Trespassing (20 page)

‘Important!’ Nini hollered. ‘Of course it’s important. Like I was saying, I tried calling last night. Your mother told me you were staying here. Then my sister just wouldn’t get off the phone. I was so mad …’

There were some people, thought Dia, who shouldn’t be allowed ownership of a telephone. Nini was one of them. In person she was calm, even gracious. She’d been a little uptight since the Quran Khwani, it was true, but she wasn’t shrill or pushy by any standard. Yet the telephone transformed her. She stopped hearing herself.

‘Nini,’ Dia sighed. ‘I really have to go. Okay? Bye …’

‘You fool!’ Nini bellowed. ‘I’m trying to tell you a date’s been fixed.’

‘A date?’

‘I thought you’d be brimming with joy,’ she added provocatively.

Silence.

‘Fine. You said you’d be with me when the boy and his mother visited. So I remembered you. You’re invited for tea on Tuesday. I picked the day with you in mind. Since your retake is on Monday, I thought you’d be free.’ She paused, letting the full weight of her news sink in. Then, ‘If you do care to come, try to dress respectably, would you?’ She slammed the receiver down.

Dia stared at the plastic apparatus in her hand.

She put it back down.

So the doctor’s son had agreed.

Nini was going to let herself be displayed.

Dia would be a silent witness to the humiliation of her best friend.

She had lost her then.

She lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling fan she’d been too tired to think of switching on. It had three screws on each of its three blades. What if the whole thing fell on her, now?

She might see her father again.

Some of the black smears on the telephone might be his fingerprints.

She could see herself in the fan’s shiny center. Small and flat.

She wanted badly to curl up in her father’s arms and have him switch the light off.

And then she willed it. He also switched the fan on. It was cool and she drifted into a deep and comfortable sleep.

At one o’clock in the afternoon Dia walked back into the shed, now bustling with activity. Workers chopped leaves, cleaned trays, recorded numbers. She absently greeted them all, forcing her way into the room where she knew bad news awaited. Sumbul was not there. The two moths were. Each faced her head-on. They’d won. She folded her arms.
If Nini had not called, I would have
…

Sumbul entered the room with Sana, an expert moth-handler, and Dia’s mother.

‘Hello, darling,’ Riffat kissed her. ‘Sleep well?’ She stood with a clipboard in her hands, looking, as always, impeccable in a sleeveless tunic with purple embroidery down the seams, over a purple shalwar bleeding into violet. Her chin-length curls were soft and lush and her face glowed. No one would guess she was past fifty.

Normally Dia enjoyed bumping into her mother unexpectedly like this. But today she turned instead to Sumbul. ‘What did I miss?’

Sumbul looked pleased and guilty.

Sana carefully lifted the female and carried her into the next room.

‘She’ll be the first mother of the next batch,’ announced Riffat, jotting down notes.

‘No!’ said Dia.

Sumbul nodded. ‘I saw them chew their way out and then immediately, their tails pinned together. They stayed that way for three hours! They only pried loose about ten minutes ago,’ she added, and then covered her mouth quickly with her hands. ‘I shouldn’t have said that! Now you’ll just feel worse.’

Dia stared at the remaining male. ‘After keeping me waiting all that time, couldn’t
you
have waited?’

Sumbul and Riffat smirked, exchanging glances. ‘They never do.’

They left the safe environment of the farm, crossed the troubled province in an armed escort vehicle, and within two hours arrived securely home. Although the tension linking these points had killed her father, it barely grazed Dia or Riffat. Sometimes Dia wondered if this immunity was really a privilege. Didn’t all shelters fracture one day? And if so, shouldn’t the signs be more visible?

The two walked up the winding driveway. At the fountain, they turned into the arbor, and Dia decided her uneasiness was nothing more than the disappointment of missing the birth of the moths. And of course, her disappointment with Nini. She tried to push her friend out of her thoughts. ‘I smell pakoras.’

‘Mm,’ said Riffat. ‘I love it when Inam Gul spoils us.’

They ducked under the trellis of jade vine, and the path widened to a ring of laburnum trees. In the center stood a glass-top table glittering in the evening sun like a pink topaz, arranged with hot refreshments and a tall jug of chilled
almond juice. The cook was obviously in a good mood today; tea varied in complexity depending on his whim. At his best, he served an assortment of sweetmeats and savories in Riffat’s finest dishware, adopting the debonair style he claimed had been his trademark in younger days. (When you were a fisherman? Dia would ask, but he’d ignore her.) At other times he’d barely remember to make tea at all, and complain if reminded.

