The Good Muslim (16 page)

‘You remember Piya?’

Maya nodded. Of course she remembered Piya. ‘She was pregnant.’

‘Yes, I knew.’

‘You knew?’ Ammoo paused for a moment, taking this in. ‘She wanted – she wanted to get rid of it. She was afraid of the operation, she wasn’t sure. She held my arm like this—’

Ammoo turned to Maya and gripped her elbow, her fingers hot, her lips smudged and red. ‘And she said, please, I don’t want to. And you know, a few days later, she was gone. She disappeared. Why do you think she left?’

‘Maybe she changed her mind.’

Ammoo tightened her grip on Maya’s arm, and they looked at each other. Maya didn’t want to tell her what had happened the night before Piya left. ‘Maybe it was better’, she said, ‘for everyone.’

‘Don’t you see?’ Ammoo’s voice was cracked, her eyes swimming. ‘They forced her. And she’s not the only one. Some of the girls don’t want to. But they’re ashamed, they’re told they’re carrying the seed of those soldiers.’

Bangabandhu had promised to take care of the women; he had even given them a name – Birangona,
heroines
– and asked their husbands and fathers to welcome them home, as they would their sons. But the children, he had said he didn’t want the children of war. Maya told herself this every day, every day while she put the mask over their faces and told them to count backwards from 100. ‘Isn’t it better, Ma, to erase all traces of what happened to them? That way they can start to forget.’

‘But their children, Maya, their children.’ Rehana passed the back of her hand over her eyes and turned away from her. Thick-throated, she said, ‘You’re not a mother, you won’t understand.’ She crumpled the letter and tossed it aside. ‘Let’s go, we’re going to be late.’

Maya was worried Ammoo would say something to Bangabandhu, about the war babies, but she needn’t have worried; Ammoo was quiet and polite and repeated what an honour it was to meet him. Only she could tell that Ammoo was trying to convince herself, that the thing did not sit right with her, and that, even as she allowed him to hold her hands between his, she resisted him, doubted his sincerity.

Maya offered no such resistance. Bangabandhu was the closest thing to a deity she had ever known, and to have him standing before her, touching her head as she bent down to take the dust of his feet, was almost too much. She thought she might vomit, and gulped down the bottle of Fanta brought in on a trolley by the servant.

He was surrounded by his family – she glimpsed his daughter, Hasina, and Sheikh Moni, his nephew. Mrs Mujib was there too, and although the room was empty when they first entered, it was soon crowded with people, touching Bangabandhu’s feet and crying with the sheer joy of it.

He lit his pipe and gave it a few short, shallow breaths.

Sohail sat transfixed, mirroring what Maya imagined was her own fascination.

‘You are responsible for the power-plant blast?’

‘Ji, sir,’ Sohail said, nodding.

‘Very audacious of you, my son.’

‘Risk was great, sir, but we were determined.’ Sohail’s head was bent, but she saw the curve of his mouth. He was smiling. She hadn’t seen him smile like that in months.

‘Shahbash,’ Bangabandhu said. ‘Come here, let’s take a photo. Come, come.’

Sohail had brought his Leica, but a photographer was already stationed, and they arranged themselves on either side of Bangabandhu. Maya put on the face she thought would be most appropriate for the photograph: a serious, determined young citizen, grateful to be in the presence of this man.

As they gathered around him for the photo, Bangabandhu turned to her and said, ‘And you, my dear, how did you pass those nine months?’

Maya looked at Ammoo, and she nodded. ‘I worked. I was in Theatre Road, sir. It was my honour to serve the government in exile.’

‘Theatre Road! Your mother let you go to Calcutta? Well, you are a brave girl.’

‘It was wonderful, sir, so many of us, working together.’

He regarded her quietly, gnawing on his pipe. ‘I would have liked to see that, ma. I would have liked that very much.’

Maya wondered if Bangabandhu had felt as she had – left out, stuck somewhere safe and unremarkable – when the fighting broke out and she couldn’t enlist in the army. He had been in prison the whole time. He hadn’t seen a day of fighting or listened to a single broadcast. She hoped he knew that he was there without being there, because they had gone to sleep every night with his name on their lips and woken every morning to his portrait, cut out of newspapers, on their walls, his voice on the radio. It didn’t matter to anyone that he had been in jail and not on the front lines of the battle. Though perhaps it mattered to him.

