Amal Unbound(11)

Finally, Fozia said, “I’ll pick up the baby’s medicine for you. I was on my way to the market anyway. Glad you’re doing better.”

She stood up. She walked past me, and I watched her leave.

Why didn’t she say anything? Maybe I made a bigger deal out of what happened.

Either way, I learned my lesson. I would follow the rules from now on. I would never step so much as a toe out of this house without one of my sisters with me.



* * *



? ? ?

“Read to us?” Rabia asked me that afternoon. She brought a book and pulled on my arm.

I had spent the day working as hard as I could. I mopped the floors and scrubbed the walls. I folded and put away all the laundry and chopped up the onions for dinner.

I sat down on the sofa with her and Safa. I smiled at the story she chose. My father had bought it years ago for me when he went to Lahore.

“You know this was my book once?” I asked.

“We know,” Rabia said. “That’s why we love it!”

I read them the story about a kitten who decided to adopt a basket of mice. I laughed along with my sisters when the kitten scolded the mice before they scattered, running in every direction.

I was so engrossed, I didn’t hear the door swing open and Seema charge in until she grabbed me by the arm and ushered me into the kitchen.

“They’re talking about it,” she said before I could say a word.

“Who is?”

“Everyone! They’re talking about yesterday.”

Before I could ask her more, the door opened again. My father.

“Tell me it’s not true.” Sweat trickled down his forehead. “If you tell me it’s a lie, I will believe you.”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered.

“Amal.” His hands fell to his sides. “Talking back to Jawad Sahib, of all people . . . What have you done?”

Jawad Sahib?

My mouth went dry like the dusty earth.

Fozia called him worse than his notorious father.

And I yelled at him. In front of everyone.

“He wants a word with me. This Friday. One of his officers dropped off this note.” He held up a crumpled piece of paper. “Didn’t know what was going on until the workers told me.”

“A-Abu,” I stammered, “I should have told you right away. But his car. It hit me. I was minding my own business walking home from the market. But he wouldn’t let me be. He wanted to give me a ride home. He took my things and wouldn’t give them back!”

“I don’t care if he wanted your entire satchel of things!” my father snapped. “You give it to him. You drop everything at his feet, apologize, and walk away! Don’t you have any idea the lengths that family goes to just to satisfy their egos? And Jawad Sahib especially! Don’t you know what he could do to us now?”

“Malik, enough. You’re scaring the little ones.”

It took me a second to recognize my mother out of bed. She stood at the archway of her bedroom door, the baby in her arms.

“Do you have any idea what your daughter’s been up to?” he shouted.

“I didn’t know who he was,” I whimpered.

“Did it matter? Have we not taught you how to act in public? Bite your tongue one minute and prevent a lifetime of burden.”

“And yelling won’t solve this,” my mother said. “Let’s talk again once we’ve calmed down.”

“It’s not fair.” Tears slipped down my cheeks. “His car hit me. He took my things. Why am I the one in trouble?”

“Since when has life been fair?” He shook his head. “You can read books and tell me the capital of China, but you have no idea how the world works. God only knows how he will find it fit to punish us.”

“He wouldn’t do anything serious over something so small, would he?” I asked.

“He’s done far more for far less.”

All this over a simple pomegranate, still lying uneaten in my satchel buried beneath my bed. I thought of the person from the car, the gleaming white teeth, the close-cropped hair, and the way his voice went from sweet like honey to cold and dark within seconds.

I thought of the stories I’d heard all my life, the way Shaukat’s jaw clenched at the mention of his name. The way Fozia said he loved to dole out punishments and had personally burned an entire village to the ground.

So what kind of punishment would he dream up for me?





Chapter 12





I got out of bed as the sun peeked its head over the horizon. I hadn’t slept in two days. Jawad Sahib would be here tomorrow.

Stepping into the kitchen, I blinked: My mother was out of bed again. She perched on a stool on the ground, kneading dough for buttery breakfast parathas like she used to. Her waist-length hair fell unbraided in waves around her shoulders.

“You’re up early,” she said. Her eyes were red. Her cheeks blotchy.

“I’m sorry,” I said. Guilt pooled inside me, liquid and dense.

She wiped her floured hands with a rag and stood up.

“I’m the one who should apologize,” she told me. “I haven’t been a good mother lately.”

“No, Amma, please don’t say that.”