Amal Unbound(35)

Then I looked at the first page.

“This is the alphabet,” I said.

“Very good! And by month’s end, you will know it all! Go ahead and read out loud for me each one you know and circle the ones you don’t.”

Of course it was the alphabet. I got so excited to be in a learning center and meet a teacher again that I forgot this was a place to teach people how to read. I wasn’t here to learn. I was window dressing in case someone came by.

“Don’t worry about getting it wrong,” he encouraged. “Mistakes happen. If you knew everything, there’d be no point in being here.”

“That’s the thing,” I said. “I know all my letters.”

“Well, that’s what the diagnostic is for. If you know your letters, we can move on to connecting them. And then we can start on books. By the end of this program, you won’t just know your letters; you’ll be reading whole books.”

He picked up a basket of books and set them on the table. Pictures of kittens and puppies smiled up at me. I looked at the one on top. It was the story of the cat that raised mice. The same story I read to Safa and Rabia not long ago.

“The last book I finished was Benazir Bhutto’s biography,” I said.

“Bhutto’s biography?” His smile faded. “I don’t understand. If you can read, why did they send you here?”

The silence stretched between us. When he spoke again, his words were flat.

“Let me guess. The man who paid for this center is running for office?”

I nodded.

“So this was a publicity stunt, and you’re here in case a journalist shows up and reports on an empty building?”

If I said yes, would he tell Jawad Sahib?

“This isn’t the first time,” he sighed before I had a chance to reply. “Well, whatever the reason, there are plenty of people here who need this center. I spent the morning taping flyers on nearly every door in this and the other neighboring villages. It just takes one person to get the community to warm up.”

“They won’t come.”

“Why wouldn’t they?” He looked startled. “It’s all right. You can tell me,” he said, noticing my worried expression. “Why wouldn’t they come?”

“I won’t get in trouble?” I asked.

“You won’t. I promise. Please tell me.”

“Because everyone is scared of Jawad Sahib. They’re scared to come into his center.”

“But this isn’t his center,” he said. “His family sponsored the building and helped pay for the startup costs, but everything else—my salary, the materials, the books—it’s all funded by the Ministry of Education.”

“The people here don’t care who paid for what. The Khan family’s name is attached to it and that’s all they need to know.”

“Well, that’s just great.” He pulled up his laptop. He opened a bright white screen with a small box and typed. Words transformed with the touch of his fingers on the keyboard.

“Is that an email?”

He turned to look at me.

“I wasn’t reading it.” I blushed. “It’s just . . . I’ve seen people do that before on television. Nasreen Baji does it, too.”

“Yes.” He turned back to the screen. “I’m letting the people back at headquarters know what the situation is. See what we can do.”

“How much faster is it to send a message this way than through the postal service?”

He laughed, but when he saw my expression, he cleared his throat. “It’s definitely faster than the postal service. Want to pull up a chair? I can show you how it works.”

When I sat next to him, he explained how people had email addresses just like they had home addresses. You could send messages from your own email address to other people with email addresses, and whatever you wrote came to the other person in a matter of seconds. It was like a telephone for words.

“That must make life so much easier,” I said.

“Yes.” He paused and studied me. “Want me to show you some more about computers?”

“Really?”

“Sure,” he said. “We have an hour. May as well teach someone something.” He pulled up a blank page with colored squares lining the side. “Ignore the English letters—I’m just showing you how to use the mouse to click and drag. The basics.” He clicked on a pink square. Then he clicked on the white space and drew a pink circle. He clicked on a black square and dotted two eyes. With the green he dotted a nose. With the blue, a smile.

“See?” he said. “Easy. Now copy me.”

“Drawing a face?” I laughed.

“A computer is simple once you get the hang of it, but you have to get the basics down,” he said. “It may seem silly to draw a picture, but it’s the simple things that pave the road for the rest of it.”

The rest of the hour vanished as I copied his drawings. We tried more complicated shapes. I learned to click. To drag. To drop.

“I might be able to find some reading or math software for you next time you come,” he said.

“Thank you so much.” I glanced back at the basket. “Would it be okay if I borrowed a book?”

“One of those?” He laughed. “I think you’ll find those a little dull if you’ve been reading Iqbal.”