Bright Lines

by Tanwi Nandini Islam

  —Pongka, she moaned, shaking her head no.

  Don’t let my son be a bastard.

  * * *

  Hawa’s mother and father, her aunties and uncles bolted over to their child. I didn’t hear the shrieking cries I expected. Instead, they murmured names for god and spirit, and dragged her away from the scene. Murder in the presence of the dead was an unnecessary sin.

  —I stole your leg; now I’m going to steal your face.

  Rezwan said the words, calm. He slathered the Rajakar’s face with a salve, as tender as a barber.

  —W-w-what are you p-putting on my face, devil! screamed the Rajakar.

  Rezwan slipped on a pair of leather gloves.

  —We’ve got enough people in this country to worry about. Don’t need any more ugly, crippled bastards, right? Step back, Anwar.

  Rezwan held the man down and struck a lighter to his face. He kicked the man over and over again, as his face burned in the flames.

  —Who’s the devil now? shouted Rezwan.

  * * *

  The next morning, I presume, the Lyngdoh family burned their daughter’s body. They would collect her remaining bones for the family ossuary. We were banned from the ritual, from ever returning to their gardens or forest. Dare we enter, we would be killed, I imagine, the old-fashioned way, by bow and arrow. As a parting gift, Rezwan kept his son. We brought baby Rana to the golden house in Jaflong. The Anwars believed we’d found the adorable crying babe in the woods, next to his murdered mother.

  Once more, Azim shook his head—he still did not want to know.

  So this fiction was told, and retold, until we believed it was true.

  * * *

  No matter of searching for that cursed Enfield turned up the other twin. We walked to the border post—a much more strenuous journey by foot—to see if the BSF jawan had sold us out. He wasn’t there. Neither was the motorcycle.

  He’d ridden off into the sunset. And I had missed my chance to kill the man who would eventually kill Rezwan and Laila.

  * * *

  In the years after the war, famine and chaos knocked us out. The assassination of Sheikh Mujib simultaneously stunned me and confirmed what I expected. An empire would not rise out of ashes, with so much to reckon with.

  Aman was among the first ones to leap to America. Others went to Britain. You might call these men useless during the war, brave enough to enter a new world without second thought. But others of us, we feared the depression that comes with failure and fear. I spent years lost. I farmed in a few villages, trying to regain that feeling I’d had in the Black Forest. I finished up a degree in pharmacy, the boring guarantee out of the country, instead of phytogeography. Rezwan married another beauty, your mother, Laila, whom he’d met once at a film screening. And they learned to love each other deeply for many years until they died.

  We learned how to divide past from present, desire from duty.

  When I told Rezwan I was leaving for New York, he laughed.

  —You and your brother are more alike than you and I, after all.

  Rezwan and Aman, they were more alike than they would ever know. Strong, controlled men with a wild side they held close to the vest. Yet, I admired Rezwan, and despised my brother. I wonder now if Rezwan was telling me that he despised me.

  —You are my brother. My real brother, I told him.

  —That’s what you say, now. You’ll forget me in no time.

  He was wrong, as usual.

  * * *

  Ella, this is my confession. I am sorry for telling you, for not telling. I hope that you find this when you are an old woman, and tell Rana when he is an old man. When I am long dead, lovingly remembered, and easily forgiven. With Love, Always, Anwar

  El printed the document and put it in an envelope addressed to Azim’s Dhaka flat. What could one say to Rana? Although El had a feeling that Rana would understand, maybe this would be confirmation of something he’d always believed to be true. What if Rezwan had sought the protection of his parents’ golden house in Sylhet? Then Rana would never have been born. Anwar, the hapless, lovelorn romantic, unfit for war, left behind more damned questions than answers. Had Laila ever known about Hawa? Had Laila loved this baby who wasn’t hers? The photo of Rezwan and Laila, the teenager between them, it looked as though they were all—happy. Both El and Rana had grown up in exile, entombed by desertions few could comprehend. El scribbled a note, but could not yet send the letter: We have two mothers, one father. You and I, Rana and El, brothers.

