Knights and Dragons of Avondale

by Kai Kazi

  I left Facebook messages for any and all of the work mates whose surnames I could remember. Three answered that they had seen her leave with Cherry, two said that they hadn’t seen her. Cherry didn’t answer, and though her phone number was on her Facebook page, and her phone rang out, she didn’t answer. And then the wait began. I paced, and wrung my hands, though I thought that this was only an expression, and bit back the bubbling sobs that threatened hour upon hour. I phoned the restaurant they had been at, all the hospitals in the area. And then, as real desperation set in, I started phoning hospitals further and further away,

  “Please check again,” I found myself begging a frustrated receptionist by mid-afternoon,

  “Sir I told you, no-one under the name Adra Khan has been admitted,” she sighed, “if you wish to leave your phone number I’ll call you personally should she come to us.”

  “Yes, just call me at this number.” I said, and cut the connection. While I was sitting with my head in my hands the front door rattled. Two knocks without answer, and they seemed to get tired of waiting because the living room door opened and Carla slipped in.

  “Sanjay told me.” She almost whispered. Her grey eyes were wide and watery, “Have you heard anything at all?” I shook my head,

  “No. I’ve messaged the women she works with, called the restaurant, the police, and all the hospitals I could.” My voice cracked, “There’s nothing. She just… she’s just gone.”

  “We’ll go look for her, then?” She said, “We can get a picture of her and go to the taxi ranks near the restaurant.” That could work, and it was something that had actually not occurred to me. Carla gripped my hands tight enough to sting and shook them, “Come on. It’s better than doing nothing.”

  Well anything was better than doing nothing.

  Ritu

  “I brought your prescription home with me,” Jalil said before I had even turned around. He waved a white paper package at me and then flashed an embarrassed smile, “I thought it’d be best to keep on top of it.”

  “Thanks.” I nodded and tucked it into a high cupboard, a habit picked up since Mitun was born,

  “How did it go?” He slumped into a chair, and looked at me with a bright, inquisitive look in his eyes,

  “I couldn’t find my laptop. I was so convinced that I wasn’t going to be able to give it,” I said while his eyebrows shot upwards towards his hairline, “but I printed off cue cards a few days ago so I got through.” I smiled,

  “That’s great.” He nodded slowly, “So you think it went well?”

  “It could have been better,” I conceded, “but I don’t think it went terribly.” I smiled, “Dr Shifidi seems to be very kind, but strict. I think she’d be interesting to work with.” I turned to the counter top again and continued seasoning the lamb the way Nazneen had taught me.

  If Jalil was going to make an effort then I would too; cooking was a small concession to tradition, and it was easy enough once I had a good, patient teacher. Pushing it to the side I reached for sweet potatoes under the sink,

  “Did your mother get more potatoes at the market today?” I asked over my shoulder. Jalil shrugged. Typical man, the voice of my Aunt Noor whispered in my head as I opened the door to the kitchen cupboard. The potatoes were there sure enough.

  So was my laptop. Tucked under the shopping bags we kept there,

  “Zahra!” The house fell silent when I shouted; the anger was hot enough, strong enough, that Jalils shocked inquiries seemed to slip past my ears. The throbbing of blood that sounded in my ears was too loud. She glided into the kitchen with raised eyebrows and the same contempt that I saw every day. As if she’d done nothing. I pulled the laptop from its shoddy hiding place and held it out, “What’s this?”

  “What?” She tutted,

  “This? What is this?” I snapped,

  “Your computer, Ritu, what do you think it is?” She laughed and shook her head,

  “So why the fuck was it in the kitchen cupboard?” I shouted, and, Allah forgive me, I loved the way her face paled. Jalil stood,

  “Ritu-” he raised his hands,

  “No!” I put it on the kitchen table and folded my arms, “I know you didn’t approve, but how could you humiliate me like that?” I ground my teeth and tried to ignore the hot tears that were burning my eyes,

  “I have no idea what you mean.” She shook her head, “If you want me to take responsibility for your stupidity-”

  “I want you to take responsibility for your own nastiness, Zahra!” I said, “I’m your daughter-in-law,” I stressed the point, though we both knew we had as much familial love for each other as sharks do for seals, “how could you sabotage me?”

