Chapter 16: Asma (1989) - The Daughters of Rosebud

Asma went swimming every day. For thirty blessed minutes in the pool, she was able to check out of her life. No matter how much she admired her slowly toning arms and legs in the mirror or how cleansed she felt after a swim, it was never enough to dampen the low-level anxiety roiling her gut. The thought of going home for Thanksgiving break filled her with dread. The dorms would be closed. Mamoo and Aunty were going to Rosebud. She had nowhere to go but home. She was boxed in.

It wasn’t just the thought of being home that stressed her. The idea of not seeing Ruby for a week seemed impossible. They saw each other every day that Ruby didn’t work, and even on those days, they stayed up late into the night talking on the phone after she got off her shift. Asma knew she was supposed to be feeling unrest or guilt or something akin to shame for her feelings, and maybe in some small closet of her mind, she was. But mostly, she was consumed with thoughts of Ruby—the deep register of her voice, her muscular arms slicing through the water. Curious about what color lipstick she’d be wearing next time they saw each other. And the smell of citrus, sweet and tart, that trailed Ruby. Ruby swore she didn’t wear perfume or lotion with a fragrance, but Asma could smell it. Each thought, recollection, gave her a thrill, a physical charge. Asma understood that these feelings were going to cause her trouble and pain and that she was out on a thin limb. But there was no stopping it. Ruby had brought her out of some dark and dreamless place into the light.

They talked about everything—almost. There were three topics Asma wouldn’t approach: the nature of their relationship, how Asma was doing in school, and her parents.

Asma couldn’t tell what Ruby thought of her other than she liked her well enough to spend so much time together. What they had seemed too delicate, too frightening to ruin by trying to name it or seek clarity. It didn’t really matter whether it was friendship or courtship; for her it was enough to just be in Ruby’s presence. Asma had never felt so heard, so understood, and so in sync with someone else, not even with Salma. Asma felt at home with Ruby in a way she never actually felt in her own life. She had not dared to ask if there was someone else. But given how much time they were spending together, it was hard to imagine that there was.

After Thanksgiving weekend, finals would almost be upon her. Asma had studiously avoided facing her academic predicament, but the runway of avoidance was quickly drawing to an end. She had already been behind in all her classes because of the play, and the last few distracted weeks hadn’t helped. Her scholarship was dependent upon maintaining a certain grade point average, and the idea of potentially losing it made her panic, unable to focus or study. If she lost her scholarship, she wouldn’t come back for her sophomore year. And if she couldn’t come back next year, what would she do? Go back to Rosebud and live with her parents? The thought terrified her. School had always been easy, or more precisely, her small, rural school had always been easy. She was unprepared for the level of intensity and academic expectations that a university, especially this one, demanded. She considered ways to get herself sick and, once, asked Ruby whether it was possible to self-inflict a burst appendix. Ruby just laughed. Asma let her think it was a joke.

As for her parents, how could she explain them? She didn’t understand them herself.

They went to dinner the Thursday before Thanksgiving. Ruby was going to Chicago to visit her family that Saturday, and this would be the last time they saw each other. They went for Asma’s favorite meal—breakfast for dinner—at a local diner. It was a busy night, and they were surprised to see one booth still open. As they approached the table, they saw why it was unoccupied. The pleather seat of one bench was ripped open with the stuffing spilling out. They looked at each other and, without a word, slid into the booth sitting side by side.

Ruby complimented her on her rapidly improving swimming and regaled her with stories about her brothers. She asked Asma whether she was ready for Thanksgiving and if she was going to try out for the spring musical. Asma said nothing.

Finally, Ruby asked, “You okay?”

Asma cut her waffle into smaller and smaller pieces.

“We come for your perfect meal and you have nothing to say?” Ruby teased.

Asma clutched her glass of water. She drew it toward her and slowly raised it to her mouth as though she was going to say something. But then, gulped and gulped until it was gone.

Ruby asked, “I’ve been meaning to ask you. Do you always drink like that?”

Asma snorted, her throat still accepting the last swallow of water at the same time as her mouth tried to expel it.

