The Sweetness of Tears (25 page)

I shook my head, rejecting this assertion of youth, feeling far, far older than the number of years in my age. Do you know how old I was? I was twenty-four.

“Yes, Deena. You are still young. Your father, who was my friend, would not have wanted to see you throw your life away, burdened with responsibilities that should be shouldered by others.”

“Abbas Uncle. I don’t understand what you’re saying. Are you urging me to marry a man who lives in America? To leave Pakistan? This is something you would allow?”

“Of course, Deena. What do you take me for? Your well-being is everything to me. Your happiness.”

I shook my head. “This is neither here nor there, Abbas Uncle. I have no intention of marrying Umar.” Abbas Uncle raised his eyebrows, a question. “The neighbor’s son,” I clarified, feeling myself blush for no reason at all. “Nor is there any reason to suppose that he would wish it.”

“If not him, as I said before, then someone else. I’ll find you a husband, Deena. Just as your father would have done for you.”

“No. This talk is ridiculous. I will not marry again. Sadiq is all I need.”

“But Sadiq doesn’t belong to you, Deena.”

“I don’t understand, Abbas Uncle. What you mean.”

“I will not allow you to use Sadiq as an excuse for living your life as if you were already dead. I have decided. For your sake. Sadiq belongs in his father’s home. And you will be free to move on. To make a new life for yourself.”

That is when it hit me—the full force of what Abbas Uncle had really come to say—like a blow to my belly, making me wince in pain, wringing tears from my eyes, bitter tears of pure rage. “For my sake?! Please—be clear, Abbas Uncle. I want to understand you fully. Before I react. Your words—all of this contrition and concern—are you saying what I think you are? That you intend to take Sadiq away from me? From his mother?!”

“It’s the only way, Deena. As harsh as it may seem. The only solution. There is wisdom in the laws of God. The laws that say he belongs in my house—in the home of his father. I tried to resist that wisdom, thinking that to take him from you would be too cruel. By rights, the boy should have come home when he was weaned. I realize now that this was the right thing. For everyone concerned. And I intend to fix it now. If I don’t do this, you will never move on, forfeiting your future. I cannot have that on my head, Deena. That, on top of the pain of your past, which I am responsible for. Don’t think I’m not aware of that.”

“The laws of God? That’s what you call it? You want to take my son away from me—to tear my heart, beating and alive, out of my chest—and then justify your brutal intentions in the name of God?”

Abbas Uncle bowed his head.

“Please, Abbas Uncle! Don’t do this! If it’s— if you want me to come and live under your roof, I will do it. Sadiq and I will move. I will give up this place. But don’t take my son away from me.”

“Deena. That will not solve the problem. If you think I do this for my own sake, then you’ll see that I would have no problem with what you suggest. But that will not solve the problem of
your
future, Deena. Sadiq is a part of your past. I will not allow you to come and live with him under my roof—a sacrifice at the altar of my son’s tragedy. That isn’t fair to you. What I propose—it’s for your own good. You’ll see that. In time. I am sure that this is the right thing to do.”

“The right thing? To separate me from my own soul? The reason I live and breathe? I—I’ll do what you say, Abbas Uncle. I’ll marry whoever you wish. Or not. Whatever you wish! But don’t take Sadiq away from me! I am begging!”

“It is the best way, Deena. I cannot allow my grandson to be raised as the son of another. He belongs under my roof. And you must move on.”

“But— I—I will fight you, Abbas Uncle. Surely I have some rights—?”

“You are free to do what you will, Deena. But I warn you, fighting me would be pointless. The law is on my side. And this is a fight I will not allow you to win. I will bring everything to bear in fighting and winning. Because I am right. I know I am.”

