The Lost Pearl (2012) (10 page)

I briefly looked up at his eyes, immediately sensing warmth in them. “No, unfortunately not,” I said solemnly.

“Then we have something in common. I was missing my mother. She died eight years ago, when I was thirteen. I miss her and sometimes come here to talk to her.”

We had just met, and he was already sharing with me the personal and poignant details of his life. This was in sharp contrast to me. It had taken me years to share the tragedy of my childhood with even those I considered to be my closest friends.

“I’m so sorry for your loss,” I said. “It was my father I was mourning. I lost him a long time ago too, when I was nine, but it still hurts.”

This was a very unusual beginning to a friendship. We continued to talk, and before I knew it, several hours had passed. I missed my literature class for the very first time but felt relieved after having opened my heart to someone who had been eager to listen.

His name was Ahmer, and he too was from Pakistan, as I had suspected. His hair was dark and fell casually on his forehead.
His eyes were almost black and were intense, as if they were holding layer upon layer of thought and concealing volumes of pain. But they were also kind and caring, as if they could soak up and eradicate another’s agony. He had a dimple in his chin that became more pronounced as he smiled. A subtle scar from a childhood mishap, perhaps, ran across his right cheekbone. He was a law student and had dreamed of becoming a lawyer since his teenage years. Both his parents had left this world. The more recent loss had been that of his mother, who had lost her battle with breast cancer at the age of thirty-six. He had been subsequently cared for by his maternal aunt.

We discussed the political and economic problems Pakistan continued to face, the changes in the cricket team, and the mouthwatering
seekh kababs
at Barbecue Tonight. We talked about the sands of Clifton Beach and the cool Karachi breeze. I told him how I loved to pick up the beautiful seashells that washed up on shore. We talked about how Hasina Moin’s plays made us laugh and cry and how Noor Jehan’s songs touched our hearts. We shared a love for old and new Indian and Pakistani songs and soon agreed to share each other’s collections.

“I remember I was constantly in a rush to complete my homework so I could make it in time for the team selection of the cricket being played in my street,” he said. “The best was when they put streetlights on our road, so we could have night matches. We all went crazy when Pakistan won the world cup in 1992.”

“Who could forget that?” I said, “I wasn’t there, but my brother said they kept listening to the commentary on the radio in their classrooms and after we won, a national school holiday was announced to celebrate. That’s how important cricket is. I saw Imran Khan holding the world cup trophy when I watched the recorded footage that my brother had saved.”

“Imran Khan went beyond cricket when he formed the cancer hospital in his mother’s name. Naturally I feel a kinship
with him for that and I have hope that the political party he began last year will bring some good.”

“I heard the party is called Tehreek-e-Insaaf.”

“Yes. It’s new, but at least it means ‘movement for justice.’ If they can bring about justice, I will support them.”

“I’m so out of touch with cricket now, I don’t even know the names of the new players.”

“Yeah, it’s hard to keep up. I’ve tried to love basketball and football, and the teams at Stanford are great, but I just haven’t been able to get used to the feel. I’m no good at baseball because I keep holding the bat like a cricket bat.” He went on, “When I left Pakistan, I left a part of me behind, and the moment I stepped foot in America, I took a part of it and made it mine. Once you leave your country, you are always regarded by your people as a foreigner, and the country you migrate to regards you as the same. So I guess I always feel like a foreigner, even though I love both my countries.”

“I know what you mean,” I replied. “It’s like you’re always pulling at your mother country’s apron strings, and the pull is far away, but it’s a strong one. With time you grow up, and the pull starts to loosen a bit, but the bond remains strong. The greatest challenge is blending in while never forgetting who you are.”

Ahmer nodded in agreement and said, “My relationship with my homeland is somewhat like a marriage; initially you turn a blind eye to your spouse’s faults, then you try to fix them, and eventually you learn to accept them and love them because they make the person who they are. The streets of Karachi would not be the same if water didn’t flood them every monsoon, and the roadside fruit
chaat
would lose its charm if it were served in a detergent-washed bowl in an upscale restaurant.”

“It’s hard sometimes not to think about the good old times, the carefree days,” I said. “But whenever I go back to Pakistan, it is usually a rude awakening; I’m reminded that it’s no longer the Pakistan of my childhood. It’s hard to believe that Karachi
has enjoyed the title of ‘City of Lights.’ Sitting with you here today, I’m getting nostalgic talking about these things with you. All those little ordinary things we mentioned—the guavas, the mangoes, the fresh pastries from the roadside bakery, and the bazaars overflowing with crowds the night before Eid—the ordinary things that made life extraordinary.”

I enjoyed Ahmer’s company so thoroughly that minutes turned into hours, as words poured like a waterfall. Not once did I, the introverted girl that I was, pause to think before speaking. Not once did either of us look at our watches. Not once did I feel a twinge of guilt for having missed my literature class for the very first time. I had not felt such genuine happiness in years. And that was despite the palpable sadness of my father’s tenth death anniversary.

Our friendship grew strong very quickly. It blossomed parallel to the purple jacarandas in the quad signaling the bloom of spring. We laughed, listened to music, and often had lunch together. We usually ate on campus but sometimes ventured into nearby eateries, mostly the Chinese restaurant Jing-Jing. We would chat about our days in college over the sizzle of barbecued shrimp and share our childhood over the aroma of hot and sour soup. Life seemed to be turning into a sweet alley, even though it might have been a blind one, and I was losing the need to fill it up needlessly with chocolate.

