Brick Lane

by Monica Ali

  I think then maybe Amma not go out anywhere but someone is coming for visit today is why she have put on fineries. I dont know why but I run away then. Is it that she look around? Is it just I get bored? I go back to chickens or I go to find you. I dont remember. But I go away from her then.

  May Allah forgive her. It she who leave.

  May Allah show His Mercy onto her. She see no other way.

  Sister I sitting in my electric light room write to you and I asking Him to put light in my heart so I see more clear the ways.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  The paper was pale blue and light as a baby's breath. Nazneen looked at the outline of her fingers beneath the letter. She held her hand open, flat. Hasina's letter lifted at the ends, cleaving to its folds. Breathless, she watched it flicker and held it by her fascination alone, like a butterfly that alights from nowhere and, weightless, displaces the world.

  Nazneen curled her fingers. She pinched along the creases and clapped the letter between her palms. There was no escape. Turning the letter deftly between the heel of one hand and the hollow of the other, she worked it around and around. Then she tucked it into the drawstrings of her underskirt at the place where she had pleated her sari.

  The plane left tomorrow and she would not be on it. She opened a drawer, took out a pile of Bibi's vests and pants and put them into a suitcase. From the cupboard she pulled down an armful of salwaar kameez and flung them on top. It would not do. She knelt down and began to disengage the metal hangers. Down on the floor she looked at the shelves beneath the girls' desks. The books were tumbled and askew, and the corners dented by feet. She looked up at the wallpaper, shyly turning in on itself. Nothing would stick to those walls. They would have to be scraped clean and begun afresh. Three, four, five, six kameez folded. What else to pack?

  She stood by Shahana's desk. A cracked mug bearing a picture of a thatch-roofed cottage and a mouse in trousers leaning on the gatepost. It was a picture of England. Roses around the door. Nazneen had never seen this England but now, idly, the idea formed that she would visit it. The mug held pens, a gnawed ruler, hair slides and two lipsticks. Nazneen pulled the lid off a lipstick and it gave way with a satisfying pop. On the back of her hand, the colour showed like dried blood. She saw Shahana's pink mouth turn to black.

  She recapped the lipstick and put it back in the mug. There was a lot to be done. It would look best, she had decided, if most of the packing was finished by this evening. Or Chanu would find a way to make her change her mind. The children were distorted with anxiety, but she could not help it. Not yet. When they left for school – for the last time, as far as they knew – Shahana had stamped on her foot. 'Be careful,' said Nazneen, swallowing a scream.

  'I hope it's broken,' said Shahana. She cracked her thumb joint.

  Bibi ducked away, and dodged a kiss. She did her own plaits before Nazneen had even risen. They were tight and straight and without need of a mother's hands.

  Nazneen worked quickly. The clothes went into the suitcases with room to spare. The gaps made everything more unhappy and she rearranged until they disappeared. Then she fished the books from beneath the desks and piled them into boxes. How little time it took. Nazneen left the room without looking round.

  The rest of the packing could wait a while. There was something she had to do now. The sitting room was half packed. The computer sat inside an old nappy box. A pink and white baby reached its little fist out from the side. Brown cardboard boxes, full of Chanu's papers and files, were stacked up on the trolley. The door of the corner cabinet was open and the only thing inside was yellowing newspaper, lining the shelves. What had been in there? When was the last time she had opened it? Inside the glass showcase the pottery tigers, lions and elephants still roamed freely, hampered only by dust and lack of will. The shelves had been cleared of books. Only the Qur'an floated above on its special ledge. Nazneen went to the trolley and opened up one of the brown boxes. She searched through, looking for Chanu's address book. She knew the name of the street where Mrs Islam lived. She knew the house by sight, but she did not know the number.

  For some reason, it was impossible to go out on her mission without arming herself with this knowledge. She wished she had something else to take with her. A piece of paper, a letter with official stamps and powerfully illegible signatures, an amulet to hang around her neck. She felt the letter at her hip, and removed it to the table. Then she lifted a corner of the sewing machine and slipped it beneath the flat metal.

  There was somebody at the door. Nazneen touched her hair: the temples, across the forehead, the crown and the bun at her nape. She went to the hallway and caught the cloying smell of medicine and the high lift of mints.

