Beneath the Same Heaven

by Anne Marie Ruff

  I step inside our home and shut the door quietly, ensuring I hear the click of the bolt before taking off my shoes, and walking silently across the red Persian carpet to the bedroom. I breathe in a lungful, the smell of coffee, laundry detergent, and breast milk triggering a wave of recent memories. Part of my being returns to this place, even as I try to resist it, to retain the essence of Pakistan in my consciousness.

  In the bedroom Kathryn occupies the middle of the bed. Michael and baby Andrew on either side. The baby is awake, playing quietly, moving his arms and legs. I go to him, touch his cheek. My father would have done the same, he always loved a baby. Caring for babies was women’s work, but loving babies was an extension of his responsibility as the patriarch, his investment in his legacy. I wish my father could have met this baby. Andrew starts to fidget with hunger. I pacify him for a minute with my finger before he fusses in earnest. From her deep slumber, Kathryn reaches for the baby, pulling aside her nightshirt to reveal her breast for him. I recognize this universal gesture of comfort, and in this interaction, my wife transcends nationality, culture, tradition. She is a woman, I am a man, and this is our child. I stroke her other breast, reach out to touch our other child, and wish I could inhabit this world with them forever. I close my eyes and allow sleep to overwhelm me.

  I spend the next few days evading Kathryn’s questions. She asks me about my mother and the funeral and our rituals. I answer with generalities, which, thankfully, she accepts. I can see from the way she makes me tea, from the extra effort she takes to boil the dried black leaves with ginger and cardamom that she will be patient with me. She thinks that with enough care, I will eventually open up and explain everything to her. Instead, I retreat to a place where people understand without the need for explanations.

  In the early morning light I can see the mosque is small, not really a mosque, but a converted storefront. The windows have been covered with heavy white curtains, so we may pray in private. I leave my shoes just inside the door, next to a handful of others. I feel awkward with my old prayer rug rolled up under my arm, the polyester fringes brushing against my ribs. I have not once bothered to pray since I came to America. I wonder for a moment if the others will judge me for my lapsed practice of the faith. But on another rug on the floor, I recognize the same image of a dome and minaret on a pale green background—the kind of rug available in any grocery store in the Persian Gulf. I roll out mine an acceptable distance away and wait. In a moment a man walks to the front of the mosque, and leads those of us who have gathered, through the familiar ritual of prayer. I have always touched my head lightly to the ground, my symbolic submission to God. In Dubai very devout men showed off a persistent bruise on their forehead as proof of their ardent belief.

  I sit, my feet tucked under me, lift my hands in supplication, touch my head to the floor in the direction of Mecca, look over each shoulder. My muscles remember every movement. These simple actions arouse images of my father, who must have taught me how to pray before I could even remember learning.

  When we finish, we all stand, roll up our rugs and return to our shoes. Most men leave quickly, the metal frame of the glass door clanging behind them. But a few linger. An old man sits with his back against the wall, lost in thought. A young man stands near the door waiting for a middle aged man to finish with his shoes and then they walk out together. I feel an emptiness. I know no one here. I tie my shoes and walk back to my car.

  I sit outside the public library for nearly an hour waiting for the doors to open. I’m not yet ready to go home. I want to find something, something that connects me to Pakistan, something that documents what happened to my father—something that might help me understand what has been written for me.

  At the appointed hour, the library opens and I enter after a small tribe of homeless people who have gathered clutching their battered bags. I have never been to this library. I consult the map on the check out desk finding the half dozen computer carrels along the far wall. A clipboard with a waiting list for users sits on one end. I sign my name as George Smith—no one needs to know I have been here—and proceed to the last open terminal, taking my spot next to the regulars.

  The familiar search engine appears, its bright simple logo promising all kinds of cheerful results. I type in drone attack and click on the image finder. I want to see if the reporting matches my memory of what a drone attack looks like. I wait the few seconds until the screen fills. But amidst all the photos, there is not a drop of blood, not a single destroyed building. I scan row after row of photos of drones, glamour shots of military hardware in cloudless skies. Some of the pilotless planes, like moles of the air, appear almost cartoonish. Biting my lower lip, I click on one. Drone Attack—3-D slides across the screen, advertising the lifelike simulation available for players who crave the thrill of the real thing.

  I slam my fist into the keyboard, eliciting startled looks from the people next to me. The computer misreads my action as a command to begin and the game launches into a demo clip; providing a bird’s eye view of a drone, zeroing in on a target, dropping its bomb, and moments later a small puff of white smoke erupting in the far corner of the screen. Digital particles aggregate into letters, Mission Accomplished! the game proclaims. From somewhere beyond the frame I hear my mother screaming, hear the thud of thrown stones falling to the ground.

