The Bad Muslim Discount

by Syed M. Masood

  When we weren’t sleeping together, we talked most about mundane things, like homework she was having trouble with or how ridiculous Hafeez Bhatti’s toupee looked. I was glad for these conversations, shallow though they were, because I was ducking my family’s calls, certain that the whole Imam Sama saga was still ongoing.

  Besides, despite the fact that Ma’s society would’ve expected me to be involved as the younger brother, I was determined to recuse myself from having anything to do with Aamir’s arranged marriage. I had no interest in watching my brother paraded around like a prize pony at a fair as a litany of his virtues was recited for a prospective mate. Aamir would be enjoying himself too much for such a scene to be bearable.

  * * *

  —

  The lunar calendar sometimes has interesting interactions with its solar counterpart. That year Eid al-Adha, the Festival of Sacrifice, was set to fall on September 11. At the last moment, it was decided—allegedly by the cycle of the moon, though I believe it was really just the Saudis—that Eid would, instead, fall on the next day. Whether this change was caused by cosmic or human forces, it was a fortunate development. The last thing Muslims in America needed was to be seen celebrating anything on the anniversary of the fall of the Twin Towers.

  As was my personal tradition, I slept through the Eid prayer services. My father and Aamir always went to some remote farm outside of Sacramento, where the farmer let Muslims purchase and then slaughter livestock in the ritual manner. They usually made their way to the farm directly after the service was over, and so if I was not at the mosque, I was not required to kill anything I would normally be inclined to pet.

  When I eventually did wake up, I saw that I had missed five calls from my mother. Groaning, I plucked my phone from the nightstand, yanked it free from the charger and dialed home. I wasn’t crazy enough to dodge Ma’s calls on Eid.

  She answered on the third ring but did not immediately address me. She was screaming at someone else in the background. I sat up.

  “Mom, what’s wrong?”

  “He’s got a chain saw, Anvar,” my mother yelled into the phone. “A chain saw! There is blood everywhere. It’s everywhere.”

  “What’s happening? Are you all right?”

  “Your father has a chain saw. He got a chain saw and now the garage is a mess and there are chips of bone in the meat and I can’t cook in these conditions. I am telling you, Anvar, I have had it with this.”

  I may not have mentioned it before, but my father loves food. Point him to the best nihari in your state and he’ll drive two or three hundred miles to get at it without hesitation. This accounts for his rather generous proportions.

  What he loves more than anything else in the world, more than his wife and his sons and even music, is meat. If you were to offer him a choice between fresh meat and ambrosia, he would pick the meat and never have any doubts about his choice.

  The problem is that you can’t really get fresh, off-the-bone halal meat in the States. Even on Eid al-Adha, his favorite holiday, Imtiaz Faris has to leave his sacrificed goat with a farmer, who then has it skinned, gutted, cut into manageable pieces and nicely packaged over several days. My father has long railed against this process because, in his opinion, the wait alters the taste of the goat and ruins his Eid.

  Ma told me to hold, shouted at my father some more, then returned to our call. “So, your father has the farmer skin and gut the goat, puts the carcass in the back of our Camry, and drives to a hardware store. He buys a chain saw. Then he lines the entire garage with old newspapers, unloads the goat and goes about trying to butcher it. What should I do?”

  The real question was what my parents’ neighbors would do if they saw my dad, dressed in his shalwar kameez and skullcap, sitting in a pool of blood, dicing up a dead body.

  “Mom.” I jumped to my feet. “I’m on my way. Listen carefully. Whatever happens, make sure the garage door remains closed. All right? Otherwise, people will freak out.”

  “I have to air it out,” my mother said. “Everything smells like goat.”

  “I don’t care. He’ll end up on the news. Just contain the situation.”

  “Would serve him right if he got arrested.” She sniffed and, in a more resigned voice, said, “Fine. I’ll make sure no one finds out what is happening. Stop by a store on your way home. I really need an air freshener for the car.”

  * * *

  —

  Ma opened the door dressed in bloodied surgical scrubs. They obviously belonged to Aamir, as she fairly swam in them, but the menace in her dark eyes, visible over the surgeon’s mask, was enough to keep me from laughing at her outfit. I couldn’t help but point to the blue cap she was wearing though. “Nice hat, Mom.”

  She snarled and thrust a pair of clear plastic gloves at me. “Go put on old clothes and come down to help clean up your father’s mess.”

  “I don’t get scrubs?”

  “If you wanted them, you should’ve become a doctor.”

  “You’re not a doctor. Also, I am a doctor.”

  Ma sniffed to show her disdain for my juris doctorate and marched away in the direction of the garage. As I went up the stairs to my old room, I ran into Aamir hurrying down.

  “Going down to help?”

  “I can’t. Emergency at the hospital. I got called in.”

  “Convenient.”

  “Anvar, a woman is dying. I might be able to save her life.”

  I hate physicians. They have the best excuses. “Sure. Whatever.”

  He gave me a wide grin that convinced me he was full of shit, the default human condition, and rushed past me. Grumbling to myself, I dressed and made my way down to help my parents.

