J
ameel had no sooner pressed his lips against Chloe's than his cell phone began to vibrate in his pocket. He dropped his arms from around her and retrieved it, flipping open the cover, and the moment was totally gone.
“Yes, Mommy,” he said softly into the phone, turning his back so Chloe couldn't hear. He'd always called his mother Mommy, but it occurred to him just then that it might sound childish. At first there was silence on the other end of the line, and then he heard his mother draw in a long, shaky breath. “What is it?” he asked.
“Where are you, Beta?” It sounded as if she'd been crying. “I'm sending Javed for you immediately.” Javed drove Jameel's father to work, then came back to drive his mother to the market and on other errands around San Francisco. Javed had taken them that evening to the Indian Consul-General's house.
“Tell me what's wrong!” He kept his voice low. His
mother was usually calm and reserved. She was not like some other Pakistani-American mothers: overprotective, disapproving, and subject to panic at the most normal things.
“We're on our way home. It's your grandfather,” she said. “We're leaving for Lahore on the first flight we can catch. We have toâ”
“What's happened?” Jameel asked. “Is he ⦔
“It sounds as if he's had a stroke, Beta,” she said. “He's in and out of consciousness. It sounds very bad. I want to see him ⦠well, as soon as possible. Before he went unconscious he was asking for you. Uncle Omar says we must come now. We're on standby for a flight that leaves around noon tomorrow. I'll pack your things and we must get some sleep.”
“Tell Javed to meet me at the corner of Embarcadero and Broadway,” Jameel said quickly. “I'm going there right now.”
Jameel folded his cell phone and dropped it back into his pocket. He flipped his skateboard with his toe, caught it, and held out his hand to Chloe.
“I have to go,” he said, his face coloring. She held on to his hand.
“I know, Jimmy,” said Chloe. “I heard.”
“It's my grandfather,” Jameel said quickly. His throat tightened and he was embarrassed to feel the pressure of tears behind his eyes. Chloe squeezed his hand. “He's, he's ⦠It sounds bad. He's in a hospital in Lahore. We're leaving tomorrow.” Jameel felt a little faint. The edges of his vision darkened and telescoped inward. Chloe shook his arm.
“Jameelâwhat's wrong?” She led him by the hand to a concrete bench near a bus stop and guided him to sit on it. “You look as if you've seen a ghost! You're sweating.”
Jameel's vision cleared and he took deep breaths until his head stopped doing loops. Chloe was wiping his forehead and face with a red bandanna kerchief doused with cool water from her bottle.
“My grandfather and I have always been very close. I'm named for himâMahsood Jameel is my real name, just like his: Mahsood Jameel Muhammad Amirzai. They called him Mahsood, except for my grandmother, who called him Jameel. He's always been so healthy, and I guess I thought he'd live forever.”
“Oh,” she said. “I'm so sorry.” Her eyes were round and her face was uncharacteristically still. She really was sorry, Jameel thought. She handed him her water bottle. “Hereâyou probably should drink this.” He obeyed.
“Thanks,” he said. “Chloe, I ⦔ To Jameel's horror his throat closed and he felt tears prickling again at the back of his eyes.
“Are you okay?” she asked. He nodded and turned his head to swipe at the tears with her kerchief. She turned, so he could see her face fully lit in the streetlight.
“I don't pray very often,” she said, “but I'll pray for him. And I'll think about you and send you good thoughts. I'll do it at eight every morning so you can be listening.” Her blue eyes clouded for a moment. “Will a Jew's prayers work?”
Jameel cleared his throat and managed to smile. “Muslims and Christians and Jews all pray to the same God, Chloe.
Yes, they'll work just fine. At eight every morning. That will be eight at night in Pakistan,” he said. “I'll be there when you are. Chloe ⦠I'm so glad ⦔ He wasn't sure what to say she wasâhis girlfriend? That seemed a little extreme.
She smiled and leaned forward to plant a kiss softly on his mouth. “Me too,” she said. He was surprised and couldn't speak for a moment. The kiss stayed right there on his lips, where she left it. He smiled back at her and they both stood. Chloe hooked her finger into his back jeans pocket again as they walked toward the corner where Javed would meet him.
