We Are Not in Pakistan (19 page)

“Come sit here! On the sofa.” Grandma pats and smoothes her shawls.

“Sofa?” says Kathleen.

“Couch, then, couch! Sit beside me on the couch.”

Grandma Miriam kicks off her sequined slippers and sits cross-legged, hands clasped around what has to be her tenth cup of Taj Mahal this morning. Grandpa Terry leans forward, duct-taped glasses only a foot away from the green and gold movements of a Packers rerun. His newspaper has fallen beside him.

“What do you want to study, Kathleen?” Grandma asks in her brightest, warmest voice. “So many opportunities I never had. Are you going to take computers?”

Like it's easy as Parcheesi. Ludo, Grandma called it. Claimed it was ancient, invented near Lahore.

Okay, Kathleen will play along for a bit. But no computers.

“Haven't decided,” she mumbles. “Maybe psychology, maybe advertising.”

“Wonderful choices! For one you need to be interested in other people, and for the second you need to find some enthusiasm. Not that I've seen much of either in you lately.” She stops, then says, “You might need a just-in-case plan, darling.”

Kathleen doesn't flinch, only seethes as if she'd swallowed live coals.

Dad hasn't sent a check this month and there's no just-in-case plan. Grandma's fault — she never liked him. If she had been nicer to him, maybe Dad and his lily-pale orangutan-haired girlfriend wouldn't be off on a cruise through the Panama Canal. And Grandma's treating Mom like a baby, picking up after her, cooking her favourite meals. These days, Grandma's even stopped
her morning nagging and chivvying — she's been letting Mom sleep late or leave early as she pleases.

No wonder Mom won't take Kathleen home. Won't even look for an apartment.

“If you decide what course you want in college, Kat, you can work backwards to decide the classes you should take now.”

Hate-glow spreads and blazes within Kathleen. No one calls her Kat but Dad.

“Don't know why you're talking about college. Like there's any way I'm going to make it to college on twenty dollars a week.”

“The Good Lord will see to it you go to college.”

“Like the Good Lord really cares,” says Kathleen.

“The Good Lord forgives, Kathleen. I pray every day that he gives me strength to do the same.”

Kathleen sets her lips. She looks past her grand mother. Through the window behind the couch, bright leaves swirl and dance before a cooling wind.

A grunt or two. That's all Kathleen allows herself on the daily walks to and from school. Today, heading home, Grandma Miriam is prattling on about the bunches of tiny berries tinted pale yellow and cherry red. Berries so beautiful are almost surely poisonous.

“Not poisonous at all,” says Kathleen, and pulls off three. Into her mouth they go. She rolls them against the inside of her cheek.

“Oh!” Grandma's hand goes to her mouth. She thinks Kathleen has swallowed them.

“If I need help, I'll call 911 when we get home,” says Kathleen. “I can do that — we're not in Pakistan.”

Kathleen walks ahead for a while and manages to spit the berries out without her grandmother noticing.

When Grandma figures the berry poison danger is past, she says in her chitchatty way, “One day you'll wish you'd asked me more questions about my parents and about when I was small.”

Heard all about it. Grandma's mother was Catholic, born in Iran, Grandma's father was an Anglo, a mixed breed left behind when the British washed their hands of India and Pakistan. He saw Grandma's mother at the Lahore Gymkhana Club and converted from Anglican to Catholic so he could marry her. Grandma got born, grew up in Lahore, a city in India that somehow got itself moved to Pakistan. She became an “air hostess” for BOAC, an airline that doesn't even exist anymore, and she met Grandpa when he was a Marine guard stationed at the American Embassy. At a “do,” where they danced like Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. And they got permission from Grandpa's CO to get married. And then they had a baby — did they have to call her Safia? — and then they travelled as Grandpa Terry got stationed in different countries. And Kathleen's mom grew up to work in the airline business too, except that she's still only in ticketing because, she says, nowadays Pakistan-born employees need not apply to be crew members.

“… and about my life in Lahore and all my travels.”

“Uh-huh,” says Kathleen. “Like I'd care.”

For once Grandma Miriam falls silent. She pulls out her handkerchief, dabs her eyes.

Kathleen keeps walking. Grandma is sniffing.

