‘Oh, Sheena,’ Nikki said. ‘I’m so sorry.’
‘Me too,’ Sheena whispered.
Sheena’s secret hung heavy in the air. They both stared straight ahead, watching the lake shimmer and ripple like a jewel. A breeze ran through the surrounding parkland, turning up blades of grass revealing their dark underside. London’s buildings were mere outlines in the distance.
‘Do you come to this spot often?’ Nikki asked.
Sheena stared out the window. ‘All the time. Gulshan didn’t live far away and she went jogging here three times a week. She had to put up with comments, you know – Punjabi girl running around bare-legged.’
‘The driver of the car would have known where to find her then,’ Nikki said.
‘Exactly. After Gulshan died I visited the scene of the accident and saw how the road curved. There’s a blind spot. The council petitioned to have a sign put up to warn pedestrians after the accident. Perhaps she had her earphones in and wasn’t paying attention. You try to tell yourself it could just be an accident, that the simplest explanation is the most likely.’
‘Maybe that’s all it was,’ Nikki offered. ‘An accident.’ The coincidence nagged her immediately. She could only imagine the struggle this created within Sheena.
‘I won’t ever know for sure,’ Sheena said. ‘But in this community I’m suspicious of accidents. A few years later, Karina’s father was hospitalized with liver cirrhosis. I heard from people in the community that he was in great pain and I thought, serves him right. He had stopped hiding his drinking. People blamed Karina’s death. They called him a broken man, a mourning father. I didn’t have an ounce of sympathy for him. At his funeral, I wore Gulshan’s necklace for the first time. People stared but they said nothing. They all knew.’
Nikki could practically feel the burn of those stares. ‘You’re very brave for doing that,’ she said.
With one hand, Sheena rolled her pendant between her thumb and forefinger. She shrugged. ‘It was just a small gesture. I’m sure nobody even remembered afterwards.’
‘They probably did.’
‘Or they didn’t,’ Sheena said. The force in her tone surprised Nikki. Perhaps Sheena felt responsible for Gulshan’s death in the first place. Nikki said nothing else, waiting for the tension to leak away.
‘Let’s head back,’ Sheena said. She twisted the key into the ignition and backed out of the park. The radio came on and an old Hindi love ballad filled the car. As they gained distance from that lonely park, Sheena seemed to relax. She hummed along with the song.
‘You know this song?’ Sheena asked as the singer reached his chorus.
‘My mum would know it,’ Nikki said.
‘Oh, definitely. It’s a classic.’ Sheena turned up the radio. ‘You can actually hear the sorrow in his voice.’ They listened to the singer crooning about his heavy heart and his longing. Nikki had to admit that the tune touched a nerve. The streets of Southall came into view, the ballad providing a soundtrack to the passing rows of jewellery shops and jalebi stands. Despite the sinister story that Sheena had just told, Nikki could understand how this place could be home, and why leaving would be unimaginable to some.
They were pulling into the bank’s car park when Sheena muttered, ‘Shit.’ Her eyes were trained on a figure in the distance. ‘Is that Rahul?’ Nikki asked, squinting. Sheena nodded. She parked in the farthest spot from the entrance and turned off the engine but made no move to leave the car. ‘I’ll wait till he goes back inside,’ she said.
‘When are you going to stop avoiding each other in public?’ Nikki asked.
‘At the moment we’re avoiding each other in private as well,’ Sheena said.
‘Why? Why happened?’
Sheena twisted the keys in the ignition. The engine purred and a tune floated from the radio. ‘We started becoming quite physical with each other.’
‘And?’
‘It’s all happening too quickly. My husband courted me for months before we even held hands. With Rahul, I went from kissing on the cheek to the most intimate level within two dates.’
‘I’m sure things are fast-paced now because you’re passionate about each other and it’s new. Besides, you’re not inexperienced any more. You can’t compare a romance at this stage in your life to your first marriage fourteen years ago.’
‘I know that,’ Sheena said. ‘But I miss the thrill, the build-up.’
‘You should try discussing it with Rahul.’
‘Discussions won’t work. I can tell you these things but I can’t talk to him about it.’
