warning in the last lines you had recited: There are other satisfactions than the satisfactions of love.
You’d wanted to teach Urdu and write your own nazms and ghazals, perhaps even sing them. You locked away all your dreams, along with your bridal finery, in a chest you’ve rarely opened since.
You murmur along with the closing refrain through trembling lips.
You’re aware Tahera has entered the room. You’re glad for the interruption, otherwise the song might have set off your tears. You sense Tahera watching you: some part of the story of this song is cherished family lore. You’re grateful for the moment she gives you to compose yourself before she sits beside you.
She squeezes your hand. “You never told us you wanted to sing too, Ammi.”
“I never trained. I never even asked. Your Nana wouldn’t have let me. It wasn’t something we did.” The truth is, it had never seemed important to you what anyone wanted. You could want so many things, you believed then, but the world would only give you what it’s willing to give, what has been set aside as your portion. You didn’t believe you could bargain with the world. “You never told me Amina sings so well. Perhaps my granddaughter—”
“If Allah wishes.” She sounds despondent, not the blossoming you’ve come to expect whenever she talks abo
ut her daughter.
“What is it, Tahera? You’ve been acting differently all day. You even skipped your namaz.”
“It’s just my period.”
You wait, knowing there is more: you can see in her eyes that the commiseration in your face is welcome today. Usually she withdraws at any sign of pity or compassion.
She opens up hesitantly. There’s all this anger in America against Muslims like her. And it’s not just name-calling and abuse. Their mosque in Irvine has been vandalized, the children’s playground has been burned.
You’re shocked and saddened. You know so little of Tahera’s life here. You don’t know what to say. You’ve never understood why both your daughters, given a choice, always seemed to choose the path that required more hardships. You’d get upset, thinking they were being thoughtless and obstinate, not considering you at all. If they cared for you, they wouldn’t act that way.
Perhaps the Faiz poem is written in their voice, addressed to you: Don’t ask of me that earlier simpler love. The world holds other sufferings than mere love.
You’d given up what you wanted without even trying. You’d convinced yourself that all you ever wanted was that your daughters lead happy lives. But you never asked them what would bring them happiness. The least, and the most, you can do now is listen. You don’t yet know the full sum of their struggles and sorrows.
Tahera’s eyes are downcast. You lift her chin up, as you would when she was a child to force a smile, and she complies, and you let your own eyes rest on her face, as if to take in all her pain and add it to yours.
16
Seema is in bed in San Francisco, waiting for her mother to come to her. Seema is in bed in Chennai, waiting for her father to come to her.
In San Francisco, Seema listens to the faint buzz of conversation between Tahera and Nafeesa in the living room. During the lulls, she can make out—barely, because the volume is turned down low—the songs her mother has been playing all evening.
In Chennai, Seema listens for the determined rhythm of her father’s steps up the stairs. He hadn’t come to the airport to receive her—he usually does when she arrives before dawn, but due to a snowstorm in London she’d been delayed till the evening. He wasn’t home for dinner either, and she’s waiting for her father to look in on her, as he does on the nights of her homecoming.
In both places—San Francisco and Chennai—Seema is sick with anticipation and apprehension. Except that in San Francisco, she is additionally burdened by the ghost of that long-ago night in Chennai, revived and clamoring.
The Seema in Chennai has made up her mind. The questions her father has asked her over the phone about “her friend Chloe” have convinced her he suspects, informed by one of his friends at Oxford, most likely Uncle Rajasekharan, who has seen her with Chloe on a few occasions. Her father has also started to talk about her marriage. How much does he know? And what does he have in mind? She will be firm about refusing marriage. She has rehearsed what she will say.
She is eager to get the confession—the confrontation?—over with as soon as possible. If only Chloe were here to blunt her anxiety. Any noise suggesting her father’s approach makes her sit up and clutch her damp bedsheet, twitching as though her organs are pulsing alongside her heart. Her palms are bathed in sweat despite the grumbling fan and the chill December night.
But still she’s optimistic: Abba loves her, he’s proud of her. Her mother has said nothing so far, and she takes this as a good sign. If anything, she expects her mother would be more upset, being more traditional, less doting. Abba had supported her decision to study in England over Ammi’s strenuous objections, persisting until Ammi had come around.
The Seema in San Francisco is no longer afflicted by the daring optimism of youth. She finds it absurd that the Seema in Chennai expected her father would support her, commending her on the courage to agitate for what she wanted, as he’d done many times before. How naive that younger Seema must have been for failing to recognize the difference between a transgression that challenged her father and her past harmless exploits.
She’s been holding everyone—her mother, her sister, even her lover—at bay for the last few months, bracing herself for a repeat of that earlier abandonment. But the last few days have softened her defenses: having experienced once again the comfort of their love, the prospect of losing them for the second time wrenches at her.
