You're Not Proper (3 page)

Pointing to the sofa opposite him, he said, ‘Sit there.'

I did. Mum came and sat next to me. I wanted Mum to say something, to say no, she had tried to turn me into a Christian. Then I would tell her what was really, really on my mind but she just stayed silent. I said to her, ‘You're not bothered what I become are you?'

Mum and Dad looked at each coldly, like they were about to fight. Like
it
was going to start right now and Mum would turn into a ghost. I didn't care. Mum took a deep breath and sighed, ‘I just want you to be happy, Kiran.'

‘You're lying,' I said. ‘You've always lied to me.' ‘All you have to do is believe in Allah,' Dad said.

‘That's just God.'

‘Yeh,' said Dad.

‘I can teach you more later.'

Mum put her hand in front of her mouth. I couldn't tell if she was laughing or crying.

‘But what do I have to do to become a Muslim?'

‘You have to recite the
Kalma
s,' Dad said, ‘as a start, like.'

Dad recited the
Kalma
, ‘
La ilaha, illallah, Muhammad ur Rasoolullah
.' He looked a bit unsure of himself, and said, ‘It means: There is no God but Allah, and Mohammad is his prophet.'

‘Are you sure, Dad?'

‘Yeh, pretty much. It's something like that.' Mum left the room.

I tried to repeat what Dad said but kept forgetting.

Dad went back to the television, and I left to buy my first hijab. As I was leaving the house, Mum stood by the front door and looked at me.

‘What is it Mum?'

She just looked at me with eyes that seemed to flicker between different worlds, one where she saw me and the other where I couldn't see her. Her blonde hair was held back by a black ribbon. It was the first time I noticed streaks of grey in her hair. The lines on her forehead twitched. She didn't look like the strong woman she was, always knowing what had to be done and when.

‘Dinner'll be ready when you get back, Kiran,' she said.

It was bright and sunny outside, with a slight chill in the air. A few drops of rain came down out of a cloudless sky. Our neighbour, old George sat in his front garden, with Bruno his dog, near him. I waved to him and George nodded to me.

Getting out of our gate, I said a loud ‘Hi' to Elizabeth, our other neighbour. She was coming towards me, holding the leash of her poodle, which was a few steps behind her, lifting its leg near a broken street lamp. She lifted her chin to make sure I knew she had been to the hairdresser and smiled back at me. I stepped onto the road. There were so many unfilled holes in it nowadays, ever since the last freaky cold winter a couple of years back, when, after the snow melted, the tarmac had cracked, so everyone drove really carefully.

I turned left and crossed the road close to where a car had been burnt. Some older boys were sitting in the carcass, taking turns smoking a large, hand-rolled cigarette and eyeing me. I felt like sticking my finger up at them, and telling them to go get a job, instead of doing this all day. But there weren't any jobs round here.

They were still eyeing me up so I quickened my pace. I didn't really know where I was going to get my hijab from, but there were plenty of shops in East Boarhead, I was sure to find one. The quickest way to get there was through the graveyard, but I didn't want to bump into anyone and went the long way round, along St. Enoch's Road, past boarded-up shops and derelict houses with broken windows. The road snaked around the cemetery and changed into Market Road as it got closer to the city centre.

At the junction where the new road began there were a group of shops I hadn't noticed before. I stopped outside the window of a shop called ‘Cluck-Cluck'. A shop worker, a small white woman, was dressing a female mannequin in blue lacy underwear. The dummy was wearing a shiny, white hijab. I was giggling at the sight of the mannequin when a tall woman dressed in flowing black robes stopped close to me and looked at the same mannequin. Apart from her eyes, everything else about her was covered. She even wore black gloves. She walked into the shop and I went in after her.

Inside the shop, she went up to the mannequin that was being dressed and felt the underwear. As she was doing this, the shop worker pointed to a stand and said, ‘They're over there.'

The woman in black went over to the stand, picked some underwear and went to the counter to pay.

I went to the back of the store, chose a couple of hijabs from a pile in a wooden basket and stood behind the woman in black to pay. She turned round to me and said, ‘And less of those dirty looks, young lady.'

