by Annie Murray
Alan’s face swam into her mind, his eyes full of love and longing, and her panic increased. She was supposed to be meeting him the next evening.
‘Oh, dear God, what am I to do?’ she said. The walls were silent, giving no answer.
Sixty-Five
I’ve got to be strong, very strong. All day she kept saying this to herself, getting more and more wound up as the time to meet Alan drew nearer. Alan, there’s something I’ve really got to say . . .
‘I’m just off to my library group again,’ she told Fred after tea, of which she had scarcely managed to swallow any at all.
‘All right, love,’ Fred said, from behind the Mail.
For a moment she paused in the doorway with her coat on, looking at him. With a pang she remembered the boy she had first seen, shivering, with no shirt, on the way to the wharf. It seemed an eternity ago. Where had all the years gone? Where had she gone? And Fred? What did he think about all the time, she wondered? She felt as if she was seeing him from far off, through the wrong end of a telescope.
‘TTFN then,’ she said softly.
Fred actually looked up. He smiled. ‘Oh – thought you’d gone! You look nice, bab. Tara!’
Tears stung her eyes. Of all the times he had to notice her and pay a compliment! She was glad of the walk, of having time to think. At that moment she was full of the past, of memories of Fred. She thought about that day she had seen him again in the cafe after the war. He’d been so pleased, in his quiet way. He had felt like a rescue to her. She might have spent her whole life stuck in Elsie’s house, playing housekeeper to her elder sister. Fred had offered marriage; a way to have some sort of life.
She tucked her scarf tighter in round her neck in the cold wind. Some of the shop fronts in the High Street had Christmas lights in their windows. She passed huddles at bus stops, pubs spilling out the sound of voices as doors swung open and closed.
The last time, she said to herself. This must be the last time meeting Alan. Then I’m going to put my life back in order. I don’t want to be a . . . what do they call it? Divorcee. That’s never been me. I’ve got to do the right thing. I owe it to Fred. And what do I really know about Alan? I’ve never even spent a whole day with him, or a night. And what sort of man is he, who would keep on walking out with a woman whom he knows is married, disturbing her life? It could be a disaster from start to finish, and then where would I be?
You’ve been living in a dream, she told herself sharply. Again she pictured her home, the cosy front room. She knew her mind was made up. No big changes for her. She wasn’t one of these overturning-the-apple-cart types. She didn’t allow the misery of her decision to take over. She had to be firm, tough even: tell Alan, then walk away.
‘I can’t do this – not like this,’ she murmured, rehearsing. ‘It’s got to stop. I’m not that sort of woman.’
She was seated at a table in the warm pub only seconds before he arrived, with no time to collect herself. There he was, coming across the room towards her, seeming in a hurry, his coat swinging open. Immediately she saw in his expression that there was something wrong.
‘Sorry, love,’ he said, out of breath. ‘I just had to come and tell you, but I’ve got to get out to the car again. There’s been a bit of bother – the police are coming. I just didn’t want you to think . . . Look, I’ll have to get back – it’s my car, you see . . . You could wait here in the warm.’
‘No!’ She didn’t hesitate, buttoning her coat up again. ‘I’m coming with you!’
It had happened further along, not far from the library. Alan had slowed to let a van in front of him turn off to the right, and the car behind had smashed hard into the back of him. The driver had turned nasty and was insisting it was Alan’s fault. As they hurried outside, a police car was drawing up, to Alan’s evident relief.
They all stood in the dark and freezing wind amid the lights of the traffic struggling to overtake and the flashing blue from the police car. One officer worked to calm the irate driver, who was clearly all the more worked up because he was in the wrong. The other officer directed the traffic. Eventually the towing van arrived to haul Alan’s car away. The back was badly smashed in. There were lengthy discussions.
Margaret stood watching, her eyes on Alan.
Eventually he came to her, looking very fed up. ‘I’m sorry about this,’ he said miserably. ‘It’s gone and spoiled the whole evening.’