Kathleen is savagely glad. She can't remember how it feels not to be angry.

•   •   •

Next morning, Kathleen comes downstairs in her pyjamas.

No water boiling on the stove in the kitchen. No Grandma bustling around in her scuzzy old apron.

Kathleen yawns. She dreamed of Dad last night. He was showing the orangutan-haired woman around the house, Kathleen's old house. He was standing in Kathleen's room by her old toy box. The toy box opened and that woman leaned over and looked inside, and then she threw back her head and laughed. Kathleen shakes her head and flexes her neck, trying to get rid of the sound.

Grandpa Terry is sitting in his chair in the living room, in the dark, newspaper folded on his knees.

“Is Grandma still asleep?”

“I don't know. Maybe she went to the store for milk.”

“It's six a.m. The store isn't open yet.”

“She saw Safia off to work,” he says. “Said Safia had to leave early.” He looks around, pats his pockets.

“Is something missing?”

“Can't find my watch.”

“Don't worry,” says Kathleen, imitating Grandma. “It'll show up. Did she take her jacket?”

“Of course she took her jacket — she's always cold.” He sounds peeved. Grandma says he gets “crotchety” if she doesn't feed him.

“Make some coffee,” he says.

“Didn't she do that yet?”

Kathleen looks for coffee in all the cupboards but comes up with only a dusty jar of instant.

Why on earth does Grandma need to hide all the spoons — is it some ritual from Pakistan? Grandpa will have to use a fork.

“I'm hungry,” says Grandpa. “Make some cream of rice.”

Kathleen wants to tell him to make it himself, but he's semiblind and forgetful and her grandfather, so she can't. She figures
out how to turn on the stove and when a blue flame finally blossoms, sticks a saucepan and Grandpa's cream of rice on it.

“Make it thick,” he shouts from the living room.

Kathleen tries to remember the times she has half-watched Grandma make it.

“Why don't you get a microwave,” she says, as she stirs and stirs.

“When you get rich, you can buy us one.” Grandpa guffaws into his false teeth.

Kathleen puts a bowl of cream of rice and a fork on the kitchen table. Grandpa shuffles in till he bangs against the table and takes his seat.

“There's no milk,” he says.

“You're welcome, Grandpa,” Kathleen mutters into the cold that greets her inside the fridge. Where is the milk?

Grandma went out to buy coffee and milk. Maybe she went for a walk before she went to buy milk. Maybe she couldn't sleep. Yeah, that's it. She went for a walk before she went to buy milk. Maybe she fell in Lake Michigan — happens in winter when perfect idiots walk out on cardboard-thin ice. Could happen in fall too, with the currents and all.

Fine, she's dead. Now there won't be anyone to scold Kathleen. There won't be anyone really Pakistani-looking in her family any more.

Kathleen finds a tiny jug of milk in the back. She pours half the milk over Grandpa's cream of rice and places the jug back in the cold interior. She runs upstairs, wriggles out of her pyjamas and into a sweatshirt and jeans. Turns on rap music louder than loud, just because she can.

No, Grandma is not dead. She can't be. Maybe she just left Grandpa. No — what did Grandpa do to Grandma, anyway? Did he ever order her not to eat Pakistani food? Does he drink and watch CNN non-stop till three in the morning? Did he ever take
a bimbo on a cruise to Panama? So he has false teeth — Grandma never said she minded. People her mom and dad's age get divorced, not Grandma Miriam and Grandpa. They're like salt and pepper, peanut butter and jelly, Mary-Kate and Ashley. Well, maybe not Mary-Kate and Ashley.

Grandma went to the store to buy milk. And coffee. And the store didn't have any skim milk, which is all Grandpa drinks, so she must have gone to another store.

Kathleen turns off the music and goes into the bathroom. She brushes her teeth till her gums tingle. She runs the water at a trickle so she can hear the front door opening when Grandma comes in with the milk and coffee.

She doesn't come.

Kathleen drags on her socks, ties the laces of her sneakers.

Grandma'll be really mad if I'm late for school.

She thumps downstairs. Grandpa is sitting in the living room in the dark again, the paper still folded on his lap. His magnifier lies on it, and he is just staring. She turns on the light beside him and, before leaving, says, “Don't worry. She'll be back soon.”

