Mae nodded, but her thoughts kept drifting to the day she’d had. You’re talking out of your arse. You’re talking into mine.
‘What’s so funny?’ asked Ilyaas.
‘Hmm? Oh, nothing. Just work stuff.’
Ilyaas nodded.
‘I’m sharing the horse suit with someone new,’ she said. ‘He’s tall so at least I don’t have to walk around like the hunchback of Notre Dame.’
‘He?’ said Ilyaas.
Fatti then walked in and looked at them both. ‘What’s going on in here?’
‘Hiding out with my young friend,’ said Mae. ‘Sorry, not hiding. Retreating into the shadows.’
Fatti looked at Ilyaas, who’d gone stony-faced and looked at the floor. ‘You all right?’ she asked. ‘You didn’t eat much.’
He simply shrugged as he left the kitchen.
Fatti let out a sigh. ‘I don’t know how to get through to them.’
‘He’s all right,’ said Mae. ‘A bit hard to break but once you do he’s a nice kid.’
‘Try being a stepmum to him,’ Fatti said, her voice clipped. ‘Sorry. It’s just, there’s a whole summer of this.’
She took a seat at the breakfast table and put her head in her hands. It was the first time that Mae felt nothing for her sister, not even a drop of sympathy, and it surprised her. This was Fatti, after all, the one she’d do anything for, who would do anything for her.
‘You’ll get through it,’ Mae managed to say. ‘Hey, a new guy started at work today.’
‘Yeah?’ said Fatti, picking up a breadstick and nibbling on it.
‘We now share a horse, thank you very much. It’s actually well funny.’
‘Oh.’ Fatti looked over her shoulder, squinting as if to hear something. ‘Aima … wonder what she has to say now.’
Mae sighed, threw her can of Coke in the recycling bin and walked out.
Farah: I’m sorry, but if I were Ash I’d be having strong words with that girl
‘Shut up,’ said Mae, flicking her phone back on to her bedside table.
She just about saved the phone from falling to the floor. For the past twenty minutes her sisters had been engaged in a WhatsApp conversation about Aima. Aima who was spoiled. Aima who was passive-aggressive. Aima who was rude and obnoxious. Aima, Aima, Aima. Sure, she was an annoying brat but her sisters perhaps weren’t aware that they too were quite annoying with their respective lives and all their complaining. Mae looked up at the ceiling and thought of Abdul-Raheem. She closed her eyes and remembered the way he’d lifted the horse’s face off his head and her surprise at who he turned out to be. Why should it have been such a shock? It was just because she’d expected a Bengali, Indian or Pakistani and instead she got someone whose family were from Ghana. Anyway, what did it matter? Why did she feel embarrassed? Nothing happened between them. Nothing could happen between them. But, why not? The idea dropped into her head like a rock as her eyes sprang open. Mae propped herself up on her elbows, feeling confused and shocked. The thought had been brewing in her head. She’d shrugged it off because of its impossibility but it had grown into such a beast that not only could she not ignore it, she couldn’t get over it. Who cared if he was black? She tried to shift the rock, push it this way and that, hammer at it to try and crack and destroy it, but it refused to budge or break. Mae wasn’t racist, for God’s sake.
‘Er, hello?’ Mae said to herself, looking around the room as if for confirmation. ‘I’m brown. I can’t be racist.’
This was just the type of thing that would have her sisters roll their eyes at their parents when they said anything casually racist. Or would they? Mae was certain that Bubblee would, but she wasn’t sure about Fatti and Farah, they were both so traditional. It was hard to change the way her parents and that generation thought, but her generation had no excuse. Up until that moment Mae believed herself to be a part of a more enlightened way of thinking, except she realised that she hadn’t actually given it much thought. Any thought, in fact. She wondered about all the crushes she’d had. They had been mostly white but that was because there weren’t that many non-white people around when she was growing up. That was just maths. Then she thought about her first year at university. Any attractions she might’ve had were for men who were either white or brown. It wasn’t even as if she didn’t find black men attractive – she did. She’d appreciate a good-looking man whatever the colour of his skin, but whenever she’d thought of having a boyfriend he’d always been Bengali in her head, and in that moment she couldn’t say why that was, other than that’s what she was used to seeing around her.