When I got home with my hijabs, the East Boarhead Curry Club, pans in hand, were walking into our house. Old George, with his violin case dangling off his shoulder was at the back. Once they were in, I carefully closed the door and tried to sneak upstairs, unnoticed. I avoided the first step, as it squeaked, and had just put my foot on the next one when Mum called, ‘Kiran, sweetheart, can you come here?'

I pretended not to hear her and took another step.

‘Come on love, I know you heard me,' Mum called again. I really dreaded moments like this.

‘Mum, please, can't Dad do it this time,' I yelled back. ‘No one trusts his judgement,' Mum replied.

I stomped into the kitchen, folded my arms in front of me, my shopping bag still in hand and hissed, ‘What?!'

Old George as ever was in his white trainers, yellow shorts and a matching, sleeveless sweatshirt. He had a great, big, proud smile across his ugly, bony face. He tapped on his creation, which was in an oblong, silver pan. Next to George stood Elizabeth, her ridiculous brown hat with small plastic flowers still on her head and whatever she was cooking in a reddish, brown baking bowl, whose lid was in the shape of a flower. And next to Elizabeth was a flat, round woman, in a fading, black skirt and a fading, black blouse. I didn't know her name but everyone called her the ‘bulldog' and kept away from her. Her pink, chubby face was all blotchy. Each time she moved, the flab under her chin wobbled. She stood behind a tall, stainless steel pan. Mum was leaning against the sink. Someone's cat was perched outside in the garden behind Mum.

‘Please Mum, not again,' I pleaded, with my stomach turning at the thought of what was about to befall me.

‘Your Mum's such a good curry cooker, she is,' George said rubbing his tongue over what few teeth he had left. He touched the lid of his pan and added, ‘I've made a special doo peeza, I have.'

I trembled.

‘You know that dish don't you?' George asked me and then he answered himself, ‘course you do.'

‘It's do peeaaza, George,' Mum corrected him.

‘I've forgotten exactly what it means, like,' George said scratching his shiny, bald head.

‘Two onions,' Mum said.

‘Two onions!' George said, raising his silver eyebrows, his clean-shaven face twitching. ‘Oh, dear.'

‘Double onion, you idiots,' Dad shouted from the living room. ‘Double Onion!' George repeated, a look of bewilderment on his face. ‘I hate onions, Mum, you know I hate them,' I protested.

‘Oh my,' George sighed, lifting the lid off his pan.

I could have just died at the sight of his creation. It was something sickly reddish yellow, with lumps in it.

‘I thought it meant double vindaloo,' George said meekly. ‘What's that?' I snapped.

Mum put her hand to her mouth, her eyes laughing.

‘Cornflake do peeaaza, that's what it's meant to be, like,' he said. ‘You daft git,' Elizabeth said lifting the lid of her pan, ‘you can't make Cornflake curry. I made chicken tikka masala.'

The only way you could tell that Elizabeth's creation was once a chicken was from the burnt drumsticks, which were almost completely black, floating in a gooey, brown sauce.

I dropped my arms to my sides and yelped. I wanted to leg it out of the kitchen when Mrs Bulldog stirred and lifted the lid of her pan. A rich aroma of freshly chopped coriander mixed with the smell of spices and lentils and filled the kitchen. She smiled and said in a soft voice, ‘I used real ghee and lots of fresh garlic for the garnish. I think you should taste mine first, love.'

‘It all looks delicious, you know,' I said throwing Mum a pleading look.

Mum flicked her eyebrows and nodded, freeing me from my ordeal. Just then, Mrs Bulldog put her nose up at George and said, ‘I bet you wouldn't dare feed it to your dog, George.'

‘I already have and he loved it,' George interjected.

They all burst out laughing and I bolted out of the kitchen, thanking my lucky stars.

I had hardly got into my bedroom when I heard Mum running upstairs. I dived onto my bed and quickly got under the quilt, but Mum hadn't come for me and went into her own room. Just then, George starting playing a jig on the violin downstairs. I cringed and shouted from under the quilt, ‘Oh, God save me!'

‘You coming, love?' Mum said, entering into my room.

I kept my head under the quilt and didn't answer. Downstairs, the violin was now being accompanied by clapping and the muffled curses of Dad.

‘Come on, love,' Mum said.