I closed my eyes, letting myself imagine what such a fight would entail. Me—a mother, alone, widowed—fighting against the likes of Abbas Ali Mubarak. I felt faint at the thought of all his power and influence, at the knowledge of how justice in Pakistan worked—at the whim of a legal system enthralled with power, riddled with corruption. I remembered his talk of bribes with my father. This man—who threw God in my face, with no shame—he would buy judges and lawyers and clerks to do his bidding. What he said was true. The outcome of any fight between the likes of me and this man was already a foregone conclusion. Out loud, I whimpered.

Abbas Uncle stood up. “I will go now. And give you a chance to calm yourself. I will be back in a few days.” He was at the door, about to see himself out. There, he paused for a moment, then said, “This is not the direction I wanted this discussion to take. I don’t want there to be a battle between us, Deena. I only want to make things right in a situation where there are no good options for any of us. To make things right for you, my child, and to clear the way for you to have the future you deserve.”

“I don’t deserve
this,
Abbas Uncle. I don’t deserve to have my son taken away from me,” I whispered hoarsely, to myself, because Abbas Uncle was already gone.

I went to a lawyer. He told me that though it would be difficult and could take time, I had a case to be made. Then he asked me about the size of my bank balance. And laughed in my face when I told him who my father-in-law was.

I went to visit Abbas Uncle. At his office. In his home. I spoke with Sajida Auntie, appealing to her as one mother to another. To Asma, too. No one listened. No one cared.

Two weeks later, Abbas Uncle sent the car to take Sadiq from me. He had threatened to send the police, with a court order, warning me, “Don’t do this, Deena. Don’t make me bring strangers into this private matter. Making it into a spectacle.”

What could I do? I couldn’t let my son be dragged away from me in that way. For his sake, I let Sharif Muhammad Chacha take him, all the while racking my brains for a way to get Sadiq back. I couldn’t find any.

I died that day. And waited, in death, for the day they would send him to visit. When he came, I came to life. For an hour, no more. The weeks passed. And there were days—so many days—when I waited in vain. This, too, I suppose, had been part of the plan. To wrench my son away, to keep him from me. I went to see Abbas Uncle again, to remind him of his promise. That Sadiq would visit me every week, the way I had let him visit them.

“It’s better this way, Deena. You think I don’t know? What I am inflicting on you?”

“If you knew, you wouldn’t be able to do it.”

“You have to move on. You must see this, Deena. It’s for your sake. For you.”

There was no one I could turn to. The few relatives I had would not help—no one wanted to become involved in helping to thwart the will of a man like Abbas Ali Mubarak.

In desperation, I searched through my English translation of the Quran, looking to see what it had to say about the custody of children. Nothing. Then I went to the mullah who had represented me at my wedding. He shook his head. “
Beti,
this is Sharia, the law of God, not to be trifled with.”

“But there’s nothing in the Quran that says so!”

“No matter. The interpretation of the learned ones is sound.”

“The learned ones! They must all have been men!”

“Of course they were!” he said, shocked. “You think it’s a woman’s job to determine what the law of God is? The boy belongs in the house of his father. That is clear. It is God’s will.”

That day, I came home and knew the truth. I had lost Sadiq. Now, I
was
alone. Even God was gone. I took out my shears and hacked my prayer rug into slivers and slices, angry at the God I could see no sign of, railing at Him for His injustice, like a madwoman. I
was
mad—as mad as my husband had been. I stopped eating. I stopped sleeping.

How to explain? What happened next. How the boy next door, who had rescued me from a fall when I was a child, saw the shell of what I had become—a brittle shell, about to shatter. He came to visit, prompted by Macee, who, in desperation, recoiling in horror when she saw the ragged ribbons of my prayer rug strewn about the floor of my room, sent him a summons through the washerwoman next door.

I don’t even remember that visit. He came and sat with me in silence. Creating a space for me to just be, a space that was separate from the madness I had given in to. He began to visit every day. Bringing books with him, reading out loud. I drank in the sound of his voice. I savored the essence of his presence, remembering a time before this descent.

