The Door Is Open, page 14
Mrs. Jaffer looks at me as if she’s seeing me for the first time. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
I mumble, “I thought he told you.”
“Call him again, Sal,” she says.
Sal gives me a sympathetic look and presses redial. But after two tries, Mr. Pandey doesn’t pick up.
“Oh Lord, help us,” Mrs. Jaffer whispers a prayer.
“Duaa,” my mom says with a pointed look. “You’ve helped Mr. Pandey before.”
I need a mental buff—a nudge to make me more confident. I take a deep breath and think back to the day my trio and I had fought our way into the semifinals. I remember that feeling—that I could do anything. I can do this. I put my game face on and step forward.
“Uh,” I mumble, heading toward the equipment. “I can take a look at it.”
Mrs. Jaffer doesn’t look very convinced. But she’s out of options.
I inspect the equipment Mr. Pandey had managed to put together, and it looks like it’s in the right order.
“Can I help?” asks Sal.
I look at him, tongue-tied.
“You’re Duaa, right?” he asks. “Started school this fall?”
I nod, not quite believing he knows who I am.
“I, uh, tried to talk to you. Twice,” he says. “Both times you kind of ignored me and walked off.”
I dissed him? Unbelievable. An uncomfortable knot settles in my stomach.
“I’m, uh, sorry about that,” I say. “Being in a brand-new school has been a bit confusing.”
He nods as if accepting the pathetic excuse. “I know you’re new and all, but there are cool people at Sumter,” he adds.
Maybe I’m the one being a snob? The thought blows me away. But I don’t have time to think about it.
I switch the subject. “We need to make sure all the cables are secure.” I hand him a blue wire and point to the back of the projector. “Find the slot behind the screen and plug it in.”
As he follows my instructions, I connect the remaining cables. I check the sound system. I open the control panel and press the test button. After hearing a reassuring beep, I move on, running through the rest of the checklist.
“Can you see if the visual display is on?” I ask Sal while I fiddle with the back of the monitor.
Sal peers at the screen and shakes his head.
The monitor is on, but the screen is black. The computer is asleep. I say a little prayer and hope a simple wake-up call will work. It’s an easy solution that’s often overlooked.
I shake the mouse on the pad and hold my breath. Sal looks over my shoulder and lets out a whoop as the lights flicker and the system purrs to life. I hand Mrs. Jaffer the mic.
“You can start the event now,” I say.
“Thank you, my dear!” she gushes in relief, and pins the wireless mic to her shirt. “Salman, I need you at the podium,” she adds, and hurries off with a file of notes.
“That was awesome,” says Sal. “You really should talk to Mrs. Peterson in the theater department. They could use your skills for sure.”
“Yeah, maybe,” I say with a smile.
“And next time, say hi back,” he adds before running off.
I sit down to run the AV system, still amazed that someone at school knows that I exist in the real world. I play the intro music, alerting guests that the program is about to begin.
Mrs. Jaffer stands at the podium. “I hope you are enjoying the lovely food, prepared by Lazeez Catering,” she says, and the room fills with murmurs of agreement. “Before I begin, I want to say a special thank-you to the young lady who came to our rescue tonight.” She points toward the AV table.
I freeze as hundreds of curious eyes turn toward me.
“Duaa fixed the AV system and saved the night,” she says.
The room fills with the echo of clapping, and my cheeks turn the color of raspberry jam. But strangely, I don’t want to hide under the table this time. It feels nice to be the answer to someone’s prayers, the way Mom knew I’d be.
TOGETHER AT THE CENTER
by Hena Khan
“YOU KNOW NOBODY’S SHOWING UP AT SIX O’CLOCK,” Baba warns as he glances over my shoulder and points at the screen. I’m typing out the invitations for my party, sandwiched between my parents on the sofa.
“Don’t worry,” Mama says. “I’m adjusting for Desi Standard Time. Dinner won’t be served until eight.”
“Dinner?” I ask. “I thought the party was supposed to be lunch. Remember?”
