Daneen

"Don't mock me Zehra! One of the reasons for choosing medicine is that I'm BAD AT CALCULATION!"

I snatched the change from shopkeeper and handed it to my friend to count it right. Instead of counting, she seemed more interested in insulting me on my incapability to do the basic subtraction. Shopkeeper was also enjoying the tussle with a smirk plastered over his dry-skinned, incisors-less face.

"I think it's right. We gave him 2000 Rupees for 1753 Rupees worth items. He returned us 247 Rupees. Mission accomplished! Return to the base soldier... I mean to the hostel! ." She giggled.

I gave her a curt shut call and ordered, "Pick up that bag. I'll carry these two."
She abruptly folded her arms at the back and announced out loud while lifting her chin up in rebellious defiance.

"No! No! No! I've just done the hardest calculation for you. More challenging than the Riemann hypothesis. It was too exhausting. Now you'll do all the lifting."

"You Bitch! Fine! I can easily carry this much weight by myself."

With that, I lifted all three bags. Those were heavier than I thought but since I've challenged Zehra that I could easily carry all the load we had compiled in three hours of purchasing, my ego suppressed the protesting cry of my tiring muscles.

It was Friday. Quetta's Barech Bazaar (Barech Market) was crammed with men, mostly dressed in white Shalwar-kameez. They were heading for some shopping after offering Namaz-e-Jummah (Friday Prayers).

It's a religious ritual of Muslims all around the globe that all men offer Friday prayers in Masjid, instead of performing it at home. Meanwhile in Pakistan, it is a custom that all men, after performing Friday prayer, buy something for their families like fruits, food, toys or ice cream.

Therefore, it wasn't particularly the best time to be at Bazaar. We made our way through the flood of broad-statured men. It was few minutes struggle before we reached a single lane road. It was too narrow to only allow one way traffic to run on.

I nudged my elbow aiming for my friend's ribs as she was too busy staring at some distant attraction, totally oblivious of me calling her name, which was already muffled by the deafening noises around us.

"What is it you devil spirited woman!?" She shouted out loud.

"CALL UBER!" I replied even louder.

"I already have. That's what I'm searching. The map is showing that our ride is somewhere around that corner but all I can see there is a stupid Tonga tied to a telephone poll."

She seemed a bit frustrated with all the rush and heat. I asked her about the details of our ride. She told me that it was a silver hued Suzuki Mehran.

"Plate number?" I inquired while spinning my head left to right and otherwise to find it.

"AMX-788" She replied.

"Driver's name?" I further inquired.

She turned to look at me with a smirk dancing around the corners of her narrowed lids. "Are you planning to ask for his hand from..."

"Found it!" I interrupted her stupid joke midway as I knew well that if I hadn't, she would've probably carried on about me and that random guy getting married, or a step ahead or two. I indicated with the gaze and head nod towards a car since my hands were too occupied to lend me a finger to point out.

Passing through the wild traffic in between, we walked to it in no time and matched the details. That was it. We both hoped into the back seat from the same door. Driver turned around to face us and asked,

"Where to Baaji (sister)?"

I was settling down, placing the heavy bags appropriately in that cramped spaced vehicle, when I noticed that some other car was honking with an ear-piercing intensity behind us and we still hadn't responded to the driver's question, even after few significant seconds. I looked at Zehra who seemed completely lost at the moment. So I replied,

"To Quetta Institute of Medical Sciences Lala. Drop us in front of girl's hostel gate please."

He configurated the navigator to set our drop point location and geared it up to begin the ride towards our destination.

I turned towards Zehra with an obvious displeasure in my glare. She was pumped up for some obscure reason. Seeing my lack of insight about her inappropriate enthusiasm, she communicated with me in a sign language.

That was what she does when she had to convey something privately. She knew that language so well because she had been volunteering at HOPE for a year then, an institute for children with hearing disabilities. She said to me with a patterned motion of her hands,

"This guy is so hot! Can we just drive around the city with him for no reason?"

I replied to her in a basic sign language, "No! Shut up!"

I had been spending a great deal of time with Zehra for more than four years then. We were in the same batch at the time of university admission, roommates at hostel, luckily in the same class group because of which, usually the projects partners as well. I could easily interpret her signs however, only learned to convey few basic but imperative pieces of information such as Yes, No, Okay, Shut up, Fuck you, Bitch and some other chunks of wisdom.

I was sitting right behind the driver's seat and therefore could easily felt his gaze boring in me through the reflection in rear-view mirror. Apparently, he seemed more content on staring at the rearward faces, correction, a Face, than focusing on the windscreen upfront.

I generally considered myself as an independent, confident, bold girl, usually unperturbed by the scanning stares of street strangers but he was making me uncomfortable with such concentration. Uncomfortable in a terrible way.

I asked Zehra about the remaining time to reach the drop point but unfortunately, she wasn't paying attention to anything but his face. His deep black curly hair, sharp jaw line with modest shade of growing beard and not to mention the slim peachy lips, in general, his pretty face was too captivating for her.

I shook my head remorsefully on the poor choice of my best friend. She wasn't good at choosing appropriate guys. Guys of her match and status. I always believed on the concept that one should marry or even date a person with matching standards and status. Mismatched couples suffer alot, like my mother did with my father. My remorseful head shaking was soon transformed into a disgusted head jerk with the thought of that. I clenched my shawl into a firm grip to swallow the anger boiling beneath my chest.

What am I even thinking!

I thought to myself. Zehra obviously was just crushing on that guy, nothing more. There was no 'Match-Making', or more precisely 'Unmatched Match-Making'. Rationalization of the situation calmed my nerves down to some extent.

