Hari Hassan sits upright in his hospital bed, waiting for his son. Part of him is unsure whether he will see him, after all, but because he is still human, albeit barely, he hopes, even when he knows that hope changes nothing. And then, without even a knock on the door, Jazz pushes his way urgently into the room, and stops short, looking horrified at the sight of him. ‘Hello Baba,’ he says inadequately.
‘Hello Ejazzy-Jazz,’ says Hassan, his voice breaking into a sob as he realizes that, for once, his hopes have been fulfilled. Come home, my darling, darling child. I’ve waited so long.
‘Why didn’t you tell me, Baba? That you weren’t my father, that you married Amma to look after her?’ Jazz asks reproachfully, ‘Rooney’s told me everything.’
‘I made a promise to your mother,’ says Hassan simply. ‘She was afraid of what you’d think of her if the truth came out.’
‘I didn’t understand,’ says Jazz, lost between remorse and frustration. ‘When you told me that you had never loved Amma, when you told me that she always knew that and understood. It’s why I’ve been so angry with you. I thought she killed herself because you weren’t there for her. Sometimes I wondered whether you helped her on her way. It’s why I abandoned you in this place after the diagnosis.’ He sits by the bed, his head sinking into his hands, his entire prone body an expression of distress. ‘All those letters you wrote and you never told me.’
‘It wasn’t my secret, son. I’m sure that your mother wouldn’t want me to tell you even now, but the sad fact is that I am too worn out and transparent to hide secrets any more. I’m a selfish old man, and I don’t want to die being hated by my only child.’
Jazz looks up, and asks simply, ‘So, tell me the truth, Baba. If you’re not keeping secrets any more. Was Amma’s death an accident?’
Hassan shakes his head, ‘I never knew for certain, until today. I’ve always felt responsible because I wasn’t there the day it happened. But I don’t think it would have made a difference; it would have just happened another time.’ He reaches painfully for and passes over Anwar’s letter. ‘Please don’t judge your mother, Jazz. She loved you so much. You were her world; she didn’t want you to have to see her in pain.’ Jazz reads the letter, and starts sobbing uncontrollably, burying his face against his father’s dead legs, and crushing the paper in his fist as he pounds the bed; Hassan sits helplessly, his parchment-pure hand stroking his son’s hair. He still doesn’t believe that it’s not his blood running in this young man’s veins, that the salt and sunshine scent of Jazz’s skin doesn’t belong to him. ‘You have always been mine,’ he murmurs, as much to himself as to Jazz, ‘I never for a moment felt you weren’t.’
Jazz pushes himself up from the bed, and as he calms down, says quietly, ‘I know now what you meant, when you wrote that we need to forgive each other. I never knew what it was that you had to forgive me for. I’m so sorry, Baba.’
Hassan reaches out to Jazz, to hold his hand with as much strength as he can muster. ‘I’m sorry too, Jazz. I wish I had been a better father, a better husband. I wish that your mother and I had told you the truth. But you will never know the absolute joy that you brought to my life; I have always loved you. I always will love you.’ Hassan looks at his son’s face, and feels a peace descend on him that he hasn’t felt for a long time; he knows he has been forgiven, after all.
‘What can I do for you, now, Baba?’ Jazz asks at last. ‘Is there anything you need from me? To make you more comfortable here.’
‘Yes,’ says Hassan. He looks with untempered affection at Jazz’s face. ‘I do need something from you, my son.’ He breathes deeply, and says slowly and deliberately, so there can be no possible misunderstanding of his words, ‘Jazz, I need you to let me go.’
Jazz stares at his father, his face beginning to crumple as he realizes what he means. ‘But you might live for months, Baba,’ he stammers with emotion, ‘you might live for years. It might not get any worse. Or they might find some way to arrest the disease, reverse it even.’
‘A magic cure?’ says Hassan ruefully at his son’s arguments. ‘I’m not like you, Jazz. I don’t believe in magic, or miracles.’ He adds with a smile, ‘Although I can’t tell you how happy I am that you still do.’
When Jazz was three years old, Hassan had taken him and his mother to a hotel in an elegant part of London, near Berkeley Square. Hassan had taught Jazz that classic old song about the nightingales that sang there, and foolishly offered to help him look for them; he was completely unprepared for how distressed his little boy would be, to find out that there really weren’t any nightingales after all. He couldn’t bear to be responsible for Jazz’s infant disappointment, and so he wasted a whole afternoon and morning making enquiries among the specialist shops in Mayfair, before he finally tracked down a pair of bejewelled mechanical nightingales, and bought them at vast expense. He carefully set them up on a tree in the manicured green of Berkeley Square the day after that disappointing first visit. ‘So much trouble and money for such a little boy,’ Zaida had said about his plan. ‘You’ll spoil him.’ But her tone was that of tender exasperation, rather than disapproval.
Hassan brought Jazz back to Berkeley Square, and wound the nightingales up while his son was distracted with his ball; and then, like magic, the birds began to sing, and flapped with clockwork stiffness in time to the melody. Jazz was so overexcited by the discovery that he ran right into the tree, almost dislodging them. ‘We finded them, Baba!’ he squealed with excitement. ‘We finded the nite-nite-gales!’ From then on, Jazz had always claimed that he believed in magic. And miracles. And Hassan had never disappointed him by telling him otherwise; that the nite-nite-gales had been nothing more or less magical and miraculous than the impractical desire of an ageing man to delight his toddling son.
Hassan, looking at grown-up Jazz now, can still see the determined optimism that he had as a child. He wishes, for his son’s sake, that there might be another extravagant gesture that he could make that would avoid disappointing him once more. But this time there is nothing he can do. ‘I can’t fight this disease, Jazz,’ he says gently. ‘We both know that it’s already won. This is all I have to ask of you now.’ He breathes deeply, and says once more, realizing that he is begging, ‘Please, Jazz. I need you to let me go.’
Jazz seems unable to say anything for a long time, but then he nods silently, and puts his arms around his father’s frail form, holding him tight. He doesn’t let go, but listens intently as Hassan tells him what he needs to be done. Jazz kisses his father’s forehead, and remains by his side, until Nurse eventually returns to prepare him for sleep.