Short story: میڈا اشق وی تو

I shield my eyes from the sun as I lift my face up to look at the board on the right that says "TO  N  PLAZA", the "W" from Town was nowhere to be seen, much like the harmony that lingered in the air when Nana was alive. This was the same building in which he was housed last, the last house which housed all nine siblings and both their parents, the last abode which had the honor of seeing the entire clan in all its glee and togetherness. It has been thirteen years now but I still can not seem to get rid of the whiff of his old-people smell which my nose catches every now and then in his memory. It was something between talcum powder and cinnamon. The only regret that still sinks in with my heart every time I think about him, is that I never got to know him as much as I would like to. 

It was in the same apartment in Town Plaza, when on one of his last days with both of us equally unaware of what was to come next I lay in his lap as he ran his fingers through my hair. A lost beam of sunshine reflected against the metal rim of his glasses which were set like a burden on his sharp small nose. He had a beautiful nose and as much as my mother would like to think that I got mine from him, I can never believe it to be held parallel against the carefully sculpted one that he had. His hair was an assortment of browns, silvers and blacks. He taught me that there are shades to everything in life, to colors, to people, to emotions, to foods. Everything is a different shade of something. Every phase of life is a shade of what is to come next. So one should never dwell in the moment, because just like everything else that has shades, it changes and is never constant. 

"And then I stole one of the doors that faced the Masjid in the next lane. And do you know what I did with it?"

"But Nana, stealing is haram!" I exclaimed, appalled at his hidden secret that I thought I was the first person he was sharing with. You see, even as a child I wanted to be the person who said all the right things.

"Arey suno tou meri baat" Hey, listen to me first.

"I sold it in Bijnor, took the next train to pick your Nani and then came to Pakistan."

It was one of the seven silver plated doors in his father's haveli in the old mahalla of Lucknow. After having spent seventeen years in orphanages and sleeping on the streets with the faqirs and waking up every day not knowing what will follow dawn to dusk, he received a letter from Gulab Jaan Zaidi. Until that day he had lived his life under the impression that he was aimless, kin-less and hence also reckless. That he was one of God's children and only God will help him live and figure out his ways, that he did not need anyone because he never seemed to. And the moment he realized his mother was on her death bed his knees turned to dust and failed to provide the same support that they always had. He thanked all the turn of events and incidences which lead to him self-teaching reading and writing Nastaliq. It was meant for this day, for him to one day to be able to decipher scribbles of ink on a paper which let him imagine a frail woman in frilly blue gharara saying "Beta ghar ajao" Son, come home. He was not kin-less, and now had a newfound ambition, like a phoenix rising from the ashes, that day changed the way he viewed the world, it changed his darveshesque way of living and gave him the wisdom of a seventy year old. This adolescent young boy who had no one to look for and no one to look after had aged decades in a matter of seconds as his world had changed. 

As he sat beside his mother's bed, sitting on his knees, enclosing her delicate fingers in his rugged palms, warm tears rolled down his cheeks and he could feel the saltiness at the corners of his lips. He listened intently as she revealed his lineage and his father's and how much wealth and estate Nawabzada Ghulam Rasool Zaidi had left him. Instead of a sharp sound of glistening greedy eyeball, the room echoed with the sound of a heart aching to elope with the beloved to the land of the pure, Pakistan. Ashraf un Nisa, my grandmother was his first and most deeply loved association with humanity. He had always referred to her as Chhammo, in his letters, in his calls of endearment, on his deathbed, from the bathroom when he would forget to take the towel, when his body would writhe in endless pain and when he would squeal with excitement at the birth of his first grandchild. Chhammo would never let go, and neither would he. There was no reality, or alternate vision of the world which facilitated a life where Chhammo was without Syed Ahmed Zaidi. When blood bubbled out of his mouth having traveled all the way from his deteriorating liver to his throat as he choked on it, there is no other word he wanted to utter and no other thought he wanted to harbor in his fading consciousness.