  A chain saw is not a precision instrument. That is why it isn’t the first choice of world-renowned orthopedic surgeons but is the first choice of serial killers.

  The inside of my parents’ garage looked like the inside of Stephen King’s head. Blood was splattered everywhere, shreds and chunks of meat and gristle clung to the walls and a giant pile of red-soaked newspapers sat in the middle.

  Ma handed me a bucket of water and a large sponge, still wrapped in cellophane, as soon as I walked into the little house of horrors my father had created. “You clean the walls. I’ll paint them. These spots of blood will never come out.”

  “Sure, Lady Macbeth.”

  My mother glared at me, though I was fairly sure she didn’t get the reference. “Was that a joke?”

  “Yes.”

  “Was it funny?”

  “Not really, no.”

  She put her hands on her hips, still staring me down. “You don’t joke with me, you understand? You and I don’t have a fun relationship.”

  “It’s definitely not a fun relationship.”

  I’d never thought it possible that someone could break a name in half. My mother did it and she made it seem effortless. “Anvar. Faris.”

  “Sorry, Ma.”

  As my mother stomped off toward the paint bucket at the opposite side of the garage, my father, who was sitting in a corner, trying to look as small as possible, hissed at me. “What you are doing, man? You’ll get us both killed.”

  “This is all on you, Dad.”

  My father shrugged as he went back to using dental floss to try to get the last bits of his latest sacrifice to Allah out from the teeth of his otherwise new saw. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. Then again, so did having you.”

  “I don’t have to be here, you know.”

  “Yes,” Bariah Faris said from across the garage. “You do.” She pointed to the wall nearest to her. “Start cleaning.”

  It was long, slow and, literally, bloody work. An hour in, I was only halfway done. My wrists were tired, my knees were tired, and my ears were tired.

  “…stupid man with his stupid goats and his s
tupid fried liver that he just plops on the table as if I don’t have things to do myself, and then he expects me to drop everything and make biryani, but does he remember to bring yogurt? No, of course, the great king of kings doesn’t remember to bring the yogurt and then, when he goes out for it, he calls from the store to ask if we use full fat or half fat and then he comes back with vanilla by mistake because he is a stupid man who loves stupid goats…”

  For the last hour, my mother had been muttering to herself, while my father sat by the water heater, eyes downcast, shoulders slumped. This was something she did whenever she was extremely worked up.

  Prophet Muhammad once said that the believer does not swear. Therefore, Bariah Faris does not swear. Ever. In her life she claims to have never said a three-, four-, five- or six-letter word. Her accounting may not be precise, but I can attest to the fact that I never heard her curse. Not being able to vent her frustrations in one forceful expletive, however, she was forced to gradually put her displeasure into words.

  So, like a kettle letting off steam as it comes to a boil, my mother whispers her fury to the world. I was pretty good at tuning her out but had never been trapped in a room with her when she was in one of these moods for an extended period of time. It was exhausting. No wonder my father looked so defeated.

  “…so now my whole day is thrown off, you see, and does the maharaja care? No, of course he doesn’t care because it doesn’t really change his schedule. He isn’t the one who has to get Zuha’s Eid present together and make it look all nice and pretty. No, he’ll just waddle along, pretending the whole while that he helped when, truth be told…”

  “Wait, Ma, what did you say?”

  Both my parents stared at me, their eyes wide. My father, I suspect, was afraid. My mother was just surprised. No one ever asked her to repeat herself when she was in this mood.

  “I was saying there is so much to do. I have to finish getting Zuha’s Eid present together.” She paused and looked at me a moment, her expression odd. “You didn’t know? I thought I told you we were going to see the Shahs when the whole fiasco with Imam Sama happened four weeks ago. I’m sure I asked you to come. This is what happens when you don’t pick up your phone and don’t take any interest in the affairs of the family. It really is your own fault if you’re feeling left out now. Anyway, we finalized everything with the Shah family. Aamir will be getting engaged to their daughter, Zuha. Frankly, I can’t believe we didn’t think of it sooner. It is such a great match. And you, you who are supposed to be so smart about everything, how come you didn’t suggest it?”

  * * *

  —

  I begged off going to the Shahs’, claiming that the fumes from the paint had given me a headache. Then I went home and proceeded to procure a headache by getting utterly and completely drunk.

  THE TRAP

  2016

  This kind play, one that looks like it will help you but which ultimately causes you pain, is called a trap. And you, my son, are in one now.

  —Naani Jaan

  AZZA

  Being with Anvar was a mistake. It was stupid, sinful, reckless, mad. I’d known all that before I’d gone to his home and his bed. I’d gone to him, again and again, despite knowing that if Abu or Qais found out, it’d be the end of me.

  Maybe it was just the upcoming Eid. It had me thinking of Baba Adam’s suicidal goat. What would it be like, just for a moment, to be completely free, even if it all ended badly?

  And then there was Anvar. His quick half smile, the constant laughter in his brown eyes, and the way he could shape words, turning them in on themselves. He made the world seem easy. It was as if he’d managed to survive life without letting it bruise him. That was a miracle. I was used to being around shattered people. He was different.

