Love from A to Z(56)

I nodded. “Maybe it was because she went on the carousel and rode on the bike.”

“Yes, that could be it. It was a double-fun day for her.” Dad smiled. He lifted both his hands up in the air like Hanna did when she got excited. “Doubah fuun, she’d say.”

“No, she’d say doubah doubah fuun fuun,” I clarified, dunking my warm cookie in the cold glass of milk in front of me. “She says the things she likes two times.”

“You’re right. Especially if she liked each of them two times as much,” he said, laughing and nodding, popping the last of his cookie into his mouth. When he finished chewing, he asked, “What about you? Did you think it was doubah fun?”

“Yeah.” I gave a thumbs-up. “Because this time I bounced back up the highest ever when I landed my somersault. On the trampoline.”

“Ah, wish I’d seen.” He split his second cookie and held out half. “I already had one too many.”

I took it and dunked it into my crumb-filled milk. “Dad, can we do this every week? The bungee trampoline and bike riding? And the carousel and riding for Hanna?”

“Hmm.” He considered it and looked around at the café. It was quiet but also busy. Some people were talking in groups, others were working on their own or with company, laptops out. “But then we’ll end up going back home later, and then homework becomes later. My work becomes later too. Hanna becomes later. Speaking of which, we have to get a move on. Both of you need to take your baths, too.”

I made a face and drank the rest of my milk. Hanna’s cookie remained on the plate so I slid a napkin toward me and folded and creased it and kept folding it like origami paper until I had a little envelope. I slipped the cookie in and enclosed it safely with a final napkin fold. “What about Hanna’s milk?”

“I’ll ask for it in a to-go cup. Watch Hanna?” Dad got up and took the glass of milk with him.

Instead of watching Hanna, I watched Dad.

The way he bowed slightly and put a hand to his heart when he almost bumped into a custodian wiping tables.

He’d been teaching me about Islam for almost a year, and for a while I’d wanted to tell him I wanted to do the things he did too. Go to the mosque or prayer rooms at malls or other places when it was prayer time, instead of watching Hanna outside like I did. Go to jumah on Fridays, instead of staying home with Marta.

I also wanted to fast for Ramadan like he had done for the first time that year, and then I wanted to break the fasts with him, when he’d close his eyes after taking that first bite of a date, saying a prayer of gratitude.

I also wanted to hold my hand to my heart like him, like he just did now, like he did whenever he said salaam, peace, to someone, closing his eyes again, like he was grateful for that, too.

He had told me a long time ago that what he liked best about being Muslim was the peace to be found in it.

Maybe that’s why he touched his heart. Because the peace was there.

When he came back to the table, I burst out with it. “Dad, can I be Muslim too? Now?”

He put Hanna’s cup of milk on the table, then sat down. “Why?”

I was going to say because I want to go to the places you go to and do the things you do and say the words you say and touch my heart the same way, but then I looked up at the staircase behind Dad. The one that split into two and then met again up higher, under a light coming straight down on it from even higher, from the sky itself. “Because I want to have peace too. Like you.”

He sat back. “I actually don’t have peace, Adam.”

“You don’t?” Surprised, I slumped down on the table.

“No.” He sighed. “But I look for it.”

“But then didn’t you say you like being Muslim because there’s peace in it?”

“Well, I like looking for it, for the peace in things. That’s why I’m a Muslim. It’s someone who knows there’s more to life than just going through it, letting things happen. I make sense of everything, that there’s more to it than just me and my worries, knowing it’s all connected.”

“Like the sky? And the world and everything in it?”

“Yup, everything. Bad and good, sad and happy. All connected to God.”

“I like that too. I believe that too.” I lifted my head from the table and said, “So can I?”

“Yes, you can.” He smiled. “You can seek peace with me.”

? ? ?

After I became Muslim, the Friday of that same week at the mosque, we began going to the museum every Saturday, me bringing my homework, Dad bringing his head-of-school work, and, after having doubah fuun time with Hanna and her falling asleep, we would eat a snack, chat a bit, and then do our work at the café, across from each other.

Those Saturdays helped Dad find peace after Mom’s death.

And they helped me find Dad.

And Hanna find sleep.

? ? ?

“Our cousin is here!” Hanna said, coming over to the fountain with Zayneb.

I stood up.

She had on the same brilliant blue hijab I’d first seen her in, but this time her face wasn’t taken over by the frown she’d worn while reading her phone at the airport.

Today it was lit by a smile, which became happier when she saw me.

“Assalamu alaikum,” I said, touching my hand to my heart, to quell the thrill of seeing her—more than due to the peace in my heart.