Love from A to Z(64)

“Yeah, we got a cheap hotel room.”

“Cool! Have fun,” I repeated, my mind incapable of thinking up anything more exciting to say, being too busy conjuring up images of Kavi, Nhu, Ayaan, and Noemi laughing in unison—in the car, in the hotel room, at Mazetown, whatever that place looked like.

“We miss you so much!” Kavi said. “We were doing this-is-what-Zay-would-say so often that Noemi just started saying it for you. The stuff you’d say.”

“So she’s being me?”

“In a fun way. She’s good at improv.”

As I considered this, my phone pinged nonstop.

Picture messages from HannaChen.

“Well, you better get back. To get ready for the Galápagos,” I said. “Tell everyone hi for me.”

“Hey, what about you? Any word from UChicago?”

I shook my head, forgetting that it was only audio.

I’d begun looking through the pictures Hanna sent me. “No. Talk to you later, Kav.”

? ? ?

Many were fuzzy, but even those stopped my breath.

I’ve never seen myself so happy in photos before.

It could have been the fact that they were impromptu pictures, and I hadn’t had time to arrange my camera-ready smile. Which was just slight turnups of the corners of my closed mouth, like a there, are you satisfied with my smile smile.

But these were different. My mouth was open and turned up naturally, and my eyes joined the smile, scrunching up with joy.

And then Adam.

His face could be used in a picture dictionary for the word “eager.”

Boy, were we ever fools.

I sent five blue heart and five blue gem emojis in reply to HannaChen. And added, Thanks. Sorry for my rude self today.

I thought for a bit, then added, Cousin.

She replied with a single, simple puppy emoji.

? ? ?

I’d decided not to ruin Kavi’s fun by unloading both the Adam and the D-from-Fencer situations, so that meant I was a mess inside. Full of churning emotions, mostly anger and frustration. With a lot of worried wonderings as to my next steps.

I needed to vent. But without venting verbally.

I went to Auntie Nandy’s room to ask her if I could soak in the Jacuzzi in her bathroom. When I’d first arrived at her place, she’d shown me the vast array of fizzy bath bombs and bottles of scented salts and collection of candles that lined the edge of the Jacuzzi. “You must help me deplete these while you’re here. You’d better be in here soaking!”

As I drew near her door, I didn’t hear anything.

Then: “She’ll understand! She’s eighteen, not seven!”

I put my ear to the door.

“Just go. I’ll talk to Zayneb. Only return when Rashaad is okay. It must be terrible for him.”

Rashaad? Dad?

Was Auntie Nandy talking to Mom? About Pakistan?

I knocked.

“Wait. I have to go. I’ll take care of it. Stay safe. Love you, Leesh.”

Leesh was Auntie Nandy’s nickname for Alisha. Mom.

The door opened. Auntie Nandy tried to smile, but it came off weird, with her forehead wrinkled by a frown.

“Can I use your Jacuzzi?” I asked, wondering if I should just outright say I heard something.

“Yes, yes you can.” She opened the door wider. “If you’re okay with me being here? That was your mom on the phone.”

I paused my steps to her bathroom. “Is her flight okay?”

“Yeah, but . . . Okay, why don’t you get ready for your soak and we’ll talk?” She went to her walk-in closet and bent to open a bottom drawer. A kimono-like bathrobe, silky and subdued in mint green and gray, emerged from it. “You can use this.”

“Thanks.” I took it with me to the bathroom, undressed, and put it on while the water ran. I selected a random bath bomb and threw it in and watched it erupt. The door was ajar, so I called out, “Auntie Nandy, what were you talking to Mom about? Her flight comes in at nine, right?”

Auntie Nandy showed up at the door. “No, her plans changed.”

I stopped watching the fizzing action in the water and faced her. “What? Why?”

“Your mom is meeting your dad in Pakistan. She just landed in Doha, but then is flying on to Islamabad in a few hours. But we’ll go to the airport, because she wants to see you. Talk to you.”

“Why is she going there too? What happened?”

“Darling, why don’t you sit down on the bed?” She came into the bathroom and turned the water off. “You can do your soak later.”

I obeyed her and went toward the bed.





ODDITY: WORTHLESS LIVES


With her arm around me, she told me everything Mom had told her. That they’d found out exactly how Daadi had died in October.

The day when she’d gone to enjoy a wedding in the mountains the way she had when she was a young child—which meant traveling out of her familiar city.

A drone strike. A missed target. Collateral damage.

A wedding caravan of cars and buses dispersed, shredded, gaping holes, gaping wounds, missing body parts, missing bodies.

Daadi had wanted to sit in one of the cars, as the bus with the family members—the one vehicle that had survived the attack—scared her with its speed and rickety way of moving.