  Or not. I found him drunk one night, wrecked by the thought of a woman he had loved—probably still did love, given how broken the thought of her made him—marrying his brother.

  There is no true measure of pain. Each hurt is unique, and even small wounds can bleed a lot. I should’ve laughed at Anvar Faris as he told me stories about Zuha Shah. The misery he’d experienced was so many shades lighter than mine. Still, as I sat there listening to him, I didn’t feel like laughing. I felt wonder.

  I led him to his bed, and held him as he found sleep, running my fingers through his hair and wondering what being in love actually was. What force it must have to completely shake a man who seemed to be so solid, who seemed to have an answer to everything, a smile for every moment.

  What would it be like to have someone love you like that, over years, through separation and heartache? I didn’t think I’d ever know, and somehow that seemed like the saddest thing in all creation.

  So, I was able to feel sorry for him, even though the world had cut me much more deeply than it had cut him. He still had a scar and so he was entitled to sympathy, and it felt like I was as well.

  * * *

  —

  I woke at home the next morning just as Abu got back from work. I’d overslept and felt groggy. I grimaced when I heard him call my name, but quickly ran my hands through my hair a couple of times, got to my feet and went to see him.

  Abu smiled when he saw me, the kind of big broad smile he rarely gave anyone anymore. I started to smile back but then saw why he was happy. In his hands was a small, blue, velvety box. The kind of box you get from a jewelry store. I stepped back from it.

  “Abu?”

  “Mabruk,” he said, “Alf mabruk. A thousand congratulations, yes, for my daughter. Qais has sent this for you.” Abu held the box out to me. I looked at it, and then up at him. “We’ve agreed on a wedding date. He wanted it as soon as possible, but always it is like that with grooms. All this time, he told me, he’d only been patient because he was getting money together for a ring. Now, I told him, give me some time to raise some money, to do the wedding properly, so you’ll both have to wait till the end of the year.”

  Qais had done it. He’d done exactly what he’d said he would do.

  I took another step back. I couldn’t cry in front of Abu. What would he think? What would he say? I’d promised. More important, he’d promised. He wouldn’t go back on his word to Qais. He’d die first. He’d kill me first.

  I tried to breathe deep and even breaths. I tried to stay together.

  “Already so emotional?” Abu asked with a chuckle. “You haven’t even seen the ring yet. Open it.” He extended his hand farther and I had no choice but to take the box. I opened it. It was a thin slip of silver with a single, dull diamond set in it. It wasn’t at all a glamorous thing, but it was still beautiful, in its own way.

  “Put it on,” Abu said. “A ring is prettiest when it is worn.”

  My fingers shook a little as I pried the ring loose from the box, and then, biting my lip, I slid it on.

  “How does it feel?”

  There had been a movie I’d caught the ending of on TV once, with these little creatures who had to fight monsters and run through war zones so that they could take a ring into a mountain of lava and throw it in there to destroy it before being rescued by a giant flying eagle. That’s what it felt like.

  “It’s tight,” I managed.

  “That can be fixed,” Abu said. “Wear it for now. It’ll make Qais happy to see it. I’ll take it to a store to have it resized for you later.”

  “I can wait to wear it until—”

  “Don’t be silly. What will Qais think? You don’t want to hurt him.”

  No. I wanted to kill him.

  I’ll take your life from you.

  I threw my hand out in the direction of my room. “Abu, I…”

  “Yes, yes,” he said, touching my cheek gently with his rough hand. “Go. Cry these tears. It is a great blessing from Allah to see tears of happiness in your eyes after so long a time.”

  * * *
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  —

  I didn’t let myself cry long. Mama had spent her life crying and hoping no one would notice. It had changed nothing for her, and being like her would change nothing for me.

  Everything good that had happened to me was because I’d done something to try to get what I wanted. I’d survived Baghdad by going to Basra, I’d brought us to the States. Now it was time to do something again.

  Except I had no idea what to do and everything that hurt in my life was also because of the things I’d done. My heart still ached over Fahd, and my promises to Qais, now wrapped painfully around my ring finger, digging into my skin, were also my own doing. I had to be careful. I didn’t think my heart could survive too many more consequences.

  There was nowhere to run. I had no money and no skills with which to find work. How would I support myself? And I didn’t really want to leave Abu. He was the last of my family, the only thing left of the life I had been born into. He was the last person I loved, even if I did so bitterly.

  And there was always the chance that Abu or Qais would find me.

  Maybe if Qais could be made to want someone else, anyone else. Then he would leave me alone. But I knew no one, and marrying him was a cruel fate to thrust upon another girl.

  I went to the kitchen to start on dinner, my mind a mess of hopes and thoughts. How happy would I be if Qais didn’t exist? I couldn’t imagine it.

  I opened the cabinets above the stove and looked over the ingredients there, trying to figure out what I would make. It didn’t matter what I’d make, I’d need salt, so I reached for it, but Abu had put it just out of my grasp.

  Shaking my head, I stood on tiptoe. I stretched my fingers as far as I could, and managed to tip the container forward. As I pulled away, my hand hit the sumac, and suddenly a wave of plastic tumbled toward me. I covered my face with my arms as plastic bottles and jars fell around me.