“Because, man, I have never met someone who loves their water like you.”

Asma covered her mouth with one hand, trying to not spit up or have water come out of her nose, and hit the table with her other hand in an effort to regain control.

“I mean, like, when’s the last time you hydrated?”

Asma inhaled the water and burst out laughing loudly. “Oh my God! I almost threw up!” She pushed at Ruby.

Ruby looked pleased with herself.

They finished eating, still chortling.

“So what’s wrong, sugar?” Ruby asked.

Asma turned sideways, registering the term of affection and liking it. She shrugged. “It’s not you, Ruby. It’s me.”

Ruby shook her head, as if to clear it. “What does that mean?” Her typical composure cracked. “Are you br— . . . ? You don’t want to . . . ?”

“What?”

They stared at each other. The fluorescent light of the diner was good for no one’s complexion, except maybe Ruby’s.

“You said, it was you and not me. That’s the kind of thing people say when . . .” Ruby trailed off.

Asma said, “Oh. No, no, no, no.” She took a deep breath. The full weight of the secrets she carried—from Ruby, from her family, from herself—pressed in on her. “I’m sorry tonight was a bust. I, I, I . . . just don’t want to go home for break.” She sounded somewhere between panic and whining. Wait, had Ruby started to say break up?

Under the table, Ruby took one of Asma’s hands in hers. It was cool and smooth, so reassuring and calming. Asma didn’t want to ever let it go.

“I’m going to miss you,” Asma said quietly. Tears pooled in her eyes. “But also . . .”

Ruby looked at her intensely, like she was looking into her soul.

Asma looked down where they were still grasping each other’s hands. Her voice shook. “It’s not good with my dad. He sees everything I do as a challenge. He didn’t want me to do Pippin, and then afterward . . . I just don’t want to go home.” Asma wanted to tell Ruby what had happened, but it felt too bizarre, too freakish to say out loud. American fathers simply did not punch their daughters. Pakistani fathers didn’t either—until hers had.

Ruby pulled Asma close to her. Her hand rubbed her back gently. She let herself go limp and be folded into Ruby’s embrace. They were face-to-face. Ruby looked at Asma’s lips for a long moment and said, “You smell like maple syrup, Asma Chaudhry.”

And finally Asma understood. There was no one else.

“I work tomorrow. I’m going to pick you up after my shift, and we’re going to go do something, okay?”

Desire flooded her. Asma didn’t know if she was interested in boys or girls. She just knew how Ruby made her feel, and that was enough.

The next night, Ruby picked Asma up at 11:00. She had told Asma to dress warm, take a nap, and that she had a surprise planned. Asma couldn’t settle herself to take a nap and opted for a caffeine pill. By the time Ruby arrived, she was jittery. On the passenger seat of Ruby’s truck, there was a small box dwarfed by a large blue bow.

“What is this?” Asma asked as she slid into the passenger seat.

“Open it.”

Asma pulled the bow off and found a cassette tape. Written on the insert in tidy, tiny cursive was a list of songs. “You made me a mixtape!” Asma hugged the tiny box. “Thank you.” She looked shyly at Ruby, goofy with happiness. Having someone make a mixtape for you was a thing of romantic myth. It required a collection of music, high-speed-dubbing machinery, and the desire to curate the right set of songs to match a feeling. It meant something.

Asma slid the tape into the cassette player, and “New Song” started. She flushed. Ruby, too, had remembered that moment across the dance floor. It felt like months ago.

“Where are we going?” Asma asked.

“To the surprise.”

“The tape wasn’t the surprise?”

Ruby shook her head with faux derision and turned onto the highway. They drove thirty miles, heading to darker and darker places. “True,” “Just Can’t Get Enough,” “I Ran,” each song better than the one before. Asma had no natural sense of direction, and for all she knew they were on the way to Rosebud. She didn’t care. They were together, and anything felt possible.

Eventually, they pulled off the highway and drove down a bumpy gravel road until they came to an open, grassy field. They had left streetlights far behind. Only the world’s natural evanescence and the bright night sky illuminated them.

Asma asked, “Where are we?”

