An American Brat

by Bapsi Sidhwa

  It was almost dark by the time Feroza returned home. She threw her backpack on the bed, grabbed a can of Coke, and plunked herself on the sofa, as she always did when she was exhausted, to watch TV.

  There was no TV on the TV table. Feroza gazed at the clean space on the dusty table where the TV should have been. She wondered what Jo had done with it. She lay on the sofa annoyed, missing the mindless, almost narcotic effect of the voices and images.

  With no TV before which to unwind and too irritated to sleep, Feroza decided to work on her term paper. She discovered that her typewriter, too, was missing. It was as if something vile suddenly brushed against her. She went into the living room cautiously. She looked more carefully this time. Sure enough, Jo’s stereo system and speakers were not where they should have been. She quickly opened the door to Jo’s room. The computer and the large monitor that squatted on it were not on her desk. Their apartment had been burglarized.

  It was terrifying to be alone in a place that had been intruded upon by God knows what kind of sinister strangers. The space in their familiar apartment became menacing. She quickly put on her jacket and, banging the door shut behind her, tore down the stairs. The area around her block was deserted.

  Feroza turned around and ran back up two flights of stairs to the apartment of the hulks and knocked on the door. They were out. She clattered down the steps again. She knew the restaurant where Jo was working; it was only a couple of blocks down their road. Feroza got her bicycle out of the small storage room near the landing and, peddling recklessly, her bicycle wobbling, raced down the darkening street.

  Feroza stood panting and flushed just inside the entrance. She spotted Jo in an apron and a cap, expertly carrying four dinners in her hands and serving them. As soon as Jo was through, Feroza discreetly called to her. Startled to see Feroza, who even in the dim restaurant light looked agitated and flushed, Jo guessed that something was wrong.

  “We’ve been robbed,” Feroza panted as soon as Jo came near her. Feroza’s knees began to shake, and she sat down abruptly on a chair at an empty table.

  “Here, have some water,” Jo poured water into a glass, and after Feroza had drained it, Jo asked, “What’s gone?”

  “The TV, the music system, your computer, my typewriter, and other things.”

  Jo called the police. She gave them the address and breathlessly told them that her apartment was being burglarized. She called Mike’s number and left a message on his answering machine.

  A couple of police cars were parked in front of their building by the time Feroza and Jo drove up. Feroza had left her bicycle at the restaurant. They took the stairs two at a time. The door to their apartment was slightly open. They hesitated and then cautiously stepped into the living room; the lights were not switched on. Slight muffled sounds were coming from other parts of the apartment. Crouching to one side they gingerly pushed open the door to Jo’s room. One behind the other they peered in and received the shock of their young lives. A figure stepped out of the shadows, holding a pistol with both hands, and said, “Freeze.”

  Jo and Feroza promptly froze.

  Another cop rushed into the room and blinded them with his flashlight. The policemen lowered their weapons at the sight of the petrified girls clinging to one another and switched on the lights.

  “You occupy these premises?” the taller of the two policemen asked. He had a red, beefy face and a stocky body to match.

  “Yeah,” Jo said.

  “You told us the burglary was taking place,” he accused.

  “My roommate came home, and the door was unlocked. She felt something was kinda wrong. She saw that the TV wasn’t on the table. She was sure someone was still around and she wasn’t going to hang out!” Jo said, stoutly defending her position. “We called from the restaurant where I work.”

  Jo and Feroza went over the apartment with the policemen, making an inventory of the stolen items. Some of their clothes were missing. Their shoes lay in a mismatched jumble, and Feroza could not see her new Nikes. Books were strewn on the closet floor in Jo’s room where the cartons containing them had been tipped over by the robbers hoping to find something of value. Jo suddenly let out a shriek. “Oh, my notebook! They took my term paper! I’ve worked three months on it and they’ve stolen it!”

  “Don’t be silly, Jo,” Feroza said. “What on earth would they want to steal your term paper for!”

  They found the notebook on the floor beneath her desk.

  “There are no signs of a break-in,” said the younger, kinder-looking cop. “Could it be someone you girls know?”

