Brick Lane (89 page)

Nazneen resisted the urge to reach over and undo a button.

'I'm going to Razia's now,' she said.

'She needs the support. Until, of course, you' – here he coughed discreetly, as if the matter were a delicate one – 'urn, go.'

Nazneen sucked the soft walls of her cheeks between her teeth and chewed them. Why had Dr Azad lent the money? Did he expect to get it back? She would return the girls' tickets and her own and take him whatever she could get for them. As far as he knew, they were all going away. Why did he lend the money? Was it a cure? For that special Tower Hamlets disease that he had discovered and named and which would never get into the medical books. What had he called it? Going Home Syndrome. Did he, with his own marriage broken, want to save another marriage where he could? Did he simply want to get rid of Chanu? Get rid of this ridiculous man who claimed him for a kindred spirit?

'Dr Azad, did your wife leave you?'

A shadow passed over his face.

Wasn't it obvious enough long ago that she had left? Nazneen bit into her tongue.

'No,' he said softly. 'She is still there. In a manner of speaking.'

'Of course,' said Nazneen. 'Yes.'

A wind blew in over the courtyard and fetched up a crisp packet at her feet.

'Dr Azad,' she said. 'Why did you give my husband that money?'

The end of his nose was pitted with age, his cheeks had given way to jowls, pockets of air puffed the skin around his eyes, when he smiled the corners of his mouth turned down, and it was a big, generous smile. 'It's very simple. Because he is my friend. My very good friend.'

The day had come. Nazneen sat on Bibi's bed. The girls stood by Shahana's desk looking as though they were waiting to be shot. Nazneen had not heard Shahana speak since yesterday morning. All her features seemed to be pulled together at the centre of her face, as if by a drawstring. Everything was locked up. Her face had shut down. Bibi had gone beyond desolation, to indifference. On the broad canvas of her face nothing was written.

'Shall I tell you a story? Which one would you like to hear?'

Bibi lifted her shoulders slightly and dropped them. Shahana remained frozen.

'Shahana, Bibi, listen to me.' Nazneen stopped. What could she tell them? If she revealed everything now, how could they hide it?

The flight went at two o'clock in the morning. Chanu had calculated that they would have to leave at ten. Nazneen decided on nine o'clock as the time to tell him. It would give them an hour to talk things over, to say goodbye.

'Sometimes things don't turn out so badly. Sometimes the bad things that you think are coming don't come at all. You just have to wait and see.'

If he knew now, he would work on her.

He could not sway her.

She would not take the risk.

'I'll make things right. Be patient. Don't make yourselves upset.'

He would go and the girls would stay with her.

It was possible that
he
would be the one to change his mind: put the tickets away and start unpacking.

It was his one last dream. He would not rip it up.

'Shall I tell you that story? Which one did you want?'

If he stayed they would unpack together, man and wife, and the long night through lie on the bed and stare at the ceiling and for ever after that avoid each other's eye and the reflection of what was in them, what was true: that for both of them the time had gone and it was too late now, too late.

Nazneen got up. 'I don't feel like a story either,' she said.

As she went past the desk, Shahana kicked her on the shin. 'Wait and bloody see,' she cried. 'How long have you waited? What have you seen? What about if this little memsahib is sick of it? What are you going to do about that?' Nazneen moved out of reach. Shahana kicked the chair. She kicked the desk. Then she turned round and kicked her sister.

Chanu was in the bedroom. He wrote on a label and stuck it on the wardrobe door.

'Very good of the doctor to deal with all this. The wardrobe – I thought we should sell it, rather than ship it. Do you agree?'

'Oh, sell it,' said Nazneen. 'Definitely. Get rid of it.'

Chanu looked at her.

'How overjoyed your sister will be to see you! Imagine it. Such joy!'

'Yes,' said Nazneen. It was inadequate. 'I have imagined it many times. Over many years.'

He opened the wardrobe and the doors hid him.

After a while, his voice came again. 'All my certificates here.' He closed the doors. He made a jolly face. 'Shall we sell those too?'

'Take them with you. Take one or two at least.'

He inspected her closely. His eyebrows tangled together. In his hand he had one of his framed certificates. 'Can't get mangoes from the amra tree,' he said. Then he sat down on the bed and held his knees.

She went close to him. Maybe an hour wasn't long enough.

'Haah,' he said, winded. 'Pheeooo-oo.'

Last night, when they went to sleep, he had wrapped his arm around her, moulded his body around her back, shaped himself to her. When she woke, he was still there.

'I haven't been what you could call a perfect-type husband,' he told his knees. 'Nor a perfect-type father.'

He had shrunk. Not just his cheeks and his belly, but all of him. His voice, his words, his temper, his projects, his plans. He had shrunk. And now he was just too small to send out all alone.

'But I haven't been a bad husband. Would you say? Not bad.' Chanu looked up at her and squinted as if her face was too bright to behold directly. 'Some of our women, they never go out. Her.' He motioned upstairs with his head. 'She never goes out. You never see her out, do you? Many aren't allowed to work. You know how it is. Village attitudes. The woman gets some money, she starts feeling she is as good as the man and she can do as she likes.' He smiled and his little eyes nearly disappeared. 'That's how they think. They are not modern. Not like me.'

'It was lucky for me' – her heart swelled as she spoke – 'that my father chose an educated man.'

Chanu grew a little. 'All this talk. We should be doing. Let's go into the sitting room and see what else needs to be done.'

Nazneen rolled up the rugs. Chanu stood and watched. After a while he lifted his shirt and peered at his belly. He turned to present his profile to Nazneen. 'What do you think? Very streamline, eh?'

His stomach no longer looked like a nine-month pregnancy. Now it was closer to six. He patted it affectionately. 'Will power,' he said. 'And ulcer,' he conceded.

'Hup,' he declared and sucked the belly in. He viewed it again, now with some uncertainty. 'Gone too damn far. Does this look like respectable type? Does it look like Soap Factory Manager, or like rickshaw wallah?'

'It's big enough,' said Nazneen. She wondered if she would keep the rugs or throw them away.

'I might go for samosas. Pack a few for the aeroplane. And I have to see Dr Azad about administrative matters, before he leaves the surgery.' Chanu let go of his shirt. It didn't occur to him to tuck it back into his trousers. At the remains of the showcase, he paused. 'But what were you doing trying to lift the computer onto a glass cabinet?'