  I think to leave, to get up and drive away from this place, but even if I drive and drive I will still be in this country. No, there is no where to flee. I type into the keyboard, invoke the cheerful search engine again. Look for the words, I tell myself, maybe the words are more sincere. I scan through results, mostly articles that briefly mention individual drone attacks. Then I see the words systematic drone attacks. I click through. A website, the Bureau of Investigative Journalists, displays articles, comments, even maps of drone attacks. The Bureau, a group of fringe British journalists have compiled local reports and plotted out each attack in the last five years. A red dot on the publicly available global satellite imaging program symbolizes each attack. I zoom in on the Khyber Agency area of the frontier territories to see if the journalists have plotted the attack that killed my father. As my mouse hovers over each dot, a text box pops up with the date, location, a single sentence about the circumstances, and statistics about the numbers of adults and children killed.

  There are only a few red dots in the Khyber Agency. I have never looked on a map at where Shoukart’s family lived, so I do not recognize anything on these maps. I read all the red dots, and come to one that describes the situation as, “Attack of village wedding, justified as gathering of Taliban because several male wedding guests fired AK-47s. Total Deaths: 15 Children killed: 2.”

  I pause, read the information several more times. For the first time since I have returned from Pakistan, I see that my father’s death has registered as significant to someone else. I see in the number 15 evidence that something happened, something that has caused my family so much grief, something that will change the trajectory of my life.

  Shoukart’s father had never mentioned the weapons. Perhaps this was some supposed evidence conjured up by the US military. Though, the description is hardly implausible. I saw lots of guns and rifles when we passed checkpoints and drove past family compounds. The AK-47 has been familiar to me for as long as I can remember. My father even asked our Sikh, Jagdeep, to distribute several to his most trusted guards whenever we had a function—a wedding or festival, or even the movie screenings on our compound. Those of us who enjoy much, my father used to tell me, in a world where most have little, cannot depend on the law or the government to protect us. We only continue to enjoy through our generosity and our guns.

  The librarian touches the shoulder of the man two seats to my left. “Five more minutes, please and then you need to allow the next person on the waiting list to use the computer.” The man grumbles.

  I place my hand over my heart, expressing my gratitude to these distant British journalists. They have documented my
tragedy, however briefly, however facelessly, but in a way that strikes me as compassionate, a digital shout of righteous indignation.

  I zoom back out of the satellite image, until the whole frontier region appears on the screen. The biggest cluster of red dots appears in Northern Waziristan. I read below the image that the intensity of attacks significantly increased in 2007, with 147 reported attacks throughout the frontier territories in one year. The website reports the drones appear to be launched from a remote compound in Baluchistan, a part of Pakistan historically known for its close ties with Iran and the Persian Gulf. The compound, the journalists report, is owned by one of the United Arab Emirates’ royal families, as a retreat primarily used for falcon hunting. I am not surprised. I can only imagine the negotiations between high level U.S. officials, and the sheiks in their elegant robes, perhaps in a private room in one of the luxurious hotels in Dubai or Abu Dhabi. The Americans use a falcon hunting retreat for another kind of hunting.

  I search the site for the Bureau’s address, a place where I might contribute to their work. I can see the librarian approaching my shoulder, letting me know my time is up. Hastily I use a little yellow pencil to scribble their address on a piece of scrap paper and slide it into my seat pocket as I stand up, remembering to close the browser before I step away.

  Still I am not ready to go home, not ready to leave this place. I make my way to the far corner of the library, where stacks of colorful children’s books surround low tables with small chairs. I sit down, reach for one of the board books stacked into a basket at the center of the table, thinking I should look like I have a reason for being here. On each page brightly colored images of a hungry caterpillar eat through a series of fruits. The author cares only about the caterpillar, not about the fruits he ruins. After tunneling his way through the middle, most of the fruit is still left, but will be left to rot. Who will care for the rotten fruit? These American children, raised on such tales of excess. My American children, will they be as greedy, as arrogant, and self-centered as this insatiable caterpillar?

  I close the book before I reach the end. The stories of my childhood were different. My mother told me of Hari Singh the vengeful warrior of Afghanistan who would come to get me in the night if I didn’t go to sleep. My nanny sang songs of Jeonya Maurd who stole from the rich and gave to the poor. I loved to see the traveling troupe of performers who would come every year to sing songs of revenge, I remember yearning for the glory the hero enjoyed as he rightfully slayed the murderer who had attacked his sister. I grew up with a call to action, with a craving for justice, not just a craving for consumption.

  In my car, I drive slowly down the street past the low wide buildings of the local suburban commercial establishments. From the radio a melodic line practically carries the smell of stale smoke and alcohol, the perfume of our favorite disco in Dubai. The singer’s words about the curve of a woman’s body, her skin as a landscape, a wonderland, bring back feelings I felt about Kathryn. I miss those days, the sex, whenever, wherever we could. I haven’t had sex since before I left for Pakistan. I feel myself stiffen in the car, try to ignore it, turn off the radio.

  I notice an Indian restaurant and make a U-turn. I wish it were a Pakistani restaurant, but I can tell Punjabis own this place, so at least the food will be familiar. I crave lamb shish kebab, the heavy powerful food I remember from Eid, from the holiday celebrating the end of our month of fasting. My father used to follow every piece of meat he ate with a slice of onion. He said it helped with digestion.

