White Teeth (44 page)

Now, while we're on the subject of nakedness, Karina
Cain had a nice little body. All creamy chub and slender
extremities. And come the weekend she liked to wear something
to show it off. First time Millat noticed her was at some local
party when he saw a flash of silver pants, a silver boob-tube,
and a bare mound of slightly protruding belly rising up between
the two with another bit of silver in the navel. There was
something welcoming about Karina Cain's little belly. She
hated it, but Millat loved it. He loved it when she wore things
that revealed it. But now the leaflets were making things
clearer.
He started noticing what she wore and the way other men looked
at her. And when he mentioned it she said, “Oh, I
hate
that. All those leery old men.” But it seemed to Millat
that she was encouraging it; that she positively
wanted
men to look at her, that she was—as
The Right to Bare
suggested—“prostituting herself to the male
gaze.” Particularly white males. Because that's how
it worked between Western men and Western women, wasn't
it? They liked to do it all in public. The more he thought
about it, the more it pissed him off. Why couldn't she
cover up? Who was she trying to impress? African goddesses from
Clapham North respected themselves, why couldn't Karina
Cain? “I can't respect you,” explained Millat
carefully, making sure he repeated the words just as he had
read them, “until you respect yourself.” Karina
Cain said she did respect herself, but Millat couldn't
believe her. Which was odd, because he'd never known
Karina Cain to lie, she wasn't the type.

When they got ready to go out somewhere, he said,
“You're not dressing for me, you're dressing
for everybody!” Karina said she didn't dress for
him or anybody, she dressed for herself. When she sang
“Sexual Healing” at the pub karaoke, he said,
“Sex is a private thing, between you and me, it's
not for everybody!” Karina said she was
singing,
not having sex in front of the Rat and Carrot regulars. When
they made love, he said, “Don't do that . . .
don't offer it to me like a whore. Haven't you
heard of unnatural acts? Besides, I'll take it if I want
it—and why can't you be a lady, don't make
all that noise!” Karina Cain slapped him and cried a lot.
She said she didn't know what was happening to him.
Problem is, thought Millat, as he slammed the door off its
hinges,
neither do I.
And after that row they didn't talk for a while.

About two weeks later, he was doing a shift in the Palace
for a little extra money, and he brought the matter up with
Shiva, a newish convert to KEVIN and a rising star within the
organization. “Don't talk to me about white
women,” groaned Shiva, wondering how many generations of
Iqbals he'd have to give the same advice to.
“It's got to the point in the West where the women
are men! I mean, they've got the same desires and urges
as men
—they want it all the fucking time.
And they dress like they want everyone to
know
they want it. Now is that right? Is it?”

But before the debate could progress, Samad came through
the double doors looking for some mango chutney and Millat
returned to his chopping.

That evening after work, Millat saw a moon-faced,
demure-looking Indian woman through the window of a Piccadilly
café who looked, in profile, not unlike youthful pictures
of his mother. She was dressed in a black turtleneck and long
black trousers and her eyes were partly veiled by long black
hair, her only decoration the red patterns of mhendi on the
palms of her hands. She was sitting alone.

With the same thoughtless balls he used when chatting up
dolly birds and disco brains, with the guts of a man who had no
qualms about talking to strangers, Millat went in and started
giving her the back page of
The Right to Bare
pretty much verbatim, in the hope that she'd understand.
All about soulmates, about self-respect, about women who seek
to bring “visual pleasure” only to the men who love
them. He explained: “It's the liberation of the
veil, innit? Look, like here:
Free from the shackles of male scrutiny and the standards
of attractiveness, the woman is free to be who she is inside,
immune from being portrayed as sex symbol and lusted after as
if she were meat on the shelf to be picked at and looked
over.
That's what we think,” he said, uncertain if that
was what he thought. “That's our opinion,” he
said, uncertain whether it was his opinion. “You see,
I'm from this group—”

The lady screwed up her face and put her forefinger
delicately across his lip. “Oh, darling,” she
murmured sadly, admiring his beauty. “If I give you
money, will you go away?”

