Trespassing

by Uzma Aslam Khan

  They ducked under the trellis of jade vine, and the path widened to a ring of laburnum trees. In the center stood a glass-top table glittering in the evening sun like a pink topaz, arranged with hot refreshments and a tall jug of chilled almond juice. The cook was obviously in a good mood today; tea varied in complexity depending on his whim. At his best, he served an assortment of sweetmeats and savories in Riffat’s finest dishware, adopting the debonair style he claimed had been his trademark in younger days. (When you were a fisherman? Dia would ask, but he’d ignore her.) At other times he’d barely remember to make tea at all, and complain if reminded.

  Now he held out a chair and napkin for each. ‘Tea is on its way,’ he announced, marching back into the kitchen.

  ‘You never know when it’ll hit him,’ laughed Riffat, pouring juice for Dia.

  While she sipped it, Dia found she could not banish Nini from her thoughts. On Tuesday, Nini would go on display. The same Nini who’d so carelessly dismissed Dia’s mother: Where do dreams get us? If you’re not careful, you’ll end up lonely, like …

  Not only had Nini spoiled Dia’s chance to see the moths, but she forced Dia to hear again the remarks others aimed at Riffat.

  When her husband died, Riffat’s in-laws had taken over management of the factory, but she hadn’t let them take over her farm. She hadn’t listened when they said she needed to spend more time with the newly orphaned children. She hadn’t changed her routine. Her brother-in-law, whether out of kindness or malice, urged the family to let her be. ‘She will have fans but no friends,’ he declared. He’d been right. That was the price a proud woman had to pay.

  Dia alone looked close enough to see the signs of wear: sometimes, when Riffat’s ulcers made her wince, she forgot to color the gray roots of her curls or conceal the bags under her eyes. And sometimes, her efficacy revealed cracks – instead of studying her notes on farm productivity, like Dia, she was seen gazing dreamily at butterflies and clouds.

  But she recovered quickly, so to others she was the same fashionable Riffat who undertook any endeavor by first looking beyond it, then setting about getting firmly there. When she walked down the street, men and women ogled, but not because they wanted to caress her. They wanted to stop her. They were unwilling to accept that every obstacle made her chin rise higher.

  In contrast, Dia was easily benumbed. She did not know what would happen on Tuesday. Nor was she able to decide what ought to happen – should the boy hate Nini? Should she produce another prank? How was she to get Nini back?

  Riffat would have a plan, and unlike Dia’s disastrous one at the Quran Khwani, hers would not leak. How she wished for her mother’s strong nerves and sense of purpose, intimidating as it was!

  They were different even to look at, sharing no features except the hooked nose. Dia was short with straight hair and light brown eyes; her mother was tall and wore her hair in a short, curly crop. Instead of Riffat’s strong jaw and high cheekbones, Dia’s face was oval and her cheek soft. When Dia walked down the street, even though most considered her too dark to be pretty, men always tried to touch her. At such times she wished her mother had rubbed some of her stoniness on to her.

  But, thought Dia, the best thing about her mother was that she never tried to make Dia more like herself.

  Inam Gul served the tea.

  ‘Thank God there was no strike today,’ said Riffat. ‘Or we’d still be at the farm.’ Conversation turned to the family. Dia’s lovesick brother Hassan was unable to snap out of it. The girl was obviously not interested. What should they do?

  ‘Send him to the Arctic,’ offered Dia, burying herself in ghee.

  ‘He may as well already be there,’ Riffat sighed. ‘I hope Amir visits this winter. Maybe Hassan needs a man-to-man talk.’

  ‘So what does Amir have to do with it?’

  ‘Come on now.’ She plucked a samosa.

  Dia looked up. ‘The doctor said no.’

  ‘Well, don’t tell him then.’

  When the forbidden food was consumed, Riffat spoke of one of her sisters, who visited from Islamabad the day Dia had been adorning Nini’s back with silkworms. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask where you went. We rushed back from the mill and Erum was so disappointed to find you gone. Inam Gul said Nissrine picked you up. But you haven’t said a thing about it?’

  Dia mumbled, ‘Yes. She took me somewhere.’

  ‘That awful?’

  ‘Don’t ask.’ Dia’s appetite began to diminish. ‘Well, all right. Nini wanted me to attend a Quran Khwani.’

