Sorry.. I've been busy today.. N i am still busy lol.. Isiliye just one chap for today .. 😳
Also.. We've almost reached the end.. Now comes the climax.. So all the mysteries will be revealed.. There will be less Romance..!! But ofcourse there will be romance at the end Again.. 6 chaps +Epilogue More 😉
Chapter 31
After Aaliya got over her initial qualms about the feasibility of trying to recreate a moment of the past, she went to work with a vengeance. The first thing she did was invite everyone who was to be involved in key roles to the house for dinner and a planning meeting.
"And I will cook," she said, to which zain began to guffaw, saying that to her cooking probably meant punching the telephone buttons until her fingers were sore. Ignoring him, Aaliya gave Zain and Zaid a very long grocery list that included such things as fresh cilantro, green chilies - "not those awful canned kind" - cumin, pion nuts, and posole.
By the evening, when Zain's relatives arrived, the house was redolent with smells of chili, corn, and beef. Zain, Zaid, and the twins had spent the day being ordered about by Aaliya as though they were in the army, as she gave them onions to chop, chilies to roast and peel, and, for the boys, bread to tear into pieces for bread pudding.
Everyone arrived hungry. While Zain poured margaritas they began to organize the recreation of the long-ago evening.
Jubilee with his mean-looking gray-haired granddaughter in tow came, but Jubilee sent her home after the first five minutes, leaving Ornette to stay with his great-grandfather.
It was as everyone was eating plates full of enchiladas, relleos, posole, and pinto beans, exclaiming with every bite about how hot the food was and saying they couldn't eat it even as they reached for more, that Aaliya began to believe that it was really going to work, because people were already talking of revealing secrets. Jubilee said that whoever was going to be directing Scalpini's men had better talk to him first. And H.H. (only the older children had been allowed to come and they were fascinated with H.H.'s tattooed hand) said he'd need to talk to Aaliya/Masuma
Halfway through the meal, when it was so noisy they could hardly hear each other, the front door opened and in came Banu, and she had Masuma on her bed, tubes connecting her to the machine rolling beside her.
"I tried to talk her out of it," Banu said, wearing her doctor face. "But she begged me. Well, is there any food left?"
For a moment, everyone gave Jubilee and Masuma some time alone as they held hands and looked into each other's eyes, sharing secrets that the others could only guess at. To the surprise of Zain and Aaliya, H.H. seemed to know Masuma very well. What's more, his respect for her seemed to be something that was usually reserved for overlords or, at the very least, great wizards.
"Who's going to play Doc?" Aaliya asked loudly, her hand on her grand grandmother's shoulder, wanting to break the somber mood the evening had taken, for Masuma looked weaker every day. "Of course it would help if we knew what Doc looked like in those days."
With those words Masuma became involved. All the way over in the ambulance that held Masuma's bed and machines, Banu had told her about what they planned, so Masuma knew what was needed.
Banu reported to Zain that the bloodstain on Masuma's dress was A positive, the most common type of blood. It could have been the blood of any number of people who were shot that night. It was not Zain Abdul Kareem's blood, which was O positive.
After Masuma arrived, Nafeesa entered with six of her friends. The sight of Nafeesa brought a hush over the crowd, for she was dressed as gaudily as a Texas tourist in Santa Fe, dripping sparkling fringe, with black and white feathers sprouting from her shoulders. After Aaliya introduced her to Zain's family, Zain told them that Nafeesa and her friends were going to be the chorus and backup singers for Aaliya. One of Zain's teenage cousins gaped at Nafeesa. When he recovered his powers of speech, he asked Vajiha if they could measure Nafeesa and her friends for their costumes. Vajiha rolled her eyes skyward, but one of Nafeesa's girls, looking at the clean-cut young men, said they'd not mind at all if the boys measured them - it would make them feel like schoolteachers.
When Aaliya showed Masuma's clothes to everyone, Rizwan said, "Nice shoes," and they all laughed. Asking about the joke, Aaliya was told that Rizwan's mother loved shoes so much that she had a room full of them. Straight-faced, Aaliya asked, "What size?" which caused more laughter.
They ate bread pudding and bowls full of flan as they assigned roles and figured out how everyone was to rehearse. Some of them were to help the principals, such as Vajiha, to make clothing, then later they were to be in the audience. Zunera was to be the resident historian, giving answers on any and all questions about what to wear, how to act, and what slang was to be used. Slang study was considered necessary after one of Zain's young cousins said he was sure the word groovy came from the twenties.
Only once did Aaliya think of calling the whole thing off, and that was when Zain's dad, Osman, talked of arranging for machine gun practice. He saw Aaliya's face and told her the guns wouldn't be any more real than they were in the movies, but she remembered the death not too long ago of an actor who was playing with a pistol loaded with blanks.
It was late when everyone left, and there was lavish praise of Aaliya's cooking.
"I haven't been in Santa Fe for years," Osman said as he stood at the front door, "but I remember it as being a rather sophisticated little town."
"I wouldn't say it's exactly unsophisticated," Aaliya answered without a hint of smile, "but the brides there do register their china and silver at Wal-mart."
Osman chuckled all the way down the stoop while Suraiyya and Aaliya arranged for her and Osman to move into Zain's house the next day. When she left, she kissed Aaliya's cheek.
