A Long Pitch Home Read online

“Oh!” She claps in delight and pushes the door all the way open. Light pink walls match the pillows on the bed. A stuffed bear sits on a rocking chair, and Hira’s name is spelled out in white letters on one wall.

  “Do you like it?” Jalaal waves his hand across the room like a showman. “I painted the walls. I heard you like pink.”

  Hira beams and throws her arms around Jalaal, then races down the stairs, calling, “Ammi! Come and see!”

  Finally we get to the last room. “This is our room, little buddy.”

  Jalaal’s room—my new room—looks like a bedroom from an American show we get on Dish. From the posters that cover the wall near one of the beds, anyone can see Jalaal likes some group called the Nationals. These Nationals must be a sports team—men in uniforms throw a white ball and hit it with a round bat—but it is a sport I have never seen.

  Jalaal’s trophies stand at attention along two bookcase shelves, with two empty shelves below. Next to each bed is a nightstand topped with a lamp.

  Jalaal points at the empty wall above my bed. “You can put up any posters you want.”

  I do not tell Jalaal I couldn’t bring my posters. My mother said posters don’t do well in suitcases, so my all-time favorite cricket stars—Omar Khan, Waqas Akram, and Arham Afridi—are still hanging on my wall back home. I look at Jalaal’s sports wall and ask, “Does America have any cricket teams?”

  Jalaal shakes his head. “Not any professional teams. There’re a few local teams. Just adults, though.” He shrugs and picks up a ball from his dresser. “Baseball is America’s version of cricket. Sort of.”

  So that is what it’s called—baseball.

  Jalaal tosses the ball a little to my left, and I reach out and snatch it.

  “Not bad, little buddy.”

  There is that phrase again, so I have to ask: “What does buddy mean?”

  Jalaal smiles. “It means ‘friend.’”

  I am glad Jalaal thinks of me as his friend, although I am not little. Compared to Jalaal, I guess I am. But I was one of the tallest players on my cricket team this year.

  I smile back at Jalaal and say, “I will call you ‘big buddy.’”

  He laughs, so I think he likes his new nickname.

  I pass this baseball from one hand to the other. It’s about the same size as a cricket ball, but not as heavy. Instead of two straight lines of stitches around the center, this one has two wavy lines, one like a frown and one like a smile. I look back at the white, round pillows on the beds and realize they are made to look like baseballs.

  Jalaal holds up his hands, palms out, the universal sign for “Throw me the ball.” So I do.

  He catches it easily, almost like an afterthought. Plunging a hand into the pile of clothes on his bed, he fishes out a folded piece of padded leather. “Come on—let’s go out back.”

  When we get to the bottom of the stairs, Auntie calls out, “I hope you’re hungry!”

  My mother turns as Jalaal and I walk past the kitchen. “Wait until you taste the iftar feast Auntie has prepared, Bilal! She even has a special birthday surprise for you.”

  I smell masala and am relieved that we are having something normal. I have heard Americans eat hot dogs, but I do not want to try those. We don’t eat dog meat in Pakistan.

  Jalaal opens the back door, and we step out onto a wooden terrace to the sound of some kind of motor. A man next door pushes the handle of a grass-cutting machine—Jalaal calls it a lawn mower. The motor is so loud that Jalaal has to yell: “This way!”

  Three steps down from the terrace and we’re standing on a carpet of green grass—not a single patch of dirt or sand. The grass-cutting motor fades as the man pushes the machine from the back of his house to the front.

  “Here, put this on.” Jalaal opens the padded leather pouch, and I stare at it.

  “What is it?”

  Jalaal grins. “A glove. All baseball players wear them out on the field. And the catcher, of course.”

  “The catcher? There is only one?”

  “Yup.”

  I frown. In cricket, many players are allowed to catch the ball, not just one.

  “Why do the baseball players on the field all wear gloves if only one of them can be the catcher?”

  Jalaal tilts his head. “That’s actually a great question.”

  I can tell it is not a great question.

  Jalaal clears his throat. “The catcher is the one who stands behind the batter—kind of like the wicketkeeper in cricket. Any player on the field can catch the ball; they’re just not called catchers.”

  “Oh. I understand.”

