Sisterland

by Linda Newbery

  ‘Muhammed Anwar,’ said Saeed’s father, shaking hands vigorously, ‘and this is my wife Soraya, and our son Rashid. It’s good of you both to come.’

  Reuben stood with his eyes fixed on Saeed, who looked as if he would rather be anywhere than confined in bed like a butterfly in a chrysalis, the centre of this awkward social situation. Hilly saw that Reuben was going to be quite useless, at risk of giving himself away if he said anything at all. ‘Saeed, how are you?’ she asked.

  ‘Oh, I’m great,’ said Saeed, with a smile that twisted painfully. ‘Never felt better in my life. Ready to run a marathon.’

  ‘They’re probably keeping him in another night,’ said the brother, Rashid, ‘because of the concussion. He’ll be home tomorrow.’

  ‘That’s good,’ Hilly said, in the falsely bracing tone she hated when she heard herself use it to Heidigran. What could she possibly see that was good? Saeed disfigured, the victim of mindless morons?

  Saeed’s mother smiled doubtfully at Hilly. ‘You are Reuben’s girlfriend? Or Saeed’s?’

  ‘Neither,’ said Hilly; ‘Hilly’s with me,’ said Reuben; ‘Friend,’ said Saeed – all at once, and rather too quickly.

  Mrs Anwar looked puzzled, glancing from one to the other in the embarrassed silence that followed. ‘We’ve guessed Saeed has a girlfriend, but he’s so secretive about where he goes and who he sees. Are you sure there’s no one you’d like me to call,’ she asked him, with an indulgent smile; ‘no one you’d like to come and visit?’

  ‘I’m fine, thanks. Everyone’s here,’ said Saeed.

  Hilly saw that Rashid was noticing everything, his expression wry, and wondered if he knew. But none of us, she thought, is saying what we want to say. What happened? Where? Who was it? Did you recognize them? Did anyone help? hung unasked in the air.

  ‘Have the police been here?’ she ventured.

  Saeed nodded, and Rashid said, ‘He’s just been making a statement. It’s tired him out, I think.’

  His mother nodded. ‘Very nice young lady, that WPC. But you must rest now, Saeed. Go to sleep.’

  ‘I’m not tired,’ said Saeed.

  Rashid got to his feet. ‘Come on, Mum, Dad. You need to get some rest. They’ve been here all night,’ he added to Hilly and Reuben.

  ‘Si,’ Hilly said urgently, ‘did you recognize them? The attackers?’

  Saeed looked at her for a moment, knowing what she meant. ‘I couldn’t be sure, but I think so. Three of them.’

  ‘Apparently they’ve bothered him before, in the coffee bar, these delinquents,’ said his father. ‘He doesn’t know their names but he was able to give the police a good description.’

  But I know their names, Hilly thought. Nicknames, anyway. Wait till I get hold of Zoë …

  Mrs Anwar kissed Saeed carefully, and submitted to being led away by her elder son. ‘Don’t get over-tired, now – try to sleep. We’ll be back later.’

  Saeed had left the concert hall immediately after the Gershwin, he told Reuben and Hilly. Instead of going up by the Guildhall he had taken a shorter back route, cutting through the car park and a narrow alley. He saw no one until, approaching the back of Bridge Street, he heard voices, laughter, saw a lit fag-end in the dusk. Three blokes were standing by a skip; something was passed from hand to hand. They were all bigger than him. He thought of turning back, but decided it was too late, not wanting to let them intimidate him. He gave as wide a berth as possible, swerving away towards the gap between two buildings.

  ‘Oi, Abdul!’ one of them yelled. ‘Paki!’

  One of the others stepped towards him, blocking his route. ‘And what might you be doing out all on your own this time of night, Mohammed?’

  ‘Scrotty little Towelhead sneaking round alleys at night – we don’t like that. What you up to, eh?’

  He saw leather jackets, shaven heads and hard faces, a silver badge that caught the light. (‘Oh, God!’ Hilly muttered. ‘I knew it!’)

  ‘Fuck off!’ he said, trying to sidestep.

  ‘Ooh, mouthy! No one talks to me like that, Abdul.’

  ‘Where’s your boyfriend tonight, eh? Cleared off, has he? Got fed up of curried—’

  (‘– I can’t tell you their exact words,’ Saeed said, with an embarrassed glance at Hilly, ‘it’s far too disgusting. Anyway, a lot more of that sort of thing.’