Mama shakes her head. “It’s dinner. I already booked the hall and spoke to Atiya Auntie about catering.”
This is the first I’m hearing about any of these details.
“Catering what?”
“A nice buffet. We can pick out whatever you like. Butter chicken, channa, you name it. But definitely biryani. And some kind of korma.”
I guess we’re having desi food.
“What happened to pizza?” I wonder aloud.
“Oh. We’ll have pizza too, for the kids. And a big cake from that new bakery on Maple Lawn Drive.”
Baba shoots me a worried look, and I exhale slowly. At least one of my parents understands. This party sounded like a blast when we first talked about it a few months ago. My ameen. Celebrating that I’ve finished reading the entire Quran in Arabic after six years.
I’d imagined a big cookout, with carnival games. But now it’s turning into just another fancy, boring dinner party. I signal my father to say something to Mama, and he nods at me with a look that says, I got you.
“Doesn’t this all sound a bit…” He pauses and clears his throat. “I don’t know… expensive?”
Wait. What?
I suddenly realize that he’s not worried about the same thing as I am at all.
“Mama,” I interrupt before she can respond. “You said this was going to be a fun party! I thought we were going to get a photo booth. And a bounce house for the little kids.”
My younger brother, Azaan, comes running into the room when he hears “bounce house.”
“Yes!” he whoops. “Can we get the one with the basketball hoop that Jacob had at his bar mitzvah? It was so awesome! I could dunk on it!”
Mama sucks her teeth.
“Halima,” she begins, resting her hand on my shoulder. “This is a big moment for you. We’re so proud of your accomplishment. But that’s why this should be more formal, a classy event. Remember when the Jaffers had their ameen for Salman? Wasn’t that nice?”
“You mean that over-the-top thing at the country club?” Baba snorts. “It must have cost as much as a wedding!”
I remember Sal’s party. I sat at a kids’ table in the corner, bored during speech after speech by Sal’s uncles and dad. The highlight was whispering with my friends Maha and Rahma, scarfing down gulab jamuns, and trying not to giggle when everyone was hushed. I forgot that it even was an ameen, because whatever the cost, it also felt more like a wedding than a kid’s party. Everyone was super dressed up, and there were silver tasseled boxes with gold-wrapped candies inside them at each place setting. I still have mine in my room.
“I know the community center isn’t as nice, but I’m going to see about a decorator. I’ve heard about this great guy named Bally,” Mama continues.
Baba and I exchange looks again, and now even I’m worried about how much this is all going to cost. I’d much rather spend money on hiring the hypnotist who came to my friend Andrea’s birthday party than some fancy decorations to cover up the old walls at the Maple Grove Community Center.
“What about entertainment?” I ask.
Mama smiles brightly and puts her hand on my back.
“That’s you, my love. You’re the entertainment. Everyone is going to listen to you read from the Quran. Your favorite passage. Sister Lamis can help you practice.”
I almost laugh before I realize that my mother is dead serious. And as she starts to go over the ridiculously long guest list with Baba, filled with a bunch of names of people I don’t even recognize, it’s clear that there’s no room for arguing with her. If Baba can’t get her to remove any of the extra people, I won’t be able to convince her to get a photo booth. She has this party all figured out. But it suddenly feels like it’s more for her than it is for me.
“Those who struggle get the most reward,” Sister Lamis always told me when I’d get frustrated during my Quran lessons. And it’s been a struggle all right. I began when I was about six years old, sitting at the kitchen table every Sunday while my grandmother-like teacher with a warm laugh taught me the letters of the Arabic alphabet.
She’d give me stickers that I put on my folder when I did a good job and alternated between calling me “habibti” and “sweetie.” Slowly, I learned how to connect Arabic letters, which change shape depending on if they are in the beginning, middle, or end of a word. After I mastered that, I began to read short words from a special booklet.
But that was just the beginning.