She wanted to tell him all of this, but a group of new visitors came to the door, and Bangabandhu’s attention was diverted. By now she really needed the toilet, but she told herself she should concentrate on this moment, because she was going to always remember it, and she tried to fix Bangabandhu’s face in her mind so she would be able to recall what he was wearing, and the weight of his hand on her head.

She looked across the room and saw Sohail sitting very straight with his knees in his hands. He rose to get up, but Bangabandhu was telling Ammoo about the other women like herself who had harboured freedom fighters in their homes, and asking if she had known any of them. Maya heard him asking what had happened to her husband, and when Ammoo told him, she saw Bangabandhu hold her two hands between his two hands again and tell her he was very sorry, and that she was very brave to raise her children without a father.

Finally, they gathered around the doorway.

‘There’s a lot of work to be done, my children,’ Bangabandhu said. ‘I hope I can trust you.’

‘Ji, sir.’ Sohail bent to touch his feet again, but Bangabandhu held him by the shoulders and lifted him up until they were eye to eye, then he embraced Sohail, three times, as though they were father and son. He walked them the entire way to the gate, and afterwards all they could talk about was how warm, how genial and how like any other person he had been.

Even Ammoo could not help but praise him, remarking on how, no matter how many people were in his presence, he fixed his eyes on you as if he were telling you a deep secret, as if you were conspiring with him on something, something lasting and great.

1984
September

Maya was astonished by the number of people who came through the door. Mrs Rahman arrived first, fluffed up Rehana’s pillows and stuffed the fridge with chicken stew. She was followed by a group of women from the Ladies’ Club, all promising to postpone their annual Rummy tournament until Rehana returned. The fish-hawker came, and the butcher she had known for over twenty years, bearing an enormous mutton bone and promising the soup would cure whatever had made her ill. Flowers arrived from the principal of Maya’s junior school, and from the Dhanmondi Society. Sufia’s sister and her husband came, dressed in formal clothes and bearing a prayer written by their local pir on a tiny piece of paper. Even the German tenant came, clutching a spray of roses. He stayed only a minute, but long enough for Maya to appraise him and find him sorely disappointing. Bald, so tall he had to duck to get through the door and covered in a fine coating of orange hair, he smiled his way through the visit, then passed Rehana an envelope labelled SEPTEMBER 1984 RENT.

After another morning with Khadija and the upstairs women, Maya found Joy sitting at Ammoo’s bedside, telling her a story about his new business venture with Chottu. She was laughing, holding her stomach in her hands.

‘Ma, be careful, your stitches have barely healed.’ She shot Joy an irritated look.

Joy continued to entertain Rehana. He looked breezy, as though he had just stepped out of the bath, with his neat sandalled feet, his closely cropped hair. Slowly, he finished his story, leaning close to Ammoo’s ear. Then he took his leave, assuring her she would be out of bed in no time, ready to fry her famous parathas.

‘Thank you for coming,’ Maya said politely, leading him to the living room. She wanted to say something about the last time they’d met, the awkward goodbye.

‘Your mother said you’ve been visiting the upstairs.’

‘Sohail came to the hospital. He sat with her, I think she really liked that. So I wanted to thank him.’

‘How did you find it?’

‘It’s another world.’

‘You say that as if it’s not so bad.’

‘It’s different. Totally unlike anything else.’ She tried to turn it into words, the feeling of being among those women. Joy’s foot had touched something under the sofa, and now he was reaching underneath, disturbing the dust.

‘I think I know what this is,’ he said.

Maya knew too. And he pulled it out, a piece of wreckage. A relic.

‘Still has all its strings,’ he said. Maya found a wet rag in the kitchen, and they rubbed it down together, watching as the colour of the wood emerged, honey-toned.

‘Does it play?’ she asked.

‘Probably needs to be tuned. I can try, I’m not very good. It was always my brother.’

‘Mine too,’ she said.

It isn’t fair, she felt him thinking, at least her brother is still alive. What he would give to have his brother back. She imagined him wanting his brother under any circumstances, so long as he were here, even if he shunned his old life and behaved like a stranger. A world of difference, she imagined him thinking, between the living and the dead; not so different, she countered in her mind. There’s a reason for phrases such as
you’re dead to me
, which she had used against Sohail more than once.

Joy began to fiddle with the guitar strings, turning knobs on the long neck of the instrument. ‘I think I’ve got it,’ he said. ‘Try it now.’