And then her boyfriend turned up, a surprisingly tall
Chinese guy in a leather jacket.

Deep in a blue funk, Millat resolved to walk the eight
miles home, beginning in Soho, glaring at the leggy whores and
the crotchless pants and the feather boas. By the time he
reached Marble Arch he had worked himself into such a rage he
called Karina Cain from a phone booth plastered with tits and
ass (whores, whores, whores) and dumped her unceremoniously. He
didn't mind about the other girls he was shagging
(Alexandra Andrusier, Polly Houghton, Rosie Dew) because they
were straight up, posh-totty slags. But he minded about Karina
Cain, because she was his
love,
and his love should be his love and nobody else's.
Protected like Liotta's wife in
GoodFellas
or Pacino's sister in
Scarface.
Treated like a princess. Behaving like a princess. In a tower.
Covered up.

Walking slower now, dragging his heels, there being nobody
to go home to, he got waylaid in the Edgware Road, the old fat
guys calling him over (“Look, it's Millat, little
Millat the Ladies' Man! Millat the Prince of
Pussy-pokers! Too big to have a smoke is he, now?”), and
gave in with a rueful smile. Hookah pipes, halal fried chicken,
and illegally imported absinthe consumed around wobbling
outdoor tables; watching the women hurry by in full purdah,
like busy black ghosts haunting the streets, late-night
shopping, looking for their errant husbands. Millat liked to
watch them go: the animated talk, the exquisite colors of the
communicative eyes, the bursts of laughter from invisible lips.
He remembered something his father once told him back when they
used to speak to each other. You do not know the meaning of the
erotic, Millat, you do not know the meaning of
desire,
my second son, until you have sat on the Edgware Road with a
bubbling pipe, using all the powers of your imagination to
visualize what is beyond the four inches of skin hajib reveals,
what is under those great sable sheets.

About six hours later Millat turned up at the Chalfen
kitchen table, very, very drunk, weepy and violent. He
destroyed Oscar's Lego fire station and threw the coffee
machine across the room. Then he did what Joyce had been
waiting for these twelve months. He asked her advice.

It seemed like months had been spent across that kitchen
table since then, Joyce shooing people out of the room, going
through her reading material, wringing her hands; the smell of
dope mingling with the steam that rose off endless cups of
strawberry tea. For Joyce truly loved him and wanted to help
him, but her advice was long and complex. She had read up on
the subject. And it appeared Millat was filled with
self-revulsion and hatred of his own kind; that he had possibly
a slave mentality, or maybe a color-complex centered around his
mother (he was far darker than she), or a wish for his own
annihilation by means of dilution in a white gene pool, or an
inability to reconcile two opposing cultures . . . and it
emerged that 60 percent of Asian men did
this . . .
and 90 percent of Muslims felt
that . . .
it was a known fact that Asian families were often . . . and
hormonally boys were more likely to . . . and the therapist
she'd found him was really very nice, three days a week
and don't worry about the money . . . and don't
worry about Joshua, he's just sulking . . . and, and,
and.

Way-back-when in the fuddle of the hash and the talk Millat
remembered a girl called Karina Somethingoranother whom he had
liked. And she liked him. And she had a great sense of humor
that felt like a miracle, and she looked after him when he was
down and he looked after her too, in his own way, bringing her
flowers and stuff. She seemed distant now, like conker fights
and childhood. And that was that.

There was trouble at the Joneses. Irie was about to become
the first Bowden or Jones (possibly, maybe, all things willing,
by the grace of God, fingers crossed) to enter a university.
Her A-levels were chemistry, biology, and religious studies.
She wanted to study dentistry (white collar! £20k+ !),
which everyone was very pleased about, but she also wanted to
take a “year off” in the subcontinent and Africa
(Malaria! Poverty! Tapeworm!), which led to three months of
open warfare between her and Clara. One side wanted finance and
permission, the other side was resolved to concede neither. The
conflict was protracted and bitter, and all mediators were sent
home empty-handed (
She has made up her mind, there are no arguments to be had
with the woman—
Samad) or else embroiled in the war of words (
Why can't she go to Bangladesh if she wants to? Are
you saying my country is not good enough for your
daughter?—
Alsana).