“A friend’s family farm. Come on, let’s get in the back.”

Ruby pulled back the tarp covering the truck bed, and underneath it there was a futon, covered with blankets and pillows, a little cocoon of sorts. It was freezing outside. Out of her pocket, Ruby pulled a red stocking cap with a fuzzy white poof on top and pulled it down on Asma’s head. Asma had spent so much time gelling her hair into the right shape but didn’t care because Ruby was close and pampering her. They scrambled under the covers and weighed themselves down with a random assortment of opened sleeping bags and quilts. They lay awkwardly, side by side on the narrow bed, waiting to get warm.

“What about tomorrow?” Asma asked.

“What about it?” Ruby said.

The stars gazed down on them.

“You have to drive to Chicago, and it’s already so late.” Asma trembled.

“I am exactly where I want to be.”

Ruby’s husky voice was an aphrodisiac. She scooped her arm out, and Asma moved in so that her head lay on Ruby’s hard shoulder. She didn’t want to make any assumptions, but she needn’t have worried. Their bodies were starlings, flowing and fitting together seamlessly while they adjusted. In one part of her brain, Asma saw the line where she was standing and recognized that she was going to step over it. On another level, the smells of earth and woodsmoke permeated her. This field reminded her of the tall grass in the lot next to their house. She could have been home. She was home.

Now that they were settled in, Asma saw how dark it really was, how exposed they were to the elements. An owl hooted nearby. Wind softly rustled the leaves on the ground around them. The bare trees encircled them.

Ruby pointed to the sky with her free arm. “There’s going to be a meteor shower tonight. From now till dawn. We’re supposed to see it over there.”

Asma propped herself up on her elbow and looked down at Ruby’s face, an entirely different shade of gold in starlight.

“Did you know that I’m really good at math?” Asma asked.

Ruby chuckled her low, gravelly laugh. “I did not.”

“Did you also know that there is only one reason I considered studying math, and that’s so I could be the first woman up in space?”

Ruby looked on the edge of laughter.

Asma went on. “But then Sally Ride came along and ruined all of that.”

Ruby reached up and pulled Asma’s face down to hers. “Did you want to go up in space, or did you just want to be the first?” And then she kissed Asma, long, slow, and deep.

Now, there was only the mystery of Ruby below her and the peace that comes from clarity. She was doing what she was supposed to. The way Ruby felt, strong and soft at the same time, the way she touched her face and ran her hands from her neck to chest, the wet, sinking softness of each of them, none of this required prior knowledge. This was ancient and raw and pure.

Later, as they returned to the city, otherworldly, early morning light cast into the cab of the truck. Asma leaned against Ruby as they drove into the pink-and-orange-smudged horizon. Ruby kissed Asma on the top of the head, lingering for a long moment as though inhaling her. By the time they turned off the highway, the morning light was blinding, and Asma knew with complete certainty that Ruby was the person with whom she would spend the rest of her days.

As Asma was growing up, Thanksgiving was probably her favorite holiday. In some ways, it was a holiday meant for them—the newcomers, the transplants, the culturally homeless. Even after she learned the real story behind the holiday and about the smallpox-infected blankets, she couldn’t help but love it. It was the one day when her family came together and celebrated something that everyone else did also. It was a day to be grateful. How could that be bad?

Her mother had started making a traditional Thanksgiving meal after their first few years in America, with mixed results. The first year, the turkey had been mostly raw on the inside. The second year, it was so dry, it caught in the throat. But she had persisted, learning the tricks to try and keep the turkey moist and slowly mastering the traditional sides of mashed potatoes, stuffing, and green beans.

Asma was supposed to return home with Mamoo and Aunty on Wednesday, but on Tuesday night, she called Mamoo in a weak voice. “I think I have the stomach bug. Maybe we should go on Thursday instead?”

“We can do that. Feel better.”

She hadn’t seen or talked to her parents since the night of Pippin. She didn’t know what she was more afraid of, their desire to talk about what had happened or pretending that nothing had.