He made inquiries, confirming what I already knew. There was nothing to be done, any merits of my case outweighed by the power and wealth on Abbas Uncle’s side. So, I yielded. Not to the injustice. But to the suffering it caused. I had no other choice.

In that moment of surrender, I also yielded to Umar. I agreed to marry him. To go with him to America, leaving behind what life had dealt me so far. In this new life that I began, there was a hole, too deep to ever fill. But it was right there in the open. Not hidden, or secret, waiting to trip me up in surprise. I learned to plant the garden of my life around it. To stop and look at it from time to time, standing at its edge. Even to descend, frequently in the beginning, into the hole—to lie down in it and let myself feel the pain of separation from my son, which was not by my choice. Though some may not see it that way. I could have stayed in Pakistan. Maybe I should have. But I don’t regret leaving. Whatever regret there was, was not mine to feel. That belonged to someone else.

That regret was what eventually gave Sadiq back to me. But when he came, he was not the boy I had left behind. Nor was I the woman from whom he had been taken. We were strangers to each other—my baby boy, swallowed up by the sullen silence of manhood—the life I had built without him alien to his faded memories of a mother he had never had to share with anyone else.

Sadiq stayed with us for only a year, unable to adjust. Then he went away, no less a stranger than he’d been when he arrived. You, Jo, are the proof of that.

I
let silence fall over the echoes of my story. While I’d been speaking, I’d heard Umar return from the supermarket. He’d quietly put away the groceries. Then, without intruding, he’d come into the room with his briefcase in hand, gesturing, telling me that he would be in his study, grading papers, if I needed him. A little while ago, I’d heard the movements upstairs that indicated he’d gone to bed. It was past my bedtime, too. Strangely, I was not tired.

After a moment, Jo asked, “And the reason that Sadiq was sent to you? The accident? You know about that?”

I nodded, a little surprised. “I know about it. I’m surprised that you do.” I let another moment of silence pass.

Jo thought about that for a moment. “He’s in Pakistan?”

“As far as I know.” We had arrived, then, at the reason she had come—a reason that went beyond merely listening to the long story I had shared. “Why do you want to see him?”

“I—it’s—it’s complicated.” She hesitated. “But—some of what Sadiq told me—when he did, I—I ran away from it. From the connection. It was hard. To acknowledge. But I realize, now, that there’s a reason for it. And—I have some things I want to ask him. And some things I need to tell him about.”

I nodded. Whatever it was, she didn’t want to share it with me. I understood. We were strangers, after all.

Gently, I said, “I’ll give you Sadiq’s number.”

“Thank you. You’re in touch, then? Regularly? Things are okay between you?”

“That depends on what the definition of okay is. What was lost between us—that, we were never able to find again. But he is very dutiful. With his monthly calls. Letting me know where he is. I haven’t seen him in many years.” I sighed. “You can call from here, if you like.”

“What I have to say, and what I want to ask him about— I have to do it in person. Over there. In Karachi, I hope.”

I frowned. “You’ll go to Pakistan?”

“Yes.”

I felt my eyebrows rise. Then fall. I looked at my watch. “It’s late. Do you live here? In Los Angeles?”

“No. I live in Washington, D.C.”

“Where are you staying?”

“I was going to drive down to my parents’ house. In San Diego.”

“It’s too late for that now. Stay here for the night. In the guest room. It was Sadiq’s room while he was here.”

After a while, Jo said, “Yes. I’ll stay. Thank you.”

“And, Jo. When you go—to Pakistan—to see Sadiq— I’ll go with you.”

Part Three

Angela

Onward Christian soldiers,

Marching as to war . . .

Sabine Baring-Gould (1864 Hymn)

I
n the days leading up to Thanksgiving, I watched Chris carefully. And saw the effort it took for him to pull himself up and get ready for Jo to arrive. She’d come home for a short visit after he came back from Iraq, months ago. Was there when his bus pulled in at the base, with flowers and balloons and a great big hug and kiss, as big as the ones Jake and I gave him.