  ‘A Quran Khwani? Who died?’

  ‘The father of a boy her mother wants her to marry.’

  ‘No!’ Riffat gasped. ‘So young. Barely twenty, poor child.’

  ‘You’d think,’ Dia fumed, ‘she, of all people, wouldn’t settle for being “a poor child”. She has options. She could refuse. But can’t you just see her ten years from now? Cranky kids, husband away, long-suffering eyes. I’ll hate her then, Ama. I’ll hate her because she’ll be just another woman pretending she had no choice.’ Dia stopped. At last, she had voiced her worst fear out loud: I’ll hate her.

  ‘She could refuse,’ Riffat pondered. ‘But at what cost?’

  ‘At any cost.’

  ‘Calm down, darling. You’re young. You’ve no idea how hostile society gets if you challenge it.’

  ‘I’ve some idea – through you.’

  A fleeting sorrow shot through Riffat’s eyes, but faded quickly. ‘True again, though that’s still not enough of an idea. For your sake, I hope it never is. Anyway,’ she added with a smile, ‘I’m always on your side, whatever you choose. And whatever others say about it.’

  Sipping the rest of her tea, Riffat continued, ‘Imagine Nissrine’s life if she resists. Waking up every morning to an icy household. Eating leftovers alone. Sly gossip forever in her ears. And that’s just the silent hate. What about all the guilt from her mother? “I’ve lost face all because of you.” Or, “Is this my reward for all the sacrifices we made?” Or, “Your father’s health is failing.” Or, “He’s leaving me just because of you …” To whom would the girl turn?’

  Dia turned away, uncomfortable with where the conversation was heading. It was the first time Riffat had alluded to her own difficulties. She did it as though she told someone else’s story, as though this was for Nini. It wasn’t. It was for Dia. She was trying to tell her that she too would have to think about these things.

  Her mother kept on. ‘And if it’s not Nini’s mother who’ll say those things, it’ll be someone else. And the older she gets, the more voices will chip in …’

  Dia shut her eyes, hoping to shut out Riffat’s story. If Riffat had been coerced into marrying Dia’s large and delightful father, she didn’t want to know. If they’d little between them, she wouldn’t hear it. The man was dead now. It wasn’t fair.

  ‘… She’d have no one to turn to.’

  ‘Stop saying that,’ Dia blurted. ‘She’d have me, wouldn’t she?’

  ‘No, Dia. She’d need to look elsewhere. Some day, so will you.’

  ‘Pah!’ She could think of nothing more convincing to say.

  ‘I’m not saying you’ll become Nini. I’m saying she’s not you – and she’s not going to be either. For her, giving in may not only be easier but also more fulfilling. She may not think of it as giving in. Right now, you’re not in a position to judge. Yes,’ she added, ‘years from now, if she expects pity for her decision, maybe.’

  Dia studied her intently. But Riffat’s face gave away nothing.

  Wisps of salmon-pink brushed through the cloud cover as the sun set. The sky resounded with the call for Maghrib prayer. The muezzin had a thin, plaintive voice and when he sang, Dia felt the day close around her. It was as if the call asked what the day had brought. The same errors? Yes, exactly the same. Even so, God hadn’t lost hope entirely. There would be tomorrow, though one day tomorrow would run out. He would not keep spinning for ever.

  It was the
call that made Dia want to go to Him the most.

  Inam Gul scurried into the bower with a mosquito coil. ‘More tea?’ he enquired.

  ‘No, thank you, Inam Gul. Everything was delicious. But our philosophical Dia dwells on matters your delicacies can’t appease – and she’ll infect us too if we’re not careful.’

  Dia scowled at her mother and Inam Gul shook his head, safely commiserating with both. Then he piled the dishes and vanished into the swiftly descending darkness.

  The twilight erupted with activity. Cats crossed paths and hissed; a chameleon’s eyes glittered like black ice; a car honked for the gate to be opened. When darkness fell, the car rumbled into its hole, and all was momentarily still.

  Dia surprised herself by being the one to reopen the discussion. ‘You’ve always told me not to blindly go with things. That too many people let others decide their future, and it’s as if individual apathy has snowballed into a national one. If all Ninis go the same way, all their offspring will too, and nothing around us will ever change.’