  'I was on my way to see you,' Nazneen told Mrs Islam.

  It was impossible for Mrs Islam's face to register surprise. Her eyebrows lifted but they could say nothing more than 'I disapprove'.

  'Indeed?' Mrs Islam rolled into the hallway, massaging the top of her thigh. Two wide shapes swung into view and overlapped in the doorway, like a pair of ill-fitting double doors. 'What are you dawdling around there for? Get along now, for the love of God.' She didn't bother to look over her shoulder. Her sons walked behind her, one toting the black bag, the other clutching a can of Ralgex Heat Spray.

  Nazneen went to make tea. All but two of the mugs were packed. While the kettle boiled she pinched the air out of bubbles in the plastic wrapping.

  When she returned to the sitting room Mrs Islam was lying on the sofa, feet on one armrest, head on the other.

  'Not long now.' Her voice was small but still sharp around the edges.

  'Tomorrow,' said Nazneen.

  'Tomorrow?' snapped Mrs Islam. 'I don't have long, but I can assure you I will live out this day and the next.' She snorted. 'God willing,' she added.

  'What I thought you meant. . .'

  'Yes, yes. What you thought I meant. I know. But how is it that young people these days never listen to their elders?'

  Son Number One and Son Number Two stood behind the sofa. Son Number One wore a round-necked peach jumper and a collar of chest hair. The distance between his nostrils and his upper lip was unusually small. As a result he appeared constantly offended. He looked like he was making up insults. And failing. By contrast, his brother looked like a genius. He had a politician's face: alert, eager, sensitive, cunning. His eyes twinkled with a love of his fellow man, and his mouth was a cast of sympathy. How galling it must be for Mrs Islam. How often did she look at Son Number Two, let hope triumph over experience, and expect from him what his face so patently promised?

  Mrs Islam regarded her sons. She closed her eyes.

  Nazneen poured tea.

  Upstairs the television was on. An audience applauded. Two faint pings, some mumbling, more applause.

  'I have brought something for the girls,' said Mrs Islam. She opened her eyes and fluttered her hand at Son Number One.

  Son Number One opened the big black bag. 'They're here.' He closed the bag.

  His mother mouthed some terrible and soundless curse. She pushed her hand against her forehead.

  'Make her give the money first.' Son Number One's mouth appeared to brush his nose as he spoke.

  'Idiot! Stupid! Imbecile!' Mrs Islam blew the words from her mouth like poison darts. 'First you must get a brain, then you can use it.' She began to cough. Each cough lifted her feet off the armrest.

  Son Number One looked straight ahead, his face immobile as his brain.

  Son Number Two seized the medicine bag. He fished out two little brown-glass bottles with white prescription labels. Mrs Islam took the pills and chewed them slowly. Her teeth clacked together. She washed down the bitter powders with a swig of Benylin Chesty Coughs.

  'The girls,' she said to Son Number Two.

  Son Number Two drew two sets of ankle bells from his mother's bag. He shook them next to one ear and then the other.

  Mrs Islam gave him a look.

  'Just a small thing. A
gift between friends.' She spoke in short gasps and held her chest as though that would stop it heaving. 'How are the girls? Don't tell me. They don't want to go. I know how it is. Giving you plenty of worry. And it never stops.' She gave birth to a long-gestated sigh. 'Believe me, it never stops.'

  Nazneen said, 'I was coming to see you.'

  But Mrs Islam was still circling her own thought. Her hair was coming loose as it rubbed on the sofa. It was tied in a loose white bundle. The hair looked so dry it was a wonder it did not simply crumble.

  'You'll miss the march, then,' said Son Number Two. He turned his intelligent face to Nazneen.

  'Yes. The flight is later, but yes.' Nazneen looked around. 'So much to do.'

  'We'll be there,' said Son Number One. 'It's going to be good.'

  'I reckon,' said Son Number Two. He wagged his finger and looked sure to produce some insight of stunning acuity. 'It's going to be a laugh.'

