“I would like to deliver a speech,” Amar announces at the head of the dinner table.
Mumma turns to Baba and touches his arm. “Let him,” she says. “Let’s see what he says.”
Mumma smiles. She appears to be proud of him. Hadia is confused—how could she be amused by an inherently defiant act? They wait to see what Baba will say. Baba raises his eyebrows and extends his hand toward Amar, palm up, as if to say, well then, proceed. The gesture surprises Amar too. They take their seats at the dinner table and Amar waits until they are quiet and facing him before pulling a piece of binder paper from his pocket, unfolding it, coughing into his fist twice like he had seen in some movie, and beginning to read.
His hands shake. His voice trembles. He reminds everyone that Baba’s signature is the only one missing from the petition. Then the rest of his speech is written in the form of a letter addressed directly to Baba, telling Baba all the things Amar will do if his wish is granted. He holds the paper high so his face is hidden, and Hadia looks from Mumma to Baba. They are both listening. There is a tenderness to their expressions. It seems very possible that Baba will grant him his wish. She has never thought to do anything like it, has never thought to continue to fight for what she wants after Baba has told her no. Hadn’t she wanted a pet? Hadn’t she wanted to go to the movies with Danielle, wanted to read the book Mumma said she was too young for after flipping through it and forbidding her?
“I will try more on my spelling tests,” Amar says, and at this Baba leans forward and stops him.
This year, Amar has gotten no more than six correct on a twenty-word spelling test. His teacher has constantly sent letters home, concerned about his performance in various subjects, calling Mumma Baba in for extra meetings. One more hour would be cut from Amar’s television time, one more toy taken away, but he has never improved.
“Let’s make a deal,” Baba says.
Everyone blinks at Baba. Amar lowers his paper, nods eagerly; he is more surprised than any of them.
“If you get one hundred percent on your next spelling test, I will get you the shoes.”
“Done.”
“Not one word misspelled.”
“I can do it. I will.”
“This week’s test, Amar.”
“Deal,” Amar says, extending his hand.
Baba takes his hand and Amar shakes it solemnly, looking Baba in the eye. Then Baba claps his hands together and says let’s eat, before returning to his seat, and in that moment her father seems like a gracious man, and Hadia looks up at him, and then again, in awe.
* * *
ON THE MORNING of the test they are almost late for school because Amar refuses to get out of bed. Hadia and Huda hear him whining while they brush their teeth.
“I am sick,” he says. “I swear it, I can’t go. I don’t want to.”
When Hadia peers in from the doorway, Mumma is parting the curtain and Amar is hiding under his covers.
“You have to try,” Mumma says to him softly. “You have to at least try.”
He peeks from the covers and relaxes a little when he sees Hadia, and Hadia tells him if he hurries she will test him one last time in the car.
“But my sore throat,” he says, touching his neck, “my dizzy feeling.”
Mumma pulls his covers away until he has no choice but to sit up, and she says good boy to him, good boy, using her gentlest voice as if he were still a baby, and Amar gets up slowly, still touching his throat in a last attempt to fool them.
“You’re good at studying,” Amar had told her the night he struck the deal. “Can you help me?”
“It’s a spelling test. You just have to memorize things.”
“I know that,” he said, but he looked embarrassed, as if the thought had only just occurred to him. “I just know that you get one hundred percent on things.”
In the few days leading up to the test, Amar came to her bedroom after school holding the list of words and waiting for her instruction. It was so simple. She hardly had to help. She glanced at him from time to time to see how often he looked at the wall, swayed in his seat, busied himself with something on the floor.
But he was dedicated. He may have shifted in his chair but he never left it. After he wrote out each word ten times he would ask her, what now? Write them ten times more, she told him. He did not doubt her, or complain, as she anticipated he might. Each night she tested him. Beautiful, she said, and watched him write it down. Bookcase. Photograph. Analyze. Cylinder. Approximate. Consequences. While she graded them he bit the inside of his cheek, kicked his feet back and forth. Ten right, ten wrong. When she told him that, he appeared sadder than she had ever seen, and she reassured him that he had another day to study. Hadia helped him come up with songs for the particularly difficult ones. He hummed as she tested him. The night before the actual test, she tested him again. He got them all right but one—approximate—the one that had given him trouble since the beginning.
“It is just one word,” Hadia told him. “By morning you will have it memorized.”
“You really think so?” he asked her.
“I really do,” she said. She was glad she said it: it took so little of her and it put him at ease, made him happy.
But in the car he is visibly worried. Hadia tests him the whole way and he spells each word aloud. Still, he gets approximate wrong.
“I’m so proud of you no matter what happens,” Mumma says to him. “I am so happy you studied.”
Amar slams the car door and disappears behind the school gates. He becomes one of the hundreds of kids hurrying to make it before the late bell, and Hadia tries not to meet Mumma’s eyes, afraid that Mumma will realize that she has not once, not ever, told Hadia she is proud of her for studying, even though it is all Hadia does.
“I’m sure I got them all right,” he says to her after school that day. “Thank you. The songs played in my head when I took the test.”
“What about approximate?” she asks.
He is silent. He twists his mouth and presses his tongue against his cheek. Then he lifts his dirty white shoe and reveals its sole. Approximate is written on the heel in black pen.
“I wrote it just in case. But I didn’t really use it. I just checked to make sure I got it right.”
Hadia’s breath catches in her. It had never occurred to her to cheat.
“Khassam you won’t tell Baba?”
“Khassam,” she tells him.
3.