Now he held out a chair and napkin for each. ‘Tea is on its way,’ he announced, marching back into the kitchen.

‘You never know when it’ll hit him,’ laughed Riffat, pouring juice for Dia.

While she sipped it, Dia found she could not banish Nini from her thoughts. On Tuesday, Nini would go on display. The same Nini who’d so carelessly dismissed Dia’s mother:
Where do dreams get us? If you’re not careful, you’ll end up lonely, like …

Not only had Nini spoiled Dia’s chance to see the moths, but she forced Dia to hear again the remarks others aimed at Riffat.

When her husband died, Riffat’s in-laws had taken over management of the factory, but she hadn’t let them take over her farm. She hadn’t listened when they said she needed to spend more time with the newly orphaned children. She hadn’t changed her routine. Her brother-in-law, whether out of kindness or malice, urged the family to let her be. ‘She will have fans but no friends,’ he declared. He’d been right. That was the price a proud woman had to pay.

Dia alone looked close enough to see the signs of wear: sometimes, when Riffat’s ulcers made her wince, she forgot to color the gray roots of her curls or conceal the bags under her eyes. And sometimes, her efficacy revealed cracks – instead of studying her notes on farm productivity, like Dia, she was seen gazing dreamily at butterflies and clouds.

But she recovered quickly, so to others she was the same
fashionable Riffat who undertook any endeavor by first looking beyond it, then setting about getting firmly there. When she walked down the street, men and women ogled, but not because they wanted to caress her. They wanted to stop her. They were unwilling to accept that every obstacle made her chin rise higher.

In contrast, Dia was easily benumbed. She did not know what would happen on Tuesday. Nor was she able to decide what ought to happen – should the boy hate Nini? Should she produce another prank? How was she to get Nini back?

Riffat would have a plan, and unlike Dia’s disastrous one at the Quran Khwani, hers would not leak. How she wished for her mother’s strong nerves and sense of purpose, intimidating as it was!

They were different even to look at, sharing no features except the hooked nose. Dia was short with straight hair and light brown eyes; her mother was tall and wore her hair in a short, curly crop. Instead of Riffat’s strong jaw and high cheekbones, Dia’s face was oval and her cheek soft. When Dia walked down the street, even though most considered her too dark to be pretty, men always tried to touch her. At such times she wished her mother had rubbed some of her stoniness on to her.

But, thought Dia, the best thing about her mother was that she never tried to make Dia more like herself.

Inam Gul served the tea.

‘Thank God there was no strike today,’ said Riffat. ‘Or we’d still be at the farm.’ Conversation turned to the family. Dia’s lovesick brother Hassan was unable to snap out of it. The girl was obviously not interested. What should they do?

‘Send him to the Arctic,’ offered Dia, burying herself in ghee.

‘He may as well already be there,’ Riffat sighed. ‘I hope Amir visits this winter. Maybe Hassan needs a man-to-man talk.’

‘So what does Amir have to do with it?’

‘Come on now.’ She plucked a samosa.

Dia looked up. ‘The doctor said no.’

‘Well, don’t tell him then.’

When the forbidden food was consumed, Riffat spoke of one of her sisters, who visited from Islamabad the day Dia had been adorning Nini’s back with silkworms. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask where you went. We rushed back from the mill and Erum was so disappointed to find you gone. Inam Gul said Nissrine picked you up. But you haven’t said a thing about it?’

Dia mumbled, ‘Yes. She took me somewhere.’

‘That awful?’

‘Don’t ask.’ Dia’s appetite began to diminish. ‘Well, all right. Nini wanted me to attend a Quran Khwani.’

‘A Quran Khwani? Who died?’

‘The father of a boy her mother wants her to marry.’

‘No!’ Riffat gasped. ‘So young. Barely twenty, poor child.’

‘You’d think,’ Dia fumed,
‘she,
of all people, wouldn’t settle for being “a poor child”. She has options. She could refuse. But can’t you just see her ten years from now? Cranky kids, husband away, long-suffering eyes. I’ll hate her then, Ama. I’ll hate her because she’ll be just another woman pretending she had no choice.’ Dia stopped. At last, she had voiced her worst fear out loud:
I’ll hate her.

