Dhoond

The Pakistani dhoond is unlike any other fog; it begins with an evening prayer plunging out of the molvis’ mouths while they sit on their well-worn prayer mats breathing out the last of their Kul Ho Walah’s to north and south; an industrial textile rush, the smouldering hay stock burn, a wet breath of ash and grey smoke, an exhausted exalted puff of rickshaws and generation diesel, it passes through the worn verandas and the woven hemp mangi s, the modern MoltyFoam mattresses where the strained hands of both servant and feudal master flick their cigarette ash into a mist that blends with the scent of gas, hustled rupees, and the coughing hack of tobacco; it whisks the clay-dappled alleyways, dampening the detergent-laden laundry, blanketing the evening gossiped whispers of housewives with the taste of mithai , chai, and sweet arousal, appears wordlessly as both fantasy and supplication, both armoured smokescreen and velvet curtain, snaking the slow grey naala s, where it enters a small mudded window into the mouth of a young village bride inhaling wistfully.

Careful fingers make the final criss-crosses, weaving the string of small jasmine flowers into Neelah’s dark braid. In their lemon fragrance Neelah imagines a modern beauty parlour of her own, the neon glow of an acrylic nail bar, the sweet sweat of perfumes and the fumes of a red cherry lacquer that once made her head spin. Her mother ties the end of the braid with a red and gold paranda that hangs below Neelah’s waist. She arranges the long silken tassels to hang over her shoulder and Neelah examines the braids closely, playing with the soft sleek fibres, threading them between her fingers, considering the worth of her lustrous hair — at the Liberty Market it might fetch 10 thousand rupees.

Through the mirror she looks over the single simple room of her father’s home. In the light of a naked light bulb, she watches her mother’s shadow undulating furiously along the walls as she pulls a cheap wedding veil from its packaging, smoothens it out along the living- room charpai . She thinks of her father in the afternoon, watching American beach-time dramas lazily, smoking his hookah while her younger brother Bilal sits cross-legged on the floor, refilling the tray with his own smouldering coals.

Her arms tingle as the embroidered dupatta brushes past her neck and shoulders. Its length reaches the floor and frames her face with a golden-threaded border, paisleys and parallelograms reflecting small points of light, her wide round eyes lined with surma , her deep-brown face lightened with powder, lips painted red. The large golden ring in her nose connects a delicate chain to an earring that matches the gold-plated tika dangling along her whitened forehead. Briefly she imagines herself truly pale and smooth, bikini-clad, gliding along the foreign water’s edge, blue ocean surging.

“Beta, are you ready?” her mother asks, rubbing Neelah’s shoulders gently. “You will have everything you want, and more — Inshallah.”

Neelah thinks of the dulhaa she met just once in the dusty courtyard of her uncle’s farm, his cracked labourer hands, the nervy laughter, the pair of shabby rubber chappals on his feet. She remembers the family cow with its head in the grass, the family pressed together on a single bending mangi as the winter sun descended behind a veil of shadows.

Outside, Neelah can already hear the deep rumble of dhol s, the sound of singing as the wedding party approaches. She imagines them, as they must be, dressed in bright colours of orange and mustard, dancing in the soft muddied streets of the village, her father walking proudly with her younger brother beneath a fresh garland of genda flowers. Her mother helps her to stand, adjusts her long skirt and veil, and leads her towards the door, wrapping a loose shawl around Neelah’s shoulders.

Neelah stands in the doorway, the damp air of December penetrating her wedding dress. Eyes open, she can only see the hazy blur of the wedding party, lanterns advancing up the narrow gully. In the fog, they are a sea of forgotten faces, the globes distant and ghostly. With her eyes closed she can still see the television’s artificial reflection, a dreaming cascade of ocean waves, rising and falling before golden sand.

She can hear the drums and the sharp call of their voices, feel her mother’s heavy hands on her shoulders, feel the burden of ancient promise and expectation, the bodied weight of the kaam and satin. Neelah wants to say something but cannot find the words, the heart, the spirit, the absolution, and her mother helps to lift the length of her blood-red lehenga from the earth, and the two slip, bound and soundless, into the fog.

Nadia Akbar is a Pakistani-American author whose first novel, Goodbye Freddie Mercury, is forthcoming from Penguin Random House in 2018

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