But Jo stayed only for a few days, not enough time to notice that anything was wrong, rushing back to D.C. to go on another one of her assignments. She said she wasn’t allowed to talk about her job. But that didn’t really explain how reserved she’d become, something that had started even before she took that job. The changes in Jo, since before she went away to college, were something Jake and Chris hadn’t understood. I’d known the truth, of course. That she had less to say because of the answers I’d given her before she left home. But now, after coming back from Iraq, the changes in Chris were more drastic than the ones in Jo.

I didn’t worry too much at first, giving him space, like the papers we’d gotten from the military said to do, assuming that some of what I noticed was just part of the process of readjusting back to life at home. At first, it was just that he kept to himself, in his room. I worried, but not nearly as much as I had when he was away. I was so relieved to have him home. So was Jake, even more relieved than me.

When Chris signed up for the Marines, right after 9/11, I saw how worried Jake was. For his son. He knew the danger. I’d thought of my dad and I’d worried, too. About what war does to a man—a word I couldn’t even use for Chris. He was just a boy. He always would be to me.

Jake and I worried about Jo, too. But not as much. Jo had promised, when her father asked—after we realized that she was involved, too, somehow, in the War on Terror—that she wasn’t doing anything dangerous.

“At least not dangerous to me,” she’d said, and then refused to explain what she meant.

I knew Jake worked hard not to show how scared he was. He said that
this
time, it was different. I knew what he was talking about—that he was comparing the war about to start in Afghanistan to the one he’d fought in.

He said, “This one, we didn’t ask for. It’s a war that
they
came and started on our soil. We’ve got a right to defend ourselves. To get the people who attacked us.”

He was reliving his past while I tried hard not to think of mine. When the war began, I looked Afghanistan up on a map of the world—a country I’d never even heard of until now. It shocked me to find out it was right next to Pakistan, the name of a place I
had
heard of, from people I had tried very hard to forget. Seeing that map made everything messier, more complicated, than I wanted life to be. I had to shrug off wondering where they were and what they were feeling—the boy I’d made love to, the woman who’d been my friend, people I’d been close to for one irregular moment of my life, yet hardly knew at all. It was the first time in all these years that I considered their connection to the lives I’d carried inside of me, the lives I’d nurtured and raised and kept from them—in the present tense instead of the past. Suddenly, I felt like the tie that I’d denied, my blood mixed with Sadiq’s, was snatching my babies back to the part of the world where he came from. I wanted things to be simple and neat, a line drawn between us and them. But in my nightmares, it was Deena’s face and Sadiq’s that threatened my children, the faces of people who’d been kind to me, people I wanted to hate but couldn’t. When Chris didn’t go to Afghanistan, after all, I was relieved. I could put all those tangled old ties back into a box and turn my attention to another place, Iraq, which, I told myself, was far enough away not to matter.

But the shift, from one war to another, made Jake more uneasy. The day Chris was deployed to Iraq, Jake cried. In all our years of marriage, I’d never seen him cry. It was hard to see him suffer while Chris was away. He started to have nightmares. Something he’d never had before. He talked in his sleep, sounding terrified, whimpering. Sometimes, he’d wake up and get out of bed. I followed him once or twice. And found him sitting in the dark, in Chris’s room. By the sound of his breathing, I knew he was crying. Once, I heard him say to himself, not knowing that I was there, in the doorway, “It’s not the same. It’s not the same.” He sounded like he was trying to convince himself. And failing.

But that was Jake by night. By day, he was all gung-ho, up on every turn and twist of battle and strategy that I couldn’t bear to hear about, because I was too afraid. He watched the news all the time. Kept the radio tuned to it in his car. He got a subscription to two newspapers, and started using the Internet to keep up with everything that was happening over there, in Iraq. All he talked about was the war, daring anyone—friends, customers, relatives—to say anything against it. Mom tried hard not to rise to the bait at first, her face all pinched up with the effort not to say anything—for my sake, I think. But I knew her well enough to know what she really felt. When she did start arguing with Jake, it was in a softer, quieter kind of tone than she normally used, making me think she’d guessed at Jake’s nighttime secrets—that his furious, daylight optimism was a mask for a fear almost as big as mine was.