  She was doubly surprised when Riffat did not answer. And then she worried. Her mother was rarely at a loss for words.

  At last Riffat replied, ‘Well, as I said, it may not just be pressure that’s pushing Nini. She may not be moving blindly, even if she is following tradition. It may work for her, if not immediately, maybe one day …’

  Dia leaned forward. ‘You never used to believe in the one-day theory. You always said not to wait for miracles, but to live in the present.’

  Riffat sighed. ‘I know, Dia. It’s just that, who knows, maybe Nini will find love, and the dear girl can be happy. That’s all. Love lurks in unexpected places.’ Her voice trailed.

  Dia rolled her eyes. Her mother was in such a peculiar mood today. ‘Ninety per cent of women do this. You can hardly call it unexpected.’

  ‘Why not? Some of them, at least, do fall into love. And here I always thought you were a romantic, curling up in the arms of enchanted trees, lost in thousand-year-old stories. Don’t you believe anything is possible? Some women say they find love after marriage.’

  Again Dia shifted uncomfortably. Did you? She couldn’t bring herself to ask. But she did know, as Nini too had recently pointed out, that it was the wife and not the single girl who grew into the plucky woman that revolutionized the production of silk in the country. Something about the arrangement had obviously worked for her. But was that all it was then – a settlement? Business partners, not lovers. Strangers, not friends.

  Hardly a star lit the overcast sky. The cap of a crescent moon protruded from a pillow of clouds, then it too was masked.

  Suddenly Riffat piped, ‘What’s the boy’s name anyway?’

  Smoke from the mosquito coil snaked between their knees. Dia rose to place it further away from them. ‘Oh, some Daanishwar. Daanishwar Shafqat, I think Nini said.’

  She’d barely returned to her seat when Riffat abruptly sat up. ‘Shafqat? Are you sure? Any idea what his father did?’ The voice had risen and was noticeably tight.

  Dia folded her legs thoughtfully. ‘Nini said he’d been a well-respected doctor, although, like her family, this one’s run into some financial trouble. She gave me all the “important” details: the doctor’s father had been a modest, gentlemanly civil servant and brave journalist. Slogged to educate his son and all. The doctor left a widow and just one child …’ She stopped. Was that her mother wheezing? ‘What’s the matter, Ama? Wait, let me turn on the lights.’

  ‘No!’ Riffat shrieked. ‘No. Sit down.’

  ‘Wh …?’

  ‘How dare you go there without my permission!’ she snapped.

  ‘But …’

  ‘Be quiet! Not one word.’ She began pacing between the boles of the trees.

  What had provoked this? Dia knew better than to pose the question now. Riffat rarely lost her temper, at home or at work. She tried to remember the last time it had happened. Was it when Hassan came home drunk one day, armed with a whisky bottle, and threatened to crack Dia’s head with it? Or when the eldest, Amir, offered one of Riffat’s rings to his Scottish girlfriend – now his wife? No, even then she’d not been in such a rage.

  Breathing heavily, at last Riffat said, ‘I’ll say this once and once only. You’re not to blame, you didn’t know. But now you do. Take care never to step in that house again. Clear?’

  What didn’t she know? What did she know now? Under her breath, Dia mumbled, ‘It’s not clear at all.’

  A distracted Riffat returned to her dark corner and adjusted herself in the chair.

  Dia gazed up at the sky, watching the wind stir the clouds that fragmented the moon. Then she glared at her mother. Her mother who always had a plan. She would know what should happen next. Dia didn’t.

  3

  Inam Gul For Ever

  The next day, when Riffat had left for the mill, Inam Gul followed Dia around the house, devising ways of discovering what had happened the previous evening.

  ‘You have to know everything, don’t you?’ She clicked her tongue.

  ‘But what do you mean?’ He sucked in his lips.

  ‘I’m sure you heard it all.’

  ‘Heard what?’

  ‘I’ll tell you something. That American boy and his mother are going to Nini’s house in two days. She wants me there.’

  He clapped his hands. ‘No!’

  ‘This is no cause for celebration, you know.’

  He shook his head. ‘No, no. No cause at all.’

  She watched him.

  He watched her.