I lifted the quilt off my head and there was Mum, wearing a green dress with black stockings and her black dancing shoes; her hair was neatly brushed and was held in place by a green hairband across her forehead. ‘What's up, Mum?'

‘It's such a lovely day…'

‘But what's with the dancing?' I interrupted.

Holding her hand straight by her sides, Mum started dancing, her feet beating a perfect rhythm on my bedroom floor.

Mum looked like a little girl skipping. She danced out of my room and down the stairs. I followed, I just had to see what Dad made of all this. It was a match day.

He was standing by the door of the living room tapping his feet.

Elizabeth was twirling round and the flab on Mrs Bulldog was doing a frenzied dance to the tune of George's jig.

‘Can't you play anything other than Morrison's jig, George?' Dad asked.

George flicked his eyebrows and carried on playing. He suddenly looked years younger.

In the morning, Mum left for work at Asda. She did the early shift on Mondays. I lay in bed a bit longer than I should have. I kept thinking about what everyone would say at school. I jumped up, got dressed, put my headscarf on, ran downstairs, wolfed down some Cornflakes and bolted out of the door.

On the bus to school, a few girls gave me the evil eye, but I ignored them. This was the first time I wasn't worried about meeting Shamshad. I was going to tell her I knew the
Kalma
and I was sorry for everything that had happened in the past. This was the new me and I'd like us to be friends.

I got off the bus reciting the
Kalma
to myself when she jumped out of the old warehouse. I was startled, but that was nothing compared to what I felt when I realised what I had done.

I looked down at my legs and realised what Shamshad was looking at: me, wearing a black hijab, a white shirt, a school tie, a black blazer, a short, black skirt, and white socks. I turned round to run back home and ran into Aisha Sadiq. Laila was close by.

‘Push her to me, Laila,' Shamshad said.

Laila didn't touch me.

‘Whose side are you on, Laila?' Shamshad asked, grabbing me.

Shamshad called everyone towards her, and I was trapped in the middle of a circle. Their mouths were wide open. I dropped my arms by my side. They were really heavy. She spun me round. I kept thinking, ‘You deserve everything you get, Kiran.' The whole world was laughing at me. And so it should. Shamshad was pointing her mobile phone at me. Mixed up rubbish, that's all I was, trash. You're right Shamshad, and you're right Laila, and every one of you. How could I do this to you?

I don't know what happened. All of a sudden everyone just vanished. I turned around and walked, not knowing where I was going.

I had gone to the graveyard with my friend Laila to see the new headstone on my granddad's grave. May the Almighty grant him a place in Heaven. It was made of royal white marble, with the
Kalma
carved into it, running around its flowery edge. Someone had written ‘EDL' on the last one. We were sitting on a bench under one of the new CCTV cameras, which covered our graveyard, when Karen Malik came flying over the fence and landed on her bum not far from us.

What else can you do but laugh at someone whose behind is stuck up in the air and whose knickers have gone up their bum?

‘I can't stand people like her,' I said loudly to Laila. ‘Especially when she's sucking up to her
gora
gang.'

‘Oh, Shami,' Laila protested, squeezing my hand, ‘let's not let her spoil it.'

‘Look what the cat's brought in,' Aisha said as she was about to jog. I nodded, letting out a sigh of relief, but still couldn't help thinking about how her gang had made me feel so bad, so often; how they had humiliated me because I'm Muslim, especially that Donna.

‘You know, Laila, once when I went past her gang, Donna started singing, “God made little, brown people. He made ‘em in the night. He made ‘em in a hurry and forgot to paint ‘em white.”'

‘It's stupid,' Laila laughed.

‘It is a bit, but then I didn't think it was, funny, you know. But what really got under my nose was the way Karen laughed with them.'

‘What a cow,' Laila said.

‘Qasmein
, I swear. Isn't she just.'

After Karen went to see her gang, Laila and I strolled up the path to see what she was going to do.

I didn't see them coming. They jumped up from behind us. Donna pushed Laila through the hedge. She held my wrists so tightly in her fat hand it hurt. I wish I had said nothing to her, just punched her in the face when she ripped off my hijab, but ended up saying the most stupid thing in the world, ‘Me Dad'll kill me!'