by Ayisha Malik
Now, they watched Haaris trudge up the stairs and Bilal felt that the road of parenthood was to become rockier. Inside the quiet house, he felt a strange sort of nervousness with Mariam – as if the spaces, now no longer filled with muttering aunties, separated them.
‘Are you hungry? I’ll make some sandwiches,’ said Mariam, going into the kitchen.
She was here, yes, but why? He recalled the scene on the stairs, but perhaps he was imbuing it with too much of his own hope. Bilal followed her.
‘Are you here because you want to be or because there’s no other choice?’ he asked.
The funeral had many effects on him, the most prominent of which was to be bold enough to ask questions, even if he’d rather not know the answer. Mariam turned around from grating the cheese, observing him – was she calculating a diplomatic way to respond to this?
‘Because if you want Saif then I don’t think we can carry on like this.’
If he hadn’t grabbed on to the chair in front of him, Bilal’s legs may have given way.
‘I need you to give me time,’ she replied.
There it was: the bubbling of rage – that she should get to decide the terms, that her feelings took precedence over his, and all the time he let her. It was his own doing. No, he didn’t want to lose her, but he couldn’t abide being a second choice. He had seen too much death in the past year to not want to live.
‘For what?’ he asked.
She folded her arms. ‘I can stand here and tell you that I’ve realised this is exactly where I want to be, but somehow I don’t think you’d believe me. Even if I did have a choice.’
‘Do you? Have a choice?’
She paused. ‘It’s hard to tell sometimes.’
Bilal too folded his arms. He needed more warmth from her to counter his reticence, but he knew that was impossible – he couldn’t expect her to be a different woman to the one he had married. It struck him then that a partnership in a relationship never was equal. One would require more patience and understanding than the other, and in that moment he had to decide if he was okay to carry on being that one. It felt rather too much like martyrdom.
‘So?’ he said.
‘Let time tell,’ she said. ‘But right now, given the choice, I promise – there’s no place I’d rather be than here.’
He watched her eyebrows contract a little, and her eyes, that were usually distant, seemed fully present.
‘Okay,’ he said.
He unfolded his arms and went to leave.
‘Where are you going?’ she asked, gesturing to the unmade sandwiches.
‘Outside.’
Bilal grabbed his coat and gloves, a big towel, some bin liners and made his way into the garden.
BILAL LAY IN HIS grave watching the dark sky, breathing in the foggy smell after too many fireworks, contemplating the absence of the two women in his life who’d brought him up. Khala had been the balm to his mum’s fiery words and looks. His mum had brought bravery to Khala’s indecisiveness – together he realised that they’d imbued him with rather more measure than should be allowed. He had seen two extremes and chosen moderation. Yet he didn’t seem to love his wife in moderation. He teetered somewhere between awe and adoration, pride and a crippling kind of dependency. Nothing imbalanced him more than the idea that she might walk away with Haaris in tow. But he wouldn’t hold on to her, not if she didn’t want it. There were a thousand little intricacies that made every human being so different that it was a wonder to Bilal that anyone ever got along at all, let alone got married.
His mobile rang and he fumbled around before taking off his glove and answering it.
‘Richard. Hello,’ said Bilal.
‘Hi.’ Richard was panting.
‘Where are you?’
‘Gym. You?’
‘Grave.’
‘Ah.’ Richard’s breathing came down heavily on the phone.
‘How’s Tom?’
‘Fine. He’ll be fighting fit again sooner than we expect.’
A long pause ensued and Bilal rather wanted to go back to his thoughts when Richard said: ‘How are things with Mariam?’
Sigh. ‘Uncertain.’
‘Right.’
‘Well—’
‘I …’ interrupted Richard.
‘Yes?’ asked Bilal.
‘This is tricky for me,’ said Richard.
Bilal felt distracted by the thudding of Richard’s footsteps. ‘Could you stop running for a minute?’
Bilal heard a beep, Richard’s breathing slowing down.
‘Well, go on,’ said Bilal.
‘It’s always easier to listen than talk.’
‘Give it a go.’
‘You and Mariam are quite different, aren’t you?’
‘That’s safe to say.’
‘What is it that made you sure? That it would work,’ asked Richard.
It was an odd question to come from his friend, yet he felt the pressure of giving him an answer that would in some way do justice to the eight years Richard had spent listening to Bilal.
‘I don’t think there was a moment,’ began Bilal. ‘Being young helps. There’s more feeling than thinking, isn’t there?’
‘Thank God for age,’ replied Richard. ‘If with it comes wisdom.’
‘Hmm.’ Bilal paused. ‘I think it was partly that she was the only woman I’d met who didn’t suffocate me with her affection. Perhaps there was something about the way she gave her attention to Haaris, too. Not the over-zealous single mother. You know the type – the one who’d end up being emotionally dependent on her only child.’
Bilal wondered if he’d had siblings whether he’d have felt the guilt in the way he did. Would they have joked about old mother Sakeena, at it again – or shared the latest story of their mum’s bizarre behaviour? Bilal shifted on his bin liner, looking at the fog emanating from his mouth. His mum had tried not to show it, but he’d felt the expectation in the tone of her voice, saw it in the way her life was just her and Khala. Bilal wondered whether it wasn’t too dissimilar to the way in which he felt dependent on Mariam.