  But I don’t really. It doesn’t make sense—if many players are allowed to catch the ball, then why is only one called catcher?

  Jalaal slips his left hand into his glove and punches it a few times with his right fist. “You don’t wear a glove for batting, like you do in cricket. It’s only for catching the ball.” He takes off his glove and holds it out. “Try it.”

  As soon as I slip my right hand into the glove, Jalaal shakes his head. “No, no—the other hand, like this.” He pulls off the glove, slides it onto my left hand, and puts the ball into my right. “There. Like that.”

  I wiggle my fingers, lost in the huge glove. “Actually . . . ,” I start. I pull off the glove. “I need to throw with my other hand.”

  “Oh—you’re a lefty!”

  He says this in English, and I am pleased I know the words. I haven’t heard of lefty, but I know left and can figure out what he meant.

  “Hold on—I think there’s another glove in the garage.” Jalaal trots off and comes right back with another glove. “This is my buddy’s glove—he’s a lefty, too.”

  When I put the lefty glove on my right hand, it still feels funny. All the fingers on the glove are stitched together, so I can’t spread them apart. And the space for fingers is twice as long as my own fingers. Jalaal’s other buddy must be a really big one.

  Jalaal jogs over to a spot by the fence and punches his hand into his glove. “Ready! Go ahead—pitch me the ball.”

  I look at the soft grass. How is the ball supposed to bounce on grass? Maybe baseballs are specially made for grass bouncing. As a fast bowler in cricket, I’ll need more room for my run-up. I back all the way to the other side of the fence.

  It is hard to know how to hold this ball with these crazy, wavy stitches. I place two fingers on the top and my thumb at the bottom, and then I take off across the yard.

  Jalaal’s eyes widen as I race toward him. Most kids look this way when I bowl in cricket because they all know I am fast. When I get about halfway across the yard, I wind my arm and throw the ball downward, like I always do. This is when I find out baseballs do not bounce. The ball thuds and rolls toward Jalaal, coming to a pitiful stop at his feet.

  Jalaal scoops it up. “I forgot to tell you that a baseball pitch is different from a cricket pitch. There’s no run-up, and it’s not supposed to bounce.”

  My shoulders slump, but I try to smile even though this baseball game is not easy to understand.

  “Let’s just toss the ball back and forth. We can work on pitching later.”

  Squinting into the fat, orange sun, I step to the right so the big tree behind Jalaal blocks some of the light. “Okay. I am ready.”

  Jalaal throws the ball overhand like I did, but instead of throwing toward the ground, he launches it to my left.

  I know I can catch it.

  But when I step to the left out of the tree’s shade, the white ball is swallowed by sunlight. I hold my glove out to where I think the ball must be. I feel the ball before I see it: a weight that slaps the fingertips of my glove, skips over the top, and lands smack on my face. On my left eye, to be exact.

  Three

  Isit down hard.

  “Bilal! Are you okay?”

  Jalaal’s voice is getting closer, but I can’t see him because I am holding my eye, with the other one squeezed shut. I do not cry, but maybe that is because I am ten
now, not nine. Or maybe it is because I am too stunned. Or maybe when a baseball hits you in the eye, your tears stop working.

  I feel Jalaal’s arms lift me from behind, and I am standing again, eyes still shut.

  “Can you open that eye?”

  The very last thing I want to do in this moment is open my left eye. So I open my right to find Jalaal leaning over, hands propped on his knees, peering into my good eye. He scrunches up his eyebrows.

  “And the other one?” He winces. “Can you open it?”

  My eye swells, a tender bump already poking into my cupped palm. I slowly remove my hand. Jalaal shakes his head.

  “What?” I say, trying to sound brave. “Is it bad?”

  Jalaal draws in a deep breath, then puffs his cheeks as he lets the air out. He narrows his eyes and stands up straight, hands on his waist. “I think it just needs some ice. You’ll be fine.”

  I don’t feel like I am going to be fine at all. My eye throbs, and the bump is getting even bigger, like I am growing a second head.

  I follow Jalaal back inside. When we reach the kitchen, my mother gasps. “Bilal!” She rushes over, holding Humza on one hip, and takes my chin in her hand. “What happened?”

  “Lal?” Humza reaches for my face, but Ammi tucks his arm back at his side.