  Inside, I order lamb. The waiter, a stoic sardarji, doesn’t make conversation with me. But the décor of the restaurant broadcasts his beliefs. In an alcove toward the back of the restaurant sits a shrine, a small wooden canopy protects an image of Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikhism. Next to the Santa Claus like image of the guru are the symbolic weapons of the religion, the various swords and blades that the Sikhs used to fight against the Hindus and Muslims who found their religion subversive. He is probably one of the militant Sikhs, dreaming of a separate Sikh state, a member of the kind of groups Pakistan supported as destabilizing forces in India.

  I wish I had a set of prayer beads that I could lay on the table, some symbol of my Muslim identity. This impulse from deep in my past surprises me, Americans don’t make a point of broadcasting their religious identity. In Pakistan and India, we learned our religions practically before we learned our names. The lamb arrives in an aromatic swell. I nod and thank the sardarji, at least he will understand that I am not a Hindu.

  I eat quickly, trying to satisfy a surprisingly deep hunger. With the pleasure in this food comes a nostalgia, a craving for the past that grows stronger the more my stomach fills. Any past; my childhood in Pakistan, my studies in London, my wild days with Kathryn in Dubai, even the past of last month would be a brighter place than this valley of foreboding. I brush the crumbs from the crispy naan off my lap, leave a big bill on the table—and return wordlessly to my car.

  At home, Kathryn sits on the couch, her eyes red, tears clouding her face.

  “What happened?” I ask, fearing news of another death in the family.

  “You tell me what happened. You didn’t answer your phone. You just leave me again without saying where you’re going, without telling me when you’ll be back. Where have you been? How long am I supposed to handle all of this alone?”

  I have been gone for hours. I didn’t think to tell her where I was, didn’t think to call her to let her know when I would be home. In fact, I didn’t think of her at all, except to feel that I wanted her.

  “I was at the mosque,” I say simply. I sit next to her, I want to be close enough to feel her warmth.

  “The mosque? What for?”

  “I miss my father. I’m trying to sort out some things in my head. I don’t expect you to understand.”

  “Of course, how can I understand anything when you won’t even talk to me, won’t even touch me.”

  I can see the shape of her breasts through her shirt. I draw her to me, feel her release her tension with a stream of tears and angry words. I can understand I have hurt her.

  “I’m sorry,” I tell her. I will not argue with her, I need her to open to me.

  “You are?” she says, drawing back so I can see her eyes. The blue is as startling today as when I first met her. I have nothing more to say, cannot restrain my hunger. I want only the uncomplicated fact of her body around mine. I reach for her breasts.

  She holds up her hands to stop me. “Rashid, the children.”

  I leave her to close the door on the bedroom where they are napping and I return to her. She yields. I remove her clothes. I press into her darkness, into the space where I am safe, where I am most alive. I want her to become the world, I want her to crowd out everything else, all my other thoughts. I kiss her skin, run my tongue over the contours of her shoulders, slide my fingertips over the depression between her collar bones.

  She arches her lower back then tilts her pelvis up to meet mine. She reaches for my back in big handfuls, pulling me to her every time I raise my hips. I close my eyes and pretend. I imagine I hear the call to prayer, plan that tonight we will head to the disco, picking up shwarma sandwiches along the way. I see her white skin against mine, as if she were illuminated against my shadow. And easily she engineers my movements to take her pleasure. I recognize with satisfaction the quickening of her breath, the small wordless sounds, a whimpering exhale. And I turn her over, raise her hips to reach me and I see the line of her spine descending away from me, the curves of her waist beneath my hands. The image crowds out all other thoughts. The motion crowds out all other sensations. I push and I pull and demand what I need. And she gives.

  For a blinding moment the world ceases to exist. I feel only the pleasure of completion. I close my eyes and collapse, covering her body with mine, feeling the reflection of my breath against her neck. And then it is enough. I push my hands into the floor and leave her body, leave the room, and go to wash myself
.

  Chapter 3

  * * *

  Preparing to leave for a rig, I repeat my tasks in the workshop as if I had never left. My muscles seem to remember the feel of the tools, the rhythm of the jobs. After the funeral, and these subsequent days of idleness, I am glad for the work, the illusion of purpose. I pack a three-foot steel canister with small explosive charges. I methodically count them out…sixty-five…seventy…seventy-five. We will be perforating the cement in a section of a newly prepared oil well at a depth where we have confirmed the presence of oil. The perforations will allow the oil to seep into the well, the rocks will hemorrhage their fluids to be pumped to the surface. The small charges, half-moon metal spheres the size of marble shooters are designed to start oil production. They will only create pressure, poking holes painlessly, through rock. The smooth, harmless looking objects are not designed for destruction, they are not like the pyrotechnics or the ammonium nitrate bombs or any other kind of explosive I had to study to receive my blaster’s permit when I came to California. I have never actually seen dynamite explode above ground. Perhaps the drone operator who killed my father hadn’t seen real explosions either. How could I find him? Would he be the responsible one? Or was he just carrying out a job, taking the orders of the government as I take the orders of the oil companies? Maybe there are hundreds, thousands of people who are responsible for the campaign of drone attacks in Pakistan.