  She waved her hands at me and snorted,

  “You’re crazy, why would I want to do that?” She said, “Do you think I want you to be a failure as well as an embarrassment?” And that one stung, though it shouldn’t have. Jalil stepped between us, looked me in the eye and said firmly,

  “I will deal with this. Finish dinner.” He gripped my shoulders when I tried to move around him, “Ritu. I will deal with this. Remember there was no harm done.”

  “Ha!” I threw my head back, “No harm? Jalil I looked like a disorganised, scatter-brained bimbo. Plenty of harm was done!”

  “Well, I will deal with this.” He sighed, “Please. Let me?”

  Ah.

  Compromises and effort.

  I was to be shown that I was just as important to him as his mother. Whether I believed it or not was my choice; no-one would ever say he didn’t try. Resentment is a hard thing to smother, and it had started to take root even then. But I let him take care of it; I turned back to the sink with shivering rage held close to my breast like a baby bird while he took Zahra quietly from the room. Their low voices hummed through the walls and doors of the house, in time with my throbbing veins.

  I chopped the potatoes with the biggest knife I could find, imagined her head under its blade and became so engrossed that when Jalil touched my shoulder I jumped. A sharp, cold pain shot through my thumb, and blood seeped onto the marble chopping board as a long, deep gash opened up on my thumb. He frowned and immediately pushed me aside to get to the cupboards under our sink where he grabbed a bright green box and pulled me to the kitchen table. He worked with such concentration that I held my breath, in case it disturbed him, and suddenly understood why he was so good at his job. Even this small wound was a grievance against him; he cared.

  “It’s not too deep,” he whispered as he pressed a pieces of clean, white cloth to the cut, “Keep it dry and don’t poke at it,” he smiled, “it won’t even scar.”

  “You talked to her?” I said though anger had been replaced with a fuzzy, dislocated feeling. Blood had never been my favourite thing. He nodded,

  “She says she didn’t do it, but I told her that she was to make an effort from now on. Since we’ve agreed to do that ourselves.” His words held no accusations or finalities; he was not taking sides at all. That was, though I didn’t see it until the morning, a good thing, a sign of some small change in the balance of the house. I nodded and stood,

  “I should finish dinner,” I said and tried to ignore the way his face fell. It was not enough, and he knew that. “Thank you.” I called over my shoulder before he left. Small concessions, one at a time. That was how we would build our marriage.

  When he left I lifted the laptop and opened it up; the battery was very low, and it was covered in dust, but the presentation was still there. Blinking on the screen. It wouldn’t have done much for me, I knew, other than making me look more organised. I had made it using the same script as the cue cards. The fans sped up, whirred, and died as the battery did, and I stared for a long time at my own tired reflection in its blank, black screen. Another future I might want to avoid, and another ghost on the other side of the looking glass.

  The television began to rumble in the next room, and some of the tension seeped out of the air. Bloody potatoes discarded, fres
h ones peeled and chopped; this is how forgiveness starts.

  He did his best.

  Chop.

  He couldn’t have taken my side; I didn’t see her do it.

  Chop.

  He should have.

  Chop.

  But I’m still here.

  Knife down, stare at the potatoes.

  And I will be no matter what happens because that’s what marriage is. Gather the potatoes, drop them in the pot, salt and put water over them.

  Forgive yourself, and move on.

  Easier said than done when you signed your own warrant, but necessary nonetheless. So when he slid into bed beside me and kissed my shoulder I turned around, kissed him back and told him I appreciated his support. And he kissed me again and told me I was beautiful.

  Small steps. Small breaths, and awkward sex. That is how we built our marriage; with closed eyes and muffled gasps.

