In the Company of Liars

ONE DAY EARLIER
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 14

He recalls when life was simpler, or at least when it seemed simpler. Certainly that was all it was, a mere illusion, the innocence of childhood. He prefers to think of his earliest memories, before the move to Peshawar. His family was happy. More accurately, he remembers being happy and either made the assumption that his parents were, too, or was too engulfed in the self-centeredness of early childhood to know one way or the other.

That is one thing that bothers Ram Haroon about his mother. He doesn’t know if she was happy. Father said she was. Father said she was beautiful and intelligent and forceful and loving.

Ram believes that. But after almost twenty years, he remembers little of his mother and his sister. Memories fade and are replaced with some combination of reality and fantasy. Probably his mother has grown more beautiful, his little sister more adorable, with time.

And his memories, such as they are, are grounded far less in the visual and more in the senses of smell and touch and hearing. He can remember the basics-clothes his mother and sister wore, the color of their hair-but he cannot recall the intricacies of their faces purely from memory; he can place them, but what he is remembering, he realizes with pain, are the few photographs that remain of them.

He remembers the sand near their home, where Mother would make thebunda pala-stuffed fish that she would bury for hours in the hot sand to let it bake. He remembers the succulent aroma of thesajii, the spiced leg of lamb impaled on a branch and cooked near, not over, an open fire, and licking his fingers with delight when the meal was over. He remembers his mother’s voice, her confidence and the change in inflection when she addressed her dear son.

Zulfi, she called him.

He remembers her English as well, the language spoken only by Pakistan’s elite, from which Mother came. She taught poetry and English at the university in Quetta, in the Baluchistan province. He remembers her English as much as Urdu, the language the government was trying to push as the only official language, the language Ram’s father spoke almost exclusively. Ram’s father, Ghulam, tried to converse with his wife in English but could rarely keep up; Mother often referred laughingly to his attempts as “Urdlish.”

He remembers that Mother read. He remembers that she debated with Father, not in intemperate tones, about politics and society. “You have one parent who is brilliant and one who is clearly the inferior,” Ram’s father would say, as Mother smiled. Neither would confirm which was which. Ram-Zulfi-would direct his finger from one to the other intermittently and guess, leaving them laughing uproariously.

He remembers when his sister, Benazir, was born, the earliest memory he has. He cannot recall specifics except for his mother’s singingsepadwhen Beni was born, the neighbors coming to the house and singing poems late into the evening. He remembers holding Beni in his arms awkwardly, her tiny, splotchy, contorted face, under the watchful eyes of his parents.

He remembers the day, four years later, when his mother and Beni did not come home. He remembers playing with other children in the streets, returning home expecting to find his mother and baby sister, instead seeing only his father sitting on a carpet, his hands over his face. He recalls the paralysis he felt, never having seen his father as vulnerable, not making a sound until his father finally became aware of him.

“Sit down here, Zulfi,” Father said, extending his arms, revealing a face wracked with pain, wet with tears.

Ram Haroon brings a hand to his face and sighs. It is painful but helpful to remember his mother and Beni. That’s what his father did, he said, and so will Ram. He will do this for them.

Ram takes a final look at the letter, handwritten in Arabic.

My dearest Mushi:

Much progress has been made. Anticipated date is middle of May. Arriving in Paris on June 1. Will deliver in person.

I am honored to have been chosen.

Ram folds the letter carefully and places it in an envelope. He licks the flap, seals the envelope, signs his name over the seal with the ornate pen his mother once used to write her poetry. He takes a bus to the post office about a mile from the university campus.

The wait in line is excruciating. Not the time that it takes; a Pakistani is accustomed to longer lines than this for such things. He simply wants this out of his hands. He removes his notepad and checks the address against the one he has written on the envelope, checking and rechecking. He realizes he is being ridiculous-he has been educated at the finest universities and now he is worried that he has not accurately copied a single address in Tashkent, Uzbekistan onto an envelope.

He makes it to the front of the line and walks up to a postal agent.

“I’d like to speak to Raoul,” he says.