  “I was trying to catch the ball, and—”

  “It was my fault,” Jalaal cuts in. “A bad throw.” Cold air wafts from the open freezer as Jalaal dumps a handful of ice into a plastic bag.

  “Jalaal!” Auntie takes my hand and makes a clucking sound. “The poor child must be exhausted from his trip. He’s in no condition to be playing baseball!”

  I realize Hira has also come into the kitchen when I hear her shriek. This does not make me feel any better. She comes up and stands on her toes to inspect my eye. “Does it hurt?”

  “Of course it hurts,” my mother answers.

  Hira leans in. “Can I touch it?”

  “Touch what?” Now my uncle joins the crowd gaping at my eye. He whistles, long and low. “What happened, Bilal?”

  Jalaal and I both say, “It was my fault,” at exactly the same time, just as Auntie says, “It was Jalaal’s doing.”

  I feel sorry for Jalaal and want to give him a look that says I don’t blame him. But by this time my mother is pressing the ice pack onto my eye, and I have to squeeze my good eye shut so I won’t cry out like a baby.

  “Hold that there, Bilal,” my mother says.

  Auntie makes a clucking sound again and glances at the clock. “Only seven thirty—another hour until sunset. Are you hungry now, Bilal?”

  “No, thank you, Auntie. I can wait.”Auntie must think I am fasting for Ramadan, which makes me feel grown-up. I wanted to try fasting this year, but Ammi said to wait for next year.

  I don’t think I could eat anything now, anyway; my stomach feels like it is bobbing on the Arabian Sea. I look at the clock with my good eye and try to figure out what time it is back home. How can it be seven thirty in the evening when the sun is still in the sky? I hold the ice pack on my eye.

  Ammi explains daylight saving time, which stretches the daylight an extra hour in the evenings. I wonder how American Muslims can wait so long to break their fast.

  When the sun finally sinks behind the fence, we sit around the kitchen table. After we thank Allah and Auntie for the food, I dig into the biryani first. My mother makes an mmm sound with the first bite. “What a pleasure to have homecooked food after those airplane meals,” she says.

  Hira grins through a mouthful of chicken jalfrezi. “Ammi, I’m going to summer camp next week, and I will meet so many friends!”

  My mother smiles. “Your auntie told me. That is very kind of your uncle and auntie to send you.”

  “Camp?” I ask.

  “Muslim Girl Scout camp,” Auntie explains. “In the mornings, starting on Monday.”

  “Auntie says a Girl Scout learns many things,” Hira says. “Including English.”

  Since I am four years older than Hira, I know more English words than she does. Not that I would go to a camp called Girl Scout. But whenever I played cricket against the boys at the International School of Karachi, I understood most of their English words.

  “Bilal,” Uncle says, “don’t think we’ve left you out! You’re signed up for summer baseball camp.” He smiles like this is the best news in the world.

  I glance at my mother, and although she is smiling, I know she is worried, because she starts fiddling with her wedding ring.

  My eye feels as big as a baseball, but I say to my uncle, “Um, thank you, Mamoo. That is very kind of you.”

  Uncle waves his fork in my direction. “You are a talented cricket player, Bilal—I know this from your father. I have no doubt you will make him just as proud on the baseball diamond as you do on the cricket pitch.”

  “Inshallah, Mamoo,” I say. If Allah wills it.

  But if He doesn’t, that would be okay with me, too.

  Jalaal nods through a bite of food, then switches to English. “You’ve got tons of potential, Bilal.”

  I am not sure what potential means. But if it’s what you need to play baseball, then I am sure I do not have any.

  I look at my mother and try to make my one good eye ask, “What about cricket?” but I think she is looking only at my bad eye, because her smile is not quite as wide as it was a minute ago.

  After dinner Auntie carries out a cake blazing with ten candles and sets it in front of me.The singing starts, and Hira’s voice is the loudest by far. I close my eyes. Everyone probably thinks I am deciding on a wish. But my eyes are not closed for wishing—I already have a wish. My eyes are closed so I can pretend my father is here, singing and clapping along with us.

