Brick Lane

by Monica Ali

  'When did the factory close?'

  'Three days ago. Not long, but Tariq is so anxious. I will have to break in myself if they don't open it. Or go to see Mrs Islam.'

  Nazneen put the cup to her lips and tipped it to cover her face. It was empty. She repeated the action. But Razia, she saw now, was not hinting at anything. She did not know about Chanu's 'little arrangement' with Mrs Islam. And Nazneen, complicit in the sin, would not tell. Razia rubbed at her hip and adopted a feeble voice. 'Just bury me now. I am as good as dead.'

  Nazneen laughed. 'Don't worry. Benylin Chesty Coughs can cure anything.'

  Razia barked. 'When I was a girl, we gave respect to our elders.' She became feeble again. 'But I am practically dead. Take your fun. Take anything you want. Take my hip. I leave you my Ralgex.'

  Nazneen snorted but Razia became thoughtful. 'We are always thinking: how does this woman come so high? Do you think that those who come so high think about us: how do they stay so low?' She worked her big shoulders. 'But we already know about her. It is just hard to believe.'

  She had been the day before. She came with her sons and Chanu jumped around the room as though it were scattered with nails. He counted out the money loudly, and had got to seventy-five when Mrs Islam raised a spotted handkerchief and let it float onto the mighty ruin of her chest. One son undid the bag. The other said, 'Put it in.' Chanu put the rest of the notes back inside the showcase. The sons helped her to the door. One of them was trusted sufficiently to carry the Ralgex.

  'How much are we paying?' said Nazneen.

  'It's between friends,' said Chanu. 'She is doing me a favour. I knew her husband.'

  Karim came the next morning to collect the vests. Before they had exchanged two words his telephone started up. He parked himself in the hallway. Nazneen saw him lean against the wall with one trainer pressed flat against the skirting board. She returned to the sitting room but did not know whether to stand or to sit. When he came in she made herself busy with folding.

  'My father,' he said. He snapped the phone shut and holstered it.

  She glanced at him. His hair stood up at the front, tiny short black feathers.

  'He's always calling the mobile. I tell him not to waste money like that. He doesn't listen.' He flexed his leg, testing that it still worked. 'And what's he ringing up for anyway? Hasn't got anything to say to me, man.'

  'He is worrying. Perhaps.'

  'Yeah, man. Worrying and nerves. Out of his mind with worrying and nerves.'

  Nazneen sat. She folded her hands in her lap. She smoothed the soft blue fabric of her sari and folded her hands again. She had once more forgotten to cover her hair.

  Karim sat on the arm of the sofa. She did not know what she could say so she said nothing. Karim sat on the place where Chanu rested his head. The plastic sheaths had long gone and hair oil made the fabric shiny. She had thought the phone calls were about work, or other things – that she could not imagine – that belonged to the world out there and which she would never understand. They were from his father and that brought him a little step nearer her world. Still, she could think of nothing to say.

  'He had to retire because of the nerves. Couldn't hang on any longer. Twenty-five years as a bus conductor, and now he can't even leave the flat. That's what you get, man. That's what you get.'

  'Yes. Is what you get.'

  He nodded with great vigour as if he had heard a new idea, one that would change his life for ever.

  'I know what you're saying. That's what you get. All those years on the bus, getting called all the names, taking all the cheek. Kids giving him cheek. Men giving aggro. Got a tooth knocked out. Someone was sick on his shoes, man.' He looked at his trainers. They were clean.

  'I make tea.'

  She went to the kitchen and he followed. He leaned with his back to the cupboards. When Chanu was in the kitchen he leaned as well, but facing the other way, with his stomach resting on the worktop.

  'He had to take early retirement and now he's just sitting at home biting his nails and calling the mobile. "Don't make trouble." He never made any trouble for anyone. Only trouble he made is for himself.'

  Nazneen moved past him to get the milk. He smelled of detergent. A crisp, citrus smell of clean clothes.

  He shook his head. ' "Don't make trouble."'