  28

  There’s nothing like springtime in Brooklyn, thought El. The neighborhood burst alive in May, winter’s residue a memory until next year. Leaves everywhere. Crocuses sprouted their ephemeral purple flowers, then gave way to magnolia and myrtle trees. El planted azalea, lilac, and peony, proper spring blooms, and where the moon garden had once been, El built a circular fire pit of sand and old bricks. Wildflowers erupted from the concrete. Climbing aster, wild bergamot, licorice-scented anise hyssop, and the monarch butterfly’s chosen home, milkweed—El had never paid much mind to these weeds, yet now discovered an appreciation. They required no nurture or attention. Weaving in and out of the bustle were teenagers on their BMX bikes. The longer the days, the more people out and about. The season of stoop sales had begun.

  It was time for El and Charu to sell Anwar’s wares.

  * * *

  One Saturday morning, Bic drove them to Anwar’s Apothecary in his van. This was the last time these keys would open the storefront before it became Kings Pharmacy. They parked in front of the apothecary. Closed gates for both Anwar’s Apothecary and A Holy Bookstore seemed to be a show of mourning: an owner dead, the other imprisoned. Ye Olde Liquor Shoppe buzzed with a new neon sign, the victor over the kooky shampoo spot and judgmental bookshop.

  El and Charu stared at the apartment above the apothecary.

  “Wouldn’t it be crazy if she was home?” muttered Charu.

  “It would be.”

  They could hear the tinny sound of a television, and nothing more. Mema has the house to herself, thought El. The boys would be in school, her husband in jail, and her daughter, Maya, run away.

  * * *

  The arresting scent of tinctures filled their nostrils as they entered. The little brown glass apothecary bottles climbed the shelves all the way to the ceiling, a kaleidoscope of jeweled shadows on the walls. They divvied their tasks by genre—tinctures (Charu), beauty (Bic), miscellany (El)—and set to work. Charu wrapped each tiny brown bottle in Anwar’s enormous stack of New York Posts. Bic stacked the shampoos, scrubs, and soaps, while El arranged the superfluity Anwar had acquired over the years—a second bicycle, boom box, cleaning supplies, a score of DVDs and vinyl records from Rashaud Persaud, and extra pairs of shirts and shoes. They worked in silence for a couple of hours, ordered a pizza, worked some more.

  “I thought we might do well with an extra pair of hands. All this stuff is heavier than it looks,” said Bic. He lifted a box of tinctures. El attempted the same, but dropped the box for its surprising weight.

  “Shit, you’re right.”

  “Charu, you mind calling Malik? I’m gonna take this over to the car.” Bic hefted the first of many tincture boxes on his shoulder and went out to the van.

  El laughed. “You haven’t talked to him since we came back, have you?”

  “Nope. Sigh,” said Charu. She picked up the landline to call Malik.

  “Hello?” he answered, sounding a bit freaked out—Charu realized ANWAR SALEEM must have shown up on his caller ID.

  “Relax, it’s not my dad’s ghost.”

  “You’re terrible,” muttered El.

  “Charu?” said Malik. “I’ve been wanting to see you—see how you’re doing—I’m sorry—”

  “Could you come over to the store? Bic said you might be able to help us move Baba’s s
tuff back to our house.”

  “Of course; I’ll be there in fifteen.”

  * * *

  Charu and Malik rode with the boxes and Bic, while El gave the place a thorough cleaning and locked up. Charu preferred heavy lifting to housework any day. After every last box was brought into the living room, Bic bade them adieu—it was date night. Charu wondered if this had been his and Mauve’s elaborate ploy to get Malik back in the fold. Not that she minded. Malik had traded his adolescent scruff for a dapper beard, shorter dreadlocks, and a fresh-inked sleeve of the Tale of Genji on his arms. He would be heading off on a Southwest tour with Yesterday’s Future in a few days.

  They sat in the living room, feet propped up, drinking beers, courtesy of El.

  “This is a lot to take care of,” said Malik, looking around the living room.

  “It is,” said Charu. “I’m not sure what’s going to happen when we go back to school. We need to rent this place out.”

  “Just don’t ever sell it. Unless you sell it to me. You know, I’ve never gotten the grand tour.”

  “Follow me,” she said.

