I was surfing through to learn something beneficial during Ramadan. Then I came across this sad but inspiring story. May this story serve us as a lesson as we go through this fleeting life, with the anticipation of a tomorrow or rather old age, which would give us an opportunity to be better individuals. Only Allah (SWT) knows how long we might live and it could be that we will never have a tomorrow but only today!!!
*~*The Teacher*~*
by
Zeba H Khan
The hands on the clock said 1:45. She would come at 1:58, though her appointment was at two, and she would walk in and give a polite smile and say, quite simply, Hello. And he would smile, genuinely happy, and stand and return the greeting, courteously ask how she was doing, and then offer her a chair on the other side of his desk. Then he would sit in tense silence as she opened her bag and took out the grammar books and the lessons for the day. He would look only at her hands as she did, because looking at her face would be too obvious.
She would produce all of the relevant papers, and he would read through his homework in a nervous voice. 'Me, nervous!' he thought. 'I'm a grown man.' And she would nod when the work was right, or gently explain when the work was wrong, or if he had written something particularly complex or clever, she would simply say, "Good." It was 1:52 now, and there were still six minutes to go.
She came on his lunch break. He had two hours for lunch, that being one of the perks of his job. He was the second-in command in a large corporate firm, and saw a steady stream of rich and important international clients for whom English was the common language. That's why he was taking English classes, to fine-tune his accent, to turn his 'beesness' into 'business' and his 'moanie' into 'money'.
("Eye-yam so sorry meester Stein, but I cannot see you jast today. Bleese talk to my seketary and we will work out de abointmint for you. Yes yes, off course. Gudbye.")
"A 'P' is not a 'B'," she explained somberly one day. "Though they are both made with the lips, there is a tremendous difference between the words pit and bit. Can you hear it?"
He would smile apologetically and stare at his fingernails. There was no letter 'P' in the Arabic alphabet. He had a tremendously hard time trying to say the words pathos, pink, and portfolio, especially while looking at his teacher's lips.
"And your letter 'T'," she explained one day, kindly so as not to insult him, "does not belong on the tip of your teeth. It belongs on the roof of your mouth just behind the teeth."
Over a course of three months, he had worked hard and succeeded in changing his accent from the harsh, guttural rendition of English that is common to Arabs, into the soft and almost pleasant accent of a highly educated foreigner. A good friend of his, a British lawyer, saw him one day after many months, and said with begrudging admiration, "My God Salim, you sound like a villain from a bloody James Bond film!"
At this he smiled and gave Robert and gentle punch in the pin-stripes. "It is my English teacher, I have been taking her classes for three months, she is good."
"She must be British then," Robert said, more as a statement than a question.
"Oh no," Salim shook his head, "She is American."
"But not incurably, I'd bet," Robert laughed. "Just give me three months and I'd put a bit of British in her." Here Robert winked wickedly, and for some reason, Salim found himself inwardly seething. Robert noticed the sudden darkening, the slight narrowing of the eyes, and said, "Are you feeling quite well? You look ill a bit suddenly."
Salim held both of his palms out and bowed his head slightly to excuse himself. "It is this traveling. I have flown to London three times this month, and it tires me."
"Very well then." Robert clapped Salim on the shoulder, a little hesitantly, and took leave. As soon as Robert was safely beyond the door and closed inside of the private elevator, Salim had sat down on his leather chair and felt around for the bottle of Scotch inside his desk. He had poured himself a double and thrown the drink down in one go.
He had long since stopped feeling guilty for drinking alcohol. Even though he was a Muslim, and his religion forbade all intoxicants, the cult of success demanded that he make a champagne toast on certain official occasions, and politely accept the fine wines that his happier clients bestowed upon him, for refusal would be seen as unprofessional, uncivilized, even. And now, he had made the inevitable transition from a slightly guilty Muslim who sipped champagne at company dinners to wholly guiltless Muslim who drank Scotch in the privacy of his office.
After another drink he had felt as though he might not kill Robert after all.
