In all fairness to him, he operated with the best of intentions. But along the way, he unknowingly lost pieces of me because of his judgmental attitude. I felt offended at having to defend my project to Zaki, especially when my focus was what had initially drawn him in.
“I don’t get it,” he often said when our schedules collided because of that work, a hint of sarcasm in his voice. “It’s a book, like a million others. I’m sorry, but what would this one do for the world that others haven’t done already?”
“It is not just another work. It’s a legacy,” I tried to explain patiently once. “And it’s not for others. It’s for him. I am trying to give it life so—”
“So he can live on,” Zaki finished for me. “Yes, you have told me that a million times before, but how can he?”
He saw my dark expression and perhaps realized that he had ventured too far into restricted territory and fell silent. I didn’t think my journey was tithable. I didn’t owe any of it to anyone. Not even to the person who had access to my body.
Ann Marie and I communicated often. Since that day at the coffee shop, I frequently consulted her on matters of importance to me and found her opinions extremely helpful. Our talks had a soothing, comfortable quality and in time, evolved into a great friendship. Her new job as an event management coordinator required her to fly to Dallas many weekends. At least once every two months, she drove in to Houston to see me. Our conversations often drifted to Zaki.
“I feel he doesn’t get me,” I wailed to her. “He doesn’t touch my soul like Faizan did.”
Ann Marie smiled. “We never stop comparing, do we?”
“What about you?” I asked. “You never remarried.”
“No, I didn’t,” she laughed out loud. “Who would have an opinionated menopausal woman who thinks love only comes to you once in a lifetime?”
“So what are you saying, Ann Marie? That I shouldn’t bother with new relationships because love doesn’t happen twice in a lifetime?”
“I am not saying that.” Her tone grew serious. “We each have to look within ourselves for that. The question you should ask of yourself is whether you are a person who dooms new relationships at the onset or are you someone who is more open to them? Clearly you’re in a relationship but has your heart really accepted that new association? What does this person and his presence in your life mean to you?”
It surprised me how clear the answers were in my head. I was just not ready to say them out loud yet.
Raian’s fears were the hardest to deal with.
Everything scared him––dogs, cats, Elmo. The list kept growing: his own shadow, the night shadows, cartoons, happy faces. Especially happy faces. If he saw one of those, he would go berserk. I had to personally take an inventory of the whole apartment and get rid of every item that had a smiley face on it. I didn’t know how else to help him. Once a fear found its way in, it wouldn’t leave.
One afternoon when we were visiting Zaki, Raian took out a doodle pad and started scribbling. Safiy joined him and drew some characters for him. I watched them together and felt happy that they were bonding. Zaki and I decided to go for a short hike. When we came back, Raian was in a corner of the room, huddled like a ball, bawling, and Safiy was hovering over him, trying to calm him down.
“I was just drawing stuff for him,” Safiy said in his defense. He held up the doodle pad with a happy face drawn on it. I cringed and gripped the edge of the table.
“We need to leave, now,” I told Zaki. “I am sorry.”
I took Raian’s hand and led him away. We left the doodle pad behind. Raian would not have anything to do with it anyway.
“Why is it so hard?” I said to Uncle Rizvi. I had stormed into his office, where he was behind his desk looking over some patient files. He understood my question as only a loving relative would. He gestured me toward a chair.
“Who said it was going to be easy?” He smiled, looking at me above the glasses on his nose.
“No one did,” I persisted, not having any form of reference to compare the statement against. “But does it ever get easier?”
Uncle Rizvi pondered his thoughts before responding. “It might, but there will always be issues to contend with. You have to realize that Raian will continue to process information in a different way than us.” He laid down his glasses on the desk. “Many of his problems won’t correct themselves, but as he grows up, he’ll be better able to live with them through our assistance.”
I knew that part, but it saddened me to have it confirmed with such finality.