******

We pass Town Plaza in Federal B Area and head on to our way towards Bufferzone, to meet Ashraf un Nisa some fifty five years after the day she entrusted her life in the hands of a seventeen year old boy with wild eyes and experiences of a sage. I might never be able to understand what thought processes must have materialized in her mind at the moment. At the thought of running off to Jamshoro in Pakistan in the midst of blood and hate and war and grief. At the sheer uncertainty of what could and could not become of them. Her grey eyes must have fluttered and flinched and she must have felt weak in the knees but looking at her now I think maybe she just did not think about it a second time. When you look at him in his excitement and thrill, disapproval is not a possibility. I would say my Nani was no less than the most fitting partner he could have spent his life with. I doubt any one else would have been half as patient with his ways of uncanny uniqueness. They settled in Jamshoro during the infancy of Pakistan. It was a small settlement of immigrants near Kotri Barrage; families of officers, workers at the irrigation workshops, fishermen and undertakers. After a few years and two daughters, Nana was posted as the Chief Operator at the workshop. From Ahmed to Zaidi Sahib, the journey was an endless series of circumstances unseen and instances unexpected and hopes lost but found again. Outside the small 250 sq feet cemented house was an expansive garden shaded by neem and mulberry trees. They tell me that the entire garden that Nana built from scratch is now all gone, inhabited instead by pan shops and grocery stores. He was a man of devotion, of utmost undying relentless devotion, he would put his life and soul into whatever he set his mind to. The garden was one of the most note-worthy places in the entire community. From the pitch black Turkish Halfeti rose to bottle-guards and eggplants, there is barely any thing that he didn't try to grow there. Surrounded with that snippet of the gardens in heaven he managed a family of twelve people with him being the only one who earns. The era of Ahmed the darvesh had ended and that of Zaidi Sahib the godly elder had begun. 

The aura around him was that of a man who carried happiness on his shoulders, tinge of orange, red and other colors representative of warmth and compassion would get slightly more saturated when he enters a vicinity. The fishermen would send some from their first catch of the day to the Zaidi household every morning, the milkman would always add an extra kilo for free, Amjad Bhai's mother would send fresh apricots from her garden only for Zaidi Sahib and his kids. Gradually, the number of kids started to grow and eventually reached the overwhelming number nine. As the number of dependents grew, the number of books in his invaluable treasure reduced. He had one of the most interesting collection of books in his possession. Books on mind reading based on the ways of the ancient Egyptian civilization, on palmistry, on astrology, books on the multitudes of religious inferences of the day of judgement written by old Persian authors, books that he wrote by hand on the knowledge he had gathered. There was a distinct parrot green leather-bound notebook which in tatters had his entire family tree traced all the way to Mohammad. It has been decades since anyone last saw it, but every single member of the household still takes the utmost pride in how their royal bloodline has been preserved. His scholarly friends from Iran had brought for him one of each of the zodiac stones, original and precious. Some of them so unbelievably rare that he didn’t let most people see them. And all I know, they were all one by one sold for pennies after his death to make up for my all my mamoo’s financial failures and gambles. All I know, the books were given to far-off relatives and whoever asked because after his death nobody wanted to preserve them. All I know I was too young to voice my concerns of the future when all of this was happening. All I know is that I still know a lot less about him than I would like to.

*********

"Meda Ishq Vi Tu
Meda Yaar Vi Tu"

Pathanay Khan played in the background as feelings of melancholy stirred together with nostalgia creating an unsettling mixture of emotions at the bottom of my gut. Nana had introduced me to ghazals and raag; tumri, alaab, etc. He would make me listen to Begum Akhtar and Pathanay Khan, his ultimate favorites. It was not until my uncle sold his tape recorder to pay back his debt without ever informing him that the music stopped. A few months after the music his heartbeat too stopped.

It is a twisted feeling to be growing up and witnessing your memory of the one person you derived so much strength from, fading. With the jaded images of him at the back of my mind, I try my hardest to keep him alive in memory, in writing, in pictures. But I am slowly blacking out, and he is gradually waning away from my conscience. I am the same person, who is trying her best to forget certain things about the recent past which cause the utmost hurt and pain and they keep on coming back, stronger than ever. The same person who is also grappling on straws to keep together the memory of some one who had meant so much. If only our mind had a heart of its own, if only it could realize that some people are ought to be remembered and some you specifically have to forget, if only it did not keep mixing the two.

یادِ مازی ازاب ہے یا رب

چہین لے مجھسے حافزاہ میرا