  ‘We can imagine,’ said Reuben. ‘And then…?’)

  They had gradually closed round him, Saeed said, cutting off his escape. He looked around edgily. There was no one in sight, no one he could yell to for help. He stood for a few seconds weighing up the situation, then ducked and made a dash for it. But they were ready; a body blocked him, an arm went hard round his neck from behind, throttling him, and with a rough twisting pressure he was forced to bend forward. ‘Think we’ll let you get away that easy, Paki? No way. Haven’t even started yet, have we?’

  ‘Don’t pretend you’re not going to enjoy this, you pervy little git,’ another voice said. For a second, then, clamped in a headlock, bent over and helpless, he thought they intended to rape him. He struggled and kicked, fighting for breath; his foot made contact with someone’s shin, and he heard a grunt of pain. But their idea of fun was more straightforward.

  First, a kick to the groin brought tears to his eyes and doubled him up. After that, he said, things got confusing. He was on the ground, trying to curl up to protect himself. A boot slammed into his ribs, another into the side of his head. He thought he was going to die, that they were going to kick and beat him to death.

  His mouth twisted; he lay back against the pillows, eyes closed. ‘Oh, Si!’ said Reuben, grasping Saeed’s hand, his eyes dark with compassion. ‘I’ll kill them, I swear I’ll kill them!’

  ‘No,’ said Saeed, attempting to shake his head; ‘no. I don’t want you involved.’

  ‘I am involved, aren’t I? How can I not be, when the bastards did this to you?’

  ‘Then what?’ Hilly prompted. ‘Who found you, called the ambulance?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Saeed opened his eyes and looked at her wearily. ‘I must have passed out. Last thing I remember is someone’s voice in my ear saying, You don’t know us, right? Never seen us in your life. But we know where you live, got that? Next I knew, I was coming round in the ambulance, and I was one big mass of hurt.’

  ‘Someone must have come along. Walked up from the car park,’ said Reuben. He and Hilly exchanged glances. What if no one had come? Would Saeed have been left there, lying injured? Or worse?

  ‘There weren’t—’ Hilly forced herself to say it. ‘There weren’t any girls with them? Nearby?’

  ‘No,’ said Saeed, understanding. ‘Your sister wasn’t there.’

  Well, thank God for that, Hilly thought. She sat pondering, perched on the end of Saeed’s bed. A nurse came round with the electronic equipment for measuring temperature and blood pressure; Hilly stood up and moved out of the way.

  ‘I think I’ll go for a coffee,’ she said, when the nurse had done. ‘Leave you two to talk. Back in about half an hour, OK?’

  She bought herself what the hospital restaurant called cappuccino, and looked for somewhere to sit. There were plastic-topped tables, and screens of artificial greenery; a window looked out at a garden area with a bird table. A group of nurses sat at one table, and at another a family group that included a patient in a dressing gown. Hilly sat at the table nearest the window and stared gloomily out.

  Zoë had lied, hadn’t she? How could there have been a band practice, if half the members were beating up Saeed?

  What must it be like, to face that sort of abuse and violence whenever you went out on your own? To know that some people hated you merely because of your race, seeing only the colour of your skin? To know that prejudice could so easily take the form of blows and kicks, not just hostile words?

  And while this was happening, Hilly thought, I was at the concert not a quarter of a mile away, listening to Bizet’s Symphony in C, happy for Reube
n, never suspecting. If only Saeed had stayed to the end; if he hadn’t been so conscientious about returning promptly to Settlers …

  ‘OK if I join you?’

  She looked up and saw Saeed’s brother, alone, with a cup of coffee and a Danish pastry on a tray.

  She gestured towards the spare seat opposite. ‘Thought you’d left.’

  ‘I took Mum and Dad home – they’ve been here all night, like I said. Then came back to talk to Saeed on his own. Wanted to see if he could tell me a bit more about what happened.’

  ‘So,’ said Hilly, ‘why aren’t you in the ward?’

  ‘Same reason as you, I guess,’ said Rashid. ‘Your friend Reuben is with him.’

  ‘Ah,’ Hilly said cautiously.

  ‘I thought they’d appreciate a bit of privacy. As much privacy as you get in a public ward, anyway. I guessed, a while ago. Knew for sure when Si was desperate for me to phone Reuben. It’s OK, I’ll keep it to myself. Not a word to Mum and Dad.’

  ‘I’m so sorry about what happened,’ Hilly said.