The truth is, I didn’t care what either of them thought—Mom or Jake—didn’t care about why or how this war was being waged, whether the reasons for it were sound or not. I couldn’t let myself think about any of that, just keeping my head down instead, focusing on things I
could
control, putting together one care package after another for Chris and his buddies, praying, praying, praying. I’d lost a father to war and its aftermath. Now, I was afraid of losing a son.

Mom knew, somehow, that I needed her. She stuck by me, not going anywhere the whole time Chris was away, at home longer than she’d been since I was a kid. Whatever the arguments were between them, Mom and Jake and I were on the same page whenever we’d hear about casualties, all of us pacing the floor, waiting until we’d hear from Chris.

Nobody was happier than Jake when Chris came home. But, as time passed, my worry was increasing. Chris was taking longer to adjust to being home than I thought he would. He refused all invitations from his old friends, even the members of his old band, Christian March, who wanted him to come out and play with them. He’d go out alone. And come home alone. Chris had always been the center of a bunch of friends, all the years he grew up.

I was shocked, that first time it happened. To smell liquor on Chris’s breath. He’d never had anything more than a sip of champagne at weddings before. I ignored it the first time. The second time, I asked him about it. He got angry. And told me to mind my own business. No big deal, I suppose. For a grown son to tell his mother off for babying him. But it
was
a big deal. To me. Chris had never once raised his voice to me before. When he got pulled over, for a DUI, I broke a cardinal rule in our dry house and begged him to bring home whatever he needed. But not to drink and drive. He’d been lucky. The officer who’d pulled him over was the brother of one of Chris’s high school buddies. He brought him home instead of arresting him, giving him a stern lecture, telling him he wasn’t going to haul him off to jail because he had too much respect for the fact that Chris was serving his country.

I regretted giving Chris permission to drink at home. Because he started to drink all the time. Finally, Jake put his foot down.

“Chris. You need help. You won’t talk to us. That’s okay. But you’ve got to find someone to talk to.”

Jake called my dad for advice and to see if he still knew his way around the VA. I didn’t object. I remembered how I’d met Jake in the first place. We’d only been in touch with my father through Christmas cards in all the years since the twins were born. That’s all the contact I’d wanted to have. Ron had done more, though. Had even visited him in L.A., with his family. After that, Jake knew how to help Chris get an appointment at the VA. We drove him there together. The people there told Chris that he had PTSD, which is what Jake had suspected, and gave him a couple of prescriptions. What they talked about, what he said to them, I have no idea. I wasn’t happy about the pills. Especially when I found out that there’d be no follow-up appointment for another six months.

At first, the pills seemed to help. But that was before I realized. That Chris, like Jake when Chris was in Iraq, was walking the halls at night. I’d wake up when it was still dark out, thinking I’d heard a sound in the kitchen. And there’d be Chris, getting himself something to eat. Keeping vampire hours. I’d make myself a cup of cocoa, offering to make him some, too. I’d ask him, beg him, to tell me what was on his mind. He’d shake his head and say nothing. The scariest thing was—there was no more light coming out of Chris’s eyes, where before there’d been stars, suns, of light. Now, there was none.

I was looking forward to Thanksgiving. Was glad to see Chris make the effort to liven up. To shave. And shower. To clean his room, which was a place I didn’t even try to set foot in because of how mad he’d gotten when I offered to clean it months before. I made a menu. And a list for groceries. Chris offered to do the shopping for me. He helped me in the kitchen. I felt like he was coming back.