She ran her thumb down the strings. ‘Sounds nice,’ she said.

‘Like old times.’

‘What was that song you used to sing, that Spanish song?’

‘We never sang a song in Spanish.’

‘You did, something with a very long name.’

‘Oh!’ He slapped his knee. ‘You mean “Guantanamera”.’

‘I always loved that song.’

‘Sohail used to sing it. He said it was a revolutionary song, but when I was in New York I had a Mexican friend who told me the words. It’s just like every other song.’

‘Oh?’

‘About some poor chap who wants to fall in love.’

‘You have something against love?’

He leaned back and crossed his legs. ‘I’m only a minor opponent. Not like you.’

She plucked at the strings. ‘You know nothing, my friend. I’m just like any other girl.’ She believed it herself, at that moment. That she was as tender as all the others, as hopeful. He began to strum the guitar.

‘Let me show you the chords,’ Joy said. He took hold of her fingers and placed them on the strings. ‘You have to press harder than that.’

Zaid came into the room. ‘Here’s my little tongue-twister,’ Maya said. ‘Zaid, come and say hello to uncle Joy.’

Joy extended his hand, and when Zaid stepped forward to shake it, he moved it quickly to his forehead. ‘As-Salaam Alaikum. Tricked you!’

Zaid collapsed into giggles.

‘This one knows every language on the planet. Don’t you, Zaid? Tell Uncle Joy something in Spanish.’

Zaid rolled his eyes to the ceiling. ‘Oh-kay,’ he said, enunciating very slowly. ‘Akee yeygo la paz.’

‘That’s very good,’ Joy said. ‘Even I know what that means.’

‘Did he really say something?’ Maya whispered. ‘I always think he’s pulling my leg.’

Joy picked up the deck of cards on the table and began to shuffle. ‘Let me show you something,’ he said.

‘We can’t play cards,’ Maya interjected; ‘he’s not allowed.’

Joy cast a sideways glance at her. ‘It’s not a game,’ he said, ‘it’s magic.’ Nervous, she let him play his trick. Then Zaid climbed into Joy’s lap and whispered something in his ear, and then he danced out of the room, ta-ta, ta-ta, ta-ta, ta-ta.

*

Rehana held her hair in her hands.

‘Oh, Ma.’ Maya took it from her, the tuft like a tiny furred animal. The place where it had been shone like a fragment of metal at the bottom of the sea.

She was in the bath when it happened. There was more, she said, in the towel.

‘Ma,’ Maya said, ‘let’s shave it.’

‘No, not yet.’ Her voice was small and tired. ‘Please, no.’ She lay her head back on the pillow, turned her face away so Maya could no longer see her crying. ‘It’s all right,’ she said, blowing her nose, ‘we discussed this with the doctor.’

Maya was still holding her fallen tuft of hair. ‘Throw it,’ she said. ‘Burn it.’

She tossed it to the floor. Sufia picked it up and disappeared into the kitchen.

Rokeya was on a patch of concrete, sitting with her face to the sun. ‘Get out of the glare,’ Maya said, ‘you’ll get burned.’ It must have been one of the hottest days of the year. Rokeya salaamed, her voice thready, and Maya saw that her lips were dry, hair feathering out from under her scarf.

‘How is your mother?’ she asked.

‘She is managing,’ Maya said.

Rokeya nodded, tears pooling at the corners of her eyes. She placed both hands on her stomach in a gesture Maya recognised immediately.

‘Are you pregnant?’ Maya asked, bending to get a closer look at her.

Rokeya smiled weakly. ‘How did you know?’

Khadija parted the curtain and stepped outside. She cast a light glance at Rokeya and handed her a glass of water. ‘Go inside now,’ she said. Rokeya grabbed the water and swallowed it quickly, holding the glass with both hands and gulping hard.

‘We must do another taleem for your mother,’ Khadija said. She turned to Rokeya again. ‘Tell the sisters to make the arrangements.’

Inside, the air had stopped in its tracks. With the curtains drawn tightly, and the windows shut, it was unbearably hot. Only Khadija looked comfortable, the shine of sweat on her forehead giving her a polished glaze as she took her place at the front of the room. She opened the Book and began to read quietly to herself. The other women, who had been whispering and fanning themselves, straightened and hushed one another. Rokeya motioned for Maya to sit beside her.