The Writing on My Forehead (5 page)

Jamila Khala spoke then, clicking her tongue between her teeth, too, her expression one of exasperation, “
Oof!
Shabana didn’t tell Saira because she is stubborn. For twenty years she has carried her anger upon her head, refusing to even discuss our father. Stubborn, she’s always been stubborn, since she was a lit—”

Lubna Khala interrupted with another clink of her bangles, “None of us are happy that you’ve invited
that
woman and her children here. To Pakistan. Don’t blame Shabana! If I didn’t live here myself then I probably wouldn’t have come also!”

“But why? What is the matter with all of you? You think it didn’t affect me? She was my mother, he was my father, too. And I was there when it happened! You think I have forgotten?
Oof
—tell me, what does it matter now? It’s all in the past. He’s dead, she’s dead. Both of them gone, what difference does it make now? Tara is Zehra’s best friend. They went to the same school, same college. How would it look? To invite her and not invite her sister and brother? And if I invited them, I had to invite their mother, too. Who knew she would have the cheek to actually come? And her children, don’t forget, are our sisters and brother, after all.”

Lubna Khala had nothing to say to this. Neither did anyone else. Zehra, who looked as if she had been witness to this argument many times before, sighed, “I’m sorry I’ve caused so many problems for everyone.” She turned to me, “And I’m sorry that Shabana Khala isn’t going to be here. But Tara is my best friend and I don’t want to talk about this anymore.” She glanced at her watch. “I’m late for an appointment. I have a fitting for the wedding outfit. Saira, you’re going shopping with me and Mum tomorrow, so rest up, okay?” She came over to hug me and left, shouting, “Borrowing your car and driver again, Lubna Khala. ’Bye!” over her shoulder as she scurried down the hall,
chappal
s flapping, past the servant who was carrying in my bags.

Jamila Khala looked at her watch now, and exclaimed, “
Oof!
Look at the time! I have an appointment, also, with the jewelers. I’ll see you all later. Don’t forget about the shopping tomorrow, eh, Saira? We have to get you measured up for your clothes, too.” She hurried out the door, too, heels clicking comically fast, oofing and tsk-ing her way out of the house about how little time there was left to get everything done that needed doing.

After Jamila Khala left, Lubna Khala left the room to supervise the servant’s delivery of my bags to the guest room.

Big Nanima took a seat on the sofa in the lounge and beckoned me to her. “Come, come,
beti
. Tell me, what shall we call for to eat?
Paan
s,
bhel puri, bun kabab?
Let’s call for a little bit of everything, eh? We’ll tell Lubna not to bother preparing anything for lunch and spread all of the food out on the table so you can choose.”

I smiled. But my heart wasn’t in it, she could see.

“What’s wrong,
beti
?”

“I wish I could stay with you, Big Nanima.”

“With me? What would you want to stay with an old lady for? When there’s a wedding in the house and all of the
hungama
that goes with it? Your place is here, with your aunts and your cousins, where you can practice all of the songs and dances you will perform for Zehra and her bridegroom. I will come every day myself, to watch you and clap and cheer.”

Lubna Khala reentered the room and said, “Adeeba Khala, please! I’ve told you a hundred times—you must stay here for the wedding. You tell her, Saira. Tell Big Nanima. She’ll listen to you. Everyone knows you are her favorite.”

“Stay here? I have my own place to look after, Lubna.”

“Yes, yes. We know, Adeeba Khala, you have your own place. But there’s nothing to keep you from staying with us for a few days. You don’t have your students to use as an excuse, now, during the summer holidays.”

“No. No students now. But Lubna,
beti,
I have my own routine and rhythm, which you know I am very particular about. And I am used to my own lumpy bed. Your house is too big, your mattresses too soft for me.” Big Nanima glanced up at me and laughed. “This one is swaying from side to side from exhaustion. Go, Saira. Go and wash up and rest a little. I’ll wake you up for lunch. Then we’ll eat and we’ll talk. Go now,
beti,
go.”

I got up a little unsteadily and obeyed.

BIG NANIMA KEPT
her word and came every day. But, with one exception, I never got to spend any time with her alone. In this way and others, Karachi was a totally different place for me that summer than it had been on any of my previous visits. Staying at Lubna Khala’s house, which had become Wedding Central, had never been an option in the past. Now, finally, Lubna Khala had become the ruler of her own domain, in charge of her own domestic affairs, where before the title had belonged to her mother-in-law, who had also recently passed away. Lubna Khala’s house was a vast structure, laid with marble, trimmed in teak, each room humming with the boxed air-conditioning that so few in Karachi could afford. Very different from Big Nanima’s modest home.