Jo came a day later than she’d said she would. She told us not to come to the airport. That she was flying in through L.A. She drove home in a rental car. I asked her why she didn’t bring Dan with her. I liked Dan. I was hoping to hear some kind of announcement soon. She said she didn’t want him here for Thanksgiving. That she just wanted things to be like old times. Chris watched her face when she said this. He smiled, happier than he had been in a long time, I could tell. That Jo was home. That he’d have her to himself for a while. Sometimes, by the way he looked up to her, even when they were little, it seemed like there were years between them, instead of only minutes. She’d always been his big sister more than his twin. When she’d left for college, I’d seen the wedge come up between them. I hadn’t done anything to stop it—something I regretted now. I’d been selfish, at a cost to their relationship that I’d pretended not to notice. Until now, when I knew he needed her. More than he’d ever needed her before. Chris was shaken and scattered and nothing I’d tried was helping.

Jo would help him put the pieces of the puzzle back together. She was good at that. Even when she was little, just a toddler, I saw how she made connections, fitting things together to make sense of the world around her. She’d sit there, with her tongue between her teeth, and figure out those wooden picture puzzles when she was two years old. At that age, Chris still thought the pieces just tasted good. If Jo couldn’t understand what her brother was going through, and give him words to express it, then no one could.

O
n Thanksgiving, the house was bursting with people and laughter and love. Mom had flown in the night before. Ron and his family came early in the day. Jo and Chris and their cousins gathered around the television, watching the game, while I got the turkey ready in the kitchen, with the help of Mom and my sister-in-law, Lisa.

Everyone was still smiling when the meal was served. I asked Ron to say grace. And then we dug in. The turkey was the best I’d made in years. The stuffing, just right. And then, as the food on the table cooled, the conversation heated up.

What is it about Thanksgiving? That controversy always has to be on the menu? Like turkey can’t be digested until someone around the table picks a fight. The one that day started before I served the pie. And, like every year when Mom was around, the fight started out being between her and Ron—both of them shooting biblical bullets at each other to defend their very different views on God and life and the world in general. Only this time, Jake, who had never before had anything to add to the spectacle that Mom and Ron seemed to enjoy making of themselves, had something to say, too. Something fierce.

“All I’m saying is that when I see your
friends,
” Mom spit the word out at Ron, “on television, going around rubbing their hands with glee at the thought of Armageddon, it makes me cringe. All this talk of End Times! It’s like they’re playing some kind of board game with the Bible. Like the war and death they see happening in the world is just another move forward, roll the dice, and full-steam ahead. Yippee!” Mom raised her hands up, sarcastically, and waved them like a fan at a ball game. “Jesus is coming! And we’re going to win!”

“These are biblical scholars you’re talking about,” Ron said, ignoring Mom’s snicker. “They’ve done their research. They’re just sharing what they see ahead of us. And it’s not good.”

“Biblical scholars! Puh-leeze! What does it take to be able to call yourself that? A certificate you earn off the Internet? You went to Wheaton, Ron. You know better!” Mom was even louder than usual. “You can’t mean what you’re saying. Giving these charlatans—these false prophets!—any credit for scholarship! The Bible can’t be read that way. Picking and choosing passages. To support the twisted way they see the world. And what for?! To foster fear? As if there isn’t enough in the world already!”

“Fear is good. Fear is what pushes people in God’s direction,” Ron said.

“Fear leads us into hate,” said Mom.

“Watch it, Mom,” said Ron scornfully. “You’re starting to sound like one of those hippie Christians again.” Ron was on a roll. “That lefty, liberal, mealymouthed version of Christianity that you preach, Mom—making Jesus out to be some kind of spaced-out, long-haired peacenik with no muscle in his words—it’s just an attempt to make religion weak, to make God into something ineffectual and effeminate.”

“As opposed to macho and muscular? I’ve got news for you, Ron,” Mom said. “Jesus
did
have long hair.”

“You know what I meant!”