  They went upstairs to her parents’ bedroom, where she’d been sleeping.

  Malik pointed at the photographs mounted on the walls. “Wow. Look at this—your family’s beautiful. I love these old-school photographs. They say a lot.” He pointed to a photo of Anwar and Hashi. “Anwar rocking killer white bellbottoms and a velour shirt? I dig it.” Another photo of Charu showed teeth charmingly missing, wearing a hot pink jumper. “What are you, like, six in this photo?”

  “I think so. Kindergarten—were we six or seven?”

  “Only if you’re stupid,” he said.

  She jabbed him in the ribs.

  “Ow! Just kidding, babe—relax.”

  “We’re so ridiculous in this,” she said, picking up a professional photo of a homecoming dance: Charu in a silver gown, Malik in his skinny tie and tapered suit pants, fingers laced with hers.

  “At least we weren’t stupid enough to go to prom.”

  “I don’t think I had permission to go, remember? Now I can do whatever I want.” She sat on the bed’s edge, and Malik stood beside her, and brought her face into his side.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said. Charu looked up at him, surprised by this gesture. Just below her chin, Malik’s pants bulged at the inseam. “Shit. Don’t take this the wrong way, but looking at all these photos of you, your family, it got me—wanting you.” He tugged at his jeans as if it would make his hard-on disappear, and then he sat beside her. “I like this new look. Pixie. Earthy pixie. You always just smelled like body,” he said, inhaling her underarm.

  Charu leaned over to grab her pipe and a nugget of Baba’s stash. “Smell this.” She lit the herb and took a toke before passing it to Malik.

  “Rest in peace, Anwar,” he said, kissing his fingers and putting them up toward the ceiling. He took a ceremonious breath in, and then blew the smoke into Charu’s face. “You know, your pops gave me this excellent book, Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi. Rumi spent years inseparable from Shams, a homeless wanderer-mystic-weaver guy. Super skeptical of him, at first. Shams walks past Rumi, who was reading a book. He doesn’t give a shit about Shams, so Shams asks him, ‘What are you doing?’”

  “Wasn’t he just reading?”

  “Right. But Rumi, being Rumi, tells the homeless guy, ‘Something you wouldn’t understand.’ Suddenly, the book catches fire, Rumi freaks out, drops it on the ground, and shouts, ‘What the fuck is happening?’”

  “What the fuck is happening? Rumi said that, right?”

  “Fine. He said, ‘What is happening?’” Malik agreed. “He thought he knew; then some random-ass mystic destroys it.”

  They passed the pipe, back and forth. Charu blew the smoke back into Malik’s mouth. He started kissing her, hard.

  It occurred to her that they should move to her room; screwing in her parents’ room felt wrong. But she pushed the thought away, not wanting to ruin the moment. She sat on him, and simply pulled up her skirt. He slipped off her underwear and she unbuttoned his jeans.

  “Button fly, really?”

  “You gonna clown me every step of the way?”

  After wrestling to get naked, Malik flipped Charu onto her back. He broke into her, fluid strokes that made her think he’d picked up (or someone had taught him) new tricks. He smacked her hard across her bottom. She cried and he froze for a moment, worried that he’d hurt her.

  “Don’t stop,” whispered Charu. “Sorry.”

  As they came together, they cursed loudly. The garlic-jasmine scent that hung stale in her parents’ room mingled with their juice. Charu felt indescribably sad. She traced nonsensical words onto Malik’s brown and hairless back. Her mother had told her once, when Charu had ripped one of Hashi’s old saris into a dress pattern, that she destroyed everything she touched. She had been angry and apologized after saying it, of course. But Charu knew she’d mostly meant it. She did destroy things, because the process of fixing it, making it better, was more thrilling that way.

  * * *

  One last look, and El brought down the gate of Anwar’s Apothecary.

  She looked up to Maya’s apartment. The television had been turned off. It was about time for evening prayer. El debated for a moment but then figured there was nothing to lose.

  El rang buzzer 2F once, then twice more.

  “Hello?” said a woman’s voice, crinkled and tired.

  “This is your—neighbor. From downstairs.”

  “Oh. I will come in a minute.”