‘Try it.’
Sheena sighed. ‘I told him last night that we need some distance. He’s managed to stay out of my way all morning. I don’t want to cross paths with him now or he’ll think it’s some silly game, like I’m playing hard to get.’
Sheena suddenly gasped and ducked. Her movement startled Nikki. ‘He’s coming this way,’ Sheena hissed. Rahul was indeed advancing on the car. All of a sudden, Sheena became very busy. She fiddled with the radio tuner and leaned over Nikki to open the glove box and search through a mess of old parking tickets. Rahul knocked on the window.
Sheena rolled down the window. ‘Oh, hello,’ she said breezily.
‘Hi,’ Rahul said. ‘Is everything okay?’
‘Hmm? Oh yes,’ Sheena said. ‘We’re in the middle of a conversation, so if you don’t mind excusing us …’
‘Sure. I noticed your car parked here but the lights were on, so I was checking to see if there was anyone inside. I was afraid your battery would die.’
‘Thank you,’ Sheena said. ‘We’re fine here.’ The high colour in Sheena’s cheeks indicated that she was anything but fine.
‘Okay,’ Rahul said. They watched him walk away and when he entered the bank, Sheena let out a huff of air. ‘Do you think I did a good job playing cool? I don’t know. He’s thrown me off now.’ She flapped her hands at her cheeks. ‘Now I’m going to be late returning to work because I can’t walk in there, all flushed like this.’
‘I shouldn’t have taken up so much of your time,’ Nikki said, glancing at the clock on Sheena’s dashboard. ‘I’m not sure what I was expecting, marching into the bank and thinking we’d just chat over the counter about it.’
Sheena continued fanning herself. It looked as if she were waving away Nikki’s apology. ‘You weren’t expecting a complicated story. Nobody does. If a girl is killed, it’s unimaginable that her loved ones would have a hand in it. People don’t consider it unless they know what goes on in this community.’
‘I thought I was well aware,’ Nikki mused. ‘When Tarampal told me about Maya’s suicide, I was shocked but then I remembered that honour was a big deal in this community. I didn’t think there was more to it …’
Here Nikki’s voice trailed off. Maya’s suicide. Out loud in this small space, the words were jarring. A dreadful question began to form in her mind. Clearly, Sheena noticed. She abruptly stopped fussing over her face and dropped her hands to her lap. In the heavy silence that followed, Nikki summoned the courage to ask her question.
‘Did Maya really commit suicide?’
Sheena’s reply was unexpectedly swift. ‘Do you think she’d do something like that?’
‘I didn’t know her,’ Nikki said.
The impatience in Sheena’s sigh was noticeable. ‘Come on, Nikki. A modern girl leaving a note confessing to her “sins” and “ruining the family’s honour?” Maya was too Westernized to have such concerns.’
Tarampal had not mentioned a note. Her version of events had made the incident sound more spontaneous – Jaggi’s threats of divorce sending Maya into an immediate panic. ‘Who wrote the suicide note then?’ Nikki asked.
‘Probably the person who killed her.’
‘You’re not suggesting …’ Nikki felt her legs growing cold from the shock. ‘Jaggi? Because of the affair?’
‘If there was an affair, but who knows?’ Sheena said. ‘Jaggi was the jealous sort. Taramp
al didn’t help things by spying on Maya and assuming that every smile she gave a man meant that she was sleeping with him. She meddled in their marriage.’
‘There was no police investigation? How is that possible?’
Sheena shrugged. ‘I know that Kulwinder tried talking to the police once, but they didn’t believe there was any evidence of foul play.’
‘So they just closed the case?’ Nikki asked.
‘There were testimonies – some of Jaggi’s friends’ wives reported that Maya had been considering suicide for a while. They made it sound like they were really tight – a social club of wives – but I can tell you that Maya hardly spoke to them. She had friends of her own.’
‘And where were they?’ Nikki demanded. ‘Why didn’t they come forward?’
‘Fear, I guess,’ Sheena said. ‘Everybody’s too afraid to fight for Maya. The risks are too high and nobody knows for sure if anything suspicious really happened. Even Kulwinder avoids the police now. I see her taking the long route from the market sometimes so she won’t have to pass the station. Somebody probably warned her not to rock the boat.’
