by Amal Awad
“I don’t ask you how you spend your time, Zahra.” Besides, so what if my idea of a decent Saturday night was to stay in wearing my Betty Boop PJs, with a packet of fun-size Snickers and a DVD? I only needed me for that, and I got along well with me.
“That’s because you already know I’m working most of the time. I don’t have time for silly things,” she explained.
“Oh, right. Well, in that case, it’s none of your business,” I said, looking towards the door. Suddenly Manga boy was looking the preferable option.
“Don’t get snarky. Sorry, I guess some people just can’t handle honesty.”
See that? Right there? Another not terribly subtle put-down. I respond in kind and I’m incapable of handling honesty. I tell you.
“I can handle honesty, Zahra.” Totally calm. Thinking of meadows and rainbows and chocolate and other lovely things.
“Oh really? Well, I’m just saying one thing and look at how defensive you’re getting.”
I’d stopped trying to get along with her years ago. By now, I was like Kill Bill’s Uma Thurman to her Lucy Liu, sans funky yellow jumpsuit and assorted weaponry.
“So what is that now? Your twentieth doorknock?” said Zahra.
Twenty-third actually.
No, really. Welcome to my universe, where instead of boyfriends there are the aforementioned suitors. Isn’t it every girl’s dream to get proposed to? Try being proposed to no less than seventeen times, including twice by one particularly overzealous suitor, from the age of eighteen.
That’s on the lower end of the doorknock system scale. A soft number. And they weren’t sweeping, romantic “Will you marry me?”-written-in-the-sky types of proposals. Like any courtship ritual, doorknock appeals have clear procedures.
After the all-important first visit, a suitor would call if he liked me (or his mum told him he liked me), or we wouldn’t hear back at all.
It was rather like a first date with no obligation to call again no matter how well you thought it went. Not that I dated per se, but I knew enough about the process to recognise the similarities. That and I’d watched enough episodes of 90210 when I was younger to know how it works.
Out of all the suitors, four or five never called after our meeting. You’ll be pleased to know that I persevered. I had been through this enough times to realise Manga boy’s family certainly wasn’t going to call. (Insert confident, woman-of-the-world laugh of indifference.)
Still, dud factor notwithstanding, the majority – and I say this with no amount of false modesty – did call. They didn’t see enough to be turned off, or they’d seen enough to be keenly interested.
I suppose you could say I was living my very own Victorian era-style of courtship. The only things missing were the fancy costumes, calling cards and well, we didn’t have a butler, or a posh name like Wyndham Cottage for our house.
But aside from that, the similarities were rather eerie. I didn’t attend fancy balls though. Not even the modern-day equivalent of nightclubs.
“Zahra, is there a reason why you’re calling?”
“Yes. My mum asked me to find out when you can come by to get the olives.”
“What olives?”
Zahra sighed. “Samira,” she sang. “My mum marinated some olives for your mum. You need to pick them up,” she said, enunciating every syllable.
“I am not an idiot,” I enunciated back.
“Look, just come by whenever. Later.”
I hung up, thankful she’d spared me the career speech, that being the one where she’d point out how “lucky” I am because I “don’t have a proper career to worry about”.
Oh, and I’m “not motivated like that”.
Agitated, I shut down my laptop and finally went back out to the guests, a sacrificial air about me. As I sat down in the sitting room, I looked over at Manga boy and noted his look of desperation, his eyes pleading with his mother’s to end the torture.
It was actually kind of amusing. Although, it occurred to me that really I should have been insulted. Here we’d put out the nice Cadbury biscuits, and all evening I’d been dutiful and obliging and everything. Yet all Manga boy could do was sit there and pout.
Some people were simply ungrateful.
2
The following Monday afternoon, I was in the middle of drafting an email to Lara when Marcus began hovering. The staff were planning afternoon drinks. They would usually go out for drinks on Fridays, but the sales team had exceeded budget, so they were in celebration mode. Or, as Cate explained, “Any excuse for a piss up”.