We stopped by the gate front of girl's hostel. I stepped out, handed the roundabout of payable amount to the driver who was still staring at me like a wolf, glance at the full moon. I grabbed my stuff and started heading towards the stairs without wasting another second in the vicinity of his perversion. Zehra called out for me from behind.

"Hey! Wait for me!" She thanked the driver and received the remaining amount back real quick.

As I was passing by the dried out fountain, which was supposed to be the decorative attraction of our hostel, a man in jet black full length coat stepped ahead to block my way out.

"Dani, this is from Tabreez." He extended his arm to hand over an envelope he had in his hand. I glanced at him to inspect the familiarity on his face. Yes, I knew that person. He was finance manager of my father's coal mines. Ever since I was in third grade, he had been visiting our Haveli. My mother used to call him Munshi. He was someone more to me than just an employee of my father. A guardian, a relative or perhaps the only one I could call family.

"It's nice to meet you too Munshi Uncle!" I replied.

He smiled contently and threw his other arm as well in my direction to embrace me in a hug. I reached out to him on my toe's tip as he was almost a foot taller than me.

Zehra apprehended the dialogue session which was about to happen. Therefore, she payed a brief greetings to Munshi Uncle, snatched all three bags from my grip and headed straight towards the stairs that led her to our room. I offered him to come inside.

"Come in please. It's too hot out here. And you can loose your coat now. This is not my father's office."

"Please don't say that. He's your father. He dearly loves you." He argued while removing his coat.

"Yeah yeah... That's why he always send someone with an envelope full of money. This someone could be himself right? And this envelope full of money could be an envelope with a letter full of love and care."

"He really want to, but he... he just can't." He hesitated with an unreadable expression which appeared for a fraction of second and replaced all too quickly by his usual pleasant little grin.

"Of course he can't! Why would he spent... no sorry, waste! Why would he waste his precious hours on someone as unprofitable as I'm."

I stopped at the hostel entrance to register him as a visitor. I could clearly sense his disapprobation as he drew in a deep breath when I said that, which was obviously noticeable.

We walked through a straight corridor in utter silence to reach the lobby. I offered him a seat by the window and went to cafeteria's cash counter to place an order for two cups of tea. Cafeteria was on the far end of that lobby.

After placing the cups on table, I settled on the chair opposite to him. He slid the envelope he was carrying towards me.

"Just keep it, please. I can't take it back. Tabreez will not like it. Try to understand. You'll be needing it."

"Only on one condition." I demanded as I interlaced my finger around the tea cup. He raised an eyebrow in curiosity, or in surprise perhaps. So I continued,

"I'm going on a field trip for a medical camp in upcoming summer vacations, which happen to be starting from the next week. A rural area named Nalwari. It's arranged by my university. I need parental or guardian's permission for it and..."

"And...?" His brows twitched a little.

"...and you'll be signing those papers for me." I finished the demand with an intended dense slurp as I took a sip of a very blend-tasted tea, just to annoy my uncle. I knew how he hate it when I do things that weren't considered too... civil!

Oh how I love it when he complain about me being ill-mannered!

His disapproving eyes followed the Shrup sound and travelled back to meet my eager gaze once again. In that moment, I could practically feel the wheels turning behind those rusty brown lenses. I tried to maintain some discipline in my attitude to show him the rock solid determination for my demand. After a thorough calculated analysis in icy silence, he finally decided to spoke up.

"I'll ask Tabreez to sign these papers for you."

"He won't and you know that!" I sat back and defiantly crossed my arms.

"I can't sign anything for you since I'm no one to you, legally." He explained apologetically.

"These are not property papers Uncle. I'm simply going on a field trip. Nothing more! And I can't wait for another day since today is the last date to submit all the forms and requisites." I learned forward once again to emphasize on convincing part.

He, with a submissive face said,

"You have to make it difficult, don't you?"

To that, I sufficiently nodded with a grin. He dragged his chair back to stand straight and continued,

"Fine! I'll sign it for you."

"Really...!" I exclaimed but the jolt of excitement was hushed midway as he raised his hand to convey me that he wasn't finished yet.

"But! Only on two conditions."

He picked up his belongings from the table except for that envelope. I awaited in quietude for the declaration of his terms. He walked around, inclined on the table beside me to face me upfront. He leaned in a bit up close to my level and said,

"I'll be sending two armed guards with you for your protection and you'll have to accept this envelope now."

"Done!" I proclaimed. He raised his hand again to stop me.

"This is my first condition."

Annoyed with the uncertainty about his next condition, I sat back again, crossed arms.

It seemed like he was ready to leave that time. He regained his standing posture and said,

"You'll be back at hostel within a week."

"Only a week!" I tried to argue with that but he looked at me with a stern gaze.

I dropped the issue by agreeing to his terms. At least something was better than nothing.

"Okay fine! A week it is then."

He grinned a bit, maybe on my resilient attitude towards that field trip. So he ordered me,

"Bring me the papers."

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Referenced Vocabulary:

Riemann Hypothesis: Modern methameticians agree on the fact that Riemann Hypothesis is one of the most significant open problem in all of math. It's one of the seven Millennium Prize Problems, with a million dollar reward for its solution.

Bazaar: Marketplace

Shalwar-kameez: National dress-code of Pakistan.

Haveli: Usually referred to a large fancy house with an antiquated construction style, like a mansion.

Tonga: A two-wheeled light weight carriage drawn by ponies, donkies or bullocks. It is commonly utilized by poor people as a vehicle or as a carriage to sell fruits and vegetables on it.

Masjid: Known as Mosque, a place of worship for Muslims.