  ‘Go on,’ she said, smiling a little at last. ‘Ask away.’

  He steered her gently from the dining room into the TV lounge. He fluffed up the pillows on the couch. He clasped the remote control.

  ‘Oh no you don’t.’ She snatched it.

  He again sucked on his gums.

  ‘You’ve gone through all those films a dozen times already.’ She pointed at the stack of videos in the cabinet. ‘They have to be returned, you know.’

  ‘Maybe we can watch the old one with Reena Roy again? Just once.’

  ‘Then I’m not staying.’

  He gazed longingly at the blank screen. Then his face lit up. ‘In two days? What will you wear?’

  ‘Nini also cares about that,’ she said peevishly. ‘I’m not the one on display, you know.’

  He nodded soothingly, then snatched the remote control quickly from her fingers and pressed power.

  ‘How childish you are.’

  Together they watched a brightly-attired young woman sitting on her haunches, pink and blue bangles up to her elbows. Hair fell pleasingly into her eyes as she dipped those festive arms into a tub of suds, scrubbing a shirt collar as if her life depended on it. Apparently it did. In marched a large, mustachioed man with another shirt in his hands. He tossed it in her face and bellowed, ‘You can’t even make one thing shine!’ And just then, a packet of the perfect detergent fell into those soapy, bangle-ringing arms. The woman was so ecstatic Dia wondered if that ugly man had actually, finally, died. Maybe it was her first orgasm.

  She leaned over Inam Gul and pressed the power button.

  He sulked, but she could see the amusement in his eyes. ‘When is your friend getting married?’

  ‘Well she’s not getting married yet,’ Dia insisted. But her voice dropped. ‘Although it does seem she’s getting closer.’

  ‘What can we do?’

  ‘Tell me a story or something.’ She looked away. ‘Distract me from Nini and the fact that I ought to be studying for tomorrow.’

  He patted her head, confessing softly, ‘I heard.’

  ‘I don’t know why she got so angry,’ Dia burst out. ‘She wouldn’t say. Why doesn’t she want me to go there? It wasn’t like her at all. And what’ll I do without Nini?’

  He muttered and cooed. ‘Calm down, beti.’

  Dia tried.

  She looked at Inam Gul, so old and frail, his shriveled bones clear beneath the thin mu
slin shirt. He’d comforted her numerous times in the seven years he’d worked here. ‘Inam Gul for ever,’ she used to whimper. Now she just thought it.

  She liked his calling her ‘daughter’. He meant it. Maybe she helped him dwell less on his lost son, Salaamat, whom she occasionally saw at the farm. If he saw her too, he greeted her kindly. The only other person Salaamat spoke to that way was his sister Sumbul. Maybe he always remembered Dia as the girl who beat her brothers at cricket. She laughed at this.

  ‘There,’ said Inam Gul. ‘You’re better now.’

  ‘No,’ said Dia. ‘Now I’m embarrassed.’

  ‘Embarrassed? In front of me?’

  She took a deep breath. ‘I’ve been told two conflicting things. Nini insists I be with her on Tuesday. Ama wants me never to see that boy and his mother again. What should I do?’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ said Inam Gul. ‘There is no conflict. Your mother says to never step in that house again. The meeting is at Nini’s house.’

  She tilted her head. ‘Sometimes I wonder: are you a befuddled old man or secret service agent? Is there anything you don’t know?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘Well, you’re absolutely right. No one shall be betrayed.’

  ‘That’s my daughter,’ he patted her again, gazing once more at the screen. Slyly, he pushed the VCR button and began rewinding the tape.

  When the video played Inam Gul snapped his fingers as Reena Roy bounced before her love.

  ‘Romance is just a spectator sport,’ mumbled Dia, remembering the conversation with her mother yesterday. Love lurks in unexpected places. Yes, in fantasy. In her storybooks and in Inam Gul’s videos. She said to him, ‘You marry your daughter off and watch other women prance about on television.’

  He looked up and pouted. Then he turned up the volume.

  4

  Examination

  There were two grilled windows. The shadows of the bars fell on the linoleum floor and a shaft of light lit a tiny space in the center. There were only two ceiling fans. Dia was under neither. The room was meant to seat twenty-five. Forty examinees were packed into it as Head Supervisor listlessly passed out exams.