Smoke

Mai­da Aslam

Haji Habib was dri­ving on in silence with his wife sit­ting beside him. The spat­ter of rain falling on the wind screen was stir­ring up a calm and cold, crys­tal liq­uid depth of a lake some­where with­in him and he felt as if he was asleep and a child was mak­ing a rack­et which pulled him in a realm where con­scious­ness and uncon­scious­ness, con­cern and apa­thy are divid­ed by a line with the breadth of a hair-strand. There was a still­ness about this buzz inside him and he had poured out all his anger and irri­ta­tion at the lit­tle boy who jumped up, trem­bled and ran out at once and Haji Habib could not let his slum­ber over­come him again. Years had passed and today, he was going to col­lect his son from the air­port after five long years – just as he used to when he was a school-going child. He was always late to pick him up but not today!

“Oh how I wish we could be there in the blink of an eye!” his trance was bro­ken by his wife who was wear­ing an expres­sion of eager­ness, care and con­cern marked with impa­tience. The note of irri­ta­tion in her voice, the clenched fists in her lap, the lips that were now mov­ing as if in prayer, had brought his mus­ings to an end and as retal­i­a­tion, he kept silent. The rain less­ened and he drift­ed back to the frail pages of his mem­o­ry, furl­ing through them and stopped at the one that marked a very sig­nif­i­cant event. It was the day of his boy’s first birth­day that marked his pro­mo­tion and the grant of a large bonus. That day, his moth­er and father had also come and cel­e­brat­ed with Zohra and the child but for some rea­son, Zohra didn’t talk to him for the next week and he, hav­ing tak­en con­trol of his new posi­tion at office, had had very lit­tle chance to think about it.

Driz­zle… Zohra was sit­ting in the front seat, pray­ing under her breath for him to reach safe­ly and for them to reach in no time. She wished she could some­how fly to the air­port but she did not have any wings – she had nev­er had any. Her son, her oasis was com­ing back… she bad­ly want­ed wings! Haji Sahab was not very com­fort­able today but there was noth­ing new about it. For thir­ty years, she had been wit­ness­ing these mood swings and now she dealt with them casu­al­ly. When she was mar­ried to him, he had giv­en her great love and in return, want­ed only one thing – a son. When she did give him one, how­ev­er, his atti­tude began to change and he became more volatile over the next few years. She remem­bered being severe­ly scold­ed at an occa­sion when she couldn’t hand him the news­pa­per at once on account of doing up Abdullah’s shoe lace. She had been a strong lady all her life – Abdul­lah was her strength. She had real­ized it the day he was born. It was her son who made her over­come the grief of her daughter’s bru­tal mur­der, car­ried out even before her birth, at the hands of the man sit­ting right beside her. A shud­der crossed her body and attract­ed a quizzi­cal look from her hus­band, to which, she sim­ply attempt­ed to smile. She was and would always be depen­dent on him, which was why she had locked the worst mem­o­ries of that chap­ter, away in the dark­est, deep­est and small­est cham­ber of her heart. She would see her son today, after a span of five long years.

The car pulled up in the park­ing area. Zohra had a sparkle in her eyes and swift­ness in her steps she walked beside the tow­er­ing fig­ure of Haji Sahab. If she was anx­ious, Haji Sahab was only keen, but this keen­ness meant a lot to him. He was begin­ning to visu­al­ize what his son would look like. Oh, he must be the true image of his father. His chest inflat­ed a lit­tle as he recalled his reflec­tion that he saw in the mir­ror before leav­ing for the air­port. His gray­ing beard fell on his chest, his kur­ta in a sub­tle creamy col­or and his ankles were bare under the hem of his shal­war.

As they looked around in the wait­ing area marked, “Inter­na­tion­al Arrivals,” even his wife at his arms seemed to him to be a part of the crowd that he felt odd­ly aloof from. And then there was an excla­ma­tion, “there he is! There’s my boy! My angel! My love…” and she let go of his arm, run­ning towards a tall, hand­some boy wear­ing trendy den­ims and a sweat­shirt with sleeves pushed back. A hand with a Rolex shin­ing on the wrist moved up to remove a pair of Ray-Bans before the arms part­ed and took her – his wife, Haji Habib’s wife – in a close embrace. He was left there to digest the attire of his son which sent his beard and ankles in a com­plex and he became awk­ward­ly con­scious about them.

Zohra was final­ly car­ry­ing her uni­verse in her arms. She could smell her own blood run­ning in his veins and could sense her own milk in the strength of his mus­cles. He was so beau­ti­ful. He was like no one else in the world. The deep blue of his shirt suit­ed him so well! He could have worn any­thing and have looked bet­ter than every­body else in the world. She wished for time to stop but Haji Sahab had come for­ward and she stepped aside. He was a lit­tle annoyed at the goa­tee his son had grown but he hugged him and imme­di­ate­ly let go – his son’s cologne was too strong for him.

Abdul­lah insist­ed on dri­ving back home owing to his father’s gout. Haji Sahab again felt the way he did back in the wait­ing area – odd­ly aloof… and there was more to it now. He was feel­ing as if his place had been con­quered by some­one else – an out­sider, an intrud­er. His son was not his son after all; he was his mother’s… or was he?

After a din­ner tak­en in utter unease and with silence prowl­ing like the shad­ow of a stealthy cat, Haji Sahab went out to light a cig­a­rette, not notic­ing that he had not brought his lighter along. Abdul­lah picked it up from the table and went after him; some­thing began to form inside him – a misty haze solid­i­fy­ing or bits of quick­sil­ver merg­ing togeth­er. He tried to look straight into his father’s eyes, mus­ter­ing up all his love for hi, and chan­nel­ing it to his eyes, tried to pour it all in his father’s heart right through his eyes. Haji Sahab met his gaze for an instant and pulled back as if he had tried to wink direct­ly at the sun. He looked at the lighter in his out­stretched hand, took it and tried to find words. “I’m fine dad and I request you to please let me dri­ve. You’ve already had enough of it today.” Spo­ken back in the park­ing area, Abdullah’s words rang in his mind and he could not think of any­thing else to say to him. It would be lame to ask, “How are you?” again. But Abdul­lah stood there – expect­ing. The mist was inten­si­fy­ing into smoke, gath­er­ing strength and speed. He want­ed to reach out for the wrin­kled hand that had slapped him at many occa­sions. He want­ed to hold it close to his chest and cry… he want­ed to break that stone-wall that enclosed a soft heart in his father’s chest. He want­ed to make him say he was proud of him but some­how, his body parts could not co-ordi­nate.

“It’s late. We should sleep,” was all Haji Sahab said before he went indoors and that ghost of courage or hope or expec­ta­tion that had begun to form a few moments back, was now col­laps­ing. A vial of quick­sil­ver broke… a string of pearls smashed… a crys­tal shat­tered… a mir­ror cracked… and a heart crushed when a flame turned to smoke…