  ‘I know. But you don’t need to apologize.’

  Hilly was silent, wondering if she had in fact been apologizing: for having even an unwilling connection with Saeed’s attackers; on behalf of her sister, for getting involved with such people.

  ‘Hilly, did you say your name is?’ said Rashid, breaking a piece off the Danish pastry. ‘Here, have some of this?’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Hilly, realizing how hungry she was. ‘That’s right. Short for Hilary, only no one ever calls me that.’ Back in the ward, she had only glanced at Rashid; now she had a better look. She felt in awe of him, remembering what little Reuben had told her: that he’d got straight As in his A levels, wanted to be a doctor, and had been away for nearly a year. ‘You’ve only just come home, haven’t you? Are you staying there now?’

  ‘Not for long. I’ve just come back from my gap year. Well, actually I’m having two gap years. I start on applications now.’

  ‘Oh, for … ?’

  ‘Medicine, if I’m lucky. The competition’s fierce.’

  ‘What did you do in your gap year?’ asked Hilly. ‘The round-the-world thing?’

  ‘No, I was in Palestine. The West Bank, near Jerusalem. That’s where our family’s from.’

  Hilly nodded. ‘Were you working out there?’

  ‘Helped build a community health centre – builder’s navvy, was what it came down to. What about you? Are you at college?’

  ‘No, school. I start sixth form next month.’

  ‘Doing what?’

  ‘AS levels – History, English Lit., Business Studies, Biology.’

  ‘And after that?’

  She shrugged, smiled. ‘Haven’t a clue.’

  Hilly wanted to ask more about Palestine, but wasn’t sure how to phrase it. Whether or not there was a state of Palestine had been, she knew, the cause of dispute, but she was unsure what stage had been reached. She thought of news items, so regular that she took little notice except for something particularly startling – suicide bombers, tit-for-tat shootings, weeping mourners.

  ‘It wasn’t your first trip to Jerusalem, then?’ she asked.

  ‘I was born there. We lived for a while in Saudi, then Dubai, then Spain for two years. Here since I was twelve. But we’ve still got family in Jerusalem and in West Bank villages. Aunts and uncles, cousins.’

  Hilly had lived all her life in one place, and felt that it would be a dull thing to admit to. ‘What made your parents come to live in Northampton?’

  ‘Dad’s work – he’s in international air freight.’

  ‘But there’s no airport!’

  ‘The head office is out on the industrial estate.’

  ‘Oh.’ She felt silly; he must think her ignorant. She fiddled with her spoon. Rashid seemed quite at ease, looking at her while he sipped his coffee. ‘Did you see anything of the – the troubles?’ she ventured. ‘In Jerusalem, I mean?’

  ‘It would be impossible not to,’ Rashid said, with a wry look that silenced her. ‘There was one thing in particular,’ he added after a moment, ‘just before I came away.’

  ‘Yes?’ prompted Hilly.

  ‘Someone was killed, someone I knew.’ His glance flicked away from her, out of the window. ‘Amos, a taxi driver. He used to come most days to a café run by a friend of my uncle, in a village not far from Jerusalem. He’d just ordered his breakfast as usual and he was sitting there in the sunshine. And next minute he was shot dead.’

  ‘But why? Who—?’

  ‘Extremists,’ Rashid said.

  ‘Why would they shoot a taxi driver?’

  ‘Amos was Jewish. All the same he was friends with a lot of the Arab people in the village. He lived on the other side of the line, but he was in and out of the village all the time. He spoke fluent Arabic, he was from Libya. He was a kind man. Generous. Loved to chat. Used to tease me about wanting to be a doctor, used to ask me to come back with a cure for his wrinkles or his baldness. I didn’t see – what happened, but I saw the bloodstain on the pavement.’

  ‘How awful,’ Hilly said, inadequately. ‘You mean – he was shot by Palestinians? Or by Israelis?’

  ‘No, not by Israelis,’ Rashid said. ‘Not this time. This was Palestinian extremists marking down someone who crossed the line. It’s usually shootings and suicide bombs against the Israeli tanks and army and helicopters – a no-win situation. A cousin of mine – well, second cousin – was killed in the street a year ago, in an Israeli mortar attack. It was the day I flew out there, I was expecting to see him, he was the same age as me – instead I was in time for his funeral. The Israeli soldiers and the militants on our side, they’ll carry on fighting, never mind the latest peace settlement. But the ordinary people don’t necessarily hate each other, you see. Lines get crossed. Amos was Jewish, but he was our friend.’