A chill passed through Nikki. She had brazenly entered the home where a murder may have taken place – a planned one. ‘Tarampal wasn’t there when it happened, was she?’
‘No. I remember seeing her at a temple programme that night. But Kulwinder has never forgiven her. Tarampal told the police that Maya had threatened to burn down the whole house the night before her death.’ Sheena rolled her eyes. ‘If Maya ever said such a thing, I’m sure it was taken out of context. Tarampal’s testimony made Maya sound like an agonized wife from a Hindi movie.’
Unstable, Tarampal had repeated. ‘And it made the suicide seem more plausible.’
‘Yes,’ Sheena said. ‘Tarampal’s loyalties are with that boy one hundred per cent.’
The son Tarampal always wanted. Nikki shook her head. ‘This is so …’
‘Twisted? Messed up?’ Sheena offered. ‘Now you see why I warned you about prying? It’s dangerous.’
Nikki understood but she still didn’t want to back away. ‘What about the note? Was it in Maya’s handwriting?’
‘It must have been close enough. The police were convinced it was a suicide note. They told Kulwinder the words were smudged, like Maya had been crying.’
‘A good detail,’ Nikki said drily. ‘Sounds like they were eager to latch onto any scrap of evidence that suggested suicide. No messy investigations, no can of worms to open.’ Poor Kulwinder.
‘I suppose so. Kulwinder didn’t have a chance of getting into Tarampal’s home, let alone searching it for a sample of Maya’s handwriting.’
Nikki dropped her head to her hands. ‘It’s sickening, Sheena,’ she said. ‘We’re sitting here, almost certain that an innocent woman was murdered.’
‘But there’s no way to prove it,’ Sheena said. ‘Remember that, Nikki. Don’t try to be a hero here. It doesn’t work.’ Before stepping out of the car, Sheena adjusted her collar in such a way that it swallowed her pendant and made it disappear.
Chapter Eleven
Geeta was gesticulating wildly. Her henna-dyed beehive quivered from the force of her movements. ‘Then they told him his shoes were too muddy to enter their country. Can you believe these people? Luckily Nikki and Mindi don’t have to travel anywhere for work. These Customs officials can be so fussy.’
‘I thought Customs in Australia was strict about muddy shoes from overseas because of foreign soil particles mixing with theirs,’ Harpreet said, ignoring Geeta’s subtle jibe at her daughters whose unimportant jobs didn’t take them overseas.
‘Leh. Foreign soil. What’s so foreign about Britain’s soil? No, I’m telling you, these people were giving him a hard time because they thought he was Muslim.’
Having already invited herself to Harpreet’s home for tea, Geeta was pleased to have an audience for her grievances. Her intentions of boasting were never subtle. In the past ten minutes, she had mentioned her son’s trip to Sydney no less than four times. Harpreet wished she had gone to the temple yesterday. She had avoided it because she knew Geeta was an avid attendee of all Enfield gurudwara’s weekday programmes; then she ran into her in the Sainsbury’s car park. She checked the clock. Still at least an hour before Mindi would finish her hospital shift and return home.
‘Suresh said Sydney is very much like London,’ Geeta tried again.
‘What was he doing there?’ Harpreet asked.
‘His company sent him there for a conference. All expenses paid. They even flew him on business class. He said, “Mummy-ji, only the bosses fly on business class. There must be some mistake. Nowadays there are so many budget cuts that even the CEOs are flying in economy. But they said, no, no, there’s been no mistake. All part of the company perks.’
‘That’s very nice,’ Harpreet said. She had no news of her children to boast of. Mindi remained unmarried and Nikki – well Nikki had not said anything about her Southall job since starting. Earlier this afternoon Nikki had brought the box of sweets and then hurried off, claiming to have some appointment just as Harpreet was about to ask again how her job was going and what exactly she was planning to do with it. Harpreet got the vague sense that the job was not a subject Nikki wanted to discuss, which likely meant that she had quit, just like she quit university.