From the moment Aunty and Mamoo had picked her up from the dorms, Asma felt Mamoo observing her. She had looked up to see him watching her in the rearview mirror. Asma felt Ruby’s presence seeping out from her body. Surely, it was visible. If Mamoo was noticing changes, would her parents see them too? She felt a pang of fear and vowed to not think about Ruby until she was quietly in bed by herself. Just in case. She feigned tiredness and lay down in the back seat to be alone with her thoughts and covered her face with her arm as though to block out the sun, but really just to hide the crazy-looking smile straining her cheeks. No, Mamoo didn’t know about Ruby. He couldn’t. She had just figured it out.

When they pulled up to the house, her father was at the door, holding it wide in welcome. “Salaam aleikum. Happy Thanksgiving!”

What was this? What was he doing? She brushed past him and immediately noticed small changes around the house: A wooden Allah carving on one wall. A calendar with pictures of Pakistan in the kitchen. Throw pillows with extensive bead- and glasswork on the couch. She coughed exaggeratedly at the acrid smell of burnt spices.

He said, “Your mother’s experimenting. She made the turkey with some of our spices. It’s going to be tasty, tasty.”

Despite her intention to ignore her father, Asma couldn’t help but stare at him. When had he ever talked like this? Tasty, tasty? And when had he started defending her mother? The father she knew was usually the one leading the judgment brigade, telling her she should stick to what she knew. To be fair, Asma was no fan of her mother’s forays into culinary experimentation either. Once, after she had made sweet-and-sour chicken, Asma had said, “If I wanted Chinese food, I’d go to a Chinese restaurant.”

In a way, it was good to have the smell of burning things and near ruin because it gave her something to complain about. She strode into the kitchen and opened a window above the sink, where her mother was zooming around the kitchen, seemingly in multiple places at the same time, frantically cutting, sautéing, assembling. It was as though important people were coming for dinner. Asma muttered a salaam and headed downstairs.

Asma hadn’t been in her bedroom since she had left for university. It felt smaller than when she had left it, shabbier and more pieced together. The spokes of the wagon wheel headboard were dusty; the bulletin board on the wall had a sign-up sheet for a high school field trip still pinned to it. She wondered how Ruby would view these tokens of her previous life.

“It feels like you’ve been gone forever,” Salma said, appearing silently behind her.

“I didn’t want to come home, Sal. But I’m happy to see you.”

Being with Ruby had made Asma vulnerable. She had recently been noticing something in Mamoo’s and Aunty’s voices when they talked to each other. They told each other in ways large and small that they thought the other was wonderful. It was the way Mamoo said, “You’re so right,” to Aunty. It was the way she rubbed his shoulder while driving. They spoke to each other with love, and they spoke to Asma and Salma with love. It was probably how they had planted a stake in her and Salma’s hearts since this was not a quality modeled by anyone else in their life. Asma was thinking about how to emulate this. She wanted to express her love, her care for the people that mattered most.

Salma looked like she’d swallowed light.

It embarrassed Asma that such a small act of kindness could make Salma so happy. It shamed her that she had caused this.

They sat down to an early dinner. The table was dressed with a harvest-themed tablecloth, and a few small pumpkins served as a centerpiece. In spite of her dread about this weekend, Asma was touched by her mother’s effort at being festive.

Asma sat across from Aunty, with her father on one side and Salma on the other, and willed her body to be as small and as self-contained as possible. If she said nothing and made no sudden movements, maybe they would forget she was there. Her mind kept retreating to Ruby, especially their last night together, the mere thought of which had the effect of inflaming her. She had to be careful. In addition to the fact that thinking about Ruby made her grin like a fool, she could feel her boundaries soften and her body relax; there was no way to entirely suppress her joy. And the only thing she knew with absolute certainty was that to survive this time with her parents, she had to keep her defenses up. All she wanted to do was to get through this weekend without attracting attention.

While her mother served the turkey from the middle of the table, her father passed each dish traveling around the table to Asma. First the mashed potatoes, then the stuffing, and then the green beans. At each handoff, he was solicitous and held the serving dish a touch too long so that they were both holding the bowl at the same time. Asma refused to look up and meet his gaze.

