Of Smokeless Fire by A.A. Jafri (i wanna iguana read aloud TXT) 📕

that his father wanted to talk about something, something important. Once dinner was over, Mansoor made a gin and tonic for himself and offered the same to his father. But Noor only drank whisky. Slowly, he eased his father into opening up about what was bothering him. Noor began complaining about Farhat’s religiosity, her superstitions, her ignorance and her blaming him for everything wrong in her life. Although he did not spell it out, it was also about his self-isolation.

With Sadiq’s horrific murder, Haider’s betrayal of his principles and Zakir’s regressive certitude in matters of faith, Noor’s loneliness was complete. When Mansoor had been in Pakistan, he had felt his father’s pain and had listened to his cynicism, but with him no longer there, Noor’s social cord had been permanently cut off. In lampooning the grotesque politicians who ran the country, he found himself not only rejecting Pakistan, but also utterly abandoned.

Mansoor had never seriously reflected on his father’s ‘regrettable citizenship’. Was his Abba still grieving for the India that he had lost? For the home that he had to flee from, the dreams that had dissipated? And what could he say about his life with Farhat? Tradition had wedded them, but their conflicting natures had separated them. Love had little traction in their conventional marriage; it was merely a Plan B, one concocted by their respective parents.

Suddenly, Mansoor’s ears perked up when he heard the name Khaleel Khan.

‘What did you say?’

‘I said your mother is turning into a zealot.’

‘No, what did you say about Khaleel?’

‘I said people like your nincompoop cousin Khaleel Khan and that troglodyte Zakir Hassan fan her extremism.’

‘Extremism? What do you mean?’ Mansoor asked.

‘Well, your mother’s life nowadays revolves around a very harsh belief system. She performs all the rituals, which I don’t mind, but then she goes to that bloody fool Zakir’s house for his weekly sermons. He has become her spiritual mentor. He incites her, and she criticizes my every habit and blames me for her past sins,’ he said, making air quotes when he uttered the words ‘past sins’.

‘What past sins?’ Mansoor asked.

‘She says that I prevented her from performing her religious obligations in the past. She blames me for never taking her to perform hajj. She even blames me for all her miscarriages.’

‘But why?’

‘I don’t know why she blames me for everything, but I have never ever imposed my beliefs on her or on anyone else. I never forbade her from practicing her faith. And if I had taken her for hajj, I would have felt like a total fraud. Why should I do something that I do not believe in? I told her that I would pay for her trip if she found someone to go with.’ He stopped, gulped his drink and continued, ‘She nags me about my drinking, she pesters me about my beliefs, and she accuses me of corrupting you . . . The other night, she asked me if I believed in the existence of God.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I got really angry and just told her off. I didn’t want to have a theological discussion with a . . .’ Noor’s voiced trailed off.

Mansoor had heard his father’s explanation about his non-belief. His father didn’t believe in the supernatural. Human existence was just brain chemistry according to him—the firing of neurones and the synaptic connections. Take away the brain, and you take away the being. Religion, to him, was nothing but wishes and fears.

‘So what’s Athanni’s role in all this?’ Mansoor asked.

Noor laughed when he heard Khaleel’s nickname. Mansoor had told him why Joseph had coined that sobriquet.

‘Khaleel Khan has become Zakir’s trusted lieutenant. You know he was fired from his job?’

‘I knew that he was fired, but I didn’t know that he works for Uncle Zakir now.’

‘I don’t think that’s his full-time job. Haider told me that Khaleel has found work as a photographer for the Daily Hulchul,’ Noor told him.

‘That’s a perfect fit, Maulvi Athanni, a tabloid journalist,’ Mansoor said.

It was getting late, and Mansoor realized that his father’s crapulous recollections were making him sentimental. He felt sorry for him. Sitting there across from him, Noor cut a figure of lonely irrelevance to his wife, to his friends and to his country—a grim relic of disconnection, stranded in his own time zone. The Unholy Quartet had collapsed; his wife of nearly fifty years had openly rebelled and there was nobody who could commiserate with him, nobody who could share his angst. That was the oppressive cruelty of his life in Pakistan.

*

Mansoor was in no mood to start his doctorate immediately; he wanted to take some time off to see the world, but his father tried his best to veto that.

‘You will have plenty of opportunities to see the world, but I won’t be there to support your studies for long. I can continue to support you for now, but if I retire, as I am planning to, I may not be able to support you later,’ Mansoor’s father told him.

‘But, Abba, I’m not sure if I want to do a PhD, and even if I do go for it, I would like to do it on my own, without your financial help.’

A blank expression suddenly appeared on Noor’s face. He sighed and turned his body sideways, as if avoiding his son.

‘Abba, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. I am sorry.’

Noor pursed his lips. He appeared deep in thought for a moment; then he turned his head towards Mansoor and said, ‘Look, son, I am supporting you not because I have to, but because I want to. I am one of the highest-paid lawyers in Pakistan, and I can easily afford to support you. Everything that I have belongs to you and your mother. So even if you can support yourself, let me continue to send the money anyway. If you don’t need it right away, you can save it for the future. In any case, the money will have more value here in America