THE BULLETPROOF BUS GLIDES through the city. Potholes and pockmarked speed bumps don’t bother it. It does not tear through red lights; instead, it slows down gracefully and gradually until it reaches a complete stop. Unlike other drivers with their buses, the bulletproof bus driver knows and understands the rules. He has Respect for the Law.
Sadaf is the first person I tell all this to. “I’m going to apply for the bus driver job,” I say casually. She is nursing the baby and doesn’t look up and chooses to stay quiet. So I go on pretending to read the newspaper and, after five minutes, she says, “What do you mean, bus driver job?”
The words in my mind stumble in their hurry to come out in an impressive, orderly way.
“It’s that new bus, the bulletproof one. I heard they’re looking for a driver, and the pay is good.”
I sound like a fool. I glance at her face, but it’s hard to look at the frown and the shadows under her eyes, so I go back to glancing at the newspaper. A fire, a robbery, a man who killed his children, and film awards. My heart is beating fast. What is her opinion about my idea? Does she believe in me?
She says, “What do you have to do to get the job?” And at those words, I feel as good as if I’d already achieved success. I tell her about the name of the man who owns this special bus, that there is no other like it in all of Karachi right now, that there are tourists who pay a lot of money to ride in the Karachi King Express. I tell her about the places the tourists go—Empress Market, Saint Patrick’s Church, a Parsi temple, a Hindu temple.
Sadaf asks, intrigued, “What do they do there?”
I dig into details, adding and subtracting. “They take pictures and make videos. They tell others how great and misunderstood and underestimated our city is,” I tell her. “They write about the wonderful history of Karachi, the forgotten places, the people who are the soul of the city.” The last few lines I memorized from the ad in the newspaper. My friend Abid had read them to me because I can’t read English very well and I’m not too proud to ask for help when I need it. Sadaf, worn out after cooking and taking care of the baby, doesn’t mind asking me what on earth it all means. I start explaining but she interrupts me by getting up suddenly.
She frowns and says, “I don’t think you’re going to get the job. It sounds too difficult for you.” While I’m still shrinking, she picks up the baby and goes into the other room, one of two in our shack.
I have been asking around for work ever since the juice seller fired me because he said I moved too slowly and cost him customers. But Hamza, who goes to a construction site every morning when it’s still dark, wouldn’t tell me the name of the man who got him the job. I suspect his mother’s brother helped him. I don’t want to ask Bilal because all he does is sell papar for twelve hours straight and comes home smelling of it. All day long, he walks from one end of Clifton Beach to another with a pole over his shoulders, bags of papar hanging on each side. When he complained about backache, I laughed. How heavy could crispy bread be? He said that after six months of carrying it, it could bend a man’s shoulders. Then he thanked God so he wouldn’t sound ungrateful because at least he was earning a decent amount. I wonder now if Sadaf wouldn’t mind my shoulders getting misshapen if it meant steady money.
I haven’t told anyone else about my plans to apply for the driver job. Someone with envy in his heart could give me the evil eye and who knows what might happen then. Chacha Fazal tells me that for all of the thirty years he had saved money to buy his own shop, he hadn’t told a single soul, not even his wife or brothers. Especially not his brothers. Brothers can be dangerously envious. But I need to tell someone with experience, someone who can help me, because I don’t know where to start. The next morning, I sit down to shave my face. Sadaf takes a look and rolls her eyes, but I ignore that and tell her in a crisp voice that I’m heading out for work in a little while.
Chacha Fazal’s shop isn’t busy, which is good and bad. Good because it means I can have a private conversation with him without the whole mohalla listening. Bad because the reeking mass of sodden plastic bags and their contents have been blocking the path to the shop for three weeks now and are the reason the place is empty. I have to lift the hems of my shalwar and ignore the wet sounds my shoes make as I walk over it. His smile welcomes me and I tell him I need his help. Chacha listens intently, stroking his white beard. He frowns in thoughtfulness. All these little actions fill me with confidence.
“I might be able to help you,” he says. “A nephew of mine works as a driver in a bank.”