Even though I saw Big Nanima every day, I missed the dynamic that she and Nanima had combined to create. Instead of the gentle rhythm of their elderly company, I found myself to be part of a crowd of extended family—and lonely nonetheless. I missed my mother. I missed my father. And most of all, I missed Ameena. I missed being her younger sister. Letting her do the talking for me. The bossy, self-important advice she offered uninvited and that I normally resented—orders, really, that I flouted more often than not. I wished desperately that she, at least, had come with me. She was part of how I defined myself and I felt off-course without her.

This was my first visit to Karachi as a “young adult.” By which I mean I had a regular period and breasts—a fact that affected my experience there far more than I would have expected. As soon as Razia Nani and I had gotten off the plane, I had noticed. How male the world around me was. I felt the eyes, men’s eyes, drilling holes into my clothes in an attempt to see what lay underneath them. I was wearing jeans that day—a mistake I realized and rectified from the moment I arrived at Lubna Khala’s house, thinking that the sight of a young woman in trousers was what was causing all of the fuss. But wearing
shalwar kameez
and a
dupatta
didn’t make much difference. At one point, on a shopping expedition with Jamila Khala and Zehra—we were looking for bangles to match the yellow outfit Zehra would wear at her
mehndi
ceremony—I started trying to outstare the men who lounged around the doorways of the stalls in the bazaar.

“What are you doing, Saira?! Look down, for God’s sake!” Jamila Khala yelped when she noticed what I was doing. “You have to look down. It’s the only way to handle them. Look down, ignore them, pretend you don’t notice. Staring back only gives them a cheap thrill—as if you were inviting them to look more.”

“But it’s so disgusting! Why do they stare? They make me feel so—so dirty!”

“They stare because they’re men,” my diminutive aunt snorted with impatience, directed with equal force at me and the men around us. “If you don’t like it, use your
dupatta
to cover your head.”

“What?” But I did as she suggested. “What’s that going to do?”

“It gives them a message. That you’re a good girl, a modest girl. It won’t stop them from staring. But you’ll feel more comfortable, more protected.”

But I didn’t. I felt fragile and painfully aware of my own femininity. Vulnerable. And resentful for being made to feel so.

I
WAS ABLE TO
spend only one afternoon at Big Nanima’s house on that trip alone to Karachi. Everything was the same and I spent the first hour exploring it all, discovering things I must have seen before but, some at least, I had never noticed. All of the bookshelves, floor to ceiling, in the living room and bedrooms, stuffed with books. There were
Jane Eyre and Pride and Prejudice
—these I was familiar with from our last visit, when Big Nanima had given them to me to read for the month we had spent there—and hundreds of other books with which I was not yet acquainted. There was a globe on a stand in the corner of the living room. On a desk, next to it, there were stacks of paper, handwritten pages, in English and Urdu.

“What’s this?”

“Ah—you naughty child. You have discovered my secret.”

“You—you’re writing something?”

“Translating. Which is very different from writing.”

“Translating what?”

“Well—those pages, there”—she pointed to one of the stacks—“that is no secret. Only some Urdu poetry that I am translating into English. I have worked on two books already which have been published.”

“Really?”

“Yes. And that pile of papers—that is something new I have begun in my spare time. A television screenplay.”

“TV?”

“Yes. It’s a script for an Urdu drama. A serial adaptation of Jane Austen’s
Sense and Sensibility.
They have begun filming it already. Very exciting.”

“You’re in show business!” I laughed.

“Shhh! After all the negative things I have said about television, I am afraid I will be rightly accused of all kinds of hypocrisy when my role in the production is found out.”

I went back to wandering around the room, taking a stand in front of some photographs, fading, on a table in the corner opposite the globe. Some needed no explanation. A series of them: Big Nanima, getting bigger in each successive photograph, standing beside groups of young women dressed in crisp white
shalwar kameezes,
pressed and starched to perfection—college students, hers. Others of a young woman with curly short hair, sari-clad, umbrella and pocketbook at hand, posing in front of Imperial fountains and statues and monuments.

Of course I knew who these pictures were of. But I had no idea when they had been taken. I took one of these off one of the shelves and turned to the subject herself to ask, “Big Nanima, when are these from?”

“London,
beta
. From when I went there to study.”

“I didn’t know that you went to London to study.”

“Hmm. Well, I did.”

Something struck me as odd. I remembered Nanima’s conversation with Ameena. About how she had been married to a man she had never met, at the age of sixteen. I couldn’t reconcile that with the photographs of Big Nanima on the wall in front of me.

“But Nanima was, like, a child bride, wasn’t she? I mean, why did
she
have to get married so young? While you were allowed to go to London to study?”