‘Right. Yes,’ said Richard.
‘What’s going on?’
Richard cleared his throat. Another beep, Richard’s footsteps quickening again. ‘I was curious. And I thought I might make sense of something in my life if I heard about yours.’
‘You’re being cryptic,’ said Bilal.
‘Sorry.’
‘You’re a man of God. People of God get all the answers.’
‘Do we?’
‘Of course. You’re meant to be, you know … certain about things.’
‘Death, I’m afraid, is the only certainty,’ replied Richard.
Bilal nodded in his grave. ‘And taxes.’
There was a pause. ‘And love,’ mumbled Richard.
‘Sorry?’
‘Nothing. Don’t mind me.’
‘Richard …’
‘Thanks for the talk, Bill. As for the mosque business, I promise it’s not over.’
Bilal sat up in the grave. Love. He’d rather not talk about it if he could help it – it was such a sentimental subject, made more uncomfortable by virtue of the fact that he suffered from it. But friends had a duty to one another.
‘Yes, but Richard … is it Anne?’
Of course. Bilal had been so wrapped up in his own crumbling marriage, he hadn’t seen the potential of something blossoming elsewhere.
A long pause ensued.
‘Yes or no will do,’ added Bilal.
There was another beep as Richard’s footsteps quietened. ‘Yes.’
‘I see.’
Another long pause. Bilal shifted in his grave again. ‘And how does … how does she … you know … feel?’ he muttered.
‘Like a woman who’s lost her son,’ replied Richard.
Bilal thought of Haaris stomping up the stairs and a well of anxiety opened up, quite equal to the depth of the grave he was in. Life suddenly felt so precariou
s that he felt the earth might collapse in on itself, smothering him in his makeshift death-hole. He stood up.
‘You’re a good man,’ said Bilal as he started to throw the towels and bin liners over the edge.
‘I’m consummately flawed.’
Bilal laughed as he climbed out of the grave. ‘Well then there’s no hope for the rest of us.’
‘I’m angry, Bill.’
The force of Richard’s words made Bilal stop.
‘There’s a spark of rage in me that I feel … Never mind.’
‘No. Go on.’
Spark of rage. Yes, he knew that feeling, having become newly acquainted with it.
‘I have great faith in God. I do. Sometimes I flatter myself that I believe in humanity, too. But every now and again something in me makes me want to—’
‘Do or say something terrible.’
Richard sighed. ‘Yes.’
‘Something out of character.’
‘Or it’s entirely in character and I’ve just been lying to myself – not to mention others – all these years. So you see, Bill, I’m not so good, after all.’
Bilal paused and thought about it. ‘Perhaps Anne would like you all the more for it.’
‘A fraudulent vicar? I give the impression of wisdom and knowledge and patience and all those virtues we’re supposed to admire, but when I’m at the gym, on the treadmill, like now, all I imagine is running away from the tedious questions people have. And the people who aren’t tedious? You can’t save them. Even Gerald. I went to see Dan …’
‘Did you? And?’ Bilal’s heart beat faster.
‘There’s something so cold about him.’
‘What did he say?’
‘Nothing. But I couldn’t find it in myself to push past my own prejudices and help him.’
‘You can’t save everyone.’
‘It’s my job to try.’ He paused. ‘And then he surprised me.’
‘How?’
‘By showing that he has the ability to care.’
Bilal sighed. ‘Right. You know, you should’ve just become an accountant.’ But really, he was thinking about Bruce again.
Richard laughed and paused for a while. ‘I was unforgivably rude to Anne.’
‘Were you? Just say sorry. You’re no prophet, Rich. No-one expects perfection,’ replied Bilal.
‘What do they expect?’
All these questions were uncharacteristic coming from Richard. He was always so ready with answers.
‘There’s something to be said about telling the truth about how a person feels. I … let’s just say Mariam has told me a few things I’d rather not have discovered, but now, well … No use tiptoeing around a marriage. Or any relationship.’
‘Hmmm. Silence can be its own tragedy,’ replied Richard. ‘Thanks, Bill. Sorry …’
‘It’s nothing. Don’t mention it.’
Bilal put the phone down and felt a sense of calm. It wasn’t the perverse gratification – which no-one admits to – that one gets when they learn that someone might be suffering a fraction more than them in life, but the realisation that everyone does suffer. That suffering can be shared, if not solved.
Bilal walked into the house a few minutes later. Mariam was staring into the fireplace, and as he went to sit next to her he felt something poke his leg. He reached into the sofa to find a bronze notebook that looked quite new.
‘This yours?’ he asked.
Before Mariam could answer, the doorbell rang.
‘Hello.’ It was Shelley, a woollen scarf over her head. ‘I hope I’m not interrupting.’
It was more of a statement than a question. Her lips were pursed and her nostrils flared. Bilal couldn’t understand what he might’ve done this time to make her angry. Perhaps it was just ongoing discontent. He heard a car approaching rather speedily. It zoomed past as he realised it was Richard. Shelley was surely about to say something about its speed, but her eyes were resting on the notebook.