  Maya’s mother has lupus. Getting up and down the stairs can’t be easy. From the doorway window, El could see her, taking one cautious step at a time, leaning heavily against the banister with one arm, cane in another.

  “Hello. Can I help you?” she asked, opening the door.

  “My uncle owned the store downstairs. I was friends with Maya. My name is El. Ella.”

  Upon mention of Maya’s name, she took El into her bosom. “Oh my goodness, come, come. I am sorry about your father. Come. Upstairs.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Sharif.”

  “Oh, no. Call me Mariam or Mema.”

  Mema leaned on El as she had leaned on the bannister. They entered the apartment, met by two young boys at the dining table. El remembered Maya referring to them as the twins, but they were quite fraternal. The thin, straight-haired one scowled—he was losing the game. The chubby one flashed El a naughty smile. Open notebooks and pencils lay on the table, but they were occupied playing on bootleg Game Boys.

  “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

  “No, please. As you see—the boys were just going to do homework,” said Mema. “Ahmed, get El a glass of water.”

  Now the cherubic one scowled, but Mema gave him a stern look. She gestured for El to sit in the living room, which was a few steps farther into the apartment. Three bedrooms connected to the living room from different sides. To share this space among five would drive El crazy. But it was immaculate. Between Mema’s health and the age of the kids, El wondered how she kept it so tidy. The sheeny rugs from Morocco and mother-of-pearl-inlaid coffee table stood in stark contrast to the faux flower arrangement and faux suede modular furniture set. They sat down.

  The scowling son presented a glass of water.

  “Oh, thank you.” El drank the glass empty. A headache behind the eyes stirred, a newly discovered signal that an episode was near. Shake it off.

  “Homework time,” said Mema, unaware that anything was wrong with El. She pointed at the backpacks on the floor. Her two sons groaned, but started writing in their notebooks. “So, Maya. She left after the . . . accident. Maya is in Mexico, working at a hostel. She got a job through a woman, Ramona. She promised that she is coming home in June. At least that’s what she last wrote. I have only spoken to her a few times on the phone. Thi
ngs are so—you know, with her father, gone,” said Mema. She wiped her face with her hands. When she brought them down, her face was covered in tiny insects, the same scarab pattern as on the table.

  El blinked several times. Headache worsened. “I would—love to see her. It’s been a very long time. I’m around this summer. Please tell her I stopped by.” El stood up to leave, but swooned back down to the couch.

  “Are you all right?” cried Mema. “Please, take rest in the bedroom. Boys, help her!”

  The boys set down their recommenced video games, again, and rolled their eyes at this high-maintenance houseguest. El let Mema, the boys, and a million creepers lead the way to the bedroom.

  * * *

  Midnight came, and still Malik slept. Baba’s weed had done him in. Charu left him on the bed, and walked over to her own bedroom. It was neater than it had ever been while she had lived there. Her mother had hidden all photos, candles, idols, fabrics, and sewing gear—basically anything indicating Charu’s existence.

  She pillaged the closet. Stacks of her unsold hijabs, a fashion project that had never taken off, were folded neatly. She pulled them out, and then added a huge pile of flannel shirts, denim jeans, some of El’s unfortunate cargo pants. She found her sewing machine and supplies. She started cutting the clothes into long strips with the rotary cutter, and laid the patches on the ground. She had a lot of blacks, whites, reds, but could use more blues. Charu ran back to her parents’ room, where Malik still slept. She swiped his button-fly jeans—a classic shade of denim—and went back to her project. She settled on a simple patchwork quilt, the only kind she could figure out how to sew. Black strips zigzagged into blue ones, with hand-cut arrowheads in white and red scattered throughout. She worked, uninterrupted, until sunrise.

  * * *

  An orange rhombus of streetlight shone on El’s face through the blinds. How did anyone sleep in this room? Mema had checked in a few times, but El feigned sleep, letting the hallucinations run their course, realizing that this time they had been particularly jarring, in front of Maya’s mother. Insects had taken on the form of jinn in the Black Forest, wicked beings who held Rezwan’s severed head as an offering to a crowned Hawa. Disturbed stories from Anwar’s letter pranced around in El’s head.