Big Nanima knew me well enough to hear no accusation in my question. She smiled. “That’s a very good question. Something I would have asked myself, at your age. Something I ask myself, still, today.” Big Nanima sighed, took the picture frame from my hand, and sat down on the sofa, patting the cushion next to hers, inviting me to sit down with her.

When I did, she continued, “It’s a good story, Saira—the answer to your question. In the beginning, you see, I thought
I
was the unlucky one. But time has a way of proving all of us wrong in the end. Every single one of us. Sit. Listen, and I’ll tell you.” Big Nanima set the photograph down on the coffee table and reached for the food she had spread there earlier. She unwrapped one of the
kabab
rolls she had called for from down the street, scooping extra chutney on the side of my plate before handing it to me.

Then, picking up the photograph, she ran the end of her
dupatta
over it, as if removing dust I could not see. “See how short my hair was in this picture? How I always hated it—so curly and unkempt! Since our days in Bombay, before Partition, I had longed to chop it off. But only when I was in London, far away from my mother, did I have the courage to finally do it. I was never very interested in such things—in my appearance and in what others thought of it. Though, truthfully, that is because I knew that the impression I made on others wasn’t a very favorable one. Only once do I remember spending any length of time in front of the mirror, which was little Zahida’s favorite place in the house!” Big Nanima laughed. “That day—I remember it so well! Important for me—because of what did not happen. And for Zahida—because of what did.

“It was—when was it? Oh—1941, if I’m not mistaken. We were still living in Bombay. Yes, I remember standing at the mirror in the room I shared with your grandmother, smoothing my hands down over my
kameez,
hating myself for the sweaty palms that made the action necessary. I put my hands together, squeezing them, trying to suppress the nervousness that filled me up, ’til here.” Big Nanima pointed to her throat. “I looked in the mirror and saw myself the way his mother would see me, and his grandmother. A plain face. With skin that was—well, rather dark.” Big Nanima smiled gently at me, shaking her head ruefully. “And hair that is easier to laugh at now than it was then. I tried everything. Pigtails, a ponytail, braids, a bun. But nothing could tame that unruly mass.

“It is one of the few times I remember resenting my father—for being so brutally honest regarding the situation about to unfold. I thought that perhaps Gray, the poet, was right, and ignorance, in this instance, would have been preferable to the folly of knowledge. That is, preferable to the painful awareness that my father’s words had caused. That everything hinged on the outcome of this meeting. That one of my flaws, for once, might actually become an asset.

“The boy’s mother and grandmother were due to arrive at any moment. To meet and assess my worth as a potential wife for the boy they represented. A boy who had expressed the specific and very unusual desire to be wed to a ‘read and written’ girl. An English-speaking girl.
‘Beti,’
my father had said bluntly, ‘this might be your only chance. And finally, I hope, we will prove your mother wrong. That I was right to allow you to study.’

“You see, I was already a little too old to be single. My parents were worried for me. There had been few enough inquiries made about me. And of those, I had suffered, in the way of comparison. Because my younger sister, Zahida—your Nanima—was startlingly beautiful. She had light brown hair, green eyes, and sharply symmetrical features. Zahida’s skin was translucent and luminous, and she was pale. With oh-so-beautiful, silky, straight hair that fell to her waist. She was also—well, not academically inclined.” Big Nanima looked up at me, a smile in her eyes. “Why lie? Your grandmother was only sixteen. And she was a stupid girl.
I
should know, as her occasional tutor, unkind as it is to say, to even think such a thing about one’s own sister. But, in the situation which I was about to face—when a suitable boy’s family came to call to size up the available girl in question—intelligence, or the lack of it, did not seem to count for much. Our parents had been fending off proposals for Zahida before she had even reached puberty.

“I was not surprised by my father’s straight talk. He had never been very diplomatic in his characterizations of his children. The boys—there were four of them, all older than me and Zahida—were, respectively: sharp, lazy, too handsome for his own good, and hardworking (at least). I was considered to be the brain. And Zahida, the beauty.

“Though I must put aside any claim to modesty to say so, I was the most educated girl in the community. And I suffered for it. Gladly. My mother never ceased to complain, saying that I would be left unfit for marriage. Even my father, who was my greatest champion in my quest to study, was less than sensitive in his advocacy.” Big Nanima winked at me, letting me know that her tongue was in her cheek. “He said, ‘Let the poor girl study! What’s the harm? God knows He didn’t gift her with the beauty He granted her younger sister. Let her make the most of what He did grant her.’