I remember Chacha boasting about him. This, too, he had announced only after the nephew had worked there for a solid three months and his chances of being fired were minimal. Chacha is tremendously helpful; he writes down his nephew’s number for me and I feel a twinge of guilt. A year ago, he had wanted me to marry his oldest daughter, but I’d already promised to marry Sadaf. Chacha had seemed to not mind. He’d also come to the wedding, and he eventually found someone for his daughter. But every now and then, I wonder if he doesn’t secretly despise me. I make a note to send him some mithai in case I get the job.
I hadn’t thought it would be so easy to get started. Already, things are moving fast, faster than I’d thought they would. I can’t help picturing myself grasping the bus’s steering wheel with one hand—no, two, because one is irresponsible—and maneuvering the rust-free, crack-free, all-parts-working body of the bulletproof bus along wide roads and narrow streets. I walk toward home as if I’m the owner of the King Express.
I want to buy something for Sadaf and even the baby, but, with a flash of reason, I don’t because I only have the smallest amount of change left in my pocket and there is not much to go on until the job is mine. I haven’t had any money coming in since the juice seller’s and that was almost a month ago.
In the evening, I stop for tea at Yusuf’s chai cart—he took it over from his father who died a few months ago. Two rupees for a cup of chai—Yusuf gives me a discount for the sake of friendship. Everyone knows I’ve been struggling to make ends meet for a while now. Jobs are hard to come by. It’s busy at that hour, the men in the neighborhood coming home from work. I talk to them about things, but not about the bus. It’s going to be better-paying work than what these men do and I remember Chacha’s cautioning words about envy. I hope fervently that the old man keeps to himself all that I’ve told him.
A few days pass before I gather the courage to call the nephew. After three rings I wonder if I should cut the call and try again—if voicemail starts, I’ll lose precious minutes from my balance. At that moment, someone says hello, and I stammer a hello then salaam. I ask for Mr. Uzair—the nephew—and the voice confirms that it is him. With each slow, practiced word that comes out of my mouth, my confidence goes down. To my ears, I whimper to an end. I want to tell him, “I just want a chance to drive the bulletproof bus.” Instead, I wait for him to say something, to tell me that he can’t help me. I admit to myself, shamefacedly, that I would be relieved to hear that. But Mr. Uzair is speaking. I press the phone to my ear.
He tells me that there is a Mr. Cheema who hires drivers for the Daewoo bus service—he might be able to help me out with Karachi King Express. In a daze, I add Mr. Cheema’s number to the scrap of paper and that’s the end of the call. I stand on the spot for a few minutes, savoring this feeling of easy progress. At that moment, I am convinced that, for a man, there is nothing worthier than honest hard work. I stand there and deliver a speech in my head about giving my job my best. I will memorize the names of the places on all the routes. I will improve my manners of greeting and talking with those more literate than me. I will always be shining clean.
Sadaf and the baby are not back yet from the market—bargaining always takes a long time, especially when you have to make a few rupees last and last. There is something I have been meaning to give her, and I take it out from where I’ve been hiding it. Today seems to be a good day to give it.
I have bought her a phone. She has never had one before—her first husband hadn’t allowed it. This phone is white and thin, and I got it for a good price from Muhammad Moosa. I’d told him what I wanted and he’d said he knew someone and I’d have the phone in a week’s time. He’d named a price and I’d brought it down and he’d agreed. When I went to get the cell phone, he started whining and lying about unexpected difficulties and said that the price had gone up. I asked him what his mother would say if she heard him, especially since she had named him after two prophets. He frowned at the mention of his mother and took the money I gave him.
Sadaf is tired and irritable when she gets home and seeing me there makes her more annoyed. “Don’t you ever have any work to do?” she says.
I want to tell her about getting Mr. Cheema’s number, but first I want to give her the phone. She gets busy right away, though, moving past me and around me until I go sit in a corner, out of her way. She bangs down a pot on the single burner and, with quick movements, fills it with whatever she’s bought. Some moments later, I smell potatoes. I would have liked chicken, but she refuses to spend that much on food, saying that we’ll deserve it when I’ve stuck to a job for longer than two months.
It is hard for me to keep sitting still, I’m so excited about seeing her surprise. I tiptoe over to the corner where the baby is asleep and almost give a little kiss on her cheek. When Sadaf finally turns, I pull out the phone and thrust it toward her. My grin feels like it’s out of control.