The American teacher was Muslim too, strangely enough. Salim perfectly remembered how shocked he was the first time he saw her: skin as white as bone, ice-blue eyes, and a delicate cream scarf wound about her head like some sort of holy aura. It hung from her head where she had pinned it, and the light shone through the layers. She looked more like an apparition than an English teacher. She was wearing something underneath of the scarf, a lacy head-band. The edge of it showed on her forehead just above her eyebrows, just above those blue eyes. He hadn't met a woman in a scarf since...since he had made his pilgrimage to Mekkah four years ago, and on the way back, stopped in the duty-free shop in the airport and bought some vodka for his colleagues.
He had been late that first time, and his secretary had led her into Salim's office and sat her down on the over-stuffed sofa in front of the bay window. She had been reading a book when he walked in, and when she looked up to greet him, he saw that the light from the window shone through her eyes like they were made of glass. It had unnerved him, they were very nice eyes, but they were a tad unnatural. He never got his calm back, he was never able to collect himself in her presence, not since then.
Salim thought about pouring himself a drink now, but reconsidered. She would be here in one minute, and she would smell the alcohol on his breath. He would be better off checking his homework again. He picked up his pen and tried to twirl it in his fingers, it fell from his hand and clattered noisily onto the desk. Salim looked at it without picking it up, and sighed.
(I, Salim Al-Umari, I who makes deals in the millions of dollars, I can have any woman I want, and yet I have dropped my pen more times in her presence than I have in my entire life...)
Salim placed both of his hands on his desk and stared at them, lost in his own thoughts. He was surprised when he heard his clock softly chime two o'clock. She was two minutes late. What if she wasn't coming? Last class, she had looked up at him just as he was stealing a glance at her, and there had been a few second of awkward silence. She had flushed a beautiful shade of carnation pink and then turned quickly back to the book in front of her. What if she was angry? What if she refused to come anymore?
Salim rubbed his hands together, cleared his throat, quietly practiced his homework, and readjusted his tie all in the course of the next two minutes. His phone rang, and he nearly jumped out of his seat.
"Sir?" the secretary said on the other end, "Your teacher called. She apologizes for the delay and says she will arrive shortly."
"Thank you, thank you," he muttered into the phone, and then hung it up without listening for his secretary's reply.
She was coming. He opened his desk drawer and poured himself a drink before he had time to reconsider. He drank it quickly, and then followed it with another. He closed the bottle and stowed it away hastily, then he went to his private bathroom and brushed his teeth vigorously. He splashed water on his face and then dried up with a monogrammed towel. He returned to his desk and quickly called his secretary, and ordered that two cups of strong coffee should be brought in when the teacher arrived. He had just hung up the phone when he heard the hiss of the elevator doors opening, and the staccato click of her heels on the marble floor. He fixed his eyes upon his desk, and did his best to appear thoughtful, or nonchalant, or calm, or anything but anxious and increasingly warm on the inside from Scotch.
She opened the heavy wooden door without knocking and stepped inside the room. She smiled politely and said, "Hello."
And he smiled, genuinely happy, and stood and returned the greeting, and then offered her a chair on the other side of his desk. She opened her bag and began pulling out the books and lessons, and he stared politely at his own hands. The secretary came in a second later, bearing a tray with two cups of coffee, and set them down on the large desk. "Cream and sugar?" she asked the teacher.
"Both please." The teacher looked up said thank you, and gave the secretary a smile, one very much unlike the one she gave to Salim every week. This one was softer. (Ah, thought Salim sadly. That must be a real smile, and the one she gives me must be just formality).
When the secretary had left, the teacher sipped her cup of coffee tentatively and then said in her strange American way, "Sorry I'm late. I had some problems with my car on the way here. Thanks for the coffee. It's pretty good."
"You're welcome," Salim said, and he was very careful to from his lips into a circle when pronouncing the 'w' in 'welcome'. Salim sipped his coffee, and then, before he could think, blurted out, "I thought you were not coming."