‘You’ve found it then?’ she asked. ‘The notebook. Notebooks, I’m sure. May I?’ Shelley asked.
Bilal opened the door for her as she stepped into the house.
‘You’ll see there’s an inscription,’ she said.
Bilal flipped to the first page.
‘That’s from me,’ she added.
‘Oh.’
Shelley folded her hands in front of her. ‘Yes, that’s right.’ She paused. ‘Khala and I were friends. Good friends, I think.’
Richard knew that if he didn’t go to see Anne now, he would lose his nerve. He stood at her door and hesitated. What would he say? He’d have to make do with the words that came to him. He was an articulate person, after all, and the worst thing he could do was think it through too thoroughly. He knocked on the door.
‘Hello,’ he said.
‘Hi.’
They stood like this for a few moments, Richard’s mind quite blank.
‘Come in,’ said Anne.
‘May I?’
‘Yes, Richard. You may.’
In the living room the fire had just been kindled, so he went and moved a few of the smaller logs, strengthening the flames.
‘Sorry,’ he said when he realised Anne was watching him.
‘What can I do for you?’
‘I owe you an apology.’
He waited for a response. None came.
‘I shouldn’t have spoken like that at the hospital.’
‘Don’t worry.’
Richard had to suppress his agitation at her apathy. Anger was an emotion to be mastered.
‘Look, Anne, I know you must be angry, but you know—’
‘Honestly. It’s forgotten about,’ she replied. ‘You’re free to go.’
It would’ve wounded him less if her face wasn’t so impassive. She would be cold towards him – that might never change – but this just made Richard more resolute.
‘I see how it has to be,’ he said, suddenly feeling a solidity in both emotion and action. ‘I came here to apologise, Anne, and to tell you that your father’s right. I do love you and you would be a fool if you didn’t see it.’
Richard noticed the colour rise to her cheeks.
‘Perhaps I’ve known it for a while but have refused to believe it because … you’re you and I’m me. I know how much this collar appalls you and if I had a choice in the matter I’d rid myself of these …’ Richard paused. ‘Feelings. I’m sorry to say it, but you know I’m not sentimental, and you’d respect me less – if you have any for me in the first place – if I pretended these things didn’t matter, because they do. And, as it happens, so do you. A great deal. I did a poor job of managing my emotions in the hospital and took it out on the person who’s put them in – let me tell you, because I’m not ashamed to say it – a bit of a tumble.’
‘Tumble?’
‘You don’t have a right to know all this,’ he continued, ‘just as I probably have no right to tell you …’ Richard tried to read Anne’s face – was she angry? Annoyed? Indifferent?
‘So why did you come here?’ she asked, her tone as steady as her gaze.
‘Purely selfish reasons,’ he said.
‘Which are?’
‘To see if you would – could – ever feel the same.’
‘Do you have expectations of me?’ she asked.
It was such an odd question. But then she was odd. If Richard was distressed at the idea of things never being the same between the two of them again, he didn’t show it. He would meet her steadiness with steadiness.
‘Just as much as you’re willing to give.’
Anne gave a wry laugh as she looked away. ‘No-one gives anything of themselves willingly. Unless they’re very optimistic.’
Any other day he would’ve laughed and agreed, but he stopped himself.
‘No,’ he said. ‘But I’m not sure what we gain by too much reluctance either.’
He stepped towards her so that they were just an arm’s length away from one another. It was en
ough, he supposed.
‘The problem is, Reverend—’
‘Would you please just call me Richard.’
‘Is that you’d spend your whole time trying to get back the Anne-before-Teddy-died, and she’s gone,’ she said, her voice cracking. ‘Everything’s gone. It’d be a bad deal for both of us. But especially for you.’
‘That’s not for you to decide.’
‘The last thing I need is the burden of making sure you’re okay, when I’m content in my own misery.’
‘You won’t have to worry about me. I’m quite self-sufficient.’
‘So, what’s the purpose then?’ she asked. ‘For someone who’s meant to be wise, don’t you see the flaws in your plan?’
‘I don’t have a plan,’ he replied. ‘Some things aren’t as complicated as you think they are.’
‘Sometimes they’re more so.’
Richard paused. He wished he didn’t see the reason in Anne’s rationale, but it was impossible not to. To continue right now would be to press upon her the very feelings that she didn’t want to be in charge of.
‘I understand,’ he said.
She looked at him, a slight crease appearing in her brow.
‘And don’t go playing the martyr, waiting for me to suddenly change my mind,’ she said.
‘If I did, you’d be the last person I’d tell.’
‘Don’t manipulate me, Richard.’
Richard felt the blaze of the fire on his back; it coloured Anne’s face as he took one more step towards her.
‘I don’t think I could even if I tried. I barely succeeded in fooling myself,’ he added.
She looked up at him with a sympathetic smile. ‘You didn’t fool me.’
Was he really that transparent? His powers of self-awareness left much to be desired.
‘Ah. That’s why the distance?’ he asked.
‘That’s why the distance,’ she affirmed.
‘I see.’
It took him some effort to step back. ‘Well. I said what had to be said. And you’ve been quite clear.’