  'Laugh? I'll tell you what's funny.' Mrs Islam lifted her head and propped herself on her elbows. 'All our boys going around, march, march, march. They have nothing better to do. Who is going to go and march against them? One or two troublemakers sticking dirty leaflets through our door. Why not catch them and give them a good once-for-all beating? Why go to all this bother, march, march, march. I will tell you something now.' She paused a while. 'I will tell you something. Not more than ten white people will turn up tomorrow. Not more than ten.'

  She rested her head again. Nazneen could hear her breathe. Each breath came so unwillingly, how many more could come? How brave it will be, thought Nazneen, to stand up to this dying woman.

  'I'll tell you something else,' said Mrs Islam, speaking to the ceiling. 'The rest will not come because they are too busy. When there is money to be made, why should they care about anything else? No. They will not come because they are not afraid. They have no respect for us. How can they fear us?'

  She began to rub her hip and Son Number Two, proving no slouch, handed her the Ralgex. Mrs Islam sprayed her sari indiscriminately.

  'Now, if we had money,' she went on, 'then you would see the difference. The block off Adler Street, the council sold it off. Do you know how many flats inside there now? Eight! Each one the size of a cricket pitch. Only one or two people living in each flat. How are they going to respect us, living ten to one room? They will not march. It is too much trouble. If they want us out of here, they can buy us out.'

  Son Number One said, 'Not us though, eh? We'll buy them out first.'

  Mrs Islam pulled a handkerchief from her sleeve and spat into it.

  Son Number Two said, 'Didn't she tell you to keep quiet?'

  Nazneen looked at the brothers. There was a rumour that they owned a pub in Stepney. There was another rumour that on Sunday mornings a woman danced in the pub and took all her clothes off. It was said that this was an English tradition. That the men went to the pub on Sunday morning, sent by wives who wanted to cook and clean while the husbands were out of the way, looking at another woman's breasts. Son Number One pushed his lips further up his face, working really hard on an insult. There was a rumour that Son Number One had a white girlfriend and two buttermilk children. There was a rumour that Son Number Two had been in prison for assault, or fraud, or both.

  Rumour surrounded them but it did not touch them.

  'Two hundred pounds, to settle the debt,' said Mrs Islam, still talking to the ceiling.

  Footsteps traced the length of the room above.

  The only thing that people did not talk about was this: the moneylending.

  Son Number Two came out from behind the sofa. He stood by the showcase with his hands behind his back.

  'How much did my husband borrow?'

  'What?' said Mrs Islam as faintly as she could. 'Oh, two hundred will settle it.'

  Nazneen looked down at her hands. 'Because I worked it out. And unless I made a mistake, then we've paid it all back.'

  Mrs Islam's breath rattled the windowpanes. She coughed so much that her shoulders and her feet lifted and she sort of folded in the middle. 'Whenever God decides, I am ready,' she rasped.

  'We paid it all back, and some more as well.'

  'I am an old woman now. Do as you like. The money is for the madrassa, but what does it matter to you? I am an old woman now.' Mrs Islam took a spotted handkerchief from her stores and dabbed it over her face.

  The sound of breaking glass shot like iced water down Nazneen's spine. She looked up.

  'You're upsetting my mother,' said Son Number Two. 'When she gets upset, I get upset. Sometimes I break things.'

  The top of the showcase was caved in. A little cloud of glass dust showered the pottery figures.

  'Sometimes I break things as well,' said Son Number One.

  Mrs Islam panted. She motioned to Nazneen to get moving. 'Quick. Two hundred pounds and settle it.'

  Nazneen's blood thickened. Her heart strained to push it round her body. 'No.'

  Son Number Two had conjured a cricket bat from somewhere. As he lifted it over his head, Nazneen wondered if it had been inside the black bag.

  The bat came down on the showcase and smashed through two shelves. The noise was terrific. Son Number Two turned round. He had flecks of blood on his cheek, glassed by splinters. His expression was both analytical and concerned, and entirely pleasant.

  'Wooo!' said Son Number One. He tickled his chest hairs and tried to tuck them down his jumper.

  'We paid what we owed,' said Nazneen. Her voice clogged up her ears. 'We paid at least three hundred pounds on top of that. I am not going to pay any more . . .' She hesitated. 'Any more riba.'

  'You bitch,' said Son Number One. 'Should I make her pay?' He looked at his mother with great hope in his little eyes.