“How was the funeral, Yar?” Mamoo asked her father gently.

But he waved his hand like he couldn’t talk about it.

Her mother breathlessly monologued. “You can’t believe what all they have at the markets now. I saw Corn Flakes!” “Our house is gone. There’s a highway where it used to be.” “Women wear short sleeves and dupattas over their shoulder. It’s so stylish.” “Your father would have done so well if we’d stayed in Pakistan.” “Rabia is doing so well. She’s in medical school and already married.” She rattled off stories about cousins and people they had never heard of, and the small mounds of food on her plate remained untouched.

Mamoo leaned toward her mother, barely blinking, and listened raptly. He punctuated her observations about the modernity of Pakistan with questions like, “Was the kulfi stand across from the school still there?” Sometimes she paused long enough to answer his question, but mostly she just railroaded onward breathlessly. In the middle of her exuberance, it was possible to forget that Musharraf’s father had just died.

Asma’s end of the table sat silently, observing the manic energy radiating from the other end. Asma was grateful for her mother’s nonstop prattling, which kept the attention relentlessly focused away from her. Salma silently picked the few pecans from her sweet potatoes and placed them on the side of Asma’s plate. Her father asked Asma how school was going. She expected to see wariness or judgment on his face. Instead she saw only a tired, aging man whose yellow skin clung too tightly to his face. She mumbled noncommittally.

The thing with being a family that did not engage in casual banter was they had no capacity for it. Never could Asma recall a time when her father had sauntered over and plopped down on the couch next to her and casually asked, “So what’s going on?” and waited to hear something interesting she’d read or experienced that day. They didn’t have anything to talk about that wasn’t affected by the past or burdened with the expectations of the future.

The few times her father spoke, she braced herself, expecting a reference to the night of the play. But not once was it mentioned. It was as though the entire ugliness, from the raw physicality to the silent complicity, had never happened.

And for a while it appeared that they would get away with an uneventful, if boring, dinner and, in that way, be more American than ever.

Finally, her mother stood up and started cutting pieces of pie. “So many people have washing machines, and washing women no longer come to the house.”

“Welcome to the twentieth century,” Asma muttered. Almost immediately, she regretted vocalizing her inside thoughts.

For the first time, her mother stopped talking. She looked around the table as though she was just now noticing everyone sitting around her. And then, offhandedly, she said, “I almost forgot, baitay. We’ve asked family to start sending rishthas for you.”

The surface easiness of the room snuffed out. Out of all the things Asma had thought Thanksgiving would bring—anger, blame, judgment, recriminations—she had never considered this. Her ears got hot and felt like they were about to pop. She knew what the word meant, of course. What Pakistani girl didn’t? If all American girls dreamed of their weddings, all Pakistani girls understood that it was the stuff of nightmares. Asma felt like she was in a tunnel whooshing past some basic understanding that was just out of her reach. She understood what her mother had said but couldn’t make sense of what she was actually saying as it related to her life.

Mamoo started coughing on his water. Her father chewed, the sound magnified in the stillness. Aunty, sweet Aunty who didn’t speak the language and had no idea what was being suggested, smiled encouragingly from across the table.

Asma turned to Salma and saw that this was not new information to her. Asma felt gut punched. Again.

“What are you talking about?” Asma barely breathed.

“Baitay, you’re at that age we need to be thinking about these things,” her mother said in a clear and saccharine voice.

“Of course. Why didn’t I think of that? Marrying me off would solve all your problems.” Asma threw her fork on her plate with a loud clatter. “No, Ami. We don’t. I just started college.”

“Well, of course. You don’t have to get married right now.” Her mother beamed as though this was the happiest of news. “It’s just an engagement.”

“Your mother’s right. It’s time you understood who you are. It’s time to grow up.” Her father spoke quietly and as though it pained him to say those words.

Asma’s mouth gaped open and closed. “Understand who I am? I know exactly who I am. It’s you. You don’t know the first thing about me! You’ve never known.” She looked around the table desperately.

Her father put his hand on Asma’s arm. “We know what’s best for you.”