After almost two entire years of prep work, I was finally ready to read the Quran, at the age of eight. Sister Lamis made a special duaa, and then I started, haltingly, with her correcting me, line after line. After months, I could read an entire page. Then I worked my way up to getting through a few pages in an hour.
“There are people who devote their entire lives to learning how to read the Quran, memorizing it, and reciting it perfectly,” Sister Lamis would remind me when I would get frustrated by the vowels that live outside the letters, or the many rules about what gets pronounced or stays silent or gets extended in Arabic. Sometimes she’d play me samples of experts reciting the Quran on her phone to inspire me. They always sounded a bit echoey, like someone recorded them in an empty marble mosque. But it was beautiful, and we’d munch on the snacks Mom put out while we listened.
“Not ‘ah,’” Sister Lamis would gently correct me as I read. “It’s ‘aaaaah.’”
When it came to certain letters, like “ein” or “haa,” she patiently had me repeat the sounds after her, over and over. After a while, I thought I was getting pretty good at it. But the pinched skin between her eyes as she exaggerated the sounds told me I still wasn’t there yet.
Sister Lamis is from Syria. She speaks Arabic, and she understands the Quran. My family is from Pakistan, and we speak Urdu. Urdu’s got some words that are like Arabic. And the alphabet is similar. But that’s about it. That’s why our parents hired Sister Lamis—to make sure that Azaan and I learn Arabic properly.
Some kids I know raced through the book, finishing by age seven or eight, which made me feel like I was behind. Even my younger cousin Rehan finished when he was only nine. But I went extra slowly because Sister Lamis would stop me after a few verses to explain the meaning of what I had just read. My parents insisted on that, saying that I needed to understand the lessons of the Quran, and not just recite the words, even if that meant I didn’t complete it until I was twelve.
The best part of my lessons was when I finished reading and could sit back and listen to Sister Lamis tell me stories of the prophets, of Nuh and his big ship, Yunus trapped in the belly of a whale, and Muhammad and his patience during hard times. Each time, Sister Lamis would end with “And that is why it is important to be good, and to be nice to your brother, and to take care of your parents when they are old just like they take care of you now.” I’d glance over at Mama at those moments if she was in the kitchen, listening as she often did, and catch her nodding her approval. I can’t help but wonder if my parents made a deal with Sister Lamis to get her to drill that message into me as much as possible.
Today, I thumb through my worn Quran as I take a bite of the chocolate-covered dates Sister Lamis gave me as a congratulations gift last Sunday. I’m looking for the passage I’ll recite at the ameen. I’ll practice until I can sound it out without any mistakes. The idea of standing in front of everyone and reading aloud makes my heart beat faster. But when I imagine my teacher’s and my parents’ faces in the front row, filled with pride, my nerves are overpowered by a whole lot of joy.
I just need to find the perfect passage to recite.
“Rehan? As in my little cousin Rehan? Are you serious?” I sputter.
“Yes, Halima.” Mama continues to chop onions and doesn’t look up. “You’re overreacting. It isn’t that big a deal.”
But oh no. She’s wrong. This is a big deal.
“It’s supposed to be my special moment, isn’t it?” I ask. My mother keeps saying that at least, even though as the day gets closer, it feels like it less and less. If that’s even possible.
“Of course it is.” Mama says it like I’m a five-year-old.
“Then why does he have to be a part of the program? Let him have his own party,” I grumble.
“Come on, Halima.” Mama frowns. “Don’t be like that.”
I fume in silence.
Mama sighs, wipes her hands on a dish towel, and turns to face me.
“You can share the stage, can’t you? You know how hard he’s been working on his recitation for so many years. It’s so beautiful.”
I know about it, for sure. I’ve been hearing about my perfect cousin Rehan and his Quran skills for years. I hold back a groan because it’s probably wrong to react that way to the idea of someone reciting the Quran. But Rehan is just so… smug. And to be fair, it’s not like all that reading of the Holy Book makes him act any holier or anything. He’s still mean to his older sister Rania and me when we visit. He still hogs the TV and whines when it’s our turn on the PS4. And he never shares his candy.
