Salar froze in his tracks. Saad was the only one in their group who, they believed, had no relationship with the opposite sex. This was not expected of someone as religious as he was. Salar turned back, uncertainly. He caught sight of a bottle and glasses on the living room table; used plates and cutlery lay on the kitchen counter.
Salar left the apartment without a minute's pause, as quietly as he had entered. He could not believe what he had heard and seen—Saad with a woman. It was incredible. A man who did not touch forbidden meat or alcohol, who prayed five times a day, and who preached Islam all the time—that he should do such a thing! The bottle and glasses indicated they'd been drinking: eating and drinking in the very home that Saad considered unclean.
Salar smiled wryly at the thought that someone out to prove himself a pious, practicing Muslim should turn out to be such a fraud. Here was Saad laying claim to being the only true Muslim in all of the USA and the other real Muslim was that girl Imama who went around wearing a tent-like chadar, but had no qualms about running away from home for 'love'. Salar was disgusted with these so-called 'true' believers and the extent of their lies and hypocrisy.
Salar grumbled to himself as he drove the car out of the parking lot. It was too late to go to Sandra's so he decided to go to Danish's. Danish was surprised to see him. Salar pretended he was bored on his own and so he had come to spend the night at Danish's place. Danish was satisfied with the explanation.
Saad had left when Salar got back on Sunday night, as planned. There was no evidence or indication of a woman's presence; the wine bottle had disappeared. Salar surveyed his apartment with a sardonic smile: everything was in place as he had left it. He then called up Saad. After a casual exchange of pleasantries, he said, 'So did your studies go well? All assignments completed?'
'Thanks, friend, I got to focus on my studies the last two days. The assignments are almost done too. How was your trip?' Saad asked.
'Very good...'
'How long did it take you? No problem with driving at night I hope?' Saad said perfunctorily.
'No we didn't travel at night.'
'Meaning?'
'Meaning that we didn't leave on Friday night but on Saturday morning instead,' Salar explained.
'Did you stay the night at Sandra's?'
'No, at Danish's.'
'You may as well have come home.'
'I did.' Salar remarked as a matter of fact. There was complete silence at the other end. Salar laughed to himself: Saad must be shaken to hear this.
'You came...wh..when?' he stammered.
'Around 11:00 pm. You were busy with some girl and I didn't think it proper to disturb you. So I left.'
Salar could not have guessed Saad's state of shock—he was speechless. He never expected Salar to discover his activities and expose him this way.
'Incidentally, you've never introduced me to your girl friend,' Salar added. He imagined Saad struggling to breathe.
'Just one of those things,' Saad murmured. 'I'll introduce you. But don't mention this to anyone,' he added quickly.
'Why would I? You needn't worry.' Salar could understand Saad's mental and emotional state. He felt a little sorry for him too. Saad cut short their conversation. Salar had a fairly good idea of his embarrassment.
After this incident, Salar thought that Saad would not flaunt his faith, his religiosity and preaching—at least, not before him, but he was surprised to note that Saad hadn't changed a whit. He continued to talk about religion with a passion, vigorously exhort people to follow Islamic precepts and to pray, and to check them on unIslamic practices. For hours on end Saad would talk about his love for Allah and Islam, and would support his views with quotes from the Quran or hadith and even become misty-eyed when doing so.
Apart from his own group, there were others too who were much impressed by Saad and his personality—they envied him for his love of God, an exemplary Muslim despite the passion of youth and the rush of life. Without a doubt, Saad knew how to speak and influence people—except Salar on whom Saad's preaching had no effect whatsoever. Salar was not convinced that Saad's bearded Islamic appearance was a mark of his faith, nor by his soft-spoken style or his respect and courtesy for others.
Salar's repulsion for religious people began with Imama; Jalal took this negative feeling further and Saad stretched it to the limit. Salar believed that all such apparently religious persons took hypocrisy to its height—in the garb of an outwardly religious appearance they were given more to immorality than those who did not profess piety. Coincidentally, these three people that he had come across confirmed his belief. Imama Hashim, a purdah-observing girl had ditched her fiance for another man and under cover of night, ran away from home. Jalal Ansar, who sported a pious mien, professed his love of Prophet (pbuh) in his melodious naats, had an affair with a girl and dumped/rejected her, who cleverly compartmentalized the worldly and the spiritual for his own convenience. And Saad Zafar: Salar's opinion of him was further lowered by another incident.
Saad came over to Salar's one day when the latter was busy at his computer, working on an assignment. They got talking and then Salar had to step out for some groceries from a neighborhood store. Saad stayed back. It took Salar about half an hour to get home. When he returned, he found Saad busy chatting online. They talked for a while before Saad went away. Salar had lunch and then went online; as he was doing so, he checked the history that Saad had been accessing—there he found those websites and pages that Saad had opened up. They were all pornographic. Salar would not have been surprised nor objected if he himself or any of his other friends indulged in such viewing, but to find Saad visiting such sites was a shock. Saad fell in Salar's opinion.
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'Then what are your plans? Are you coming back to Pakistan?' Sikandar was speaking to Salar; he informed his son that he was going to Australia for a few weeks with Tayyaba to attend a family wedding there.