‘Ugh,’ she added to herself, flopping back into bed. ‘Maybe I am a racist.’
But more than that, it made her realise that her feelings for Ji Su really were platonic. If they were anything else then would she be feeling this way about Abdul-Raheem? Mae’s head hurt. So many feelings! She looked at her phone again, this time checking on Ji Su’s WhatsApp status. It was just the type of thing she’d have been able to talk to her about. But it wasn’t just that; she missed her in general. Her perspective of things, her insight into situations. Mae missed her friend. And there was nothing she could do about trying to get her back.
The following morning Mae woke up, annoyed with herself. Her annoyance was only made worse when she saw her parents bickering in the kitchen, looking on her mum’s iPad for a gazebo for the garden.
‘No, Jay’s abba, that’s too expensive.’
‘Only the best for my wife.’
‘Someone pass me a bucket,’ said Mae, getting a box of Frosted Shreddies out of the kitchen cupboard.
They barely acknowledged her they were so engrossed with their gazebo-shopping, so she stopped to consider their faces. Her dad was a little fairer than her mum, but after years of marriage their features had almost become similar – as they say people’s do when they’ve been together for so long. Mae thought about Fatti’s husband, Ash, and Farah’s dead husband, Mustafa, and she was struck by the fact that everyone was the same. Their roots all led back to Bangladesh, the second language they shared, the food they ate, the cultural references they made and for a moment Mae felt nauseous at the sameness of it all. It was just so unimaginative, now that she thought about it.
On her way to work Mae gave herself a talking-to.
‘Calm down. Why’ve you got to be so dramatic about it? Not like he’s your boyfriend or whatever. He’s just the guy you share a horse with.’
Then she got out of the car and saw him, leaning against the booth and talking to Leanne. His arms were folded, his head bent low as he smiled at something and she wondered why she even saw the colour of his skin. Their eyes met and Mae waved a bit more enthusiastically than she had intended. Leanne watched her approach now as if with new eyes.
‘Ready for another day of horsing around,’ said Mae.
Leanne rolled her eyes and walked into her booth. Abdul-Raheem straightened up. He seemed almost bashful, which was just as well because Mae couldn’t quite look him in the eye.
‘You,’ exclaimed Barry, standing at the hut door, pointing at Abdul-Raheem. ‘You gonna stand around and chat all day or do your job?’
‘Stand around and chat if that’s a choice,’ replied Abdul-Raheem.
‘Yeah, the choice between having a job or being fired.’
Mae looked between the two, grateful that at least Barry spoke like that to all of his workers, regardless of their colour.
‘So,’ Abdul-Raheem said.
‘So,’ Mae replied as they got into their costume.
‘You doing anything nice tomorrow?’
‘Family,’ she said.
‘Don’t sound too excited about it.’
‘You wouldn’t either if you knew them.’
He laughed. ‘They can’t be that bad.’
‘Oh, trust me. They’re worse. Mum and Dad have started shopping for a gazebo.’
‘Are you the Bengali Brady Bunch or something?’
Mae couldn
’t help but laugh too, which was a good way to distract herself from feeling as if there was even less room between them today in the costume than there was yesterday.
‘Sorry. It did sound that way, didn’t it?’ said Mae.
‘Well, if you want to escape them, let’s have lunch somewhere.’
‘Lunch?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You and me?’
‘That’s the idea,’ replied Abdul-Raheem.
‘But we’re not working tomorrow.’
‘I could bring the costume with me if you preferred?’
‘No, I mean … well, right. No, that’d be weird.’
Why were Mae’s words not working properly? Where had her ability to form a sentence gone? It was like university all over again.
‘What? Lunch or the costume?’ he asked.
‘The costume. Obviously.’
‘I don’t know. Not much is obvious with you.’
‘Whatever,’ she replied.
‘Well?’
She didn’t understand why there were knots in her stomach, or why she had to keep swallowing hard, or why she felt compelled to reach forward and touch his arm.