“There will always be small accomplishments that you can celebrate,” Uncle Rizvi continued. “Through it all, you have to remember that this isn’t easy for him either.”
That made me think. My question to Uncle Rizvi probably had selfish overtones, seeking normalcy for myself rather than my son. I realized that the answer wouldn’t change no matter how I asked or whom I asked.
Short-term planning, Arissa, I reminded myself as I headed out with Uncle Rizvi to get burgers for lunch. Don’t think too far ahead. There’s a very good reason why the future is hidden from us.
TWENTY-THREE
I knew the day would come, but I just didn’t want my mind to think about it.
It came one afternoon when I turned the stereo on in the house after a long time. Yes, my flaws do make me unique. They also make me lose people.
Ma and I were cleaning the apartment, me less industriously than her. I lifted a stack of books off the coffee table and turned around to carry them into the den when something caught my eye—the little stereo that Faizan had bought the year before the towers fell. It had cost a small fortune, but Faizan was passionate about music, and I hated to stand in his way. He said that listening to great music inspired him, formed his characters, and moved his plot along better. He loved old classical ghazals and listened for hours to Mehdi Hassan, Ghulam Ali, and especially Amanat Ali Khan. He appreciated the smooth, riveting songs, nodding his head in tune like an ardent member of the audience, caught in rapture by the haunting notes.
I had not used the stereo all these years. At first it seemed like an inappropriate thing to do soon after losing a spouse, and then there was never a time when I thought I was past the point of grieving. Gradually I lost interest, but like other items of our household, it moved with us to Texas and became a part of the furniture. The forgotten stereo sat on the corner entertainment deck, waiting for someone to blow off the dust and turn it on.
I paused and acknowledged it like I would an old friend I hadn’t met in ages, slightly guilt-ridden at losing touch. From a distant corner of the past, melodies came flooding in and filled the corners of my mind. I gyrated in rhythm to the music that only I heard, nodding my head in approval as Faizan had years ago. I tried to get in his mind to feel what he felt, to sense what he sensed. I always made it to a certain point and then faced a brick wall, stubborn, unyielding; it stood in the way of our mingling of senses. I realized faintly that that tactic would never work. He simply didn’t exist anymore.
“Give me a sign, a real sign, something tangible that tells me that you see me, you know I suffer,” I had pleaded to the night shadows for a long time. “Not the gentle caress of a wind or the slight fluttering of the light. Show me something concrete like a storm or a tornado that jolts you, like a monsoon that catches you unaware and soaks you.”
Silence.
“I won’t be frightened. I promise,” I begged again.
The wind outside rustled the leaves, but a storm did not ensue.
“If you show me a sign now, I swear I’ll never ask again.”
The candle in the kitchen flickered slightly.
“Please.”
Silence.
In time, I gave up. Some returned from the grave to visit their loved ones. Faizan seemed to be at peace wherever he was. Or perhaps my love was not strong enough to entice him for one final appearance.
I tapped the stereo lightly and brushed off a few fleck
s of dust from its surface. I saw an unopened CD on the shelf. The cover had faded, and I could not read the label. I tore off the wrapper, opened the case, and slid the disc inside the player. Ma walked in with a dust cloth and glanced over at me. I nodded the silent acknowledgement of my domain, and she continued dusting the rest of the furniture in the room.
The stereo came to life. With the duster in my hand, I attacked the tiny areas of the stereo, the buttons. Play and rewind. What if there was a rewind button in real life? Could we turn back time? If life was as simple as the Undo command on PCs, what would it be like? Could we Ctrl-X all our dreadful moments away? Press Ctrl-S before dreams fled?
Where are you? Stop this game of constant hide and seek. The woman’s voice reached my ears from the speaker. Sweet, passionate, brimming with longing in poetic Hindi.
Don’t you know that dusk has fallen? Your mother has grown tired now. My eyes are blurry from waiting up for you.