‘Don’t be daft,’ Margaret told him. ‘It wasn’t your fault. That bloke just wasn’t looking where he was going.’
‘No, and the speed he was going – ridiculous!’ For some reason he chuckled, as if at the craziness of fate. ‘Look, shall we have a drink anyway?’
‘Yes,’ she said calmly.
She followed him back into the pub.
‘I’m sorry,’ Alan said again. ‘I’ve wrecked the evening.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘No, you haven’t.’ If he only knew!
He seemed sad as they settled down with his pint and her half.
‘Your car’s quite a mess,’ she said.
Alan shook his head. ‘I don’t think they’ll be able to salvage it – it’s a write-off, I think.’ He shrugged. ‘Never mind: no damage done to life or limb anyway.’
She realized this was not what was bothering him. Even though he started talking in his normal way, there was still an underlying feeling.
After a while she said, ‘What’s up?’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘You seem a bit – down. Is it the car?’
‘Oh, no not really. That’s just one of those things.’ He paused to think. ‘I s’pose it’s just – maybe it’s Christmas. It brings things out, doesn’t it? You know, you can’t help looking back, thinking of how things were, how you might have messed them up. It comes back to haunt you.’
‘Yes,’ she agreed. ‘It’s a family time.’
There was a silence. Alan looked down for a minute, then away across the pub. It felt to her as if there was something he wasn’t saying, couldn’t say. She knew it was up to her.
‘Alan? Do you – I mean, d’you think much about the future?’
He turned to her. ‘How d’you mean?’
‘Well, about how things might be.’ She swallowed. All her blood seemed to have turned into one of those jacuzzi things, swirling round her body. ‘About – us?’
‘I think about it, yes,’ Alan said cautiously. ‘I just . . .’ He shook his head. ‘I don’t know that there’s all that much I can do about it. I suppose I don’t feel I have the right – to ask anything.’
Margaret gazed into his eyes. I can say it now, she thought, or not say it . . . And it will make the whole difference to everything . . . In that split second she knew all of it, could see it opening out in front of her. She would speak now, the truth that she knew, as she had known following him out to the street, to the wrecked car; hearing his voice as he spoke in his quiet way to the police, while they probably assumed she was his wife: she knew she belonged with him, that she just couldn’t imagine life without him. He was life – a new life full of wonder that she had never experienced before and hardly dreamed of. She had moved on too much – he was her love, and things could be no other way.
And she knew that this would lead to other things. She would have to find strength and courage to gather her family together: Fred and Karen, Joanne and Dave. And in front of them she would open her mouth again and make her choice, and cause things to change, and from then on she would have to take on that change, whatever it meant.
I have something to say, she would begin.
February 1985
Sixty-Six
Sooky sat at the desk in her room, finishing a college assignment. It was late in the afternoon. Harpreet was downstairs helping Mom. Roopinder was looking after Priya.
Sooky sat back for a moment, pausing to think, and realized how dark the room was, apart from the light from the angle-poise lamp. Like a planet floating in space, she thought. If
that were the case, how would it be to land, alone in her spaceship, on an unknown planet? What might she find there when she climbed out and looked around? Captain Kirk had always had all his space crew . . .
Dragging her mind back to the task in front of her, she looked down at the lined page, her biros and textbooks, her curling handwriting, blue across the page. She experienced a moment of acute happiness and possibility. Even the act of writing was pleasurable, marking the white page. Her handwriting was nothing special, but a whole page full of it looked nice. And here she was, learning things, going to college, with a future in mind. She was only twenty years old and had so much already – a daughter, a place at college, friends from before, from school and college; and Joanne, who had been round with Amy that afternoon. And what was more, slowly, miraculously, things had improved at home. Even she and Roopinder got along better these days. They were more of a team.
She looked down at herself, at the pink Punjabi suit she was wearing. Funny, when she was younger Mom was always trying to force her into suits, and all she wanted was jeans, trainers, denim skirts and platform shoes like the white girls wore.