  'Riba,' whispered Mrs Islam. 'Riba, she says.' Her head lolled around as if the word had given her fever. 'Do you think, before God, that I would charge interest? Am I a moneylender? A usurer? Is this how I am repaid for helping a friend in need?'

  'No?' said Nazneen. She thought she might be shouting, but she really could not help it. 'Not interest? Not a usurer? Let's see then. Swear it.' She ran across to where the Book was kept. Glass crunched beneath her sandals. 'Swear on the Qur'an. And I'll give you the two hundred.'

  Mrs Islam was perfectly still. Nazneen listened for her breath, but all she could hear was her own.

  Son Number One stirred. 'I'm going to break . . .'

  'My arm,' shouted Nazneen. 'Break my arm. Break them both.' She held her arms out, until she began to feel foolish.

  Slowly, Mrs Islam swung her feet down and sat up on the sofa. Her hair had been dragged apart and it hung in thick swathes around her neck. She glared at Nazneen with her hot-coal eyes. Nazneen took it and she turned it round. A minute passed. The television crowd applauded with muffled enthusiasm. Music came and went, and the lunatic scramble of advertisements. Mrs Islam stood up.

  'There are some things a wife does not want a husband to know.'

  Nazneen burned. She did not look away.

  'Fresh start,' said Mrs Islam. 'New life, back home. You don't want anything to spoil it.'

  'My husband,' said Nazneen slowly, 'knows everything. He'll come soon. Why don't you ask him?'

  The impossible happened. Mrs Islam looked surprised.

  Nazneen, strengthened, said, 'Swear on the Qur'an. That's all you have to do.'

  Mrs Islam picked up the ankle bells from the back of the sofa. She placed them on the coffee table. 'For the girls,' she said.

  She walked over to Son Number Two and picked up her bag.

  Son Number Two nodded, as if everything had happened just as he expected.

  'Let's go,' he said. 'They paid too much anyway.' He gave a good-natured laugh.

  Mrs Islam let out a cry, a low animal noise of despair. With both hands she raised her medicine bag and swung it at her son's shoulder. It bounced off. She swung at his head and missed. She made another cry; shrill this time, as if she had been cut. Son Number Two moved leisu
rely towards the door. He put his hands up to shield his head. Mrs Islam followed. As she passed, Nazneen saw the tears flood her eyes and pour down her cheeks. She wielded the bag once more and struck Son Number Two on the back. She made a sound in the back of her throat that Nazneen remembered for days.

  Son Number One was still at his station behind the sofa. He looked around, trying to decide something. Then he walked over to the ruins of the showcase and levelled a kick at the one remaining door. The door twanged and vibrated and came to rest intact. Son Number One shrugged. With the tip of his shoe he toppled a few boxes, and then he left.

  Nazneen fetched the dustpan and brush. She wrapped the large pieces of glass in newspaper and began to sweep up the rest. Nothing at all came to her mind. As she squatted in the debris, everything inside was peaceful. She stopped working and slipped into the moment like a hot bath. Gradually, a thought began to form. God provided a way. Nazneen smiled. God provided a way, and I found it.

  She walked down Brick Lane to get to the tube station at Whitechapel. Days of the Raj restaurant had a new statue in the window: Ganesh seated against a rising sun, his trunk curling playfully on his breast. The Lancer already displayed Radha-Krishna; Popadum went with Saraswati; and Sweet Lassi covered all the options with a black-tongued, evil-eyed Kali and a torpid soapstone Buddha. 'Hindus?' said Nazneen when the trend first started. 'Here?' Chanu patted his stomach. 'Not Hindus. Marketing. Biggest god of all.' The white people liked to see the gods. 'For authenticity,' said Chanu.

  Outside the station a little lad, maybe ten or twelve years old, walked back and forth across the entrance. He had headphones round his neck and springs in his heels. A boy came galloping up the steps and banged into him.

  'Watch it,' said the little lad.

  'You all right? Didn't see you there.' The boy was older; old enough perhaps that he called himself a man.

  'Clear off,' said the small one. 'Or else.'

  'Or else?' The boy was amused. 'Or else what, little brother?'