'What would I do in Pakistan if you both are not going to be there?' Salar said forlornly.
'That's not on—meet your brother and sister. Anita misses you a lot,' replied Sikandar.
'Papa, I'm OK here; I'll spend my holidays here. There's no point in returning to Pakistan.'
'Then come along with us to Australia. Moiz is coming too.'
'I'm not crazy enough to just tag along with you to Australia,' Salar said wearily. 'Besides, there's hardly any understanding between Moiz and myself that you should tell me about his company.'
'Well, I won't compel you—you can stay there if you want to, but look after yourself. And Salar, you should not do anything that's wrong,' Sikandar warned him. Salar knew very well what his father meant by this allusion to 'anything wrong', but he was so used to it because Sikandar always said this at the end of every conversation. Salar would have been surprised if he didn't say so.
Salar cancelled his booking after speaking to Sikandar. Then he lay on his bed and staring at the ceiling, began to think about what to do when the university closed down for the vacations.
'I should go skiing somewhere or...go to another state,' he thought. 'Fine, I'll go to a travel agent tomorrow, after class and we'll work it out from there,' he decided.
The next day he finalized a skiing programme with a friend. He then informed Sikandar of his plan.
A day before the holidays began, Salar went to an Indian restaurant for dinner, and then after spending some time there, he went to a pub nearby where he had a few pegs of whisky. Around ten, he headed home. A sudden wave of nausea overcame him. He pulled the car to the side and stepped out. For a while he paced up and down on the patch of grass alongside the road. The cool breeze and the nip in the air seemed to help him feel better, but once again he had another bout of nausea, accompanied by pain in his chest and stomach.
He didn't know whether it was the food or the whisky that was responsible for this misery. His head was spinning and as he bent over, he suddenly threw up. He was still doubled over; even though his
stomach had emptied out, he felt no better. When he tried to straighten up, his legs were weak and wobbly. He tried to turn back towards his car, but his head was in a daze and his sight was blurred as he tried to focus on his car. He made a futile attempt to move a few steps, but he was too weak and fell to the ground. He tried to get up but he was sinking into the dark.
Before he lost consciousness, he could hear someone shake him; someone was talking to him a loud voice—it seemed there was more than one person.
Salar tried to shake his head but he couldn't even move it. He tried to open his eyes, but they would not respond. He slipped away into complete darkness.
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He had spent two days in the hospital. A couple, passing by the road where he had collapsed, saw him fall and brought him to the hospital. According to the doctors, Salar was the victim of food poisoning. He regained consciousness a few hours after being admitted, but despite wanting to return home, Salar was too weak to move. The next evening he felt better, but the doctor advised him to spend another night at the hospital. Salar got home on Sunday afternoon and the first thing he did was to call up the tour operator and cancel the skiing trip. He had planned to leave on Monday morning and to try once more to get Sandra to go with him. When he cancelled his plans, he didn't call up Sandra or any other of his friends.
Salar had a light sandwich and a cup of coffee for lunch; then he took a tranquilizer and went to sleep. The next day he woke up at eleven; he had a severe headache. He felt his forehead and his body burning with fever.
'Oh, come on!' he was quite exasperated. After spending two days being ill, he wasn't planning to spend the next two days likewise—but that's how it was going to be, he estimated.
He dragged himself out of bed, and without even washing up, headed for the kitchen to get a cup of coffee. Then he began to check the answer service on his phone for missed and recorded calls. There were a few from Saad who had been trying to speak to Salar before leaving for Pakistan, and was quite annoyed at Salar's disappearing without a word.
There were calls from Sandra who believed that Salar had gone off skiing without meeting her; Sikandar and Kamran also called, thinking that Salar had gone off without a word. There were some calls from other friends and classmates who were leaving for home. They all asked Salar to call back—and he would have done so had he not been laid low. He could have called Saad, Sikandar and Kamran in Pakistan, but was in no mood to do so.
Salar finished his coffee with a couple of slices of bread; then he took his medicines and went and lay down again. He thought he'd be rested enough by the evening to bring down the fever.
His estimate proved to be totally wrong. When he awoke from the drug-induced sleep that evening, his body was burning with fever. His mouth and tongue were parched and his throat was dry and sore. His head and his entire body were racked with pain. Perhaps it was the pain that broke his sleep.
He lay prone, his hands gripping his forehead—he tried to ease the pain by massaging his temples with his thumbs, but to no avail. He gave up and just lay still, his face buried in his pillow. Salar was not aware of when he fell asleep again, trying to endure the pain that gripped his being. When he awoke again, the room was in complete darkness. It was night and not just his room, but the entire apartment was in the dark. He was in greater distress than before. He made a futile attempt to get up from his bed, but his body seemed to have no energy and he lay down. Once again, he felt himself slipping into a state between slumber and unconsciousness. He could hear himself groaning but he could not stop himself from the act. Despite the central heating, he was shivering uncontrollably—the blanket couldn't warm him nor was he able to get into warmer clothes. Once more, he felt the pain cut through his chest and stomach.
