by Umera Ahmed
Akif would have none of it. 'Come on, get in,' and he pulled him in.
Salar was perplexed but though he acquiesced, he was getting quite upset.
'You'd gone to the States to study, and then I learnt that you'd got a job there. Now, how come you're back in Pakistan?' Akif asked him, starting the car. 'Have you come to spend your holidays here?'
'Yes,' he replied very briefly so that he could extricate himself.
'What are you doing these days?' Akif asked, driving the car.
'Working for an agency of the United Nations.'
'Where are you staying here?'
'At the PC...'
'Why on earth at PC? You could have come to my place or called me.
When did you arrive?'
'Yesterday.'
'Then you're coming with me to stay at my place. There's no need to go to the hotel.'
'No; I'm going back to Islamabad tomorrow.' Salar lied with facility— he wanted to be rid of Akif. His presence was bothering him—or maybe it was the memory of the time spent with him in the past.
'If you're returning to Islamabad tomorrow then come home with me.
We'll have dinner together,' Akif offered.
'I just ate about ten minutes ago.'
'Even so, come home with me. I'll introduce you to my wife.'
'You're married?'
'Three years ago; and you?' Akif asked. 'Have you married?'
'No.'
'Why?'
'I was somewhat busy, that's why,' Salar replied.
'Good! You're still independent,' Akif observed, taking a deep breath.
'You're lucky.'
Salar made no comment. Akif, whilst talking, tried to take out a cassette from the glove compartment. His attention wavered, and inadvertently, a lot of stuff fell out into Salar's lap and at his feet.
'Too bad,' exclaimed Akif. Salar bent down and started picking up the things and Akif switched on the light in the car. As he was putting them back, he was shocked. He felt a current shoot through him—there was a pair of earrings lying in one corner of the glove compartment. His hands trembled involuntarily. He took out the earrings with his left hand. They were now in his palm, glimmering in the light inside the car.
He was looking at them in disbelief.
Several years ago, he had seen these earrings on somebody. He looked at them again and again, and yet again. He was looking at them for the fourth time. He had no doubt, now. They were Imama Hashim's earrings. He could draw those earrings with his eyes closed, every twist and bend. Akif took the earrings from Salar's palm, as though breaking his trance, and put them back in the glove compartment.
'These earrings ' he stammered, 'these are your wife's?'
'My wife's?' Akif laughed. 'Come on, pal, if they were my wife's, would I keep them here?'
Salar watched him, unblinking. 'Then?' he whispered.
'A girl friend of mine was with me the other night. She left these in my bedroom. She had to leave in a bit of a rush, because Ruba had returned. I put them in the car because I intend seeing her today,' Akif explained to him very candidly.
'Girl friend?' Salar choked.
'Yes, girl friend. She's a girl from the red light area who's now moved to Defence.'
'What what's her name?' he asked. 'Imama could never be the name of a girl from the red light area. Surely, I'm mistaken,' he thought, looking at Akif.
'Sanober,' Akif revealed her name. Salar turned, put back the things he was holding, and shut the glove compartment. He had, indeed, been mistaken. Akif had switched off the light inside the car. Salar leaned against the back of the seat and breathed a sigh of relief.
'But that's not her real name,' Akif continued. 'Her real name is Imama.'
Something exploded inside Salar's head—or had someone poured molten lead into his ears? 'What...what did you say?' His voice was quivering.
Akif was leaning forward on the steering wheel, using the car's lighter to light the cigarette between his lips. 'You said something?'
'You were telling me her name?'
'Yes, Imama. Do you know her?' Akif transferred the cigarette to his fingers.
'I...I...' Salar tried to reply: his voice seemed distant as though it came from a deep chasm. The Red Light Area was the last place he could ever have imagined Imama Hashim to be in. In the dimly lit interior of the car, Akif scrutinized Salar—he looked at Salar's face going pale, his clenched fist, his trembling lips, his incoherent speech. He smiled and patted Salar's shoulder in consolation.