He mentally braced for the bolt of lightening he expected to strike him for his impropriety.
"Pardon me?" she said with her coffee cup halfway to her mouth.
Encouraged by the teacher's subdued reaction, and by the Scotch, he cleared his throat and said, "I said I thought you were not coming."
"Oh no," she said, "I would call if I had to cancel."
The coffee was finished in silence and the lesson began. Salim did his best to pay attention and to covertly study his teacher's face at the same time. It was a fairly difficult task, since all of the conversation revolved around the lesson, and the entire lesson was in the books on the desk. There was no legitimate reason to look up during the lesson at all.
When the lesson was finished, the teacher gave her wrist a small shake and her watch slid out of her sleeve. "I've stayed ten minutes to make up for me being late," she said looking at it, "I hope I haven't made you late for something."
"Not at all," Salim said, leaning back in his chair and looking up at her. He liked this chair a lot, it was quite expensive, made of soft Italian leather and expertly engineered. It had a comfortable feel, and an aura of money and power about it. "You were having problems with your car?"
"Yes," the teacher nodded. "I've already spoken to your secretary about it, she's a very sweet lady. She's going to call me a cab."
"A cab?" Salim said uncertainly, trying to remember something.
"Yes, a cab is a taxi. A taxi cab."
"I should have remembered that," Salim said, "I knew that word. A taxi, one minute please." Salim dialed his secretary. "Hello? Yes, cancel the uh...cab. Send the driver up please. Yes. Thank you."
Salim looked up and saw bewilderment on the teacher's face. He registered the look with private and pleasant surprise. "I would not dream," Salim said, choosing his words carefully, "Of sending you in a taxi cab. Please accept the services of my driver instead."
"Oh no no," the teacher said quickly, straightening and holding both of her hands out, palms forward. "A cab will be fine, please don't trouble yourself."
"Trouble myself?" Salim smiled, feeling the soft leather on the arms of his chair, "It is no trouble to myself, only to the driver, and he is paid enough to be troubled in such a way. I am sorry I will not be accompanying you, only my driver."
The teacher was visibly relieved. "Thank you," she said a bit more calmly, "That's very nice of you, and of your driver."
There was a self-conscious pause in the conversation as Salim tried to say something that was fitting, grammatically correct, and possibly friendly. Before he could think of something that fit all three requirements, there was a knock at the door and a uniformed driver stepped in. He gave a deferential bow and said, "Madame?"
The teacher smiled at him and stood up, and then turned slowly back to Salim. "Thanks again," she said haltingly, "I appreciate the ride. The day after tomorrow at the same time then?"
"Yes," Salim nodded, standing up, "The same time."
The teacher followed the driver out of the door. Salim stood until he heard the hiss of the elevator doors, and even for a few minutes afterwards. Then he allowed a guilty smile to spread over his face as he sat down and locked his fingers together, propping them under his chin. He was thinking of her reaction, how when she refused his ride, she said no, not once, but twice very quickly. And her eyes had widened. Had she suddenly straightened in her chair?
Salim's eyes darted from left to right over the space on his desk as he processed these signs. He knew what people looked like when they were afraid. Dozens of men came into his office weekly and cowered in the same chair that she sat in, quietly terrified of the power he wielded and the favor he could bestow or withhold at his leisure. They all sat erect in their chairs, blinking more often than what is natural. Some openly cringed, some of them feigned cheerfulness, some of them wore fake nonchalance, and the bravest of them put on an air of humble dignity to cover their inferiority before him.
It was too good to be true. Salim must not believe that this teacher, this confident and professional teacher he had meekly submitted to for the last three months, was actually afraid of him! But still, he savored the outlandish thought, and decided it would taste better with another glass of Scotch.