Asma yanked her arm away. “Best for me? You don’t know the first thing about me.”

“I know I saw you on that stage and that it was filthy, shameful.”

“It was a play! People pretending! I wasn’t actually having sex on stage.” Asma threw her hands up in exasperation.

“This country will corrupt you, Asma. Don’t you understand? All this sex with many people? You’ll end up loose and divorced, like all these women here. You have to trust me. I know what I’m saying. I see these kinds of people all the time. Children with different men, barely able to scrape by. This is not what we want for you.”

Asma was so braced for his anger that she was struck by its absence. He was using a cajoling, almost gentle tone, like he was trying to convince her.

Mamoo looked back and forth between her parents as though he was trying to find the weak link. Finally, he started, “Sadia, don’t you . . .”

“Javed, this is a family decision. It doesn’t involve you.”

Mamoo paled. The sad and bitter pill was that no matter how much Asma wanted Mamoo to be her father, he wasn’t. She and Salma were her parents’ children, and no amount of pretending or imagining otherwise would ever change that. Asma sat numbly in the middle of the disappointment that was her family.

No one took the dessert her mother held out, so instead, she walked a plate, with a slice of pecan pie and a gulab jamun, around the table, humming to herself the whole while.

“Sadia, sit down!” Mamoo ordered.

No one had ever heard Mamoo use that tone of voice. It came from a distant past.

Asma’s father glanced sharply at Mamoo, as though he was going to stand up for his wife. Instead, he said, “Asma needs to realize what is expected of her.”

“We’re not living in that bloody backwater! We live in America.” Mamoo jabbed the table with his finger. “Here, we don’t marry our daughters off when they’re barely out of junior high!”

“You see the things she’s doing. In front of others. You can see where this is going.”

“I’m right here!” Asma screamed. “Why are you talking about me like I’m not here? Where ‘this is going’? The only thing that’s going is me. From this family. The first second I can.”

“This isn’t our way. Look at the home your mother and I raised you in. That is how you should act.” Gone was the cajoling voice. “Do you think that this is okay? The Quoran tells how Muslim girls should act. This is not what we expect from you.”

“Is a father hitting their child expected?” But even as she said it, she knew that in their culture, at the time he came from, it was. It was permitted and, in some cases, might even be encouraged. “Because I don’t know God wants that either.”

Maybe he had thought that what had happened in that dark parking lot would remain there and that it would be relegated to everyone’s collective memory, because Asma could see that she had shocked him into silence. Her father had been prepared to say something. She could see it hovering, just on the edge of his lips. But he stopped. Abashed? Ashamed? It was impossible to tell.

“I know what happened, Musharraf.” Mamoo pushed his chair back from the table with a scrape. “In this country, there are laws prohibiting parents from hurting their children.”

So everyone knew. Asma turned to look at Salma and found her with her head tucked down. Of course it had been her. Asma filed it away, with all of Salma’s other omissions.

Her father’s face contorted, and he placed his hands on the arms of his chair like he was going to stand up. Instead, he spoke in a false, slow voice. “We’ll talk about this more later.”

Oh, she had so much to say. But too much had already been said, and she just wanted this to be over.

He went on, unable to stop sermonizing. “It’s my job as your father. It’s my job to protect you.”

“‘Protect me’?” Asma scoffed.

He picked up his spoon and cut off a small bite of pie. “After this trip home, it’s very clear.”

“‘Protect me’?” she said again, incredulously. She stopped herself from going any further because she knew if she said what was in her heart, there was no going back.

“I tried to be a better father than my own. And maybe I haven’t been perfect, but I’m going to be better now. Your life is so much better than my sisters had it.”

It was their end of the table that now held everyone’s attention. Her father may have been wandering around in his own thoughts, but everyone else sat on the edge of their seat. She was so sick of his justifications, his attempts to make what he did sound noble and warranted.

“I’ve been at work too much and not been here to teach you,” her father went on.

“Did Ami ever tell you?” Asma asked slowly.

“But enough is enough. I’m not letting my daughters run around like these American girls. These easy, anyone-can-have-me girls.”