'Don't worry, pal—why are you so concerned? She's just my girl friend, that's all. It's no big deal even if there's something between you both— after all we've shared many things in the past, haven't we?' Akif laughed meaningfully—then he tossed a flaming match on the fuel.
'After all, she's just a girl.'
The Mall Road was choked with traffic; Akif was driving fast. Salar was so fired by these two questions that he did not even consider the consequences of his reaction or what would happen to him if he grabbed the man at the steering by his throat. Akif's foot hit the brake and the car jerked to a stop; they both hit the dashboard with full force. Salar did not let go of Akif s collar.
Goaded to anger, Akif screamed, 'What are you doing, Salar! Are you mad?' He tried to extricate himself by pushing Salar away.
'How dare you talk like that?' Salar growled back. His hand was at Akif's neck again; Akif was suffocating. In anger and fear, he swung his fist at Salar, hitting him squarely in the face. Salar moved away, his hands covering his face. Cars had piled up behind them, honking to get them out of the way as they were in the middle of the road. They were lucky that despite the sudden braking in the middle of heavy traffic, they had not been hit by any vehicle from behind.
Salar had doubled up in his seat, holding his jaw with both hands. Akif, coming to his senses, moved the car into a quiet bye lane and stopped.
Salar had straightened up by then, and covering his mouth and chin with his hand, was looking straight ahead. The fury that had erupted a few moments ago had subsided.
Akif turned to him. 'What is your problem? Why did you lash out at me? What have I done?' While talking, he passed the tissue box on the dash board to Salar—he'd seen a few drops of blood on Salar's shirt.
Salar pulled out a couple of tissues and began to clean up the cut on his lip.
'There could have been a bad accident...' Akif said.
Wiping his hands, Salar was once more reminded of the earrings. He began to search for them near his feet.
'The car could have jumped on to the pavement...' Akifs voice trailed off. He turned to Salar. 'What are you looking for?'
'Those earrings,' he replied, briefly.
Akif was really aggravated. 'What's the problem, Salar? She's my girl friend, the earrings belong to her, and they are my problem or her, not yours.'
The realization of his stupidity dawned on Salar. He sat up, and throwing away the tissue, he looked out. He was feeling suffocated. Akif was looking at him, a frown on his face.
'You and Sanober....' Akif started cautiously. He wasn't quite sure what there was in his last words that had so infuriated Salar, and he did not want to say anything that would set him off again.
'I am sorry,' said Salar when Akif paused.
'OK, fine,' Akif was somewhat relieved. 'You and Sanober...' he stopped again.
'You said her name was Imama.' Salar turned to look at him. The look in his eyes frightened Akif—it was far from normal. There was fear, helplessness, terror—all kinds of expressions—in his eyes.
'Yes, she told me once, when she was talking about herself in the beginning.. .then.'
'Can you describe her to me?' Salar asked, faintly hoping.
'Yes, why not?' Akif was a little confused. 'Very beautiful, tall, fair...' he didn't know how to go on. 'She has black eyes and her hair used to be black...she dyes it now. What more can I tell you?' he was growing impatient.
Salar closed his eyes and turn
ed his face away. He was feeling increasingly stifled. Looking out, he mumbled, 'Is her name Imama Hashim?'
'I don't know. She didn't tell me her father's name, nor did I ask,' Akif replied.
'She is Imama Hashim,' he mumbled. His face clouded over. 'This is all because of me—I am responsible for this.'
'What are you responsible for?' Akif was intrigued. Salar gazed ahead in silence through the wind screen. After a few minutes, looking Akif in the face, he said, 'I want to meet her. Right now.' Akif stared at him for some time, then picked up the mobile from the dashboard and started to make a call. He tried for some time;finally shrugging his shoulders he said, 'Her mobile is switched off. I don't know if she is at home, because it is getting dark and she ' Akif broke off and switched on the ignition. 'But I want to take you to her place.'
Half an hour later they were both standing before a house in Defence.