“Thanks, Chloe,” he said a few minutes later when the black Mercedes rolled up to the stoplight on Broadway, a block away. “I'll see you soon.” Jameel felt a stab of embarrassed alarm as they approached the car, but Chloe didn't even seem to notice. She took his hand and squeezed it quickly before letting go.
“Bye, Jimmy,” she said, her voice a soft whisper. He felt her eyes on his back all the way to the car, until he opened the rear door and climbed inside. He waved at her through the dark-tinted rear window. She probably couldn't see him, he thought, but she smiled and waved, then waved with her red kerchief so he could see her under the streetlight until the car turned the corner.
Jameel felt as if a giant fist had him by the heart, it thrashed and hammered so hard inside his chest. He wondered what it felt like, this sleep after a strokeâwas it dark? Or just like sleeping? Or death, for that matterâwould his grandfather be aware as he died that he was leaving all of
those who loved him? He wondered if Grandfather was trying desperately to awaken. Jameel hadn't thought of these things when Grandmother had died the year before. He rested his head against the white linen cover on the backseat of his father's car as Javed drove along Embarcadero, passing warehouses with metal roofs that glinted dimly behind the streetlights.
Jameel closed his eyes, and an image popped into his head of himself and his grandfather riding the bright red-and-silver BMW motorcycle one July day through the streets of Gulberg near Number 5 Anwar Road. His grandfather whooped like a small boy, his white beard flying over his shoulder, just as it had on the Jet Ski this summer. Jameel held on for dear life, but he laughed the whole time as the wind snatched away his breath.
When Jameel got home it seemed every light in the house was lit. Upstairs his mother rushed back and forth from the laundry to his room. A large leather suitcase lay open on his bed, and a metal trunk sat on its end near the bedroom door.
“How long are we staying?” Jameel asked as she brushed past him with another armload of neatly folded shirts. When she didn't answer, Jameel followed her back to the laundry. She stopped beside the dryer and he ran into her.
“I don't know,” she said, turning and stepping around him.
“But you don't have to pack
all
of my clothesâschool starts in two weeks ⦔
“Jameel,” she said, “I'm sorryâI don't know how long I should be packing for. I'm just trying to do it. Javed's getting
gas in the carâhe'll be back in a few minutes. Daddy's packing some papers in the office. Your grandfather is very ill. We don't know if he will live until we get to Lahore, or if he does, how long he'll be alive. Uncle Omar said the doctors don't know exactly what's wrong yet. They don't know whether he'll awaken again, so we can talk to him.” She laid her hand against Jameel's cheek and then resumed bustling and looking worried.
W
hen Muti and Omar arrived at Jinnah Hospital, they rushed to the second floor, where they found several relatives standing in a knot and talking quietly near the foot of Baba's bed in a large, dimly lit room. Nazir was there, and Auntie Selma, as well as various cousins. Only Selma stood near Baba, who lay under a sheet that was neatly tucked around him. Selma's hand rested on her brother's shoulder, and she talked gently to him as if he were awake. Nazir and two cousins stood apart from the others, their backs to the bed. A glucose drip was fastened to Baba's arm and his face was peaceful. Dr. Ghafoor came in and spread his arms as if to embrace them all.
“Please,” said the doctor, “please take seats in the visitors' lounge. It's just across the hall. We don't know whether he will awaken, but if he does, the room shouldn't be so chaotic.” One by one they moved quietly out into the hall, where they stood near the doorway as if reluctant to miss
the old man's awakening. A fan clicked overhead, and a strong scent of antiseptic barely disguised the underlying smell of body fluids.
Dr. Ghafoor stopped Muti and Omar at the door and motioned for them to stay. Selma stayed behind, too.
“Is your nephew coming?” Dr. Ghafoor asked Omar. “You said he asked for his grandson and his niece.”
“This is Mumtaz,” said Omar. “It's the middle of the night in California, where Jameel and his family live. They were trying to get a seat on a flight that leaves around noon their time, I think. How much time does he have?” Mumtaz looked anxiously from Omar's face to the doctor's.