She owes it to Fiaz to correct her mother’s misconception about their relationship, and to Leigh for standing by her patiently. But mostly she owes it to herself, so she never reacts again with the kind of fear that the threat of Bill’s disclosure had aroused that evening. She will speak to Ammi tonight, as she should have done earlier. She owes it to Ammi, too, to give her a chance to come through. Perhaps her mother’s desire to see her partnered will yield a different outcome this time, this second coming out.
In Chennai: footsteps first, then a soft knock, then her father’s voice, muffled.
She gets up and opens the door.
He’s come directly to her, not having changed his clothes. He holds her by her nightgowned shoulders, kisses her on her forehead. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be at the airport. Was the delay too taxing? Did you eat?”
She’s relieved to still hear tenderness and concern in his voice. She reaches for the switch to turn the light on.
“No, you should go to sleep,” Naeemullah says. “You must be tired. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“I’m jet-lagged—I won’t be able to sleep anytime soon.”
They compromise: she gets into bed, Naeemullah pulls a chair to her bedside.
The room is lit only by a night lamp. He is a dark shape sitting beside her, stroking her hair. They converse in whispers, even though Tahera has her own room now, next door. They talk about Oxford, which he has fond memories of. She talks about college, and the courses she’s taking. She has one semester left.
And then what?
She hesitates: she’s thinking of a doctorate.
“Wonderful! Both my daughters will be doctors.” Tahera has surprised everybody by opting for medicine after her schooling. “But don’t you think,” he continues, pressing her hand, “it’s time to get married? Your mother already had you at your age.”
In the shadows, she can’t quite make out the expression on his face. Is that what gives her the courage?
“Abba—” She hopes he’s smiling. “There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you—”
In San Francisco: her mother gets ready for bed, as unobtrusively as possible—the lamp remains off, she barely opens the closet door to retrieve her nightclothes, her footsteps are as soft as the moonlight streaming through the window. And then she arranges herself rigid and narrow, toward the edge of the bed, as if to minimize her presence.
“If you scoot any closer to the edge, you’ll fall off,” Seema says, her eyes still closed.
Nafeesa sits up, surprised: “I thought you were sleeping.”
“I was waiting for you.”
“Why did you wait up for me? As if I need help to come to bed. You need your rest.” Tsk-tsking, Nafeesa lies back again. “It’s late. Let’s go to sleep.”
But instead of abiding by her own proclamation, Nafeesa continues, “I was listening to the songs Fiaz brought me.” And, after a pause, “I never thought I’d hear them again before I—”
The hush in the bedroom is then punctuated by quick sharp intakes of breath, Nafeesa’s desperate attempts to stifle her sobs. As with Tahera the previous day, Seema doesn’t know how to react. This is the first time her mother has alluded to her impending death, displaying open grief at the prospect. She reaches a tentative hand toward her mother, but Nafeesa brushes it away.
In the darkness, an immense abyss opens up between mother and daughter, in the space between their bodies in bed. It is Seema who lies rigid now, not breathing, as if even that could pierce the distance separating them. Her world turns soundless, complying with her mother’s wish that the mome
nt simply pass by unacknowledged. Nafeesa’s sobs are someplace else, in a different room, a different continent. Only unmoving shadows remain, the dark curve of the calla lilies arcing over Seema in the ghostly moonlight streaking through the window.
Gradually, as Nafeesa regains control over herself, sound returns. She hears her mother say: “Seema, I want to say something—”
In Chennai, Seema’s rehearsed speech starts off well. The darkness is liberating: she won’t be distracted by her father’s reactions. She is the performer, her father the audience. She has prepared an impassioned argument, incorporating much that he has taught her, much that he should recognize as his own values. He will be proud of her—she will make him proud of her, not for nothing is she his daughter.
When does she realize her performance is coming up short? When Naeemullah listens but his grip on her hand tightens, his face looming large and featureless? His impassivity makes her falter. Her prepared words sound trite and unconvincing. She panics, losing the thread of her oration, digressing into explanations and justifications she hadn’t intended. Still he’s silent. She clings to the belief that she can salvage this. She only needs to find the right words, the right way to declaim them, and her father will respond with his usual applause and approbation.
She repeats sentences, phrases, rehashing herself in increasingly desperate constructions and combinations until she finally stops with a strangled gulp of air, her father’s grip painful around her wrist.
“You’re hurting me, Abba,” she sobs, trying to reclaim her wrist from the vise of his hand.
In San Francisco, Seema turns toward her mother, ashamed at having allowed her to cry alone. She takes her mother’s hand, lifts the bony knuckles to her lips for a kiss—dry lips to dying skin—as her mother had done earlier that evening, consoling her.