  The tea was ready. But he showed no sign of moving. Would they drink standing up in the kitchen? Would she invite him to sit down with her in the other room? How would that seem? Would it be better to have him sit, while she continued to work? She decided that was the best plan.

  'He thinks he is Mahatma Gandhi. He thinks he is Jesus Christ. Turn the cheek, man. Turn the cheek.'

  She picked up the cups.

  'What about Muhammad? Peace be upon him, he was a warrior.'

  'Yes,' said Nazneen.

  He looked at her as if he needed more time to absorb the impact of what she had said. He squeezed the back of his neck.

  She was still holding hoth cups when his phone began to bleep. He flipped it open.

  'Salaat alert,' he said.

  'What do you mean?' She was so surprised she slipped into Bengali.

  'On th-th-the phone. It's a service you can get. To warn you of prayer time.'

  'Will you do namaz here?' She said it without thinking, in the same way that another time she had switched instinctively to English.

  He rolled his shoulders. He stopped leaning. 'Yes. I will.'

  He went to the bathroom to wash. In the sitting room, in the small space behind the sofa and in front of the door, she rolled out her prayer mat. 'I'll pray a little later,' she said. There was nothing wrong with it. No reason why he should not pray here; it only delayed her a short while.

  'Allahu Akbar.'

  He stood to attention, with hands raised to shoulder level.

  He put his right hand over his left on his chest. She tried to stop the prayer words forming on her lips. To pray with an unrelated man, it was not permitted. She would pray later.

  'Glory and praise be to You, O God; blessed is Your name and exalted is Your majesty. There is no God other than You. I come, seeking shelter from Satan, the rejected one.'

  She heard the blood pound in her heart and she trembled because he would surely hear it. She closed her eyes. At once Amma came to her, shedding her famous tears, wailing with her hand over her mouth.

  'He is God the One; He is the Eternal Absolute,' said Karim. His voice did not falter.

  In prayer he does not falter, thought Nazneen. And she pleaded with herself to keep fast to the words.

  'None is born of Him and neither is He born. There is none like unto Him.'

  He bowed, hands on knees, straight back. She saw how well he moved. Twice more. It was he who moved, but she who felt dizzy.

  Nazneen rolled up the mat and put it in the wardrobe. She would need it again soon but this setting straight was necessary. Later, when she changed the sheets after he had been, she remembered this action. She remembered it perfectly. In the only way that pain can be truly remembered, through a new pain.

  He had packed the vests himself and he was waiting to go. He fiddled with the strap across his shoulder and he fingered the mobile. He began to leave and then he adjusted his bag again and he said, 'I want to ask you to come to something. A meeting.' He ran a hand over his hair. 'Please ask your husband. It's for all Muslims. We want everyone to be represented. And we don't have any older women.'

  It was only after he had gone that she realized. He meant her as an older woman.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Of course she would not go. It was out of the question. she did not mention it to Chanu because there was no question of her going. There was no point in raising it.

  On the day, she had little to do. She had finished her sewing in the night, moving between the kitchen to eat and the sitting room to work. She had gone into the bedroom and taken Chanu's book from the pillow. She had gone again and pulled up the bedclothes to hide his shoulde
rs. A third time, she watched him from the door, and stepped out of the way when he stirred.

  She was tired today but she was restless. The fridge was stacked with Tupperware and there was no real excuse to cook. She washed a few socks in the kitchen sink, and then she went out.

  The meeting was in a low building at the edge of the estate. It had been built without concession to beauty and with the expectation of defilement. The windows were fixed with thick metal grilles that had never been opened and notices were screwed to the brickwork that read in English and Bengali: Vandals will be Prosecuted. This was pure rhetoric. The notices were scrawled over in red and black ink. One dangled by a single remaining screw. Someone had written in careful flowing silver spray over the wall, Pakis. And someone else, in less beautiful but confident black letters, had added, Rule. The doors were open and two girls in hijab went inside.

  Nazneen, seeking cover, rushed to follow. Sunlight lit up the entrance but inside the hall was gloomy. The girls had gone straight to the front and were arranging themselves on chairs. Nazneen hesitated; she considered turning round. Nobody had seen her.