“Did she tell you about what happened to me?” Asma’s voice was soft and exquisitely paced.

“No, I’m going to be better.”

“Did she?” Asma yelled.

Finally, he stopped and turned to Asma, warning lights reflected in the shine of his eyes. His attempts at good humor were running low.

“At the barbecue?” she continued.

“What are you talking about?”

“Why don’t you ask Ami? She knows.” Asma turned her head to the other end of the table. She looked down the table where her mother was meticulously slicing pie and ladling a gulab jamun in just the right amount of syrup.

“Don’t you, Ami?” She thought she could still hear her humming, but it might just have been the blood in her head.

Her father looked back and forth.

“Tell me what?” he asked flatly.

Asma wondered if her mother had genuinely forgotten. When it was clear her mother would say nothing, Asma said, “What your good friend Fazal Karim did?”

Her father stared at her with no effect, daring her.

“Do you remember the July Fourth barbecue we had when all the Pakistani people came from the city?”

“There was no barbecue.”

“After we got our citizenship. Five years ago!”

He remained silent, but his brows were furrowed as though his mind was working.

“So I guess Ami didn’t tell you that your good buddy Fazal Karim molested me?” Asma asked.

“What’s this molesting? What rubbish is this?”

At last, he was back to his old tone of voice, harsh and dismissive. In a way it was a relief. She knew these ground rules.

“Do you remember Salma running outside to tell Daisy that her father was angry and wanted to go?” Asma’s voice quavered. “Of course not. It was just another night for you. You have no idea what we go through, do you? Not when we were little and not now.” The injustice of having to keep herself hidden, of always having to choose to take care of the feelings and needs of others over her own, of the memory of the child that had once been assaulted fueled her rage and metastasized with the rawness underneath. Her voice got louder. “He touched me. He grabbed me. He kissed me . . .”

“You are a curse.”

Aunty moaned as though in pain. Mamoo stood up and sat back down, a man caught between polarities.

Asma backed up out of his reach. “You have no idea what ‘protect me’ means. It’s just a convenient little phrase you use to feel good about forcing me into marriage. Because neither of you”—she pointed a finger at each of her parents—“protected me when I needed it.” Now that the words were coming, they were fast and clipped. No hesitation or equivocation.

“This isn’t one of your plays schmays. Always pretending. Always acting. You think you say whatever you want. No! This is real life. You can’t say these things. You have to learn your place!” He hit the table for emphasis, knocking over a glass of water.

No one moved to clean up the water or put a towel down. In that space, when the awful words poured out of her mouth, they were the only two people in the room. Asma’s vision dilated and got hazy at the edges. She felt like she was vibrating from the inside out.

“How do I learn my place, Abu? Huh? He trapped me in the bathroom. He kissed me and wouldn’t stop. He put his hand up my shirt. He put one hand over my mouth so I couldn’t scream. What would it take? Me being raped? Me getting pregnant? What is this lesson you’re so desperate for me to learn?” Fat, heavy tears rolled off Asma’s face.

“Shut up! Shut up!” He bolted up to his full height, tipping his chair backward. “Fazal Karim is a good man. He has daughters. You imagined it.”

“Imagined it?” Salma screamed. “You think this is what we spend our time imagining? An old man pinning us against the wall, kissing and suffocating us? Who makes something like that up?”

“You saw?” He faltered.

This was what Salma’s yelling voice sounded like. From some disassociated part of her brain, Asma noted that her father gave credence to the event only when it came out of Salma’s mouth.

“Yes, I saw! He was following Asma around all night, tracking her. How did you not notice? I found them in the bathroom. Asma was pushing him away, crying.”

He leaned over the table and braced his arms. “I just can’t . . . what . . . what else?”

“You want to know what else?” Salma asked. “Asma told Ami that Fazal Karim was kissing and touching her really weirdly. And you want to know what Ami said?”

Asma was aware that Salma was speaking on her behalf and telling things that she thought only she had known.

He didn’t move. He didn’t make a sound.

Asma said, “She said, ‘Never tell your father.’”