While everyone at work understood why I never attended drinks, Marcus would still come by every week to try to shame me into going with them.
“How about no?” I said, still typing. I actually had a ton of work to do and I’d spent the last hour looking at bags on eBay.
Shameful, I know. I wouldn’t ordinarily do that, but I was still feeling a little disillusioned after the Manga boy visit. Only two things gave me comfort in times of distress and they were prayer (which I attempted to do five times a day) and shopping (which, rather unoriginally, I wished I could do five times a day). Ultimately – and this is very important – both were capable of inspiring the same warm, fuzzy feelings of comfort and joy within me.
Marcus laughed. Oh God, the hyena-laugh.
Cate groaned. “Marcus, shut up! Is he hassling you again, Samira? She doesn’t friggin’ drink!”
“She can have orange juice!”
This was his cause, you see. Getting me to Friday drinks sat just below anti-whaling, but beat out obtaining subsidised vending machines for the office kitchen. We were all behind him on that one though.
“I don’t go into pubs, Marcus,” I said in my maternal voice, the one I reserved for my nieces. And Marcus was pouting in response, much like my nieces when I refused them a second helping of chocolate.
It’s just that, he already knew this about me. I’d only told him several hundred times, or thereabouts.
“I can’t believe you won’t even have an OJ with us,” he said.
“Get used to disappointment,” I replied distractedly, finally sending off my email.
Just so you know, I stole that line from The Princess Bride, my absolute, all-time favourite comfort-food movie.
I looked up from my screen and waited for one of Marcus’s stunning one-liners in response. He always had them ready for swift deployment. Cate suspected that he had a list of them written down, catalogued for different occasions, like Mr Collins in Pride and Prejudice (which, in case you’re interested, is Cate’s ultimate comfort-food movie).
Anyway, it was hard to say why, but people at work seemed to say strange things they wouldn’t dare say to family or friends. For example, would you ever say, “Yohohoho!” instead of laughing at something funny? My point exactly.
“Marcus, did you reflow that feature layout yet?” said Cate, coming to my rescue. Marcus was head designer at the magazine. He was rather clever at his job and won a bunch of awards last year.
“The system crashed and I had to start again from scratch,” he said, still leaning against my cubicle.
“What was the problem?”
“A bug,” said Marcus. “But nothing I couldn’t fix with a crucifix and some holy water.”
The hyena-laugh again.
He looked at me and I nodded and smiled. Yes, just nod and smile. It’s only Monday.
When Marcus finally turned away, I put my head in my hands and massaged my temples. I truly believed in God’s mercy, and right then I prayed wholeheartedly for it to be showered down upon me.
Okay, I’ll be the first to admit that Bridal Bazaar magazine was a vast improvement on my previous place of employment – an accounting firm where I was secretary to three chain-smoking men with potty mouths, including a recently arrived Indian Hindu who wished he could “propose me”.
Vast, vast improvement.
At least the magazine was one of those trendy workplaces where everyone ca
lled each other by cool nicknames and at regular intervals a game of cricket or a round of hula hooping would begin. So far, Cate was reigning champion in the latter.
Incidentally, my ‘nickname’ was Mira. There was Bazza (Barry) and Mickey (Michael) and Ollie (Oliver) and Shazza (Sharon). You get the idea. Samira became Mira, which was preferable to Sammy, or Sazza, come to think of it.
We even found the time to circulate emails that contained links to immensely profound and revealing tests like “Which Care Bear Are You?” In the interests of full disclosure, I’m Tenderheart Bear, which means I’m a keeper of the peace, a thinker, I’m organised and people listen to me. I didn’t say it was necessarily accurate.
“I really like your headscarf today, Samira,” Marcus said, turning back to face me. He leaned his forearms against my cubicle wall again, evidently settling in for the morning.
“Thanks, Marcus.” I typed away at an email, although this one was work-related.
“You’re all matching.”