Salar's tortured cries intensified as waves of nausea washed over him. He tried to get up and go to the bathroom, but was too weak to move. He struggled and sat up but before he could get off the bed, he retched violently and threw up whatever he had had in the past few hours. Even in this semi-conscious condition he was aware of the filth on his clothes and blanket, but he found himself almost paralyzed, groaning and mumbling in a daze, senseless.
How long this state lasted he did not know, but he did recall that at one point he felt he was dying, and for the first time the thought of death terrified him. He wanted to somehow reach the phone, to call someone, but he was unable to move—the soaring fever had pinned him down.
Eventually his fever subsided and, far into the night, he emerged from his near-comatose condition. He opened his eyes to the dark in the room— his body wasn't burning and the chill had left him, but the pain in his head and body lingered, albeit to a lesser degree. For a while he lay staring at the ceiling, then he searched for the switch and turned on the bedside lamp. The light—after the long spell of dark—blinded him, forcing his eyes shut. He felt his eyelids with his fingers: his eyes were swollen and they hurt. With an effort, he kept his eyes open and looked around the room, trying to remember what had befallen him. Short bursts of memory revived the events.
Salar was sickened at his state. Still sitting on his bed, he unbuttoned his shirt and flung it off. With feeble tottering steps, he got off the bed and pulling away the sheet and blanket, threw them on the floor. Still staggering, he went into the bathroom. He was shocked when he caught sight of himself in the mirror—his eyes were sunken in, dark shadows encircling them, his face was pale and his lips were dry and peeling. Anyone looking at him would believe he had been suffering from a long illness.
'Have I grown such stubble in just twenty-four hours?' he thought, as he ran his fingers over his face.
'I didn't look half as bad in the hospital after that food poisoning episode as in this one day's fever,' he mumbled incredulously as he scrutinized his appearance in the mirror. Filling the tub with warm water, he stepped in. he was surprised why, in spite of the fever, he had not immediately changed out of those filthy clothes, instead of just lying there.
Having bathed, he went into the kitchen—he was ravenously hungry. He made some noodles for himself. 'I must go to the doctor tomorrow for a complete check-up,' he decided as he ate. He felt light and better after the shower, but his whole being felt drained and weak.
He had switched on the TV while eating and flicked channels to find something suitable: there was a talk show going on. Salar stopped eating— spoon poised in mid-air, he stared at the TV in distraction and picked up the remote to change channels. Now he was looking carefully at the programs on each channel and the confusion on his face was growing.
'What's this?'
He remembered that it was Friday night when he had been taken ill and had collapsed on the road, and had been taken to the hospital. Saturday was spent there, and he had returned to his apartment on Sunday. After going to sleep on Sunday afternoon, he had awakened the next morning at eleven; that night he had fever which must have lasted till Tuesday, and it must be Tuesday night now. But the television channels told a different story—it was Saturday night and the next day would be Sunday.
Salar glanced at his watch, lying on the living room table and his mouth fell open in amazement. He put down the bowl of noodles; he couldn't believe his eyes when he saw the date on his watch.
'Does this mean that I've been ill for five days? Out of my senses for five whole days? How can that be? How is it possible?' he muttered. 'Five days is a long time—how come I did not even notice the passage of time? How could I just lie there, senseless, for five days?'
He stumbled towards his telephone to check the answering service— there were no calls.
'Papa didn't even call me...and neither did Saad ....what's the matter with them? Didn't they miss me?' Salar was shocked to find there were no messages for him. He sat silently by the phone for a long time.
'How can it be that Papa did not even think of me? None of my friends thought of me—how could they just abandon me?' He realized for the first time that the thought made his ha
nds tremble; it wasn't weakness or debility, but then what was it that had shaken him so? He sat down on the sofa and tried to finish the noodles, but they were no longer appetizing. He felt as if he was chewing in pieces of soft rubber—he couldn't eat any more. He was in a strange state of uncertainty—had he really spent five days alone and that neither he nor anyone else had known what had befallen him?
He went into the bathroom again. His face was not as haggard after taking a shower, but the dark circles around his eyes and his overgrown stubble were still there. He stood there, staring at his reflection and touching the shadows under his eyes as though he didn't really believe what he saw. Suddenly, his hirsute face was bothering him. He took out the shaving kit and prepared to shave; he realized then that his hands were still trembling and, in close sequence, he managed to nick his face in three places. He washed his face and patted it dry, trying to stanch the thin trickle of blood that had appeared. Vacantly, he kept staring at his image. The cut bled again—dark blood oozing out—and unblinking, he watched the tiny drops roll down his face. 'What's next to ecstasy?'
'Pain.' A cold, low voice spoke. He stood rooted to the ground.
'What's next to pain?'
'Nothingness.' He remembered each word.
'Nothingness,' he mumbled, looking at himself in the mirror. The movement made the drops of blood roll down his face.
'And what comes after nothingness?'
'Hell.' Salar retched again, all of a sudden, and doubled over the wash basin. The food he had finished eating a few minutes ago, was ejected once again. He turned on the tap to clear away the mess. He remembered what he had asked her next and what her reply had been.