The room was deathly silent. Emotional debris scattered, walls blown out, gaping holes to the outside showing through. Asma’s ears rang in the sudden vacuum left behind. Mamoo cried noiseless tears.

Her father looked at Sadia from under his heavy brows. He shook his head, his face drawn with disgust. “All this time, I’ve let you do what you want with them. ‘They need to fit in’ and ‘What’s the harm?’ And the whole time you knew this. You let this happen. No wonder she has no regard for her culture or us. This girl blames us. What have you done, Sadia?”

Her mother’s plate was barely touched. “He was your friend,” she said as she picked a green bean from the table and delicately nibbled it.

The table hushed, waiting to see how her father would react, but in the context of the rest of the night, the comment barely registered.

“I’m not marrying a man and certainly not some goonda Pakistani, fresh off the boat,” Asma said.

Her mother kept the same strange, small smile plastered on her face. “Oh, did I tell you about the monkey we saw begging for money on the side of the road? It was so cute.”

Asma announced, “We’re going back now.”

Everyone scurried away from the table like it was a drowning ship.

“Already? I made something for you.”

Her mother went to the kitchen and returned with a grocery bag cold from the freezer and extended it like a peace offering. Asma didn’t reach for the bag. Her mother pulled out a sandwich bag from the paper sack. It looked like it was filled with keema and peas. “I packed some things for your freezer.”

“I have a meal plan.”

“Our food is good for your brain. It makes you smarter.” Her mother picked up Asma’s arm and placed the handles of the bag in her palm.

“What are you even talking about?” Asma didn’t move her arm, and the bag fell to the ground.

Mamoo was outside dragging a cigarette deep, his hands busy lighting another. Where did he get cigarettes from? Did anyone even know he smoked?

She went downstairs to get her still-unpacked duffel bag and sat heavily on her bed to gather herself. She prayed Mamoo didn’t want to talk on the way back to school; she didn’t have it in her. This place. It wasn’t home. It was a cage. She felt like she was suffocating and her parents and Salma were trying to suck the life out of her. Maybe Bram Stoker came from such a family. No matter how much they tried to ruin her life, she wasn’t going to let them. No, she was going back to her real life. The rec center would open again tomorrow, and she could swim twice a day until Ruby came back on Saturday.

She heard Salma shuffle in through their shared closet. “Asma? You okay?”

Asma didn’t respond.

“They can’t make you. This is America, okay? They can’t make you marry someone you don’t want to.”

“Is there anything else you want to tell me? Any other secret plans about my life that I should know?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Then, what’s it like?”

Haltingly, stammering, Salma said, “I heard them, Ami, mention it. Before their trip.”

“You didn’t think to mention any of this? All that time at Mamoo’s . . .”

Salma’s tone hardened. “It was kind of hard to say anything since you weren’t around and, even when you were there, weren’t exactly talkative.”

Even as she said it, Asma knew that Salma was right. “I saw a Quoran on your desk. What? You’re reading it now? To get in Abu’s good graces?”

“No.” Salma sounded miffed. “Abu wanted to read it together after he picked me up from your dorms that night. Or maybe after the night of the play. I don’t even remember.”

Asma stood up and touched the handles of her duffel, a silent threat that she could leave whenever she wanted. “‘They can’t make you. This is America, okay? They can’t make you marry someone you don’t want to,’” Asma mimicked sarcastically.

“What do you want, Asma, huh? My faithful loyalty? You already have it. Accept whatever little attention you want to dole out for me? Done. They’re making me apply to CCC. That’s where I’ll get to go to college. And you know what? If that permits you more freedoms, I’ll gladly do it. What else could I possibly do to show you that I’m on your side?”

“You told Mamoo.” Asma’s voice was jagged.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Someone had to tell Mamoo, and God knows you weren’t going to.”

“Why? Why did he need to know?”

They locked gazes, warily.

Salma fished for an answer. “I don’t know. He just does. Maybe he can help.”

“You mean like at dinner tonight?”

Salma started to respond and then stopped abruptly like she was trying to work something out for herself.

Asma started toward the door. “You still don’t get it do you, Sal? No one’s coming to save us.”