  'Get on the train of repentance, sister, before it passes your station.'

  Her mouth was full of saliva and she could not swallow.

  A small young man with a scabrous-looking beard grinned at her. He was drowning in white panjabi-pyjama and he had a skullcap in his hands. He waved the skullcap at her. 'Welcome. You are welcome, sister. Go and sit down.'

  She walked uncertainly past empty folding chairs. Four rows at the front were at best half full. Where to sit? Next to someone. Not a man. Not next to someone. Leave a seat between. It will look rude. No, it will look as though I am expecting someone to join me. My husband. But he won't come and then they will wonder about me. Talk. Even before I have left they will talk. She held on to the edge of a chair. She saw people indistinctly and she heard voices without hearing words.

  He put his face in front of hers. He was saying something. Now he was pointing. 'Sit there,' Karim said. She sat down hard.

  He walked to the front and jumped up on the small stage. He clapped his hands.

  'Right,' he said. 'Thank you all for coming.'

  She heard the door open. Now the same voice that had greeted her at the entrance. 'Get on the train of repentance, brother, before it passes your station.'

  She allowed herself to look around. Mostly young men, jeans and trainers, a few kurtas, a handful of girls in hijab. Maybe twenty people.

  'Right,' Karim said again. 'I shall ask our Secretary to read out the business for today. Anyone wants to add anything, please raise your hand.'

  The small man with the ineffectual beard ran up from the back. 'Business of the day. Number one, name selection. Number two, mission statement. Number three, election of Board.'

  Immediately a hand went up. The Secretary pointed to it. 'Yes?'

  'Why don't we do this all in our own language?'

  The Secretary grinned. He looked at Karim. 'Question from the floor. Do I allow it?'

  Karim stood with his arms folded. 'I will answer. This meeting is open to all Muslims. I'm talking about the ummah here. Every brother and every sister, wherever they come from.'

  The Questioner stood up and looked elaborately around the hall, even at the empty chairs. 'Ekhane amra shobai Bangali? Anyone here not speak Bengali?'

  There was a moment's silence before a chair scraped back and a black man in a wide-sleeved swirly-print shirt stood up. 'Do I look like a Bengali to you, brother?'

  The Questioner showed his palms as if the game was up, and they both sat back down.

  'OK,' said the Secretary. 'Name selection. Item one. I open it to the floor.'

  'Muslim League!'

  'United Muslim Action.'

  'Muslim Front.'

  The two girls whom Nazneen had seen coming in whispered behind their hands. Eventually one called out, 'Society of Muslim Youth, Tower Hamlets.'

  The Secretary waved his arms. He dropped his skullcap, picked it up and thrust it in his pocket. 'Enough suggestions. We'll take a vote. What was the first one? Who made the first suggestion? Speak up.'

  The Questioner jumped to his feet. 'This man is Secretary, but he takes no notes. It is totally un-Islamic'

  The Secretary drew himself up to his full height. His small face bulged with indignation. 'Where does it say in the Qur'an anything about taking notes?'

  'It is clear in the hadith and the sunnah that a man must take his responsibilities seriously.'

  The Secretary wound himself up to reply. His beard quivered. The turn-up of one pyjama leg had come down and covered one foot entirely. Nazneen worked it out. His beard was too young to grow full.

  Karim put a hand on the boy's shoulder. 'Get a pen and a pad. You will be in charge of keeping the record.'

  There was some discussion then about whether the name of the group could be chosen without the purpose of the group being voted on first. The Secretary grew excited. As his excitement grew, so his pyjamas seemed also to grow until he became a thin voice squeaking inside a tent. 'It's the Agenda, man. We got to stick to the Agenda.'

  Karim settled it. 'We'll take the name first. We all know what we are here for.'

  There was a general, murmured agreement. Nazneen found herself joining in although she was only there because there was no sewing and no housework to be done.

  He walked about the stage and she saw that it was a show of command. He stood at the edge of the stage and said, 'The Secretary has noted all your suggestions. I have another to add. The Bengal Tigers.'