Mama continues to gush about him anyway.
“He didn’t get to have an ameen, so it would be nice for him to have the chance to recite in front of everyone too, don’t you think? And we can recognize him, too.”
I think back to when Rehan’s grandfather suddenly fell ill in the spring. He and Rania missed school for three weeks to go to Cairo because it looked like it was the end. But then his grandfather recovered, and the family returned, relieved and thankful, with armloads of presents for us. But Rehan’s ameen was canceled and never rescheduled.
Rehan’s mother is my mother’s sister. And his father is from Egypt. Rehan’s been hearing Arabic his whole life and visiting Cairo almost every year. So it makes sense that he recites Arabic so well. He’s half Arab after all. But no one seems to remember that, or the part about there being more reward for those who struggle. He has it easy, and that still doesn’t stop him from being braggy or super annoying.
It doesn’t help either that all the aunties are obsessed with him and his big eyes, dimples, and curly hair. It’s disgusting. But Rehan loves the attention, basking in the cheek pinches, smiling through all the praise, and eating up all the treats the aunties pile on his plate at parties. They act as if all that Quranic training has left him weak and in need of extra nourishment.
“I’m sure Sister Lamis would be thrilled to see two of her favorite students on the stage together, reading from the Quran,” Mama adds. “You can do that for her, can’t you?”
It’s like she’s been saving my teacher as her secret weapon. What am I supposed to say?
“I’ll think about it” is all I can manage. “But Rehan’s name isn’t going on the cake.” Mama took me to the bakery last week to try cake samples, and I picked chocolate with white chocolate icing.
Mama smiles and squeezes my shoulder.
“Thank you, for thinking of everyone else,” she says, like the matter is settled. But I still don’t like the idea of Rehan worming his way into my event one bit. And the thought of him biting into my cake with that superior look on his face leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.
Baba slams a copy of the newspaper onto the kitchen table.
“Look at this,” he mutters. “Thirty years living in this city, and I never expected to see something like this.”
“What is it?” Mama asks. She stops washing dishes and comes toward him. I quit emptying the dishwasher and follow her.
“It’s just so infuriating!” he continues, running his hands through his hair.
I check out the paper, the Maple Grove Dispatch, and don’t see anything but ads for a used car dealer and a law firm for personal injury.
“Increase in Car Break-Ins,” a headline reads.
“That’s terrible,” I say.
“No, this.” Baba points. “I mean, yes, that’s terrible, too. But look at this letter.”
It’s a letter to the editor. In response to a recent article. I scan it quickly.
“This person is arguing that Maple Grove Community Center should be closed instead of renovated,” Baba explains as I read. “They want to divert the funds to build a new dog park.”
“We’ve heard about that debate for a while,” Mama says, sounding unsurprised. “The city council is going to vote on it.”
“I know, but listen to these reasons this person gives for closing the center.” Baba pauses and then reads from the paper. “‘Noise pollution, traffic issues, loitering, strong food odors, unauthorized vendors.’”
“Hmmm.” Now Mama frowns, too.
“What?” I ask, confused.
Baba looks at Mama, who nods her head. Then he looks at me and sighs.
“It sounds like people who oppose the center don’t like some of the things it’s used for. Or maybe even the people who use it,” Baba says.
“Does it say that?” I glance back at the paper.
“Not in so many words,” Baba says. “But if you read between the lines. The center is heavily used by people of color, immigrants and others, for our parties and cultural classes and programs. Like your ameen.”
“So?” I ask, trying to stay calm and act mature, even as a tiny prick of fear pierces my chest.
“So, that threatens some people. They don’t want to see us practicing our traditions or our culture. They don’t like the smells of our food, the sound of our music, or how we pray.”
“Oh.” The prick in my chest intensifies to a pinch. “Am I still having the ameen, then?”
Baba takes the paper and drops it in the recycling bin, and then he turns to give me a hug.