They had not spoken till getting there. Akif was now cursing the moment when he had given Salar a lift. On honking a few times, a man emerged. He was the chowkidar.
'Is Sanober at home?' Akif enquired with urgency.
'No, Bibi Sahiba is not home.'
'Where is she?'
'I don't know.'
Akif looked at Salar, then opening the door of the car said, 'Wait here.
I'll be back in a few moments.' Akif went inside the house with the man.
He returned after ten minutes.
'You want to talk to her?' he asked immediately on getting back into the car.
'I have to meet her.' Akif again switched on the ignition.
They again traveled in silence. It was getting on for nine o'clock when they had reached the Red Light Area. The place was not new for Salar.
Only the pain was new that he was now feeling.
'She is here today. Somebody has booked some girls from here for some function, and she is going with them,' Atif explained, getting down from the car.
'You can also get down because we've got to go a long way in. I can't bring Sanober here to meet you!' Salar alighted. He started to tread those lanes once again with Akif. He remembered clearly the last time when he had been to such a place. Nothing had changed: human flesh was being traded in the same clandestine manner.
He remembered very well too the first time he had been there. He was eighteen—and then he had gone there many, many times. Sometimes he would go to watch a dance, sometimes to attend the performance of a renowned actress, sometimes to watch the half-naked women peeping or hanging out of the doors, windows, or rooftop balconies in these very lanes. (He would experience a strange sense of happiness, passing through these lanes. There, he could buy any of those girls, regardless of looks or age, for a few hours. The notes in his wallet would give him complete ownership of any of the girls on display. What else do you call on being on top of the world, having the universe in your grasp, as it were? He would feel elated.) And sometimes, he would go there to spend the night with these women, whom he despised—women, who would sell their bodies for a few rupees. What other sentiment, but hatred, could he have for them? But in spite of despising them, he bought them because he could afford to buy them. Even as a youth of eighteen or nineteen, he was convinced that there was no woman there with whom he could have social contact, blood relationship, or with whom he could fall in love.
His mother and sister were members of the elite class. His wife would also have to come from the same elite background and his daughter too.
But the women from the Red Light Area they had been born for this purpose. He was convinced of this. He could not despise them enough - with his stiff neck, uplifted chin, and raised eye brows.
And now what had fate done to him now? The woman who was once secluded in seven veils, and whom he could not countenance being touched by another man, had now been thrown in this bazaar. Walking a few paces ahead was her client and Salar Sikandar could not even open his mouth, could not raise his voice, could not protest. What could he say to anybody? Could he have asked God as to why this had happened to her? What wrong had she done? He bit his lips. How could he stop trembling? Could a man visiting these streets say with utter conviction that no woman belonging to him, or from his family would ever work in this bazaar? Would not sell herself to another man? Would his mother, sister, wife, daughter, granddaughter, or anyone from the later generations not find themselves here?
Salar Sikandar was speechless. Imama Hashim was his wife, she was married to him—an upper class woman, who could never have anything to do with this place. Salar Sikandar once again found himself tied to the tree in the darkness of the Margalla Hills. He felt utterly devastated.
'Sahib! Come with me. I have girls of all ages. The best girls in this place and the price is also not much.' A man started to walk with him.
'I've not come here for this purpose,' Salar said in a low voice, without looking at the man.
'Want a drink or drug? I can supply anything you want.'
Akif halted in his steps and brusquely admonished the man, 'You've been told once that we do not want anything, then why are you pursuing us?'
The man stopped. Salar quietly walked on. His mind was braving a storm. When, why, and how did Imama Hashim get there? The past unrolled itself like a film before him.
'Please, go to him once just once, and tell him everything about me, ask him to marry me. I don't want anything from him, only his name. If you beseech him in the name of the Prophet (pbuh), he will not refuse. He loves him (pbuh) so much,' he had heard her several years ago, pleading on the phone as he reclined on his bed, eating chips. 'By the way, what's your connection with Imama?' Jalal was curious.
'Imama Imama and I are very close and old friends.'