  Rizvi

  She was dead, I was certain of that. Adra had to be dead or hurt, or in the hands of some degenerate because she wouldn’t leave me in this kind of pain. She was too kind, and too caring to do that to me. I had made up my mind before we even got on the bus, the car was left behind because Carla couldn’t drive and I was too prone to tears for a traffic jam, that we would find nothing, and that I would be a widower before I was thirty. Before I had been married two years,

  “I should have waited for her to come in,” I moaned into my clenched fists as the bus crawled through the city centre, “I should have went to pick her up. I should have-”

  “This isn’t your fault Rizvi, believe me.” Carla said, and then added with a measure of bile, “It’s all hers.”

  “What?” I raised my head, “How can you say that. What if she’s hurt, or dead… what if someone-” She gripped my hand and squeezed it,

  “I didn’t mean,” she sighed, “I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant, I should’ve kept my mouth shut.” I wanted to ask her what she meant, but the cold, hard look in her eyes was too much. I looked away, watched the city crawl by with a picture of Adra, taken on our honeymoon, clutched tight in my hands.

  We got to Papa G’s just as they were opening the doors for lunch service; the waiter looked at us like we’d ruined his day before it had even begun. He probably hadn’t even had time to straighten his uniform,

  “Table for two?” He sighed with a brittle smile,

  “No.” I shook my head, and he raised a strangely neat eyebrow, “Were you working here last night?” Suddenly I was shaking, properly shaking, and a hot, stinging nausea startedto crawl up my throat,

  “Yes.” He said, drawing the word out with narrow eyes,

  “Did you see this woman?” I held the picture out, “She was here for dinner about eight and… she, uh,” I coughed and cleared my throat, “she hasn’t come home yet.” His face transformed into a mask of concern and pity,

  “My God, I’m so sorry-” he took the picture from me and stared at it, “I can’t remember if she was here…wait, I’ll ask around.” He pointed to a vacant table and chewed his lip, “Do you want a drink while you wait? On the house?” I shook my head, but Carla nodded,

  “Maybe just some water please?” She smiled at his receding back before turning to me, “It’ll be alright, Rizvi. Everything’s going to be ok, I promise.”

  Don’t be so fucking stupid, I wanted to hiss, how can it all be ok? Either my wife is hurt, or she’s a dead. How could anything be ok again after this? Instead I said,

  “Can I use your phone? I left mine at home… I’ll pay you back for the charges.”

  “Sure, yeah. Absolutely!” She fished a huge, wide smart phone from her hand bag and gave it to me without question. She was a good woman, really. I slipped out side and waited for an answer,

  “Hello?” The voice was tinny, far away, and distorted by the many servers it had to filter through, but it hit me like a hammer to the head,

  “Nānī?” I gasped,

  “Rizvi? What’s wrong?” She said, and for a moment I couldn’t speak; I tried to think about how I could tell her, honestly, what had happened,

  “It’s Adra, Nānī, she went out last night…” I gasped, all the wind gone from my lungs, and tried to formulate a coherent sentence,

  “And? Rizvi, what’s happened? Rizvi?” The growing panic in her voice was what brought me back,

  “She hasn’t come home, Nānī, she’s missing.” And, just like that, the dam broke. I sobbed down the phone like a child, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. I don’t have her parents number, and my phones at home and I just-”

  “Be quiet.” She said, as if it was the easiest thing in the world to do, and I fell silent, hiccupping and sniffing, “This is not your fault, pyaare bete. Where are you now?”

  “I called the police, but they said they can’t do anything until she’s been gone for three days.” I continued on without thought, “And then I called all the hospitals I could think of, now we’re in the restaurant she was at last night. Nānī what am I going to do? What if she’s dead?”