The stalemate was so pronounced that land had been divided
and allocated; Irie claimed her bedroom and the attic, Archie,
a conscientious objector, asked only for the spare room, a
television, and a satellite (state) dish, and Clara took
everything else, with the bathroom acting as shared territory.
Doors were slammed. The time for talking was over.

On October 25, 1991, 0100 hours, Irie embarked upon a
late-night attack. She knew from experience that her mother was
most vulnerable when in bed; late at night she spoke softly
like a child, her fatigue gave her a pronounced lisp; it was at
this point that you were most likely to get whatever it was
you'd been pining for: pocket money, a new bike, a later
curfew. It was such a well-worn tactic that until now Irie had
not considered it worthy of this, her fiercest and longest
dispute with her mother. But she hadn't any better
ideas.

“Irie? Wha—? Iss sa middle of sa nice . . . Go
back koo bed . . .”

Irie opened the door further, letting yet more hall light
flood the bedroom.

Archie submerged his head in a pillow. “Bloody hell,
love, it's one in the morning! Some of us have got work
tomorrow.”

“I want to talk to Mum,” said Irie firmly,
walking to the end of the bed. “She won't talk to
me during the day, so I'm reduced to this.”

“Irie, pleaze . . . I'm exhaushed . . .
I'm shrying koo gesh shome shleep.”

“I don't just
want
to have a year off, I
need
one. It's essential—I'm young, I want some
experiences. I've lived in this bloody suburb all my
life. Everyone's the same here. I want to go and see the
people of the world . . . that's what Joshua's
doing and
his
parents support him!”

“Well, we can't bloody afford it,”
grumbled Archie, emerging from the eiderdown. “We
haven't all got posh jobs in science, now have
we?”

“I don't
care
about the money—I'll get a job, somehow or
something, but I do want your permission!
Both
of you. I don't want to spend six months away and spend
every day thinking you're angry.”

“Well, it's not up to me, love, is it?
It's your mother, really, I . . .”

“Yes, Dad. Thanks for stating the bloody
obvious.”

“Oh, right,” said Archie huffily, turning to
the wall. “I'll keep my comments to meself, then .
. .”

“Oh,
Dad,
I didn't mean . . . Mum? Can you please sit up and speak
properly? I'm trying to talk to you? It seems like
I'm talking to myself here?” said Irie with absurd
intonations, for this was the year Antipodean soap operas were
teaching a generation of English kids to phrase everything as a
question. “Look, I want your permission,
yeah?”

Even in the darkness, Irie could see Clara scowl.
“Permishon for
what
? Koo go and share and ogle at poor black folk? Dr.
Livingshone, I prejume? Iz dat what you leant from da Shalfenz?
Because if thash what you want, you can do dat here. Jush sit
and look at me for shix munfs!”

“It's nothing to do with that! I just want to
see how other people live!”

“An' gek youshelf killed in da proshess! Why
don' you go necksh door, dere are uvver people dere. Go
shee how dey live!”

Infuriated, Irie grabbed the bed knob and marched round
Clara's side of the bed. “Why can't you just
sit up properly and talk to me properly and drop the ridiculous
little-girl voi—”

In the darkness Irie kicked over a glass and sucked in a
sharp breath as the cold water seeped between her toes and into
the carpet. Then, as the last of the water ran away, Irie had
the strange and horrid sensation that she was being
bitten.

“Ow!”

“Oh, for God's sake,” said Archie,
reaching over to the side lamp and switching it on. “What
now?”

Irie looked down to where the pain was. In any war, this
was too low a blow. The front set of some false teeth, with no
mouth attached to it, was bearing down upon her right
foot.

“Fucking hell! What the fuck are they?”