‘Yeah. Cool. Lunch sounds good.’
‘Good. Great. Shall I come and pick you up?’
Mae had a horrifying moment at the idea of any member of her family seeing someone like Abdul-Raheem turn up at her doorstep. Wasn’t he Muslim enough to know boys don’t pick you up from your home? It’d be unthinkable if it was anyone really, but him … They’d probably prefer her to bring home Ji Su and announce that she was a lesbian. They were all racist. The fact of it almost made Mae invite him over for dinner but she managed to hold herself back from that particular impulse.
‘We can just meet in town,’ she suggested.
So, he mentioned wanting to try Zobar’s Café and they exchanged numbers because that’s what people who met each other socially for coffee and lunch did, didn’t they? Once the lunch question had been settled, Abdul-Raheem made a joke about them being the only two people of colour and perhaps they should hang out with some of the others during break time.
‘Just in case they think we ethnics band together,’ he added, a smile in his voice.
Mae wasn’t sure what to make of this. Had he already got bored of her? Did he regret asking her out for lunch? Oh God, did that mean she was actually going on a date with him? As they got out of the costume for their break, she couldn’t help but be surprised every time she looked at Abdul-Raheem. As if he’d morph into another body. Except this time she also saw Leanne looking at him.
‘Fit, isn’t he?’ said Leanne as a bunch of them were sitting on the benches by the hut, eating their food.
‘Do you think?’ asked Mae.
Even though she knew the answer. Of course he was fit.
‘I mean, anything looks fit given the turds that work here, but he’d be fit anywhere, I reckon. Especially in my bedroom.’
Leanne laughed as she licked the tomato ketchup off her chip and stared at Abdul-Raheem. Mae wasn’t sure if she wanted to be sick or stick the chip up Leanne’s nostril.
‘Sorry, excuse me,’ said Abdul-Raheem. ‘Time to pray. Mae, do you want to join me?’
‘Huh?’
She looked up at him, towering over her.
‘Don’t you want to pray?’ he asked.
Want to? What she wanted to do was say, not really, no. Mae would pray here and there; when it was Eid, or maybe on a Friday when she was at home and her mum would tell her to get her act together or she’d go to hell, but hellfire never had induced enough fear in her to listen to her mum. She had to hang on to herself. Part of her knew that by going with Abdul-Raheem she’d just be doing it to impress him, but if she was going to pray then she wasn’t going to make a mockery of God and do it for a man.
‘No. Thanks,’ she said.
This was it. Now that he knew she didn’t pray he wouldn’t want anything more to do with her. He’d move on to another person who shared his religious values and forget all about her, the thought of which made Mae depressed.
He smiled. ‘All right. See you in a bit.’
‘Religious,’ said Leanne, shaking her head and now diving into her pecan nut ice cream. ‘Knew he was too good to be true.’
As Mae watched Abdul-Raheem walk away, she wondered whether Leanne might be right.
At the family dinner that night Farah had said at least three things about Bubblee never being at home with Zoya and Mae realised that if anyone had probably gone on a date with a non-Bengali, it’d have been Bubs. Mae had tried several times to corner her in the kitchen but someone was always walking in or out, interrupting. It was when Farah said it was Bubblee’s turn to change Zoya that Mae followed her upstairs and into their parent’s room.
‘What?’ said Bubblee, realising her younger sister was behind her.
‘Nothing.’
Bubblee popped the buttons off Zoya’s Babygro as she got all the nappy paraphernalia ready.
‘Aren’t they the cutest legs you’ve ever seen?’ said Bubblee to Mae.
‘Yeah. Cute.’
‘Farah goes on as if I don’t see the new facial expression she’s pulled, or that her hair’s grown a bit …’
Mae looked at Zoya’s patchy head but decided not to say anything.
‘Hmmm,’ said Mae. ‘Farah.’
‘Exactly.’
‘The dating still bugs her then?’ said Mae.
‘That’s an understatement.’
‘Have you actually met anyone, though? Someone you like enough to go on more than just a few dates with?’
‘As in someone I might actually bring home?’ said Bubblee, almost laughing.
‘Yeah.’