“Yes.” I continued typing. Marcus didn’t move.
“Is it hard to find headscarves to match your clothes?” he said, a few seconds later.
“Not really. You just look for a variety of colours.” I looked up and gave him the smile I’d give to the Mormon boys who stood on the street corner near my building and yelled “Assalamu alaykum!” to me as I walked past. Cheeky buggers.
“Samina! Coffee, please,” demanded Jeff as he walked past my desk.
A year later, he still didn’t have my name right.
I smiled at Marcus apologetically and pushed myself away from the desk. Marcus walked off as I went in the direction of the kitchen.
Despite a reasonable amount of office space, there was a shortage of meeting rooms and the kitchen was quite tiny. Which was a pity as it could have doubled for a meeting room. The kitchen was, however, a substantial improvement from the insect-ridden one at my former employer, Pachowski and Pachowski. In actuality, there was only one Pachowski. When I asked the boss why there were two in the name he said in his strong eastern European accent, “Looks better. When can you start?”
At least here we had utilities and appliances and OH&S rules. There was a small microwave that no one but me ever bothered to clean. We also had a toaster, a hot water tank beside the sink, and a fridge that had seen better days.
Rounding out the benefits, we were given unlimited supplies of instant coffee, tea, Milo, five different varieties of milk, sugar and stirrers. Which naturally made the workday all the more tolerable. I wasn’t quite sure I’d be able to face the day without stirrers.
And we have not, I repeat not, ever misused the significant stirrers supply to build a castle. Nor did it get knocked down by a random cricket ball while Marcus yelled, “Incoming!”
I had just finished Jeff’s coffee when he boomed out from across the hall, “Samina! Where’s my bloody coffee?”
I jumped, spilling the contents of the mug all over the kitchen counter.
Bugger. I cleaned up the mess as quickly as possible before pouring a fresh cup. It was the instant kind, so it wasn’t really coffee, but Jeff seemed to like it. He’d told me once that it helped to calm his nerves. I wasn’t exactly in a rage to find out what he would be like without his instant coffee fix.
Cate flew into the kitchen just as I was about to leave, giving me a shock and once again causing me to spill the contents of the mug. This time I was the lucky recipient of the coffee.
“Cate!”
“Ooh! Sweetie! I’m so sorry!” she said, her eyes wide. She grabbed the paper towel roll and ripped some off. “Does it burn?”
“No, it’s okay,” I said, putting the mug down on the counter. “Just feels hot and soggy. It’s a thick top.” I inspected the damage. “I’m wearing black at least.”
Cate turned on the tap and wet some paper towel. Then she began fussing over me to sponge off the damp spots.
“I’m going to smell like instant coffee now,” I whimpered.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, honey,” said Cate with a frown.
“Don’t worry. But I can so tell it’s going to be one of those weeks,” I sighed.
“Well, that’s why I came in. I forgot to tell you that Jeff wants you to attend the Bridal Convention with me.”
I was about to reply when Marcus walked by and stopped at the kitchen door. He assessed us for a moment, Cate still mid-clean. He smiled then made a strange movement with his hands, as though he was twirling pistols.
Cate shook her head sadly once he was gone. “Such a shame. He’s so pretty,” she said, tossing away the damp paper towels. She leaned against the kitchen counter and fiddled with the badge she was wearing. It was the size of a saucer and said, “Some days are a total waste of make-up”. Last week it was “I love the 80s”.
“Too much information, Cate,” I said, washing Jeff’s mug so that I could make him another cup of instant’s finest.
“I’m just saying the man is good looking.”
I suppose Marcus wasn’t bad looking, although I couldn’t be sure because I tried never to look directly at him. That, I surmised, would have the effect of drawing him in, the way an unsuspecting tourist might provoke a dangerous animal while on safari in Africa or something.
“Ahuh,” I said, scooping in some coffee.
“Anyways,” she said, more brightly. “The convention. We’ll man the stall together. Freebies galore, baby!”
