After The Honeymoon

6. Daughter's Duty

"Children learn more from what you are than what you teach them."- WEB DuBois

Madiha

"Omar, is it ok if I spend the weekend at my parents' place? I was thinking of coming directly to work from there on Monday."

He was on call this weekend, and I had been so busy with planning for my move that I had barely had time to visit my parents.

"Madi, you don't have to ask me these kinds of things," he smiled from the doorway as he got ready to leave for the hospital.

"Ok, then I am telling you, not asking you, like the badtameez biwi that I am. I am going to my parents' house for three whole days and leaving you alone," I laughed shamelessly.

Completely unfazed, he replied in his deep, sincere voice, "As long as you always come back to me, Madi, it doesn't matter where you go."

Oh God, him and his dialogues!

I couldn't help but walk up to him and place a kiss on his cheek, surprising him, "Keep up those dialogues Dr Khan, and I'll have to drag you to St Louis with me permanently, residency or no residency."

We laughed some more, hugged, and then kissed one more time before he finally walked out of our apartment, leaving me to pack a small suitcase for my weekend trip.

I had no idea what I had done to be lucky enough to get married to such a supportive and understanding man. But whatever it was, I knew one thing for sure. I was going to protect his trust in me with everything I had. Nothing could ever be worth destroying our relationship over.

Today was a Friday, and I had taken the day off. Since it was still early in the day, I decided to surprise my parents with some halwa-puri from Devon, the famous desi food street in Chicago.

Abu usually worked from 10 am to 6 pm, which would give me plenty of time to pick up the food and have breakfast with them. In fact, to make this a family event I even texted Maliha, whose baby woke her up early anyway, and Moin, who was in college now but whose classes didn't start till later in the day.

Sure enough, by the time I reached my parent's home almost an hour later, everyone was there with their appetites and a thermos of karak chai.

The fact that it was drizzling on that summer morning made it seem all the more like we were sitting down to breakfast at the home of one of our Pakistani relative's homes. All that was missing were little kids running around creating a ruckus.

That day shall come too, I smiled to myself.

"Moin, how are your classes going? You better not be getting anything below a B, "I asked my brother.

When he was younger, he would roll his eyes at me and pointedly let me know that I wasn't his parent, but over the years even he had realized that my siblings' education had more or less fallen on my shoulders. And I took that job very seriously.

"I got one C last quarter, but I am working on it now," he sheepishly replied.

"Maybe if he wasn't up all night with his video games, he would not be getting C's in the first place," my dad added, looking at Moin over his glasses.