At that I turned sharply to where Ma stood. Her back was facing me, and I saw her frame tremble slightly. Her hands stopped dusting, and she held on to the arm of the couch nearby for support.
How can I tell you where I am, Ma? The voice turned to a man’s in the song. The expanse of sky at my disposal. My kite flies freely; its string cannot be cut. Not anymore.
Ma turned around and walked over to where I stood as if in a trance. She cranked up the volume and sank down on the couch. I sat down next to her, watching the pain surface on her face, her eyes brimming with tears she refused to shed.
Here, I can drink straight from the river. On my tiptoes, touch dreams in bunches.
Should I turn it off? I wondered. I decided against it. Ma needed to hear it. Of all of us, she had had the least time to grieve, busy as she was in healing our souls, helping us move on.
There is only one thing missing. The man’s voice full of sadness reached a higher pitch.
I held my breath.
You, Ma!
And that’s when Ma lost it. Tears finally streamed from her eyes and rolled down her face. I had mended; how had I not suspected that she hadn’t? I had seen occasional tears in her eyes but never anything this intense. Like a child, she cried until she was overcome, in fits, her body heaving, healing at last. I put my arms around her to offer her some comfort, and it was an odd sensation to soothe someone who seemed to have always held it together better than us. How had she managed to carry that sorrow inside her all these years? It seems like cleansing, I thought as I watched her.
“Women’s hearts hold on to so much,” she’d once said to me. “Some secrets you take to your grave because telling them might mean offending someone. That is our lot. The uglier truths get filtered within us; we wash those away, creating something beautiful out of dreadful, delicious out of distasteful.”
For days Ma cooked vigorously, freezing curries and dal, ginger garlic paste, non-fried samosas and kabobs. She filled big jars with dry snacks such as chewra, the spicy Rice Krispies with slow-roasted peanuts, pistachio, raisins and curry leaves, rusks made from scratch, and five anise jars. She spent an entire day slivering mangoes, jalapenos, and carrots and then pickled them with oil and split mustard seeds. I looked at her activity and considered it therapeutic for her. We grieve differently, I thought. I did not realize that she was preparing to exit my life.
Even before I entered the apartment at the end of the day, I knew something was not right. The air had a sad quality to it, a passive acquiescence. Raian! My thoughts immediately went to him, and I raced in, leaving the door ajar. He was sprawled out in front of the TV, eyes fixed on Blue’s Clues, all limbs intact. He sensed the motion and looked at me sideways, signing hello.
“What is it?” he signed again, looking at my distressed expression.
For once, I didn’t answer. Instead, I raced toward Ma’s room. She was writing at the desk. The diagonal rays of the sunlight were falling on her fingers as she wrote furiously, right to left in Urdu, paper angled on one side. Her lips were mouthing the words she penned. Then I saw it, the suitcase beside her, and my heart sank. Ma looked up and smiled.
“You are back, Arissa!”
I dropped my handbag and stood as still as a statue.
“Where are you going?” My words did not sound mine; I heard them through a haze. I was certain some life-altering adjustment was underway.
“Back home,” Ma said, folding the paper in front of her.
“I don’t understand.”
“We still have a home back in Karachi and a handful of relatives. Masha Allah, you are doing quite well now, Arissa. I think it’s time we said our goodbyes and left you in peace.”
I didn’t want to be left in peace. I was at peace with them present.
Ma came around to where I stood and led me to her chair. “We always thought we’d stay as long as it took for you to stand on your own two feet.”
I didn’t answer, just sat there feeling like a crushed can.
“And now that you are, we think it’s time for us to go,” she concluded. “You enjoy your work, Raian loves his school—”
She stopped and sighed. I knew what was coming next. “Your Baba and I think you should marry Zaki. He seems to be a fine man.”
“But I don’t want to marry him.”
“Arissa, you have to look out for your own future, too. Do you want to be alone for the rest of your life?”