  My birthday gifts are all about baseball—I receive a bat, a ball, and a glove that Uncle says he’ll exchange for a lefty glove before baseball camp starts next week. Jalaal gives me a baseball cap exactly like the one he wears—dark blue with a red W outlined in white. He says the W stands for the Washington Nationals, but the loopy W looks like the Arabic writing for Allah. When I ask if this team is blessed by Allah, Jalaal says, “Not since 1924, when they last won the World Series.”

  “Shukriya—thank you to all of you,” I say. I know that everyone is trying to make my birthday special. But I want this day to be over. I am thinking of a polite way to say that I just want to go up to bed when a loud pop makes me jump. Humza drops the empty gift box he was playing with and cries. I scoop him up and let him pull my cap off my head. I’ve heard gunshots in Karachi—sometimes from bad guys, but usually for celebrations like when our neighbor, Mr. Fahd, got married. Auntie and Uncle are grinning, so maybe one of their neighbors just got married, too.

  Hira races down the hall and flings open the front door. “Fireworks!” By the time we step outside, she’s already running across the lawn toward the street.

  “Hira!” Ammi calls, but she does not sound angry. “Wait for us!”

  We all help pull chairs from the garage and set them up on the lawn. Other neighbors do the same as they wave and call, “Happy Fourth!”

  My uncle points off in the distance, where another set of fireworks explodes before shimmering back down to earth. “The local high school puts on a show each year.” He waves at some neighbors sitting in chairs on their lawn. “We’ve got the best view right here!”

  Jalaal jogs over to some teenagers who stand in the street. He motions for me to join, but I pretend not to see his invitation as I adjust my chair and sit down. I don’t want to insult Jalaal, or my aunt and uncle, but it feels wrong to act happy today. I don’t want to share my birthday with America; I want to share it with my family—including Baba—and Mudassar and my cricket teammates and my neighbors. I want to play cricket, not baseball. I want to laugh with my friends as we watch tourists try to balance on the camels that strut down Seaview. I want to jog down to the corner shop to buy a samosa instead of floating on a chair in a sea of American houses and
lawns and driveways.

  To watch Hira, you would think she’s not missing home at all. She has already met a girl her age called Lizzie, and they shout and turn cartwheels after each set of fireworks lights up the inky sky. Humza is happy chasing Hira and Lizzie, falling every two or three steps in the grass and picking himself up again.

  My mother pats my hand but does not look at me, and that is when I know her heart feels like mine.

  Our hearts want to go home.

  Four

  My eyes open before the dawn is awake on my first morning in America. From under my sheets I listen to waking-up sounds: creaking floors, soft footfalls, calls of “Eid Mubarak—Happy Eid!” For a moment I forget Baba is not here with us. And then weak strains of a muezzin’s call to prayer drift upstairs from the TV. The call to prayer from our mosque’s minarets back in Karachi flows through the streets and floats in through the windows, filling up the room. I wonder if it is prayer time back home.

  Jalaal’s alarm goes off—a thunk followed by a cheering crowd. He groans, fumbles for his phone on his nightstand, and silences the roaring fans. He sits up, a smudge in the dark room. He doesn’t speak at first, and I wonder if he’s fallen asleep sitting up. Then he rubs his face. “You awake, little buddy?”

  “Yes.” I pull back the sheet and swing my legs over the side of the bed.

  Uncle’s voice calls softly from the other side of the door: “Eid Mubarak!” In he steps, still in pajamas.

  “Eid Mubarak, Baba,” Jalaal says.They hug three times, then hug me three times. Seeing Uncle’s janamaz tucked under his arm reminds me to get my own prayer mat from my suitcase.

  After doing wudu, washing before prayer, we carry our mats downstairs into the living room and lay them out, side by side.

  Everything in America is so different from Karachi. But as we recite the Fajr prayers, standing, then kneeling, then touching our foreheads to our prayer mats, it feels like home. If I close my eyes, I can imagine Baba right here with us.

  The rest of the morning is full of sames and differents. I sink my teeth into the sheer khurma, and it tastes like home. The creamy milk pudding filled with thread-thin noodles, plump raisins, crunchy pistachios, and spicy cardamom is the same. But then, instead of a five-minute walk to our neighborhood mosque filled with faces I’ve known ever since I can remember, we drive twenty minutes to a mosque crowded with strangers.