“What is this?” she says, wiping her hands on the ends of her dupatta. “It’s a phone, silly,” I say. “For you. You keep it.” I wave it at her and she slowly takes it.
“What did you get me a phone for?” she asks, turning it over in her hands, pressing a button.
“You need to charge it first,” I explain quickly before she lets the excitement slip away. Then she looks up at me, asks me how much I had to pay for it, and her voice is sad and her mouth is a straight line. I tell her it wasn’t expensive at all, I got a good deal, and it’s a gift so that’s all I’m going to say, and it’s a useful gift because now she can call anyone she wants to. She looks at me and a lot of seconds go by—sneaking out with the last pieces of temporary joy—and she tells me in a flat voice that she will start spending money on calling when we can spare it. I watch her put the phone inside a box that she keeps locked and I think, That’s not a safe place, but I don’t say it.
I haven’t been to see Chacha for some time and that is remiss of me. I owe him an update. The heat after the rains is worse than before and I am sweating by the time I reach the street where his shop is. The carpet of plastic bags is dry, but the smell and the flies have been spurred on by the rising temperatures to go higher and spread wider. I hold my breath and hurry to the door, gasping for air once I reach inside. Chacha greets me serenely from behind the counter. I wonder if he takes the smell home in his beard every night. I see that I’m not the only one there today. Chacha’s other nephew, Jawed, is there as well. He’s been looking for work for longer than I have. We talk about this and that, the three of us, but part of me is imagining being in the bus, in my uniform—I hope there’s a uniform—where there are no bad smells and flies, only the vibration of the engine and the steering wheel and driving, driving, driving with the wind from the air conditioner on my face. Chacha asks us to stay and have a cup of tea with him.
When I say no, he looks at me and then says tactfully that he’ll add it to our accounts because we’re old friends. The shop is warm and the chai is warm and the talk is slow. He offers us biscuits and when we refuse he looks at us in an avuncular fashion and puts small packets of Gluco next to each of our cups, adding them to his account book in his neat, small letters.
I am surprised when, a few days later, Sadaf asks me about the bulletproof bus. I tell her about all the phone calls, and she asks me why I haven’t called the Cheema person yet and I don’t have an answer for that. She clucks her tongue impatiently and tells me that she’s going to sell the phone I bought her so that she can buy her baby a pair of shoes. I want to remind her that the baby doesn’t walk yet but—wisely—I keep my mouth shut.
Sadaf tells me the next evening that she is going to start work at a lady’s house.
Sweeping, washing clothes, maybe a little cooking. Anguish grips my heart.
“You’ll be her maasi,” I say.
“I don’t care,” says Sadaf. “I should have done this sooner.” Her tone is lighter than I’ve heard it in the whole year we’ve been married. It amazes me that she really doesn’t mind pushing a wet cloth over someone else’s marble floor and wringing other people’s dirty clothes with her hands. She hums as she cooks dinner—peas, potatoes, and two rotis—and tickles the baby. I eat my food in silence, leaving half of my roti in case the baby gets hungry later. I hope Sadaf notices.
When I was younger, I was told every day by my parents that I had to take care of my older brother. He was irresponsible and I had to be a good example to him. But when I wasn’t looking, he slipped away and never came back. My father died from worry one year later and my mother died six months after that. I told myself I would never let myself get talked into taking care of a difficult situation again, and then when I turned twenty-five, I ended up marrying Sadaf, who had been married once before to a bad man. Not only was she divorced, she had a small girl, a baby. I couldn’t convince my aunt and uncle that she was a good woman. They don’t speak to me anymore.
The next day, I watch her and the baby leave right after breakfast. Then I take out my phone and my scrap of paper with its collection of phone numbers.
What I get from calling Mr. Cheema is another name and number, and I call this one—a Mr. Anwar—right away. By this time, I have zero nervousness. Mr. Anwar speaks fast, his words slanting upward like questions. He says that I must have ten years of driving experience, a valid license, four copies of passport-sized photographs of myself, and a letter of recommendation from my last or current place of employment. I must also be able to speak English. All this he tells me in less than a minute, and after he says “Khuda hafiz” and the call disconnects, I try to hold on to what he has told me. Pictures, letter, license, experience. And English.