  “Nah,” Jo said. She sounded hurt. “Our friends aren’t that type.”

  “I suggest you think about it some more,” said the older man. “There’s nothing to be worried about, but it’s always a good idea to keep the doors locked. If you think of something or someone, let us know.” He winked at them both.

  After the police left, Jo wept as she looked at the empty spaces that had once been occupied by her computer, her printer, her stereo, and her TV. She missed them horribly and, like Feroza, felt uncomfortable in the apartment; their space had been violated. “I wish we could sleep someplace else. Let’s spend the night at a motel.”

  Feroza was readily agreeable.

  It took Feroza till late next afternoon to air her suspicions.

  They had both been delighted by their stay at the Travel Lodge. They watched TV till two A.M., slept late Saturday morning, indulged themselves with a sumptuous breakfast of mushroom omelettes and hash browns at a snack bar, and had left with their small overnight bags stuffed with the motel’s towels and toilet paper an hour after checkout time.

  Back at their abandoned apartment, they were again overtaken by a sense of bereavement. They flung open all the windows and drew the curtains. Fiercely, Jo set to scrubbing the kitchen tile and vacuuming the floors. Feroza dusted and polished their furniture obsessively, tidied up their rooms, and watered the plants.

  A couple of hours later, Feroza switched on all the lights and flung herself on the living room sofa in an exhausted torpor. The vigorous activity was cathartic, as if in dusting and tidying up, she had reclaimed her space in the apartment and made it safe.

  As Feroza absently watched Jo, who was on her knees washing the fridge with a dishrag and a bowl of suds, she felt a great swell of affection and gratitude for her friend. How many girls did she know in Lahore — or anywhere — who could decide, just like that, to move out of their homes to spend a night in a motel? To Feroza it was an unimaginable feat accomplished, a lottery won.

  At the same time, she wished she could be of more use to Jo, do something splendid for her, protect her friend better. Ever since she had gone with Jo to Mike’s apartment, she had felt driven to safeguard her strangely vulnerable apartment-mate.

  Half an hour later, pushing back strands of hair that had come loose from her ponytail and holding a large glass of Coke, Jo sank into the lumpy sofa beside Feroza.

  “I’ve been thinking,” she said, pensively looking into her Coke and stirring the ice with her finger.

  “Uh-huh?” Feroza said.

  “I think we’ve been paid back for my sins.”

  “What sins?”

  “The shopliftin’ and stealin’ … and stuff.”

  Silence.

  “I’m gonna stop that shit.”

  “That’s a good idea,” Feroza said cautiously, reflecting with remorse on her own timorous complicity.

  They remained quiet. Feroza, sitting in corner of the sofa with her legs tucked beneath her, stole a glance at her friend. Jo, abstracted by her thoughts, sipped her Coke absently. Then, holding the glass in her lap, she lay her head back wearily and shut her eyes.

  “Feeling better?” Feroza asked at length.

  “Yeah,” Jo said and then irritably added, “I don’t know where Mike is … I’ve left messages on his answering machine … The asshole hasn’t called back.”

  “Are you still seeing him?”
Feroza asked, trying to keep her tone neutral.

  “Only a couple of times since he beat up on me.” Jo turned her head to look at her friend curiously. “Why d’ya ask?”

  “He has a key to our apartment.”

  “Yeah, I gave it to him. I oughta take it back.”

  “You should’ve taken it away from him. I don’t think he’s gonna call you,” said Feroza.

  The implication in the choice of words, and the tone in which they were spoken, sank in.

  “You’re telling me Mike stole our stuff?” Jo raised her feet to the sofa and turned to face Feroza. Her incredulity and rage were explosive. She was too much on the defensive.

  Her attitude strengthened Feroza. “I don’t see who else could have. The place wasn’t broken into. The policemen thought it was someone we knew.”

  “I can’t believe you’re saying this!” Jo shouted, shifting jerkily and spilling part of her Coke. “The poor kid’s a mess, but he’s not a thief! He wouldn’t steal from us! He’s a good kid, basically.”

  Feroza kept quiet.

  Jo began to snuffle quietly into her glass. She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

  Mike showed up a week later. Both girls were in the living room looking at an old black-and-white TV loaned to them by Jo’s current boss.