‘But you are an Indian girl,’ Meena would say, her brow puckering with bewilderment. ‘You look so much better in our clothes, with a nice plait – not this hair – in pink and green, like these girls are wearing.’
‘But I’m not Indian, am I?’ Sooky would protest. ‘I’ve never been to India!’
‘One day we will be going . . .’
‘Yes, but that doesn’t make me Indian – not in the way you mean.’
One time Meena pulled her over to a mirror and stood behind her, pointing. ‘So, look at your face: what do you see? Are you a goree? No! You’re Indian!’
‘But why can’t Indian girls wear jeans?’ Sooky demanded stubbornly.
Over the years Meena had softened about this and let Sooky choose for herself. Just now, though, she found herself opting more for Punjabi dress. What had happened last year had made her see things differently. Everyone was still full of anger and a sense of betrayal – no one had been prosecuted for all the killings in Delhi. It felt as if it was willed, even organized, by the government. If I was really English, Sooky thought – white English – I would just see it as another piece of news. ‘Oh dear, how awful!’ Until the next piece of bad news, which as it turned out came in December, when an American company called Union Carbide had allowed a chemical leak so catastrophic that it had poisoned thousands of people in an Indian town called Bhopal. This too felt personal – it felt part of home.
I’m not Indian, but India is part of me, Sooky thought. That’s how it is. It’s not part of Joanne, but it’s part of me.
And just as she had been coming to terms with these things, her mother surprised her, as she sometimes did.
Meena had been in deep mourning. The loss of Nirmal had touched something very deep in her, as she tried to explain one afternoon as she and Sooky sat in the front room minding the children. Sooky was on the floor and Meena behind her on the sofa. She suddenly started speaking again, as if a tap had been turned on.
‘Mama-ji was always so kind to me. Always my favourite uncle – before we left home, and after.’
Sooky swivelled round to look at her. Meena was hunched forward, rocking very slightly back and forth, a pained expression on her face.
‘He was so funny and such a good man. No one should meet a death like that – but a man who was so kind and amiable, who brought joy to people . . .’ She shook her head. ‘Now I feel I have nothing left of home – nothing at all.’
‘What about Bhoji?’ Sooky said.
‘Yes, Bhoji . . . But I hardly know her really. She and the other widows will have to give each other comfort. Nirmal I knew from a child. Now – it is all gone.’
There was a long, sad silence. Sooky was trying to think of something comforting to say, but then Meena started again.
‘All these weeks I’ve been thinking. I came here to this country when I was very young. I had no ambition to come to England for myself, but it is the duty of a wife to follow her husband. And at home there was not much for me, living with my mother-in-law. She was not the worst, but she was not very nice. Rajdev needed his father. When we got here, all everyone could think of then was to make enough money to go home. At first. Then we realized we were not going home: we had too much here; we had changed too much to go back. So I wanted to make India here. Always I was dreaming of home.’
She looked at Sooky.
‘It took me too long to notice that my children do not dream of home like this. Rajdev did – does still maybe – but he and I have been talking a lot. He is changing. I try to make him see that his life is here, with his family.’
Sooky was surprised by this. It was news to her. Though Raj did seem softer, less burdened, even despite the rage he shared with everyone else over the Golden Temple, the killings. He seemed more peaceful in himself.
‘Now I am starting to see that I have been foolish. Even if I went back home, everything is gone.’ Meena made a sweeping motion with her hand. ‘Too much has happened. They are there – we are here. And you children: you are English . . .’
‘Indian-English,’ Sooky said, smiling.
Meena inclined her head. ‘Indian-English. Yes, that is true. But I have decided . . .’ She sat up straighter to make her announcement. ‘I have children who are intelligent and do well in school. Now, I don’t mean to be rude to your father, but I don’t think you can have got one hundred per cent of your intelligence from him. Perhaps I have a little helping too?’
‘You do, Mata-ji!’