‘She could refuse,’ Riffat pondered. ‘But at what cost?’

‘At
any
cost.’

‘Calm down, darling. You’re young. You’ve no idea how hostile society gets if you challenge it.’

‘I’ve some idea – through you.’

A fleeting sorrow shot through Riffat’s eyes, but faded quickly. ‘True again, though that’s still not enough of an idea. For your sake, I hope it never is. Anyway,’ she added with a smile, ‘I’m always on your side, whatever you choose. And whatever others say about it.’

Sipping the rest of her tea, Riffat continued, ‘Imagine Nissrine’s life if she resists. Waking up every morning to an icy household. Eating leftovers alone. Sly gossip forever in her ears. And that’s just the silent hate. What about all the guilt from her mother? “I’ve lost face all because of you.” Or, “Is this my reward for all the sacrifices we made?” Or, “Your father’s health is failing.” Or, “He’s leaving me just because of you …” To whom would the girl turn?’

Dia turned away, uncomfortable with where the conversation was heading. It was the first time Riffat had alluded to her own difficulties. She did it as though she told someone else’s story, as though this was for Nini. It wasn’t. It was for Dia. She was trying to tell her that she too would have to think about these things.

Her mother kept on. ‘And if it’s not Nini’s mother who’ll say those things, it’ll be someone else. And the older she gets, the more voices will chip in …’

Dia shut her eyes, hoping to shut out Riffat’s story. If Riffat had been coerced into marrying Dia’s large and delightful father, she didn’t want to know. If they’d little between them, she wouldn’t hear it. The man was dead now. It wasn’t fair.

‘… She’d have no one to turn to.’

‘Stop saying that,’ Dia blurted. ‘She’d have me, wouldn’t she?’

‘No, Dia. She’d need to look elsewhere. Some day, so will you.’

‘Pah!’ She could think of nothing more convincing to say.

‘I’m not saying you’ll become Nini. I’m saying she’s not you – and she’s not going to be either. For her, giving in may not only be easier but also more fulfilling. She may not think of it as giving in. Right now, you’re not in a position to judge. Yes,’ she added, ‘years from now, if she expects pity for her decision, maybe.’

Dia studied her intently. But Riffat’s face gave away nothing.

Wisps of salmon-pink brushed through the cloud cover as the sun set. The sky resounded with the call for Maghrib prayer. The muezzin had a thin, plaintive voice and when he sang, Dia felt the day close around her. It was as if the call asked what the day had brought. The same errors? Yes, exactly the same. Even so, God hadn’t lost hope entirely. There would be tomorrow, though one day tomorrow would run out. He would not keep spinning for ever.

It was the call that made Dia want to go to Him the most.

Inam Gul scurried into the bower with a mosquito coil. ‘More tea?’ he enquired.

‘No, thank you, Inam Gul. Everything was delicious. But our philosophical Dia dwells on matters your delicacies can’t appease – and she’ll infect us too if we’re not careful.’

Dia scowled at her mother and Inam Gul shook his head, safely commiserating with both. Then he piled the dishes and vanished into the swiftly descending darkness.

The twilight erupted with activity. Cats crossed paths and hissed; a chameleon’s eyes glittered like black ice; a car honked for the gate to be opened. When darkness fell, the car rumbled into its hole, and all was momentarily still.

Dia surprised herself by being the one to reopen the discussion. ‘You’ve always told me not to blindly go with things. That too many people let others decide their future, and it’s as if individual apathy has snowballed into a national one. If all Ninis go the same way, all their offspring will too, and nothing around us will ever change.’

She was doubly surprised when Riffat did not answer. And then she worried. Her mother was rarely at a loss for words.

At last Riffat replied, ‘Well, as I said, it may not just be pressure that’s pushing Nini. She may not be moving blindly, even if she is following tradition. It may work for her, if not immediately, maybe one day …’

Dia leaned forward. ‘You never used to believe in the one-day theory. You always said not to wait for miracles, but to live in the present.’

Riffat sighed. ‘I know, Dia. It’s just that, who knows, maybe Nini will find love, and the dear girl can be happy. That’s all. Love lurks in unexpected places.’ Her voice trailed.

Dia rolled her eyes. Her mother was in such a peculiar mood today. ‘Ninety per cent of women do this. You can hardly call it
unexpected.’