I’ll have to wait for Sadaf to get paid so that I can get a picture taken at a Kodak studio. I’m sure the juice seller won’t write a letter for me but my friend Abid might. We were in school together until class five, after which both of us left to get work at a mechanic’s. He has his own mechanic shop now—well, he and his brother-in-law. He’ll write me a letter, I’m sure.
And I know my English. There is nobody home, but I still look around before saying in a low voice, “Hello, my name is Asif.” My face feels warm and my armpits are instantly damp and I think, I can’t let myself look like this after just one sentence. I try again, though it is hard to make my tongue glide smoothly from sound to sound. I feel better after the tenth time and I then say, “How are you?” and “Welcome to Karachi.” It is only ten in the morning and a good time to go see Abid.
My scalp itches in the humidity and I walk slowly so that I don’t sweat too much. I see Jawed standing by the chai cart and he lazily raises a hand in greeting. I nod a salaam and look away as if preoccupied purposefully, but he falls into step beside me.
“I heard you got a job,” he says. His voice is lazy, too. His statement feels like a trick question.
“Not yet,” I say cautiously. “Have you?”
“Now who’s going to hire a good-for-nothing like me?” He grins and I relax.
“Come to Chacha’s shop for lunch,” he says, and I tell him I’ll be there.
Abid’s letter of recommendation is in English and I am reading it slowly, silently, because Sadaf and the baby are asleep. There are five lines, and when I reach the end I feel good.
He has been generous, calling me a hard worker and a good employee. He told me he’s writing this lie of a letter only because I have a wife and a baby to take care of, and I need the job. I don’t mind him saying that because he is an old friend.
I let myself think about the bus. From the outside, it looks like any other bus, every inch of it covered in patterns in different colors. There’s a line of poetry on the back framed by two peacocks sticking out their chests as if they wrote it. There are two eyes on the front outlined in paint-kohl, with the headlights as pupils. Underneath the paint, the body of the bus is made to protect the bodies of the passengers. The doors of the bus must remain closed for the duration of the tour. They pay a lot of money for that kind of protection so they can safely take their cameras and wallets to the parts of the city where people like us live. People who look thin with desperation and want to mug or kill better-dressed people. At least, that’s what those others think. When I drive that bus, I’ll be enclosed in the same safe zone as those people. Even the windshield and windows are bulletproof.
It shouldn’t be long now before Sadaf gets her first pay. I don’t think she will mind if I use some of it for the photographs that I need to give with my job application.
Then one evening I see Jawed at the chai cart again. His scruffy beard is gone and his hair looks combed. He saunters toward me, grinning.
“Asif! Salaam,” he calls out.
For some reason, the return greeting sticks in my throat.
“Remind me to buy you some mithai with my first pay,” he says. “I got a job.”
“Really? Where?” I manage to ask.
“You know that new bus they’ve got running through the city? Karachi King Express. I’m going to be its new driver.” Jawed’s grin is genuine and wide. One of his teeth is slightly crooked and there is a mole under his left earlobe. And still he talks. “I owe a lot to Chacha Fazal, I do. He gave me the idea and all the encouragement. He never gave up on me.” Jawed’s voice gets thick with emotion.
I don’t remember what I say to him—congratulations, probably—before I walk away in a hurry, away from his grin and the picture of him in the smooth driver’s seat of the bulletproof bus.
I walk fast and I know where I am going. The plastic bags look a uniform bluish brown in the twilight, almost like a road. They don’t smell so bad anymore or maybe I’ve become used to their stink. I probably come here too often. Through the door, I see Chacha behind the counter, his beard blowing in the air from a small fan he’s got standing on the glass. A gift from his nephew, probably. I push down on the door handle, but he has locked the door. I hit it with my fist, and again, and again, but nothing happens. He looks at me once, then picks up his phone.
I realize I don’t know what he’s capable of doing, so I turn around for home.
I hold up my hands, and in the dark I try to show Sadaf the difference between the right one and the left one. The thumb of the left hand is swollen, and there are cuts on the right one but they don’t hurt. I tell this to her in a whisper so that she doesn’t wake up. She is less angry with me when she’s sleeping.