‘And I have decided that it is time I learned English, so that when your goree friend comes round she does not think I am an ignorant Indian peasant.’
‘Joanne!’ Sooky laughed. ‘She doesn’t think that – of course she doesn’t.’
‘Hmm,’ Meena said, unconvinced. ‘And so I can talk properly in shops and – and health centres . . .’
Sooky laughed at this, pleased and excited at the determined look on her mother’s face.
‘Banita told me they have volunteers who will come and teach English in the home,’ Meena said. ‘An English lady is coming.’
‘You mean you’ve already arranged it?’ Sooky said, astonished.
Meena inclined her head again. ‘Banita helped me.’
And ever since the middle of January a plump, jolly young woman called Rosie had come to the house each week, wearing baggy dungarees and red, flat shoes. With her she brought books and picture cards, and Meena was ensconced in the front room with her for an hour or more. Afterwards Meena would make her tea and snacks. Sometimes they even cooked together and laughed a lot. They seemed to get on like a house on fire.
‘Your mother already understands a lot of English,’ Rosie said to Sooky after the first couple of sessions. ‘After all, she’s been here a good while. It’s just putting it all together and helping her to speak. She’s a fast learner.’
Sooky liked Rosie. She seemed genuine and lively. Raj found her bewildering. ‘Why does she wear those awful clothes – and her shoes!’ But he too seemed pleased to see his mother progressing. Khushwant also appeared proud. It was all rather surprising.
Sooky breathed in deeply, smiling to herself, and bent over the desk again. Picking up her pen she was just writing the next sentence of her essay when the door opened. She turned, squinting, only just able to see Harpreet’s outline in the doorway.
‘Sorry, Sukh,’ Harpreet said.
Sooky was alerted by the tone of her voice. There was worry in it, and warning.
‘It’s just – Dad’s home. He and Mom want to talk to you, downstairs.’
Somehow she already knew. It was something that had been nagging at the back of her mind, like the pain of a boil that has not yet reached the surface. When she saw them both, she knew for sure.
The two of them were in the front room, sitting side by side on the sofa as stiffly as if they were posing fo
r one of those old-fashioned photographs where, on pain of death, you mustn’t smile. If it hadn’t been so serious it would have been funny, the way Mom’s chunni was so neat, and Dad was sucking in his belly and trying to sit up very straight.
It suddenly occurred to Sooky that they were very nervous, which made her stomach clench with dread in sympathy.
‘Shut the door, Sukhdeep,’ Khushwant said with overdone cheeriness.
She obeyed and sat down like an interviewee. Mom and Dad looked at each other.
‘You want me to get married, don’t you?’ Sooky said.
They exchanged glances again.
‘We-ell,’ Khushwant said. For the first time ever it occurred to Sooky that they were a bit afraid of her, of her strength and her ability to do what was best for herself, if necessary. ‘It’s not so much that we want you to . . .’
But his eyes were begging. Please, Sukhdeep my daughter, don’t fight this. Please do the right thing, put us right again with the community, with tradition, with what is right . . . Don’t continue in a state of disgrace forever!
‘It is a chance for you,’ Meena said, sitting bolt upright. ‘There is someone who has asked to meet you.’
‘Okay,’ Sooky said cautiously. ‘Tell me.’
‘The thing is, he lives in Birmingham and he would be prepared to allow you to go on studying,’ Meena said, all in a rush.
Sooky frowned suspiciously. ‘Doesn’t he want children?’
They looked at each other again. It was Khushwant who explained. The man in question was called Arun. He was a Jat by caste, of course, and had a good job working in insurance. But he was thirty-two years old and a widower. His young wife had died of a brain haemorrhage more than a year ago. He had two children already, a boy and a girl.
‘Oh,’ Sooky said. ‘I see.’
Even though she had been expecting something like this, she still felt stunned and a bit sick. She found she was shivering. Arun. A man called Arun. Longing and dread threaded through her, confused.