The Lost Pearl (2012) Read Online Free PDF Page A

life was turning in many unexpected directions, full of uneven gravel and a multitude of speed bumps; but now it seemed to have reached a dead end.
    “He is a nice man, educated and kind, and he has agreed to marry me and to adopt both of you and raise you as his children. He was previously married, but things didn’t work out. There are not many men in our culture who would agree to take on such a big responsibility.”
    I looked at her with disbelief, trying to find the right words. “But why, Ammi? You won’t be alone if I am with you and Sahir is with you. And Nana can live with us. Why do you need to get married? Papa has barely been in his grave; it hasn’t even been six months. How can you do this? Sakina’s husband died five years ago and she has not remarried. Why do you have to…” my voice trailed off as I realized how pointless my questions were. I was not being asked, I was being told. The decision had been made, and the date of the wedding had been agreed upon and printed on an invitation card. It was the date that Papa would be replaced by a stranger and the date that I would lose the only thing I had left of my father: his name.
    “Anyway we had to leave the house. It was a government-allotted house through your father’s job. They will take it away, along with the car and the domestic staff.”
    I glanced over at the two sunflowers that seemed to have survived the storm in our lives and envied the bird that still sung her song. So my mother had brought me here to gently tell me that my life was over. “Where will we go?” I asked in a tone of resignation.
    “To your new papa’s home,” she replied matter-of-factly. “It’s not as big or as luxurious, but it is a decent-sized new home not far from here.”
    Now I understood the boxes and my prolonged visit to my aunt’s. I couldn’t believe my mother was talking to me about the size of our new house as if it mattered to me. Had the new residence been Buckingham Palace, I would not have wanted to leave my home; it was all I had left of my father’s memories. This was where my childhood was, where Sahir had been born, where laughter had once echoed through the walls, where Papa had taken his last breath. Where Zareen had been given the gift of education. Where happiness had prevailed. And the car was going too. It was the car in which I had gone places with my father, where we had listened to our favorite songs and eaten delicious ice cream. The front seat still had the scent of his cologne.
    So Ammi was going to marry someone else. How could she? How could she forget Papa so soon? How could she replace him with someone else? “Your new papa,” she had said with such ease. I could not bear it. I went to my room, buried my face in the pillow, and wept until the early hours of dawn.

Chapter 3

    I did not wish to speak to my mother or my grandfather, who I held partly responsible for planning the wedding behind my back. I had been close to Nana and I failed to comprehend how he could have made a decision that was so deeply hurtful to me in every possible way. He had taught me so much about life, reading stories to me and explaining the morals behind each of them, that his actions seemed hypocritical and unfair.
    “It’s all for the better,” Nana said, putting his arm around me. He placed his teacup with its saucer back on the glass table, and insisted I take some cookies he had kept aside for me. I refused the sugar-sprinkled Nice Biscuits with a wave of my hand. He was going home for a few days to take care of household matters after having stayed with my mother for all these months. “I know you are upset now, but you will see many years later, when you are old enough to understand things, that this really is the best thing for everyone involved. You need to have a father figure, a man of the house. And he is a nice person; he will treat you all well. If you are nice to him, he will be good to you too. He will be just like your real