  “Enough.” She snapped, “Adra is a grown woman…” less confident now, “I’m sure she’s fine, though why she was out at night alone I don’t-”

  “She wasn’t alone.” I sniffed, “She was having dinner with people she works with. She called and said she was leaving the restaurant, but…” the rest was obvious. She sighed and the phone turned it into a gust of wind,

  “I’ll phone her mother,” she said, “keep me in the know, hm?” I nodded, and then remembered with a dry snort,

  “Yes, Nānī. I will.” I said, voice cracking under the strain,

  “And take care of yourself, don’t spend all day walking the soles off your feet. You should be in the house in case she comes home, or calls.” Nānī, as always, spoke sense before considering sentiment.

  “I’ll go home after we ask the taxi drivers.” I said, “And I’ll call later.”

  A sharp rap at the window drew my attention; Carla’s lips were draw in into a tight line, and her face was white. I hung up and turned on my heel like a man desperate to get his own execution over and done with.

  “Yes?” I raised my chin and readied for the inevitable; she was here, she left. No sign of her. No further forward,

  “Your wife was here last night,” a young waitress said, “with a big group of women.” She chewed her lip, “They all left early, but her and a blonde woman stayed until closing time.” Cherry, it had to be, “we had to ask them and their friends to leave about one-ish so we could close.”

  “Her friends?” I frowned, “I thought you said they all left early?”

  “They did.” Carla said quietly, “Adra and Carla left with two men.”

  Worst fears confirmed; a shared taxi ride that ended in horror.

  “That…” I blinked, “are you sure?” The waitress nodded,

  “I can show you the CCTV?” She said, looking over her shoulder,

  “Please.” Carla said,

  “I really shouldn’t,” the waitress looked at her colleague, he nodded, “but there’s no harm if we’re quick.” They pulled us into an empty back room filled with papers, the manager’s office no doubt, and he logged into the computer.

  “See.” The waitress said, “Here she is moving to the bar when her friends leave.” It was her, no doubt. She motioned and the waiter fast forwarded the footage. She and Carla sat at the bar, drink after drink in front of them, until about half eleven when two men sauntered over to them. They chatted, and the men sat down. Fast forward.

  And there she was, staggering out of the restaurant, calling me on her mobile while she left with Cherry. And two men. To say the world came unhinged would be pointless because, in all honesty, it had been ripped off its hinges when she didn’t answer her phone. But it felt worse to see this.

  “Did she tell you she was sharing a taxi with these guys?” Carla asked with a hint of something unnameable in her voice,

  “No.” I whispered. Enough said. “We have a good
picture of them, though,” I swallowed, “if she doesn’t come home we can show this to the police.” Carla and the waitress shared a look, no a look. The kind that only other women could decipher,

  “Of course,” the waitress said, “We keep our footage for a full year. You can come back with the police if she doesn’t turn up.”

  “I’m sure she will.” Carla said, “Maybe she fell asleep in the taxi and stayed with Cherry?” She shrugged at me, “She looked pretty drunk.”

  “I left Cherry a message, she didn’t call back.” I said, “But maybe.”

  She didn’t look drunk on the footage; she was a wreck. Staggering and stumbling about like an old drunk. I hated myself for being disgusted, but I was. The part of me that was too much like my grandmother whispered that good Muslims didn’t drink, and that even bad Muslims should never allow themselves to fall that far. Especially not a woman. Definitely not a wife.

  The ideals of the twenty-first century were something that would only really take precedence in the next generation. Mine was halfway between the two; striving for progression, liberalism and tolerance while our parents muttered traditionalisms in our ears. I digested that fact as we canvassed the taxi drivers, all of whom knew nothing.

  “One more,” I pressed Carla when she sighed and sat on a bench, rubbing her ankles, “Look those two are talking now.” I gave a weak smile, “Two for the price of one, right?” She snorted and nodded,

  “Ok. Then we go home, Rizvi, you’re white as a sheet.” She rubbed her nose, “Well, almost.” That got a real laugh. A dry, wavering, pained one. But it was real nonetheless.