He looked at me in that imperious way of his and said, “Not yet.”
“I’m hungry,” I protested.
“Wait for Dad to get back.”
“Why?”
“Because otherwise no one will know that I shared my chips with you.”
“So what? I’ll know.”
“But you won’t tell anyone. You never tell anyone when I do nice things. What is the point of being good if no one knows about it?”
I stared at him. His wide, bullish face was set with that rigid, stony determination that I knew so well, and that has always made him look a little older than his age.
“That’s why we’re going to starve?”
“He’ll be back in a second.”
I considered trying to snatch away the bag of chips, but he was thick and heavy, while I, taking after my mother, have always been wiry and lean. I didn’t think I could manage it. So, instead, trying to keep a straight face, I said, “Allah is here. He’ll know what you did. Isn’t that what’s important?”
Aamir opened his mouth to argue but then closed it again. He had been raised by the same woman who had raised me. He knew he was trapped. With a scowl, he handed me the spicy spoils of my victory, which I proceeded to devour.
—
Back then there was only one person in the world who I knew preferred me to Aamir, and I know that because she told me so. I’m pretty sure Naani Jaan, our mother’s mother, told Aamir so too. She didn’t give a damn about anyone’s feelings. As far as she was concerned, if someone was a pedantic little son of an owl—the insult loses something in translation—they ought to be informed of that fact. After all, if you didn’t do people the service of pointing out their flaws, how could you reasonably expect them to improve themselves?
Naani Jaan was a severe-looking woman who rarely smiled and almost never laughed. With narrow, serious eyes she surveyed the world as she found it and, generally speaking, found it wanting. I loved her because she loved me, of course, but also because she never changed, and it is always comforting to have constants in your life. Her gray hair was always pulled up in a tight, painful-looking bun, and she always wore a plain white sari, which she said was the only dress appropriate for a widow.
My mother, appalled by Naani’s adherence to what she considered a non-Islamic custom, lavished Naani with saris of every color imaginable, but the old woman never even tried them on. When she died, Naani left behind a rainbow of never-worn, out-of-fashion clothes in her cupboard.
When you’re young everything seems eternal, however, even if you’ve killed more than your fair share of goats. I thought the days of sitting by Naani Jaan’s window watching the rain come down and playing checkers while spearing sweet slices of Chaunsa mango with her dull silver forks would never end.
I was twelve when I got good at checkers, but I never got good enough to beat Naani Jaan, who refused to teach me all her tricks because that was her way.
“I’m like a cat,” she said. “And you’re a young lion.”
“What?”
“I’ll teach you everything I know,” Naani said, “except how to climb a tree. That way, I can always get away when I need to.”
I shook my head. “I’m pretty sure lions can climb trees, Naani Jaan.”
“But how high can they go?” she asked, a rare, broad smile on her frown-lined face as she plucked my final piece off the board and left me, once again, at a loss in her favorite game.
I groaned.
“Another one?” Naani asked.
“What’s the point? I always lose.”
“Losing is good for the soul.”
“What about your soul?”
Another smile. “My soul is not your concern. Set up the board.”
I started placing the red and black pieces on the board, which I’d been told was a task beneath the dignity of a winner. “I wish I was better.”
“I wish you were better too.”
I grumbled under my breath but didn’t dare complain further. Naani was the only person I couldn’t beat at checkers. She really had taught me well. Aamir wouldn’t even play me anymore, and none of my friends were any threat. I didn’t want to offend Naani Jaan and lose the only worthy opponent the game still had left to offer me.
“At least I’m getting better,” I said, mostly to console myself, as I put the last piece in place, the board ready for another round.
“You aren’t.”
I looked up at her. “I’m not?”
“Not really.”
“But Ma says that practice makes perfect.”
“Don’t listen to your mother. She doesn’t know anything.” After a moment, Naani added, “Don’t tell her I said that.”
“Tell me why I’m not getting better and I won’t.”
“Cheeky and irreverent.” She didn’t sound upset about it.
“Yes, Naani. The game?”
The old woman scratched at her left eyebrow with her pinkie finger, which I knew was something she did when she was thinking. Just now she was probably trying to decide if the secret of my weakness was something she wanted to share with me or if it was an advantage worth keeping. Finally, she plucked a round, red disk from the board and held it up for me.
“Checkers is the game of life,” she said. “Idiots will tell you that chess is, but it isn’t. That’s a game of war. Real life is like checkers. You try to make your way to where you need to go and to do it you’ve got to jump over people while they’re trying to jump over you and everyone is in each other’s way.”
“Okay, I guess. But—”
“I’m getting to it, boy,” Naani Jaan snapped, and I ducked my head to show that I’d been suitably chastised. “Now, as I was saying, just like in life, right when you think you’ve got victory in your grasp, people screw with you by stalling the end as long as possible and generally making a nuisance of themselves.”
“Not helpful, Naani Jaan.”
“Life,” she went on, as if I hadn’t spoken, “requires risk. It requires that you sacrifice safety. You have to have courage, Anvar, to get what you want. You have to be bold. You have to, not to sound like your know-nothing mother, dare.”
“I’m not brave enough? In checkers?”
She nodded. “You play like a wet cat.”
“I thought I was a lion . . .”
Naani sounded weary. “Just play like you’ve still got your dangly bits. Stop being defensive. You never move the last row until you have no choice. It’s too late. You think that makes you safe. It doesn’t. It just makes you weak.”