She doesn't know if he heard her. If she were married to him, she'd dump him. But Grandma …

On her way to school, Kathleen kicks stones along the bike path, looking over her shoulder in case Grandma is following. In algebra class, she comes out of a daydream to find the teacher talking about simultaneous equations you can solve only by adding them together or switching sides. That glacier is back at the base of her stomach.

What if Grandma has left Kathleen?

Fine. She can be that way. I don't care.

•   •   •

At lunchtime, Kathleen slides her cafeteria tray over the rails behind Jodie's.

“What's up?” says Jodie, helping herself to a strawberry yogurt.

“Not much.” Kathleen takes the same so she doesn't need to decide. “I think I lost my grandma.” That sounded pretty stupid.

“No kidding.” Jodie leads the way to a table. “Didn't know she was sick. When's the funeral?”

“No, I mean we can't find her. She wasn't at home this morning. She didn't walk me to school.”

“And you think she got lost?”

“No, she's lived in this area since before I was born. I don't know. She could be a missing person.”

Kathleen keeps her back to the Muslim girl as she gives Jodie the details.

“Have you made flyers, you know, like people make for lost cats?”

“No, no yet.” Kathleen pictures Grandma's face on a milk carton. With hat or without? She should have checked her hats.

“Did you call 911?”

“No. I mean, not yet.”

“Aren't you going to?”

“Sure.”

“They have canine search teams,” Jodie says. “I saw them on TV. But hey, maybe she's been kidnapped.”

“No, Grandpa's not rich.”

“I know — she went for a walk by the lake. People fall in sometimes.”

That's not what Kathleen is imagining. Kathleen is imagining Grandma boarding a plane to Pakistan right now with her brother, both “voluntary departures.” Hadn't Kathleen said, “If you like Pakistan so much, why did you leave?” Grandma might be on her way home to Lahore — Kathleen can't go find her in Lahore.

But wait, didn't she say people in Lahore didn't want her or her family?

Jodie lends Kathleen her cell phone to call Grandpa.

“No,” says Grandpa. “She hasn't come home. And I'm pretty sure she's taken my watch.”

“Taken your watch? She has her own.”

“Well if
she
didn't steal it, either Safia did or you did. Or someone else did.”

“I didn't steal your watch, Grandpa. Bet you anything I can find it for you. Did you find a note?”

“No. Did you?”

“I haven't looked for one.”

“Well, why do you think I should look for one?”

“Right,” says Kathleen. “Okay, thanks, Grandpa.”

Kathleen flips the cell phone closed and hands it back to Jodie. Leaving her tray, she runs to her locker. She yanks her backpack out and turns it upside down. Books thud, coins ping on the floor, her makeup kit pops open, powder spills all over. There will be a note. It will be in a lavender envelope. She will use her key to Grandma's house to slit it open. There will be a picture of blue prairie flowers on a card. She will see Grandma's tidy writing: “I'm tired of your rudeness,” it will read, “tired of being your unpaid servant, of picking up after you, running after you. You bore me because you're always bored. I'm tired of telling you nicely. So I am on strike.”

But there is no note. Kathleen puts all the stuff back, returns to the cafeteria, borrows Jodie's phone again and calls Grandpa. “Maybe she's on strike or something. What do you think?”

“Yeah, could be a wildcat strike,” says Grandpa. “But she'd do some yelling first.”

“Did you have an argument?”

“Nah,” says Grandpa. “Maybe. I don't remember. It's hard for me to remember. But I never argue with that woman. Never. She's a
good cook. But you know those Eastern women. So nice and sweet when they first get here. But then, oh boy, watch out once they get a few American ideas.”

“She doesn't have nearly enough American ideas, Grandpa.”

“Uh-huh. Well, let her strike all day. Maybe I'll lose a little weight.”

Kathleen hangs up. Maybe Grandma was right about Grandpa Terry being in the early stages of Alzheimer's.

If her mom were lost, Kathleen would want someone to tell her, so she calls Safia at work. Tells her all the Twilight Zone parts — didn't walk me to school, didn't tell grandpa, and no note — but doesn't say how she's feeling because she doesn't know what to feel. “Mom, what do you think?”