Jennifer and Kavita started teasing me long before I had confessed to them what I had in my heart. Jennifer would say, “There’s a bounce in your step, my dear,” and

“I’ve known you for so many years and have never seen you smile or laugh so much. Whatever this source of your happiness is, may it last a lifetime. I can’t wait to hear about it.”

Kavita would say, “What’s up with you? Your singing has improved tremendously. You are hitting the high notes effortlessly. You are far more in tune than I am, and I spent four years learning classical music. I can tell what it is: you are singing all those romantic songs with your heart, as if you are thinking about someone.”

They were constantly upset that I no longer had time for them and was always making excuses, saying I had tests to prepare for and assignments to submit. “You are awfully busy for the beginning of the semester,” Jennifer would mumble, not believing my story.

When I was ready to share my secret, I had my friends over for dinner. I waited for Jennifer to narrate her blonde joke of the evening.

“OK, so she goes to get a haircut and tells the hairdresser not to take off the headphones she’s wearing or she’ll die,” she said in her usual animated tone. “But the hairdresser forgets and takes them off. Soon after, the blonde has a pretty haircut, but she’s lying there dead. Nobody can understand what happened, and then they find her headphones and listen to the taped recording. It says, ‘Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out.’”

We had a good laugh and started devouring the roasted chicken. As we ate, I casually informed them that I had something important to share. “I met someone,” I said.

Jennifer let the fork in her hand drop. “I knew it! I knew you were up to something. That radiance doesn’t just show up on someone’s face without a really good reason,” she said, jumping out of her chair. She came over to me and gave me a tight hug.

“Who is he?” asked Kavita, reaching over to be included in the hug. “We want details!”

I was suddenly inundated with their questions: “What’s his name? How old is he? Where is he from? When did you meet him? When can we meet him?”

“Let me get some dessert,” I said, trying to escape for a few minutes and not knowing quite where to start.

“Come on, Sana,” Kavita argued, “You know you don’t have to serve us. We will help ourselves. We practically hang out here all the time.”

“Yeah,” said Jennifer. “It’s more fun at your place, although you guys are welcome to hang out more often at mine, but you won’t be able to find anything unless you can swim through the mess.”

“That’s not true, Jennifer,” I remarked. “You are pretty neat, just not when your assignments are due. But even then,
there are pencils and stencils everywhere. At least there is a method to your madness.”

I proceeded to tell them how Ahmer and I had met and how in sync we seemed to be. We were just friends, I told them; I did not know how he felt about me and certainly was not planning to ask. I told them how perfect I thought he was for me, and we spent the next few hours chatting and laughing uncontrollably.

Jennifer helped me hang up one of her sketches that I had asked her for, my favorite angle of the Twin Towers that she had made for her project. It was an oblique view of the World Trade Center towering above the rest of the Manhattan skyline in the early hours of the morning. It was commendable how she had replicated the impression of height on a sixteen-by-twenty canvas so well. We placed it next to her other two drawings that covered my wall. This arrangement had worked out well, it had helped decorate my sitting room with meaningful art, and assisted Jennifer in finding a good home for her dear paintings, which would otherwise have collected layers of dust in her apartment. I had moved all the photographs into my bedroom, including my very treasured family portrait, and had turned the lounge into what I called “Jennifer’s gallery.” One of the paintings depicted Shah Faisal Mosque in Islamabad, an architectural asset of Pakistan. I had given Jennifer a photograph of it, and she had drawn the tall minarets surrounding the tent-shaped center on the backdrop of the scenic Margalla hills. She had submitted it for an assignment about The Modern Architecture of Southeast Asia. The third was a pen drawing of the Stanford quad, with its intricately constructed arches and the shadows they cast, and included a couple of students in the midst of a busy day. I admired it and knew it would forever be my valued possession, as it was a beautiful depiction of my alma mater. But now, after having met Ahmer there, that artistic sketch had acquired a new meaning for me altogether.

Over the next few months, I continued to talk to Ahmer and liked everything I learned about him. I had subtly made it clear to him that I was from a conservative, traditional family, and the only step beyond a platonic friendship that I would consider would be marriage, which would have to occur through the proper channel, after a proposal to my family. We only talked about these things indirectly.

There was a mystery about him that I found intriguing, and I was not in any hurry to unravel it. He would sometimes get a faraway look in his eyes, but it would be gone before I had a chance to read it. He seemed to have a magnetic force emanating from him that was gradually pulling me out of my cocoon. I thought briefly about the comparison he had drawn about his relationship with Pakistan being like a marriage. It was unusual for a single person to be so insightful about the complications of marriage, but then he was an unusual, multifaceted person and seemed to know a lot about everything. I smiled to myself, thinking his understanding about married life may come in handy later.

In the summer, I finally gave in to the pressure from my friends and introduced him to Jennifer and Kavita. To my delight, they liked him tremendously.

“He’s cool,” Jennifer had said. “I really like him, and I’m not saying that just to flatter you.”

“He seems like a guy with a backbone, and forgive the cliché, but a tall, dark, and handsome one at that. Plus I think you both look great together,” Kavita commented.

I was pleased that my friends had approved of him. They were honest, and I knew they had set the bar high for me and were undoubtedly in a position to be far more objective than myself. Their opinion mattered and helped me seal my trust in my own sentiments.

I met his friends too, a group of girls and boys who all seemed quite amiable; we would often go out as a group to eat or
occasionally to watch a movie. My one-to-one conversation with Ahmer was mostly on the phone or chatting on the computer. Occasionally we would meet on campus or have lunch together.

“Abida Parveen is coming to San Francisco,” Ahmer told me one day, referring to a famous Pakistani singer. “You want to go to her show?” he asked casually.