Jalal Ansar had frowned. Salar felt strangely elated. He could guess very well what Jalal was thinking about him and Imama.
'You can tell her plainly that I won't marry her.'
He had wanted to see Imama's face when Jalal Ansar's message was conveyed to her. He had given her Jalal's reply over the phone, as he was popping bubbles with gum.
'You've done me so many favors, do me one more. Divorce me,' she had later pleaded on the phone with him.
'Oh, no! I'm tired of doing you favors, I'm not doing any more. As for this favor? It is impossible,' he had replied. 'If you want a divorce, you go to the court and get it, but I won't divorce you.'
Salar began to choke badly.
'Yes, I'd done all this, but I'd removed from her the illusions she had about Jalal Ansar. I'd told her everything; I hadn't concealed anything from her. It was only a joke, a prank. I hadn't wanted all this to happen to Imama,' he was explaining to his conscience, as though he was in a court of law. 'It is true that I'd wronged her by not giving her a divorce, but....but....but I hadn't wished that she should be trapped here. I had I had dissuaded her from leaving home. I had, granted only in jest, but I had made offered to help her. I hadn't brought her here. Nobody can hold me responsible for all this.'
He was offering explanations incoherently. His mind was numb. He stopped, and began to rub his temples—he felt the onset of another bad attack of the familiar migraine. The pain subsided. He opened his eyes and saw the twisting lane. It was a blind alley - at least for him and for Imama Hashim. He stepped forward. Akif had stopped before a multi-storied house, and he turned to look at Salar.
'This is the house.' The color drained from Salar's face. How much further was the reckoning?
'We've got to go to the top floor, Sanober will be up there.' Saying this, Akif started to climb the dark and narrow stairs. Salar stumbled on the very first step; Akif turned to look at him and stopped. 'Be careful, the condition of the stairs is not too good. Moreover, they can't be bothered to provide even a light bulb.' Salar straightened and feeling his way along the wall, he put his foot on the next stair. It was a winding staircase and so narrow that it could accommodate only one person at a time. The cement had also given way. Wearing boots, he could still feel their deteriorated condition. The ceme
nt of the wall on which he was leaning had also come off. Salar, like blind man, feeling the wall, began to climb the stairs.
The light coming through an open door on the first floor helped him see. Akif was nowhere there. He had certainly gone ahead through the door. Salar stopped momentarily and he too went across. He was now in a balcony. On one side there were doors to many rooms. On the other side, the lane down below was visible. The corridor-like balcony was absolutely empty. Standing there, all the doors of the rooms appeared shut. He could not tell where Akif had gone. Very carefully, he stepped forward, as though the place was haunted. He felt that at any moment a door might spring open and suddenly Imama Hashim would appear before him.
'Oh, my God! How How am I going to face her here?' His heart sank.
He walked, watching the closed doors, when, from a door at the end of the verandah, Akif appeared. 'Where were you?' he called from there loudly. 'Come here.'
Salar hastened, but he paused momentarily before he reached the door.
He could hear the thumping of his heart. He shut his eyes, clenched his cold hands, and entered the room. He found Akif sitting in a chair, talking to a girl, who was brushing her hair.
'This is not Imama!' he exclaimed.
'Of course, this not Imama—she's inside. Come.' Akif, getting up, opened the door to another room. Salar followed him on unsteady feet.
Akif went through the other room also, and opening a door entered yet another room.
'Hello, Sanober!' Salar heard Akif call out from afar. His heart leapt to his mouth. For a moment, he felt like running away from there...instantly...blindly, without looking...from this house...this area...this city...this country...never to return...he turned his head to look at the door at his side.
'Come in, Salar,' Akif called out. His face turned, he was busy talking to a girl. Salar swallowed hard, his throat was parched dry. He moved forward. Akif heard his foot steps behind him and moved out of the way. Salar was in the doorway. She stood at the end of the room.
'This is Sanober,' Akif introduced her. Salar could not take his eyes off her. She also gazed at him.
'Imama?' he looked at her, still, unmoving.