Geeta responded to Harpreet’s silence with a look of pity. ‘Children will do as they please,’ she said generously.
Not your children, Harpreet thought. But then who wanted sons like Geeta’s – grown men who still called her Mummy? ‘How is your yoga class going?’ Harpreet asked to change the subject.
‘Good, good,’ Auntie Geeta said. ‘Improving my blood flow. We need this kind of exercise. The teacher is a very lean woman but she’s in her fifties. She says she’s been practising for only a few years but she’s gained a lot of flexibility.’
‘Hanh, yoga gives you a lot of strength.’
‘You should join us on Tuesday evenings.’
Harpreet could think of nothing worse than attending a yoga class with Geeta and her gaggle of friends who spent more time backwards boasting than downward dogging. ‘Personally, I prefer the gym.’
‘You joined a gym?’
‘A few weeks ago,’ Harpreet said. ‘I just brisk walk on the treadmill and ride the stationary bike sometimes. I like going in the mornings. It gives me more energy.’
‘Energy for what?’ Geeta asked. ‘At our age, we should be slowing down.’ Disapproval clung to her words.
‘Everybody is different,’ Harpreet said.
Leaning forward to pick up a piece of ladoo, Geeta’s kameez dipped forward, revealing a deep line of cleavage. ‘What I like about yoga is that it’s all women. Is your gym unisex?’
Harpreet’s face burned. She was trapped into answering Geeta’s question. So what if there were men at her gym? ‘Yes,’ she said.
‘Come to yoga,’ Geeta said. It was a reprimand. ‘There are other women like us there,’ she added.
‘Hanh, women like us,’ Harpreet said vaguely. If a uniform and a code of conduct could be issued to Punjabi women over the age of fifty, Geeta would have designed it.
‘How is Mindi doing?’ Geeta asked.
‘She’s well. Working today.’
‘Found anybody yet?’
‘I’m not sure,’ Harpreet said. This would be the default answer until Mindi was ready to get engaged. The truth was, Mindi had been seeing someone but she hadn’t mentioned him lately. Harpreet was afraid to ask. On one hand, she wanted Mindi to find someone and settle down. But it meant returning each evening to an empty home and Harpreet wasn’t ready for that.
‘She’d better find somebody quickly, nah? If she spends all this time looking and comes up empty, it looks bad.’
‘She’ll find someone,’ Harpreet said. ‘There’s no use pressuring the girl. She can think for herself.’
‘Of course she will,’ Geeta murmured.
Harpreet
poured the last of her pot of chai into Geeta’s cup. Black specks of Lipton leaves dotted the surface. ‘Come, I’ll filter them out,’ she said, taking the cup from Geeta’s hand. In the kitchen, she searched for her sieve and remembered having to throw away the one her mother had given her to take to England after Nikki and Mindi used it to scoop their goldfish out of its tank. She felt a pang of sadness. What was home without her family?
Geeta was brushing crumbs off her lips when Harpreet returned. ‘No sugar, please,’ she said with the nobility of a dieter. But no combination of yoga poses would eliminate those ladoo calories, Harpreet thought with smug satisfaction.
‘Now tell me,’ Geeta said after taking a sip of tea, ‘have you heard about these stories?’
‘What stories?’
‘The stories,’ Geeta said.
Harpreet found it difficult to mask her irritation. Why did people prefer repeating rather than explaining themselves? ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Geeta set her cup on its saucer. ‘The stories that have been passed around the entire Punjabi community of London. When Mittoo Kaur told me about them I laughed and didn’t believe her. Then she brought one of the stories to my house. She said that she had read it aloud to her husband and after that …’ She shook her head. ‘Well, people get affected by these things.’ She stared at Harpreet as if this would help her absorb her point. ‘They had sex on her sofa,’ Geeta whispered.
‘What? She told you this?’
‘I was surprised as you are but the story was very involving.’
‘What’s the book called?’ Harpreet asked.
‘It’s not a book,’ Geeta said. ‘They’re just typed-up stories. Nobody knows exactly where they’re coming from.’
‘What do you mean? The author’s anonymous?’
Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows Page 22