When everyone had left, Masuma with Banu back to the nursing home, Zaid with the boys to the hotel to return in the morning with their clothes to move in, Aaliya looked at Zain. And Zain looked at Aaliya.
In the next minute they were on each other, making love on the foyer floor, then moving into the living room, then to the library, both of them feeling as though they hadn't seen each other in six months. In his exuberance, Zain began to bend Aaliya's body into unnatural shapes, but she was so limber from years of aerobics classes that she bent easily, her legs twisting about various parts of him with ease. They fell asleep on the floor of the breakfast room and woke in the wee hours, to feel bruised parts of each other's bodies. Zain, yawning, said they ought to go to bed, but Aaliya said that she just had to have a bath - a nook and cranny bath. Grinning, Zain picked her up and carried her up to the bathroom.
* * * * *
Hell, Samantha thought, was rehearsing rehearsing with Ornette Johnson. Never in her life had she met such a bigot, and when she called him that - after he'd told her for the fourth time in three hours that she was too white to sing the blues - a hush came over the room. According to Ornette, only white people could be bigots, and that idiocy sent Aaliya into a rage.
When Zain entered the nursing home recreation room, he found Aaliya standing on a chair shouting into Ornette's handsome face while he yelled back at her. Masuma and Jubilee sat to one side, looking on with expressions of adoration.
"So who's winning?" Zain asked, taking a seat next to Masuma.
"I'd say it was a draw, wouldn't you, Jube?"
"A draw, yes. I think Ornette's met his match."
Leaning forward, Zain quietly told them that he had arranged for a record producer to attend the night Ornette was going to play. "Who knows what will happen, but at least he'll be heard."
Smiling and nodding, Jubilee nudged Masuma to tell her that Aaliya had just called Ornette a racist and that they should watch the show the way the other residents of the nursing home were doing.
* * * * *
One morning, two days before the performance, Aaliya threw up. "Nerves," she said as Zain handed her a washcloth. As he'd done before, Zain held her head while she heaved, then smiling mischievously, he suggested breakfast, which sent Aaliya back to the toilet.
By midmorning she felt better, ate some toast and juice, and took the vitamins Zain handed her. With a wicked grin, she said, "How's the dancing coming?" It had taken her four days of badgering to get Zain to tell her what he was doing to prepare for his role of Zain abdul kareem. When he'd at last told her, he'd had such a look of martyrdom on his face that she couldn't help laughing. Zain was taking lessons in ballroom dancing.
At eleven Zaim went with Aaliya to Masuma's, then waited outside for what turned out to be three hours while Masuma told Aaliya everything she knew about that night in 1928. When Aaliya came out, she was white-faced and drawn looking.
"Find out?" Zain asked, taking her hand.
"Yes," she answered. "Most of it, but not all." Looking at Zain, her mouth was a hard line. "That corrupt old man," she said, and Zain knew she was referring to Doc. He also knew that Aaliya would have cursed, but there were no words to describe what she felt about the man.
Everything had gone so perfectly that there had to be something that went wrong, and it did. On the morning before the day of the performance, after Aaliya had thrown up for the third time, Zaid called and said that one of his sons was sick. He said it was nothing, but Aaliya could hear the worry in his voice.
"Banu's with him and she says it's nothing to be concerned about, but I don't want to leave him. Could Zain get Dad or Faraz to go with him to..."
"To get Doc?" Aaliya finished for him.
"Yes," Zaid said with a sigh, wishing Aaliya didn't know so much. "Dad will know what to do."
After Aaliya hung up, she called Zain into the library and told him what Zaid had said.
"Sure, I'll get Dad," Zain said as he moved toward the door, but Aaliya put her body in front of it.
"I am going with you."
"Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha," Zain's humorless voice said as he reached for the knob.
Aaliya put her hand over it. "Zain, listen to me, it makes sense. I know what you and Faraz have done, and don't even think of lying to me about it. Your brother thinks money can buy anything."
"For Faraz it usually does."
"I know that this time his money bought the guards at Doc's place."
"It wasn't too difficult since they haven't been paid in weeks. Doc holds them off with promises of big money coming in from Europe, but I think he's broke. Faraz could find out nothing about any money coming in from anywhere."
"Who did he ask? His Wall Street friends?"
"Money is money everywhere. Faraz asked in places you don't want to know about."
"Simple little Aalu, too dumb to hear all the facts."
"Dear little Aalu whose life is in danger," Zain shot back at her.
Calming, Aaliya looked at him. "How many of Doc's guards were you able to bribe?"
"Most of them. Okay, okay, eighty percent. There were three of them we couldn't get to and there's the house staff, such as it is. It's going to be dangerous getting in there." He leaned toward her. "Aaliya, those guards carry guns."
She took a deep breath. "Zain, I'm small. I can go places you and your muscled brothers can't. I can climb fences and trees. What if you and your dad have to climb a fence? Who lifts whom? You can toss me over like a javelin if you need to."
"And land on your pretty head?"
"Don't you dare patronize me!" Putting her hand on his chest, her face softened. "Zain, you must take me. If there are any problems, Doc won't kill me and I can protect you."
"And what makes you think he'll stop at killing you? You know you're not his granddaughter."
"Because now I know what happened to Half Hand's money," she said softly. "And if Doc hurts either of us, he'll never see a penny of that money."
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