  There was a collective gasp, and the hijab girls raised their hands to their mouths for some more intensive whispering.

  'Ben-gal Ti-gers,' shouted a young man in the front row. He punched the air with his fist in time to the syllables. 'Can I have that name for my band?'

  The Questioner was on his feet again. 'Are we forgetting our non-Bengali brother here?'

  Karim walked across the stage to stand in front of the swirly-shirt man. The Secretary followed, pad at the ready. 'I ain't meaning,' said Karim, 'to alienate you, man.'

  The black man stood up and bowed deeply. 'Man, I think it is a powerful name. I gonna be proud to be a Bengal Tiger.'

  The vote was taken and the motion carried (unanimously, said the Secretary, with one ununanimous vote against) and the meeting moved on to item two: mission statement.

  Suggestions were shouted up from the floor while the Secretary scribbled on his pad. He sat on the edge of the stage now with his legs dangling and he chewed the end of his pen, just like Bibi. Karim remained standing, though every so often he moved about so that when he became still again he could plant his legs and fold his arms and show his strength anew. The girls in hijab had grown more relaxed. They no longer whispered but talked to each other without raising their hands. And they shouted out suggestions freely. 'Women's rights,' called one. 'Sex education for girls,' called the other. 'Got to put that in.' But she lowered her head immediately she had spoken, ducking out of it.

  Karim called for a break and from somewhere a trolley was found, decked with white plastic cups. The girls placed themselves behind it and served. The young men took out their packets of Marlboros.

  Directly in front of Nazneen, some lads had broken the line of chairs to form a sub-committee.

  'They take down one of ours, right, we'll take down ten of theirs. Simple as that.'

  'Burn their office. What we waiting for?'

  'We don't know where it is.'

  'They shouldn't come round here. What they doin' round here if they don't like it?'

  'We don't want no trouble. But if they come asking, yeah, we'll give them what they want.'

  'Few years ago – think about it – they'd never dare.'

  'We was better organized.'

  'Now we's too busy fighting each other.'

  'Brick Lane Massive 'gainst the Stepney Green Posse.'

  'The racists – they cleared out of here ages ago.'r />
  'What about Shiblu Rahman?'

  Nazneen recognized the name. The man had been stabbed to death.

  'It could happen again.'

  'Thing is, see, they is getting more sophisticated. They don't say race, they say culture, religion.'

  'They put their filthy leaflets through my front door.'

  'We all know what we're here for. Why don't we get on with it?'

  Karim called the meeting to order. 'Right. We're taking a vote. What are we for? We are for Muslim rights and culture. We're into protecting our local ummah and supporting the global ummah.'

  The Secretary scrambled onto the stage. 'Voting. Everyone raise your hand. I mean, those in support – raise the hand.'

  All hands were raised.

  'Unanimous.' He made a mark on the page.

  'What are we against?' said Karim. 'We are against—'

  'Lion Hearts,' someone shouted from the floor.

  'We are against,' said Karim, 'any group that opposes us.'

  It was carried.

  The musician made a request for his band to become the official musical group of the Bengal Tigers. 'Spread the message, like. Are you cool with it, man?'

  The Questioner was on his feet once again. 'What will we do?' He had changed his seat during the break and was close enough now for Nazneen to see that he had the dangerous face of an enthusiast. 'We are "for" this and "against" that. Are we a debating club?'

  There was some laughter and the Questioner's face grew keener still. He was spare and hungry, this boy. His clothes hung from his bones as if flesh was an unnecessary expense, as if his passion consumed him. The only extravagance was his nose, which was large, though being hard and bony-looking it managed yet to add to the impression of austerity.

  'What do we want?' said the Questioner. 'Action, or debating?'

  Karim cut off the laughter. 'Item three. Election of the Board.' He looked at the Questioner. 'If I am elected, the action will begin straight away.'

  The Secretary was elected to be Secretary. Though no one else stood for the position, he looked down into his crotch as the vote was taken as if the suspense were unbearable. Afterwards, he hitched his pyjamas in the manner of one girding his loins.