“There's no way to tell,” Dr. Ghafoor said. “His vital signs are relatively weak. That could change. Right now the trend is toward further weakening. There's no way to knowâit could be days, or a matter of hours. While it's possible that he'll awaken, you shouldn't have false hope. But it would be very good to have everyone he asked for here.”
Muti had never seen Omar so shaken. His face was pale and droplets of sweat stood out on his forehead. “Please, Doctor, tell me the truth. Is there any chance my father will live?”
“I have told you the truth,” said Dr. Ghafoor. “It appears he has had a cerebrovascular accident, most likely a thrombosis, a blood clot that has lodged in his brain. While he has weakened since he came in, it's possible that if he regains consciousness in the next twenty-four hours, he could survive. I suggest those of you who are closest to him take turns staying here with him. We don't know what role the will
plays in surviving an event like thisâif it's so important to him that he should talk with your niece and nephew, he may fight hard until Jameel arrives, and perhaps he'll regain consciousness.”
“Can he hear if we talk to him?” asked Muti.
“Of course, we're not certain what a stroke patient can hear when he's in a coma. But nothing will be lost if you try, and a great deal might be gained.”
Omar pulled a chair up to the bedside and beckoned Muti to sit. Muti reached under the cover for Baba's hand. It was warm and soft and very much alive. Muti squeezed her fingers around the huge palm, but his fingers did not return the pressure. She stroked his arm and looked into his face. His winged black eyebrows, which had always wriggled with pleasure when he smiled, were still.
“I'll check back in a while,” said Dr. Ghafoor. “Send someone for me at once if he awakens.”
Omar and Muti took turns talking to Baba, telling him that Jameel would soon be on his way, that the others were waiting outside, and how everyone was praying for his recovery. Selma stroked her brother's arm and talked softly near his ear. Omar and Selma began to reminisce, with Selma sitting in the chair next to the bed and Omar standing on the other side. Muti stood beside Omar and listened.
Across the hallway, Muti saw Uncle Nazir staring straight ahead into Baba's room. A memory of something so painful that Muti hadn't thought of the event since it happened flew into her mind with such unexpected ferocity she felt as if she'd been hit in the stomach.
It was on the farm at Okurabad, at a time when she felt happy and secure. She and her mother lived in a small mud brick building of one room across the stable yard from the kitchen. Her mother had declined to live in the big house, where her father lived with Amina and his other two wives and their children. Shabanu shielded Muti from the other women in Rahim's household.
One day when Muti was five, she was playing in the courtyard with her fawn, which she and her mother had named Choti because the deer remained little even as she matured. The fawn was a gift from her father. Shabanu and Muti had tied a red cord around Choti's neck with a little bell on it so Mumtaz could keep track of her pet. The ayah called Muti in for her lunch and a nap. Mumtaz had fallen asleep, as she always did, with Choti curled up beside her bed, her velvety nose buried between her delicate fawn legs.
When Mumtaz awoke, the fawn was not there. She and her mother searched all through the heat and dust of the afternoon. They looked in the kitchen, where the khansama sometimes slipped treats from the oven to Mumtaz when no one was watching; they walked along the canal, calling into the woods and underbrush; they searched the stables, where Choti was forbidden to go. By the end of the afternoon they still had not found the fawn.
The next morning Mumtaz awoke before her mother and slipped away to help the mali water the flowers and feed the birds in cages on the veranda of the big house. She hoped the mali might have seen Choti. On her way to the front garden, Mumtaz passed the courtyard in front of the garage, and
there, hanging from a thick tree branch by their hind legs, were four deer, blood dripping in dark red ribbons from their noses. An indentation in the smallest doe's fur around the neck where the bell cord had hung identified Choti.
Mumtaz had run crying to her mother. Shabanu's lovely face turned pale and her eyes were like stones. She took Muti away to Lahore. And shortly afterward Rahim was killed in a dispute with Nazir over land. And not long after that, Shabanu was gone, too.