Chapter 2 Asma #4
For the first time, Asma sensed there was something in her father’s response beyond anger or derision.
She couldn’t remember the last time he had paid her a compliment.
It was as though he was experiencing a type of loss and, to her surprise, sitting side by side with the sting of his words, she felt a deep well of empathy for him.
Had he been proud of her because of her long hair?
Because it meant there was still some part of her that cared about traditions and conformed?
Because he was still hoping that she would be someone that she could never be?
They paused to give stiff, obligatory salaams to a young couple with a little boy from the mosque as they walked into Ray’s. The bell on the door tinkled, and the happy smells of cinnamon and oil wafted out.
Asma looked to her mother for help, even though they all knew that there was only one person to convince. But she was looking longingly into the interior of the donut shop. Exasperated, she said, “Why do you care? It’s my body.”
“We are not like these Americans, shaming yourself and your family,” he spat.
“It’s hair! It’ll grow back. What is the big deal?”
“Let’s go home and talk there,” Ami said.
“Home?” Asma scoffed. “I’m not going home. The way you go on about Americans, Abu, it’s as though you hate this country.”
“I love America. We bring you so you have . . . have chance. So I have opportunity.” When he was angry, he was left without language, unable to fully access any one of his.
“That’s exactly what I’m doing! I got a full ride to a top university. Do you have any idea how competitive it was? Would I even have been allowed to go to college in Pakistan?”
“We’re proud of you. And keep your voice down,” her mother said beseechingly and glanced behind her.
“For once, just understand, this has nothing to do with you. I love acting. I’m not trying to shame you.”
He shooed her away. “Not that stupid thing again.” Over the top of his car door, her father said to her mother, “It’s Javed and his American wife. Nothing of this would happen if she’d stayed home.” He jabbed his finger in Asma’s direction. “She thinks she can do whatever she wants.”
Dots danced in front of Asma’s eyes. She was so tired of being disregarded. “You’re going to blame Mamoo for why I am the way I am?”
“Abu, that’s not right,” Salma said quietly behind her.
Mamoo was off limits.
Her mother said, “Baitay, what your father’s trying to say is that this just isn’t proper.
It was one thing to be doing these childish things when you were in high school.
But you’re a young woman now. People might talk.
” There was no real anger or admonishment in her confrontation. She was speaking to an audience of one.
“Who are these people that I’m supposed to be living my life for? Who are these people that care so much about what I’m doing?” She pointed behind her to the mosque. “Other Pakistanis like you? People who chose to come to this country—supposedly to give us choices, but now won’t let us make any?”
“Well. You’re at an age . . .” Ami’s voice faltered. She had run out of lines.
Asma walked up to her father slowly, eyes narrowed.
People always said that she looked exactly like her father, but until that moment, she’d never thought so.
She just felt like herself. But here, facing each other, almost the same height, pale skin, and almond-shaped eyes, aquiline noses almost touching, she felt like she was looking at her own reflection.
Even their thatches of thick, red-black hair looked the same.
“This is what taking advantage of opportunities looks like. You made nothing of yourself in this country. I’m doing something. You drive a cab. That’s why you came.” As she said it, she felt her words make contact with the soft tissue of her father.
“You want to stand on stage and let men look at you? Show your body and act like a hooker? This is why we come to this country?”
“Hooker?” she said incredulously. “I am trying to be more honest with you. You don’t like it when you find out about things. So this is the other option. Me telling you. In advance. But you can’t take the truth.”
“It’s not about how you tell us. We just don’t want you to do these things,” Ami said.
They stood still for a long moment, uncertain about how to disentangle themselves from each other and afraid of making any moves that showed weakness or could be construed as a concession.
Finally, Asma said lazily, “Do you know that my scholarship doesn’t cover room and board?
Mamoo pays that. You didn’t know that, did you?
You have no idea how to do anything in this country.
It’s left up to us to figure out how everything works, and then protect you from it because you can’t handle it. ”
Her father’s face lost all expression, the tiny pulse in his temple the only visible sign of his internal state. “All I ask is for you to be good girls. The Quoran says that heaven lies at the foot of your parents. What kind of an example are you setting for your sister?”
Asma looked at Salma and saw that long-familiar conflict of emotions play across her face like an advancing weather front—empathy for their parents run aground with loyalty for each other.
God knows she understood that feeling; it popped up when it was least wanted or expected, like an old injury that refused to be forgotten. “Feet.”
“What?”
“Feet.” She turned her gaze back to her father, the only one who, with his acceptance or rejection, mattered.
However he reacted, her mother would fall in line.
“Heaven is at the feet of your parents. Not the foot.” The truth was that there was nothing she could ever do or say that would make them happy.
“This isn’t disrespect. You don’t always get your way only because you’re a man. ”
Abu got in the driver’s seat and slammed the door. He was done.
“You just can’t handle me having my own mind!” Asma yelled loud enough for him to hear through the closed window.
Asma grabbed Salma’s hand before she got in the back seat and squeezed it. “Come visit me at school.”
She stepped away from the car and watched her family pull away from her. Sometimes she wondered why she even bothered to be honest.