  “I got your messages,” Mike said to Jo. “You guys had some stuff stolen?” He was looking paler and thinner and, to Feroza, transparently guilt-ridden.

  “Yeah,” Jo said and then mournfully listed the missing items.

  Mike shook his head. “Too bad. You call the cops?”

  “You didn’t expect we’d hang around for you, did you? Didn’t you get the messages I left on your machine? Why didn’t you call?”

  “I’ve been kinda busy,” Mike said, dismissing the charge lightly.

  “Oh yeah?” Jo said. “I’m kinda busy too, but I’d go help a friend who’d been robbed!”

  “I’m sorry, I wanted to see you, but it’s been, like, one thing after another.”

  Feroza was distinctly cold and minimally civil. After five minutes of haughty, monosyllabic participation in the conversation, she withdrew to her room. But her attitude had rubbed off on Jo, and some time later she heard Jo and Mike argue loudly. Mike left the apartment before dinner.

  Mike again started dropping in at odd hours. Feroza noticed, though, that Jo was more guarded and wary when he was around. She did not believe everything he said anymore, either, and startled him by frequently declaiming, “I don’t believe you,” about some trifling assertion.

  Mike came over late one night, asking to borrow Jo’s car.

  “You can’t have it,” Jo said flatly.

  “Why not?” Mike was surprised.

  “ ’Cause I need it tomorrow. I’ve got a busy day.”

  “I’ll get it back to you by morning,” Mike said. “Promise.”

  “Why don’t you use your own car?”

  “I’ve got to go a long way, and it won’t hold out.”

  “I bet it’ll hold out if you fill it with gas.”

  “If you don’t give me your car keys right this minute, you’ll be sorry!” Mike shouted.

  Mike was drunk. Jo wondered how he’d managed to conceal it so well. “Get outta here,” she shouted, and Feroza, who had heard most of their conversation, barged into the living room to stand by her friend.

  “I know what you want the car for,” Jo yelled, drawing courage from Feroza’s presence. “You’re gonna deal drugs or fence stuff that’s stolen. If you think I’m gonna allow you to use my car for shit like that, you’re crazy!”

  “Gimme the keys, or I’ll kill you,” Mike said, advancing dangerously on Jo. Feroza quickly inserted herself between Jo and Mike. She stuck out her elbows defiantly, but she was shaking. Mike felt his pockets and his waistband as if searching for a knife. He didn’t appear to find what he was looking for and, yelling, “You wait here; I’m gonna kill you,” dashed out of the apartment.

  Feroza and Jo rushed to lock the door after him. Jo stood trembling against the locked door, and Feroza sat down panting on a chair. A few moments later they heard Mike’s car tires viciously scrape gravel as he wheeled into reverse and, with a wrenching of gears, roar away.

  Jo phoned her sister in California with the news of the threat. Janine advised her to get a gun at once.

  “Please don’t,” Feroza said. “He’s only threatening you. If you get a gun, I’m not going to live in the same house with you. You’ll shoot me by mistake.”

  The next evening, Mike came to the restaurant and created a scene when Jo again refused to let him have the car. In the ensuing brawl, Jo finally accosted him. “I know you stole the stuff from our apartment!”

  “Yeah? So what?”

  Jo was shocked and dismayed by his admission and the cool and insouciant way in which he said it. “I want my TV back!” she yelled. “I want my computer and my stereo back, you asshole!”

  “I’ve hocked ’em. So what’re you going to do?”

  Jo’s burly boss, a meat-cleaver in hand, rushed Mike out of his restaurant.

  After a month Mike again turned up at the apartment to announce, “I’m getting married.” He looked subdued and sober in a clean, striped shirt and washed jeans.

  “So, when’s she due?” Jo asked.

  “Oh, Jo, you think I’d only get married if I got the girl pregnant? She is pregnant, but that’s not why we’re getting married.”

  Jo looked at Mike with pitying contempt. “You poor kid. You don’t realize that becoming a father means more than being a dildo with a sperm count!”