“Our mother had better luck—trying to protect her daughters from educational corruption—with Zahida. When she was five, Zahida was sent off for her first day of school, the same convent school which I attended. She came home crying—so pitifully that our father affectionately gave in to our mother’s objections to having sent her in the first place. ‘All right, all right!
Acha, baba, acha
! ’ he said. ‘Stop crying, Zahida. You can stay at home with your mother. No schooling for little Zahida, all right?’ I remember our father’s words as he turned to my mother and said, ‘She’s a pretty thing, and doesn’t need to worry her little head over studying and learning English. Everyone can’t be a scholar, just as everyone can’t be a beauty. Her sister can teach her the basics—reading, writing, a little English—at home.’ But Zahida was very naughty. She ran away from the lessons I tried to give her. Despite my best efforts, she never did learn English.

“I was ashamed to admit that I was grateful for that fact. On that day, standing in front of that mirror. For once, I needn’t worry about being upstaged by my beautiful little sister. And—just to be safe—our mother had taken the precaution of giving Zahida strict instructions to stay out of sight. In the meantime, while I waited for our guests to arrive, I did the best I could, tried to do something with my hair, wishing, not for the first time, that my mother would have allowed me to cut it down to size, like so many of the Englishwomen I had gotten to know through school. They were visitors from England, educational experts who had been invited to observe and help to improve the British-run convent school that I used to attend. The school where I now taught English. Though no one but my father knew
that
.”

“What do you mean? You—your job was a secret?” My mouth was full of
kabab
roll, my eyes watery from the spicy chutney that I dipped into before each bite.

“Yes. From everyone except my father. My mother was suspicious, I think, when my father told her that I would continue to go to school every day, for ‘special studies’ that the teachers had deemed me worthy of. ‘Why? What is the point of all this study?’ she had asked him. ‘It is time for her to be married. It was time for her to be married a long time ago!’

“‘Yes, yes! We know all that,’ my father had replied, ‘but it’s not that she has a choice, is it? Let her study…what difference does it make? It keeps her busy. She’s a very good student. And those silly old British women think she’s a very clever girl.’ My father had winked at me then, and I could see the amusement that twinkled in his eyes as his plan to trick the family fell into place.

“‘Just go along with whatever I say,’ he had told me. ‘Don’t contradict me. And make sure you hide whatever your earnings are. Don’t go showing off to your brothers and sister, mind you! Or there’ll be hell to pay!’

“That instruction had been more difficult to follow than expected. Since the marriages of my two eldest brothers, things in the household had become complicated. My new sisters-in-law had proven their value and fertility very quickly by producing one son each, within one year of matrimony. Household expenses had increased dramatically. And my father’s small business, never a very profitable enterprise, had taken a downturn that made it difficult for him to pay the bills. My hand had itched with the desire to ease the burden that now fell on my father’s head. Ultimately, his need had outweighed his pride.

“He had come to me within the first two months of my employment. His embarrassment, even now, makes me cringe in sympathy for how his dignity must have suffered. His head had hung low and his eyes were cast downward. ‘Adeeba, uh, well—things have been very—uh—difficult lately. All of the strikes and boycotts. They have affected the business. And with all of the talk of Independence, so many of the British are leaving. And you know that some of them have been our best customers. Adeeba,
beti,
I am ashamed to ask, but I have to do it—’

“I interrupted him then, ‘No,
Aba,
please don’t ask. You don’t have to ask. I have been saving my salary. I wanted to give it to you from the beginning. I don’t need it. I have everything I need. Please, please take it.’ I went into my wardrobe, rummaged through it to find the old talcum powder tin, which I had wrapped in an old shawl, and took out my meager savings.

“My father stared down at my hand, full of money and extended toward him. I can never be sure, but I thought I saw moisture collect at the corners of his eyes as he put his hand over mine, held it firmly, caressed it, and withdrew it, having accepted the transfer of funds within his hand. That day, in front of the mirror, as I waited for the guests to arrive, I worried about what might happen if things turned out the way my father and mother hoped they would. I knew, with all humility, that my secret contribution to the household finances was what kept up the appearance of even a minimal level of prosperity. And yet I was practical enough to realize that marriage was a requirement for my own future security.

“I was not a stranger to ideas of romance. Part of the reason I so loved English literature was because of the importance it gave to romantic love. It was an abstract ideal, however, and one which I was perfectly happy to wait to discover within the context of social acceptability and economic necessity. One of my favorite authors—you know, Saira—was Jane Austen, who well understood the need for reason and pragmatism with regard to matters of the heart. The success of a marriage depended no less on economics than on an intellectual understanding between its participants. And here, finally, there was hope for that. I had not given much thought to the boy in question, beyond marveling at the progressive nature of his desire to be wed to an educated girl—a girl who spoke English, no less! My father had met him before, had known his father.