Two Love

Chapter 31

Ali was holding onto Parisa's hand as the Patel family approached the mosque one Saturday afternoon. The wind was biting despite the bright sun that Parisa had to keep shading her eyes from.

"Look, Parisa! It's Jonah!" said Ali with alacrity, letting go of his sister's hand to play tag with his friend.

"Seems like Ali is quite the evangelist," said Alina with an amused smile. "I'm going to talk to my friends now, so you go find someone to talk to."

Parisa was lucky because she didn't have to go out of her way to find a friendly face; they always seemed drawn to her. She talked to Aliyah about school, she and Inayat discussed their favourite meals and Sahar regaled her with tales of her troublesome puppies. Something she liked about the community at the mosque was how easily she could talk to people of different ages and stages of life. Aliyah was a 30-year-old teacher who was looking for a husband after renouncing an atheist lifestyle; Inayat was in his mid-forties and married with two children and a cat; Sahar was a smiley 7-year-old who went to the same primary school that she used to go to.

Habibah came over to talk to her, but Mum was beckoning her inside the mosque. So they performed wudhu in companionable silence, left their shoes in the washing room and entered the room where the service was being held. Parisa glanced to the other side of the room and saw her brothers wearing their taqiyahs – even Jonah had one on his head. Then the Imam led the congregation in worship. Since it was half 4, he led them in the late afternoon prayer, Salat al-'asr.

Usually, the Imam delivered the sermon/khutba in the Friday noon service, but seeing as most children could not make that time because of school, he had recently started doing mini-sermons on Saturdays for their benefit. There was a reading from the Qu'ran that stayed in Parisa's mind once the worship had ended:

"Receiving your friend with a smile is sadaqah (charity). Helping people load their animals is sadaqah, and pouring some water in your neighbour's bucket is also sadaqah."

Yet Parisa could barely raise a smile at the moment...

"Are you okay, girl?" asked Habibah. "You look a little spaced out."

"Yeah, I'm okay... just a little sad about my dad, that's all." This wasn't exactly a lie – some of the tears that stained her pillow were from missing her father, but it was a different person who was the main source of her tears.

"Well, just know you can talk to me about it if you want." Habibah took a look in her friend's handbag. "What's the book this time?"

"Little Women." It was pathetic that she could no longer think about this book without thinking about the person she'd lent it to.

"Cool. Hey, did you hear the news about Marty Pocock?" Habibah's habit of jumping from one topic to the next in conversation often gave Parisa whiplash, but this was the biggest whiplash of all. Could she be so desperate to hear about her ex that she was hearing his name when it hadn't been mentioned at all?

"Who?"

"Marty Pocock. He quit the county badminton league two days ago. I guess that means he's given up on his dream of becoming an Olympic badminton player. Oh well, the boy has brains: he'll find something great to do, Insha'Allah."

The cogs turned slowly in Parisa's brain like treacle had clogged them up. "He quit? Why?"

"Hassan didn't say why – I learned the news from him – but he says Marty was pretty certain about the decision. That's unusual; I've never known that kid to be certain about anything in his life."

Parisa wasn't sure what to feel. Had the break-up caused him to give up on something he loved, or had it just helped him figure out his priorities in life? Her gut feeling confirmed the latter conjecture.

"I think he knew he had to let go of the old," mused Parisa. "I think he knew that it's okay to love something for a while and let it go when it runs its course. Not every passion leads to a career, and that's okay because we can enjoy so many different things and discover ourselves in the process. When something's not the right fit, like badminton for Marty, quitting is not giving up – it's letting go to make room for something new."

Habibah blinked like a confused camel. "Wow, that was deep." She looked over her shoulder to watch Ali and his friends running around in their umpteenth game of tag. "I wonder how many lightbulbs these kids would light up with the energy they have..."

*

When Parisa returned home, she went into her room and sat on her bed. She took a moment to admire her room: the scratch-off poster with 100 'best' books to read (though this assertion seemed slightly elitist to her), quotes from her favourite books written in colourful gel pens on post-it notes stuck on her wardrobe door, pale pink curtains with white polka dots that matched her duvet cover. In the heart-shaped mirror on her bedside table, she caught a glimpse of the book poking out of her handbag. 

Parisa took out Little Women and flicked through its pages. She wasn't going to begin reading it now - she was already in the middle of three other books - but it was nice to be reminded of a book that she loved. 

The book fell open on a scene halfway through the book. It was the scene when Jo finds out that Aunt March has chosen Amy, rather than Jo, to accompany her on her travels through Europe. Parisa remembered crying when she first read this passage. The ambitious, vivacious Jo so deserved to go see the world - she had wanted to see it so badly - and yet the opportunity had been given to Amy, the girl who had dared to burn Jo's story. It was so unfair!

And yet, Parisa remembered, Jo had ended up seeing the world later on when she went to New York City, and that was where she met her beau Dr Bhaer. Things had worked out okay. Better than okay, in fact. 

Maybe, just maybe, her story would work out well too.