  Feroza didn’t understand what “dildo” meant, but she sensed from Mike’s stunned reaction that Jo had said something quite profound. Feroza’s already soaring regard for her friend climbed a notch higher.

  Just before the end of the term, a little, short-haired, bandy-legged dog trotted up to Jo as she was washing her car and, for no apparent reason, growled and suddenly nipped her ankle.

  Observing the rites of the American spring, Jo, like millions of girls all over the country, was wearing shorts.

  “I’ve had it,” Jo announced as Feroza applied the mercurochrome — farsightedly provided by Zareen — to her roommate’s tiny, perforated wounds. “I’ve taken about as much as I can stand! This crummy town is jinxed! I’m getting out! You can stay if you want, but I’m going!”

  “Where to?” Feroza asked, suddenly very frightened, wondering how long their bad luck would continue.

  “Somewhere, anywhere, so long’s it’s not Twin Falls. Even the dogs here are nasty. The jealous little mutt bit me ’cause his legs’re short and mine are long!”

  Both girls laughed. After all, it was spring, and even Jo had to admit that Twin Falls looked spruce and green. Above all else, vacation loomed, and Feroza was going to spend the summer with Jo and her family in Boulder.

  The dog bite was the last problem bequeathed by the Panchang.

  Chapter 18

  Meanwhile Manek was returning to Pakistan after an absence of four years.

  A phalanx of perspiring relatives awaited Manek’s arrival at the Lahore airport. Jeroo and Behram, who required only an excuse to visit Lahore, had driven down from Rawalpindi for the occasion. Their fourteen-year-old son Dara and his younger sister Bunny were charged with protecting the rose and jasmine garlands hanging from sticks.

  Anxious for news of Feroza, Cyrus and Zareen flanked Khutlibai behind the iron paling that separated the crowd of receivers from the arrival lounge. Khutlibai stood entrenched at the central position she had fought through to occupy earlier, grimly hanging on to the handrail.

  The arrival lounge was also the baggage claim area, and the aluminum-framed French windows and glass doors that formed one wall — about twenty feet away from them — were guarded by two armed security police.

  Khutlibai had insisted on coming well before the plane was due, so in deference to her wishes the family had hauled itself to the airport
an hour earlier. Other families — predominantly Muslim and a few Christian — milled behind the railing, their children propped up in their arms like wilting bouquets. The ceiling fans hanging from the vaulted roof were remote and ineffective.

  The arrival of the 747 from Karachi was announced, and a few moments later the passengers started trickling into the baggage claim area. The congenitally short-sighted Parsee adults squinted in an effort to peer through the glass doors and urged the few lucky youngsters with normal sight to put their 20/20 vision to salutary use. The glare from outside made it still more difficult to look in.

  “Can you see Manek? Can you see him?” Khutlibai asked frequently, and the moment the youngsters’ attentions wandered she alerted them with a sharp “What’re you doing? Look in front!” If they were within striking distance, she thumped or pinched them to encourage their attention.

  The other adults also kept a check on the brood, but the children’s eyes, smarting from staring at the dazzling windows, kept wandering to less tedious vistas.

  Khutlibai and company were able to make out only a thickening blob of shirts and shalwars as the passengers poured into the arrival lounge. Occasionally one of them clearly saw a figure in the foreground or spotted a porter in a khaki uniform, but there was no sign of Manek.

  In a country of paradoxes, where bold women of a certain class often wield as much clout as pistol-toting thugs, Freny could be relied upon to use the advantage. “Here,” she said and gave her bright red patent-leather handbag to her husband to hold. “I’m going to find out what’s happening.”

  “Old mare, red bridle!” quipped Khutlibai, offering up the sly adage with a fresh twist.

  A mischievous bubble of merriment burst about her. Not used to such levity, Rohinton pursed his mouth and averted austere eyes. He had discovered a few days back that the youngsters had nicknamed his wife “Allah-ditta,” or “God-bequeathed,” in an obvious allusion to his spouse’s bountiful endowment of bosom. He added a thunderous frown to his astringent mouth, and the giggles at once subsided. Rohinton folded his thick arms across his chest and the handbag swung from his wrist defiantly.