I order some food, which is stupid, since a meal here costs much more than I can afford, but I need time to decide how to ask him if he needs some hash.
We talk general business talk for a while, and he listens closely to what I’m saying, because I know my stuff, I know the near-bankruptcies and defaults businessmen love to hear about, and my information may be dated, but it’s still good.
When the bill comes, I reach for it, but he takes it from me over my objections, his manner slightly condescending, in the way the rich condescend to their hangers-on. I should pay, being the first to get my hands on it, but the total is four fifty-three and I only have a couple hundred on me.
‘Drop by for a drink sometime,’ he tells me as he places a five hundred on the table, but I know the offer is insincere.
‘I’d love to.’ Then I flex my abs and take the plunge. ‘You know, I got my hands on some good charas today.’
‘Really?’
I hope he’ll say he wants to buy some, but he doesn’t. ‘You don’t need any, do you?’ I ask after a while.
He grins. ‘I can always use some. I’ll take whatever you can spare.’
‘I can give you about five hundred worth.’
‘Come by my place tonight.’
‘I have it here.’
He looks at me, surprised. Then he starts to laugh. ‘I love it. You people have balls, yaar. Slip it to me under the table.’
I don’t like the ‘you people’ comment but I do it anyway, startled to feel him place a note in my hand because I didn’t see him take one out. But he’s from a business family, so I suppose this is what he was bred for.
As he drives off he rolls down a window and says, ‘You didn’t get fired for trying to sell dope to bank clients, did you?’
Laughing, he speeds away.
Maybe he doesn’t think what he said was insulting, or that someone like me can even be insulted, really. But humiliation flushes my face.
And something inside me starts to snap.
I suck the spit through my teeth and nod to myself, rage building. Then I run to my car and pull out onto Alam Road behind him, my bald tires squealing. But even though I drive like a maniac, my Suzuki’s no match for his Range Rover. I lose him near Hussein Chowk.
He probably didn’t even know I was chasing him.
I circle the roundabout, five hundred rupees richer, and I think I’d be willing to pay all of it for the chance to hit him, just once, on his double chin. Making money this way isn’t worth it. These rich slobs love to treat badly anyone they think depends on them, and if selling them dope makes them think I depend on them, I just won’t do it.
But as I’m sitting at home I realize that I sold him a hundred and twenty-five rupees of drugs for five hundred. That makes me feel a little better. Not much, but definitely a little. I promise myself never to sell to any of these rich bastards unless I can rip them off. Let them think they’re getting a fair deal. And if they’re nasty enough, maybe I’ll slip a little heroin into their hash, just to mess with them.
Making money this way isn’t pleasant, but it’s easy, and easy money is exactly what I need, even if there isn’t enough of it to pay an electricity bill.
I spend most of my time smoking and thinking of Mumtaz. It’s been a week since we went to Jallo Park and I miss her. I tried to reach her on her mobile once, but Ozi picked up and I had to ring off without saying anything. I wish she would come to see me.
Every time I roll a joint I keep it for a while, hoping she’ll appear so I can share it with her. But she never does. And Manucci must be leaving the screen doors open, because there seem to be more moths in the house every evening, circling candles, whirring in the darkness. I kill them when I can catch them, until my fingers are slick with their silver powder. But most of the house is dark at night, and there’s little I can do about the invasion. Sometimes, when Manucci’s asleep and I have no one to talk to, I get stoned and take out my badminton racquet to smash a few. Occasionally the biggest ones make a pleasing little ping as I lob them into the ceiling, but more often they just explode silently into clouds of dust.
One night I’m doing this, sweating in the heat, my body lightly powdered with moth dust, when a car honks outside the gate.
It’s Mumtaz. She says nothing when she sees me, shirtless and clutching a badminton racket. I take her up on the roof.
‘Ozi’s out of town,’ she says. ‘And Muazzam’s crying like mad. I left him with Pilar. I had to get out for a while. I wanted to see you.’
‘Would you like a joint?’
‘Please.’
I have one rolled and waiting in my cigarette pack, so I light it and pass it over.
I watch her face in the glow of the burning hash and tobacco. She seems worried.
‘What are you thinking about?’ I ask.
She passes the joint back to me and watches me smoke it, but she doesn’t answer. Then she reaches out and wipes sweat down my shoulder with the blade of her hand. ‘What were you doing?’ she asks.
My fingers are trembling and I drop the joint so she won’t notice. The tip breaks off, smoldering separately from the barrel between my feet. ‘I was killing moths,’ I say. My shoulder burns where she touched me.
‘I want to kiss you,’ she tells me.
I can hear my breathing.
Her fingers curl through mine and I close my fist, holding them there. Our eyes meet and I look away, but she leans forward, leans until her forehead presses against mine and her hair falls around my face and her breath touches my lips.
She kisses me.
And we’re touching and tasting, roving each other, and I’m overcome and afraid of her and willing all at once. We shiver, the hair on our bodies rising as the night heat bakes dry the sweat and saliva on our skin. I’m pushed down on the roof, worn brick pressing into my back. She takes a condom out of her handbag, one hand stroking my throat. Then we make love, and as my eyes follow the curve of her body above me, I see the moon, round, perfect, the color of rust, burning like a flame to her candle.
She takes me and keeps me.
It’s like someone’s died. I hold her tight, muscles tense, pulling away from the bone. And I know she knows what I’m feeling, because the tears on her face mix with mine.
Afterwards, when she leaves me lying there, I smell the moth dust mixed in with her sweat and my sweat on my body.
10
the wife and mother (part one)
I’m sure we’ve already met, Lahore being such a small place and all, but let’s reintroduce ourselves so there’s no mistake. I’m Mumtaz Kashmiri. You’re probably anxious to know about Daru and me, everyone else is, but you’ll have to be patient, because I’m going to tell my story my way and Daru doesn’t appear for a while.
Where to begin? Certainly before Muazzam was born. Definitely before I got married. Before I went to America? Hmm. No. We haven’t the time to go that far back just now.
Let’s start in New York City, my senior year in college. The scene is the East Village, a little before midnight, on the steps of a fourth-floor walk-up on Avenue A. The date is important: October 31. Halloween. I’m dressed as Mother Earth (rather ironic, as you’ll come to see). My roommate, Egyptian, English major, is improvising around the Cleopatra theme again. This year there’s a sun motif. Ra, you know. Last year it was more Leo.
So there I am, trudging up the steps, the wheat stalks on my head hitting the ceiling, when I see this cute desi guy in a white shirt and black trousers, looking ridiculously out of place but very comfortable at the same time. He catches my eye as I pass and says ‘Hi,’ but I ignore him, because the last thing I want to deal with tonight is some conservative boy from the homeland with nothing to say. I just hope we aren’t related and don’t know anyone in common.