American Dervish: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page A

on our door one afternoon. I opened it to find a middle-aged man, rail-thin, with searing blue eyes and a violet-colored birth stain spilling across his nose and right cheek. He held a clipboard in one hand, a thin envelope in the other.
    “Shah?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Telegram,” he said, handing me the envelope.
    “What’s that?”
    “Cable letter. Could you just sign here?” He pushed the clipboard at me, and I signed my name.
    “What kind of name is that, anyway? Shah? You Iranian or something?”
    “Pakistani.”
    He grunted. It seemed like he wasn’t sure what I was saying. He looked at me now, his head tilted, suspicious. I noticed the thin silver cross dangling from a chain around his neck. “You people hate Americans, too?” he asked.
    “No.”
    He kept staring, and then he finally nodded. “Okay,” he said, satisfied. He turned and headed off toward the tan car idling in our driveway.
    At the kitchen table, Mother tore open the envelope. “Mina’s cable!” she cooed, delightedly.
    “What is it, Mom?”
    “When they send a message with the cable. From one office to the other. From one side of the world to the other, behta. When I was a child, Hayat, cable was how we sent messages overseas. Now, of course, phone is easier. But cable is still a hundred times cheaper than the phone in Pakistan.” She started to read. “She bought her ticket.”
    “What does it say?”
     
COMING TO AMERICA STOP MAY 13 ARRIVAL CHICAGO STOP BRITISH AIRWAYS
     
    She handed me the gossamer-thin sheet. Everything was printed out in capitals, including the word “stop.”
    “Why does it say ‘stop’?”
    “Costs more to have punctuation,” Mother said, taking the telegram back. Then she looked up at me, her eyes wide with a sudden idea. “Let’s send her one back!” she said.
    “Where?”
    “Western Union.”
    And so out we went. Mother and I headed for the mall, where we stood at the counter and filled out the form to send a telegram. If the message was ten words or less, it would only cost six dollars. Every word after that was seventy cents. I couldn’t see how Mother was even going to get to ten words considering all she wanted to say was that she’d gotten Mina’s telegram.
     
CABLE RECEIVED STOP SO EXCITED STOP INSHALLAH
     
    Mother looked at me. “What do you think?”
    Sounded fine to me.
    As Mother paid at the window, I spied the messenger with the stain across his face in back, milling about. He emerged from the back room and our eyes met.
    He nodded. I nodded back.
     
    Mina came in May, just as promised. On our way to the airport to pick her up, we got caught in traffic and arrived just as the plane was supposed to have touched down. Mother was frantic. Father pulled to the curb and Mother yanked me out of the backseat. We ran inside to the airline counter to ask about the flight while Father went to park the car. When the ticket clerk announced the plane had already landed, Mother yelped. Off we went down the terminal hall to Mina’s gate. But when we got there, the lounge was empty. Two stewardesses stood at the gate’s counter, and Mother went over to inquire. That was when I noticed a striking woman standing against the window of another gate lounge farther on. She was small and held a large sleeping child against her body, its arms dangling at her sides like ends of a stole. When Mother returned, I pointed. “Is that her?” I asked.
    “Miinnaa!” Mother cried out with joy.
    As Mina turned to us, I was surprised. Though she was just as beautiful as the photograph had promised, there was something different about her as well: a confidence, a magnetism.
    She smiled and I was struck.
    “ Bhaj, you made me wonder if I ended up in the wrong city!”
    Mother laughed, her eyes welling with sudden tears. She took Mina by the shoulders and looked deeply into her eyes. The confident smile on Mina’s lips now quivered as her own eyes filled with tears. The two women hugged, melting together.