Later that evening, after a full day's work and a gourmet meal, he sat pensively in the back seat of his car. Salim considered himself an expert in the analysis of behavior and body language, and he had been thinking all day of how the teacher had accidentally given him the upper hand this afternoon, how she had accidentally shown that she was nervous, maybe even afraid. Salim felt he could relax now, that he would no longer need to be nervous around her, for he had enough proof that it was she who was nervous around him. He pushed a button on his armrest and the glass dividing the back seat from the front slid open.
"Yes sir?" the driver asked.
"My teacher's car, where is it now?"
"I don't know the name of the shop sir, but I know where it is located."
"Take me there now."
"Now, sir?"
The driver was a quiet man, and though Salim never forbade him to speak frankly, he almost never spoke unless he was spoken to and usually never questioned Salim's requests.
"Yes. Now."
The driver nodded and the glass went back up. The car was turned away from the part of town that Salim was familiar with, the glass towers, the opulent restaurants, the quietly luxurious private clubs, and headed for a neighborhood of small neat houses with struggling lawns.
The street lights glinted off the curves of the long, black car as it slid noiselessly from the street into the driveway of a mechanic's garage. The sign was turned off, but there was a light shining from a room towards the back of the garage, and there was perceptible movement within. There were several cars parked outside the garage, presumably in various states of repair. Salim wondered which one his teacher drove.
The glass slid down again. "Shall I note the phone number sir?"
Salim stared intently at the light in the back room, and felt a trembling of suspense, of good things to come in the future.
"See who is in that room," Salim said slowly, "And if he is the owner, bring him to me."
The back of the driver's head dipped slightly and he opened his door and stepped out. Salim watched, invisible behind his tinted window, as the driver strode purposefully to the window. He knocked on the window, twice, and stepped back. Salim saw another bulb come on in the garage, and the front door opened a crack, sending a slice of warm electric light over the cars parked outside. Salim watched the pantomimed exchange between his driver and the man behind the crack in the door, unable to hear and unable to look away.
Finally a small, stout man emerged from the door with one hand suspiciously in the pocket of his overalls, stepping carefully towards Salim's driver. The driver took a step back and gestured towards the car where Salim was sitting. The man took two steps, and then stopped, and then started again. When he had mincingly come as far as the tinted window, the driver opened the passenger door for him, and waited for the man to step in. Salim sat quietly in his corner of the back seat, simmering with anticipation. The man grunted and sat himself down, and the door was closed behind him, then he squinted into the darkness.
"Wh-who's there? What do you want?"
"Sir," Salim said, using 'sir' with a smug sense of irony, "Please don't be alarmed. I need a small favor from you only, and I will pay you handsomely for it."
"The garage is closed," the man said with an admirable show of bravery, "and besides, I don't work on imports."
"You towed a car belonging to one of my friends today," Salim said in the low, smooth voice he used for intimidating lesser men, "I want you to replace anything that is even slightly old with new parts. I want you to clean it, inside and out. I want you to make it run like it is new again, and I want your work to take no less than one week."
"You'd be lucky if I finished all that in just a week!" the man said, forgetting his fear to talk shop, "If you and me are talking about the same car, the one the little Moslem lady with the scarf drives, it can take two weeks to set everything right!"
"No," Salim said, his voice so low he was almost purring, "Finish it in one week and you will not be sorry."
The little man shivered, but still said, "And wh-who's gonna pay for all this?"
"My driver will call you, he will come to check what you have done. Give him the bill for the extra work, and give the lady the bill only for what was broken when you towed it. I trust you will not mention my surprise to her."
The mechanic shook his head quickly and began pushing ineffectually on the handle of the door. Salim unlocked it from the button on his side and the mechanic opened it and tumbled out. He shuffled quickly back to his garage and slammed the door shut behind him. Salim chuckled and ordered the driver home again.
The driver drove, and as Salim watched the neighborhood change and the streets widen, excitement twisted and writhed and throbbed in the bottom of his stomach. (One week. I have one week. Today was Monday, we have class on Wednesday and Friday. He should have the car ready by next Tuesday. That way I can have next Monday, too. Three classes...I have three days..).