‘You’ve got to be kidding me. I’m having fun, but I don’t have time for a relationship – not with work, and baby here. Anyway, what kind of a man could even deal with this set-up?’
Zoya thrashed her legs around as Bubblee grabbed both her ankles in one hand so she could wipe her bottom. ‘Zoyaaaa. No, that’s not nice, is it? We have to have a clean bum-bum. No one wants a dirty bum-bum, do they?’
Mae saw the opportunity to ask her question. ‘But, like, maybe if you dated someone who wasn’t Bengali, he’d be all right with this.’
Bubblee patted down the nappy to make sure it was fastened properly and stared at the wall in front of her for a moment.
‘Men,’ she said, finally. ‘They’re all the same really. I mean, sure, there might be one or two who’d be okay about it, but I’m not betting on finding one of those.’
‘What if you did?’ Mae asked. ‘And he wasn’t Bengali?’
‘Who cares about him being Bengali or not?’ said Bubblee. ‘I can’t even believe you’re asking me that question. Who are you? Farah or Fatti?’
Mae smiled and felt closer to Bubblee than she had in a long time. ‘I know, I know. It’s just … sometimes we have more prejudices than we think we do.’
‘Not dating or marrying someone because of the colour of their skin makes you, in my book, the worst type of person,’ said Bubblee.
She threw the nappy in the bin, screwing her nose up at it as she did so. Mae suspected the look had more to do with the subject matter than anything else.
‘So, if you met a white or black guy who was everything you wanted, then you wouldn’t care?’ she asked.
‘Black?’ said Bubblee. ‘My little Mae, it’s one thing not being a racist, but it’s another thing giving the parents a heart attack.’
‘Huh?’
Bubblee picked Zoya up and kissed her cheek. ‘There’s enough drama in life to have to add to it.’
Having babies really did change a person. This was the same Bubblee who’d use any given opportunity to rock their parents’ sanity. All someone had to do was mention Jay not washing his own dishes for Bubblee to start quoting Simone de Beauvoir and start going on about the injustices of being a woman, brown and Muslim. All the hard edges of Bubblee seemed to ha
ve softened and while it did mean the family got a bit more peace, Mae also felt something had been lost.
‘So, what?’ said Mae. ‘Just give up on happiness because some old people think they know better than you?’
Bubblee looked at her for a moment. ‘No. That’s not what I mean. Just that, if you can avoid bringing drama into life, then that’s probably better.’
There wasn’t much else to say when their mum walked in and she and Bubblee began talking about Zoya’s sleeping patterns. Mae looked between the two of them, amazed how the bond of motherhood could bring two people, so frequently at loggerheads, together. Mae thought about what Bubblee had said and shook her head. What if she didn’t want to avoid drama though? Wasn’t that living? What if she actually really wanted it?
Mae chose the outfit she was going to wear the following day with great care. She’d have liked to wear her cargo trousers and a T-shirt, but it made her look even younger than she already was so opted instead for a pair of loose-fit jeans, a red short-sleeved top and a pair of tan sandals. She didn’t quite have the nerves for breakfast because she was sure it’d come right back out and so inspected herself in the mirror for a while. The top was quite baggy, hiding her love handles, but she tucked it in to her jeans to give herself a nicer shape. The hair was another matter. It was short and straight and usually gave her no pause for thought, but today she wished it would do something different. She made a little puff with her fringe, pinning it back with a kirby grip, and it gave her face an open look.
‘Make-up,’ she muttered, looking through her five make-up items.
Every time she looked at her lip gloss now she couldn’t help but shudder, recalling the incident on the train, but she steeled herself and applied the raspberry-coloured gloss to her lips, curled her thick eyelashes before putting on her mascara and touched up her face with some blush.
‘Hmm,’ said Mae, looking at the mirror. ‘Subtle but effective.’
She grabbed her bag and her dad’s car keys and went to say bye to her parents.
‘Where are you going?’ asked her mum, looking at her up and down. ‘With your abba’s car?’
‘Out.’
‘Out with who?’
‘A friend.’
The Hopes and Triumphs of the Amir Sisters Page 13