“Goody. That’s just what I need right now,” I replied with a tragic sigh. More samples of crap I’m unlikely to get any use out of. But perhaps there’d be chocolate and cake pops, I realised hopefully.
“Next week, okay? And you can write something up,” said Cate, completely oblivious to my tragic sigh. She grabbed the mug off me and poured in some hot water.
“Sure,” I said, as I grabbed a stirrer, still lacking in enthusiasm. “Tell me, is this convention by any chance run by Arabs?”
Cate laughed. “No. But it’ll be a nice change from the office. And from making coffees,” she assured me, handing back the mug.
“I suppose so.”
“What’s with all the sweets?”
“A doorknocker brought them.”
Manga boy’s family had brought us a tray of baclawa, but because we’d be unlikely to finish it all at home, Mum told me to bring the surplus in to work. This was always a good idea really since just about the only thing Bridal Bazaar staff was united in besides discontent was food. Group emails were ignored unless it was an internet quiz or an alert for cake when someone was celebrating a birthday or leaving.
Nor did any alcohol get wasted. I can tell you right now that my respect among members of the sales team increased greatly the moment they found out I didn’t drink my weight in liquor because somehow it meant more for them. They were, however, somewhat perturbed to discover that I didn’t drink at all, and at the first work function I attended, a small semi-circle of watchers gathered around me. Tim raised an eyebrow and said, “You know, I don’t think I’ve ever known a Muslim”.
That sort of comment would ordinarily piss me off, because it’s not as though we’re a bloody species one has to familiarise one’s self with.
Thinking of David Attenborough type docos about now, but instead of studying animals and plants, there’s a man geared up in a safari suit on the lookout for Muslims. “By golly! There’s another one. This one’s white!”
Then he approaches ever so slowly and continues to narrate in soothing tones: “Here we have a bona fide Muslim who doesn’t drink! We shan’t get too close yet though, as we’re not sure if it’s easily provoked!”
Tim was nice enough, so I kept my thoughts to myself.
Cate dug into a piece of baclawa and commended the dud suitor’s generosity.
“Yeah, I guess,” I mumbled.
“They’re so delicious. I’ve already had three,” she confessed, biting her lip.
“Well, I’m glad something good came of it,” I said lightly.
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br /> “Another dud?” said Cate, with a sympathetic smile.
I smiled back. “Ahuh.”
Cate knew all about the duds and to her credit, she was generally a very sympathetic listener, as I was to her when she’d had the date from hell and was trying to cleanse herself of the memory. Of course, most of her stories required the employment of a ratings system. My stories were always G-rated, occasionally veering into PG territory when a non-Muslim boy would try to pick me up.
“So what happened?” enquired Cate.
“He looked like a Manga character.”
We were both quiet for a moment. I was cradling Jeff’s mug in my hands, Cate looked as though she was trying to figure out a complex equation.
“Huh,” said Cate eventually, nodding slowly as she envisioned him. “A Manga character.”
There was another pause.
“Did he sound like one?”
“I don’t know. He didn’t say a word to me.”
“Ouch.”
I smiled again.
“Well, obviously there’s something wrong with him. You’re gorgeous. Those blue eyes of yours? What isn’t there to like?”
“You have to say things like that because you’re my friend.”
Not that it wasn’t nice to hear, if I was being completely honest.
“Oh come on, Samira. You just said he looked like a Manga character. There could be trauma there. God knows what’s going through that boy’s gelled head,” she said, and I bowed to her knowledge.
In the afternoon, after what was perhaps an ill-advised double-shot coffee break, I logged on to Facebook (very bad). I was planning to do some intense work, of course, but I just needed to get settled in for the afternoon. I didn’t do this every day. Just some days, and everyone did this on occasion. It was practically an unwritten rule that you’d spend an hour or so at work doing other things. In fact, I was pretty sure I’d read something about it before.
Within a few moments a chat window popped up on my screen. I looked around to check no one was about, feeling a bit like a renegade.