  Hilly nodded; Rashid looked bleakly out of the window.

  ‘Now home, and this,’ he added.

  ‘Has it ever happened to you?’ Hilly said. ‘Being attacked, like Saeed?’

  ‘Not as badly as this. I’ve never ended up in hospital. But every Muslim gets to hear the whole range of racist abuse. Sometimes, from other kids, it’s meant in a semi-friendly way. Often it isn’t. You get used to people looking at you with suspicion – even fear. Now, since the Iraq War, you can’t walk down the street without someone staring at you and wondering if you’re plotting something, or hiding explosives in your shoe,’ said Rashid, adding: ‘It hasn’t done much for race relations.’

  ‘What about where you live?’ Hilly asked. ‘I mean, gangs in the town centre is bad enough – you don’t get trouble at home as well, do you?’

  ‘Not much. But things need to change – we shouldn’t keep ourselves apart. We live in a street that’s mainly Asian, and all my mother’s friends are Muslim women. My father meets a wider range of people, through business. That’s the way it is for a lot of families. It’s different for our generation. Which is a good thing, as far as I’m concerned.’ He smiled, for the first time, and Hilly saw the resemblance to Saeed. He seemed more solid than his brother – more confident, more at ease with himself. Instead of Saeed’s delicate beauty, he had instead a sort of robust attractiveness. ‘Our parents would be happy if Saeed and I married nice Muslim girls, but they’re likely to be disappointed.’

  ‘Your mum thought I might be Saeed’s girlfriend.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Rashid, his almost black eyes looking at her keenly; ‘that was an interesting moment.’

  ‘Would she mind if I was?’

  ‘Nice Muslim girl would always be top choice. Non-Muslim girl would be a long way second,’ said Rashid. ‘But as for non-Muslim boy …’ He shook his head. ‘Let’s not go there.’

  ‘But if they found out?’

  ‘I wouldn’t want to be around,’ said Rashid. ‘Put it like that. And you?’ he asked. ‘Since Reuben and Saeed only have eyes for each other?’

  ‘Me, what?’


  ‘Is there someone for you?’ said Rashid.

  ‘No,’ Hilly said lightly. She hesitated to ask, ‘And you?’ What had he said just now about his parents being disappointed? Was he hinting, perhaps, that he was gay too?

  Well, she couldn’t come straight out and ask that. She’d only just met him. She replaced her empty coffee cup on the tray. ‘Shall we go back to the ward?

  Chapter Fourteen

  Hands Together

  She was so far away, and … if she did not go home for a long time, she might arrive to find everything changed and her loved ones gone for ever … And when she was in bed, and all the well-loved scenes of home came before her eyes, she cried and cried, until her pillows were quite wet.

  Johanna Spyri, Heidi

  Sometimes I hate Heidi, Sarah thought. I used to pretend she was my friend, but now she really annoys me. Everything comes right for her in the end, every single thing. And everyone loves her, because she’s always cheerful, with her rosy cheeks and her sparkling eyes and the way she runs and skips to and fro and makes everyone happy.

  Perhaps people would like me too if I was always happy. But I can’t be cheerful and neither can Helga.

  We’ll never see them again, our families, and I was horrible and mean to say what I said to Rachel. That’s how she’ll always remember me, shouting nasty, hurtful things at her.

  I remember how she looked. Not angry but sad.

  Why didn’t she tell me? Why didn’t they tell me the truth? I suppose they thought I wasn’t old enough to know, but now I do know.

  Everything now was to do with the war. Even things that apparently had nothing to do with it were only diversions, ways of pretending life went on as normal. At school there was a special assembly. Everyone trooped into the school hall, which smelled of floor polish and cooked potato and cabbage, to sit down in neat rows, cross-legged. Miss Munson clapped her hands. ‘A special treat for us, today!’ she said brightly. A small boy called Billy Watkins, from the year below, was playing the piano – what Miss Munson said was called a medley. ‘A medley of English folk tunes,’ she said, ‘to cheer us in these dark days. William Watkins is going to play them for us.’ And people shuffled and giggled, because it sounded so funny and grown-up, William Watkins, when everyone knew him as Billy. Afterwards Miss Munson asked the children what separate tunes they had recognized, and they put up their hands and said things like ‘Greensleeves’ and ‘Early One Morning’ and ‘The British Grenadiers’. Sarah didn’t know any of them.