That dreadful question again. What was wrong with my life the way it was? “I am not alone.” I pushed back the cuticle on my left thumbnail and frowned, my head bent low. “I have Raian and you.”
“All the more reason you need some support,” Ma said, standing up and walking over to the closet. “How long will these frail bones be your anchor?”
She paused and then pulled out a polished wooden box from a shelf at eye-level. She carried it back and opened it on the desk in front of me. It was hinged at the top with black velvet inside, filled to the brim with letters. Unsent, unstamped envelopes with just dates on them.
“I write to Faizan,” she said with a passion in her eyes. “Every two weeks. I always have. When he was—” she faltered. “I used to mail the letters before. I just couldn’t stop writing when he passed away.”
I remembered Faizan reading those when they came, his expression an interesting collage of emotions. He’d never shared them with me.
She thrust the box in my lap. “I want you to keep them. You appreciate the worth of words and will treasure these, I know.”
I had the weight of words in my care. Again. It seemed like dejá vu.
They were packing some more. I heard it through the walls of my bedroom when I was finished going through the letters in the box. Ma was poetic in words just like her son, I soon found out when piece by piece I read a mother’s messages to her son. They contained uplifting thoughts, gems of truth, words of hope. Reading them somehow strengthened me. She would have been an ideal person to finish Faizan’s legacy, I thought, had he chosen to write in Urdu.
I heard the thud of the suitcase on the floor and the sound of bags being dragged as I tried to sleep. They were leaving us; the very people who had held my hand and brought me this far would soon be gone. Restless, I stood up from the bed and headed to their room, tired of wavering between sleep and panic. I could hear the thumping of my heart as I leaned my back against the doorframe and stood amid the shadows waiting for them to spot me. But first I burped. It sounded more like a low growl—a body’s rebellion at the scene before me.
“Come on in.” Baba waved me in. I sat down awkwardly at the edge of the bed and looked at Ma. Overnight, her wrinkles had deepened.
“Why can’t you stay?” My voice sounded afraid, like a little girl’s. Even as I asked that, I realized that they were fearful of decisions I would not make in their presence. They knew as long as they were with me, I would commit to no one.
“Think about what I said,” Ma said, not responding directly to my question but giving me the answer nonetheless. “Life waits for no
one. If an opportunity is available today, do give it a sincere thought.”
She heaved a long sigh as if her own words had sucked the life force out of her. I nodded and hugged her.
They left a few days later.
I had a hard time explaining to Raian what had happened although Baba had painstakingly tried to prepare him for days. They’re gone, I kept signing. Raian was puzzled and asked over and over again if they left because they were mad at him. Was it because he didn’t drink his milk to the last drop and didn’t keep his room clean? My hands ached from signing No, it’s not your fault. It didn’t seem like he believed me.
I cradled him in my arms and let him rock for hours on my feet to calm him. He spent the rest of the day lying on his back, rocking forward to a sitting position and then back again as he tried to regulate the air around him, wanting to find his balance. I knew he was seeking out the constants in his life, the parts that were unchanged. I let him deal with it privately but came often to check on him, assuring him of my presence, the factor in his life that would remain unchanged, I hoped.
In the days afterward we shifted roles as he found his equilibrium and I fell apart. I was grateful for his presence as he became my coach, my teacher. When I cried, he hugged and comforted me in his heroic but silent effort.
TWENTY-FOUR
The first thing I heard as I opened the door to the apartment, the groceries in my arms, was a sharp shriek followed by uncontrollable sobbing. I ran inside the living room to see Zaki in a tussle on the floor with Raian, who was fighting him off, kicking and swatting at him. His face was bathed in sweat.
“What is going on?” I demanded.
“Raian, that’s enough,” Zaki said breathlessly as he caught Raian’s hand in mid-air and then addressed me. “He was banging his fist on the wall. When I tried to stop him, he got upset and started scratching my face and wouldn’t stop.”
Saffron Dreams Page 20