Tunnel Vision (26 page)

Now if only I could escape the awful things that happened to unmarried women.

Everyone knew about the strange things happened to unmarried women, they got all cranky and inquisitive, focused either on living vicariously or not living at all. I knew portly matrons who cornered newly married women and demanded juicy details of their wedding night to compensate for their own lack of sex. What a terrible terrible fate.

Frustrated souls, deprived even of the forbidden knowledge of self-satisfaction, they scoured every available periodical, paper or book for any hint of titillation that might bring the monsoon down on their arid plain. The most disturbing of all were the tummy-rubbers. The tummy-rubbers were a particularly odious variation of the theme of the typical spinster, being plump and apple-cheeked rather than taut and spare as if consumed by inner fire. They used their kindly aunt appearance to lure young married women into hugs they wouldn
'
t freely dispense to their angular spinster friends, fearing no doubt that envious bones might perforate their still cherished notions of married bliss. Once a victim was held tightly in that embrace, the tummy rub began. The tummy rub was a slow, constant, almost sensual drag of the hand across the belly, testing for bulges, bumps, possibly an extra breast? Did they feel a tingle when they felt evidence of consummation? A thrill when they realized the slender, taut physique would soon spread and congeal like their own? Who knew what evil lurked in the hearts of unmarried women? According to Ammi, I would of course find out first-hand.

Watching Omar with the luscious cheekbones watching me, I wondered what had held me back. What had kept me from skipping across the bridge of courtship onto the pastures of bliss on the other side?

‘
Yes Ayesha,
'
Omar settled himself comfortably on the foot of the bed and began to massage my big toe,
‘
do tell what held you back?
'

ALLAH AAP KO CHAND SA BETA DAY

POPULAR BEGGAR LINE

~

W
omen got fat, men lost interest.
‘
I didn
'
t want to get fat Omar.
'

‘
Liar.
'

Which portent of doom came first, the ageing rooster or the fossilized egg?

‘
I didn
'
t love you.
'

‘
How is that relevant? How many people here marry for love?
'

Truth.

‘
I was too young.
'

‘
You were more than old enough.
'

‘
There was something really important that I needed to do.
'

I had yet to come to terms with what had happened to my father.

‘
Tell me all about it.
'

So he could hear me after all.

Tired, stressed, just beginning to plumb the depths of Ammi
'
s madness, Omar had been little more than a diversion for me. A pleasant detour from an otherwise bumpy road. A flyover, if you like, but the destination remained the same. My friends had thought I was mad when I told them as far as I was concerned our relationship had no future.

‘
What is wrong with you?
'
Kulsoom had spluttered,
‘
what kind of idiot thinks these things? That
'
s precisely why you should get married, all this emotional dislocation business will fly out of the window soon enough.
'

‘
Disconnection, not dislocation. I haven
'
t broken anything.
'

‘
I think you have. You should have a CAT scan in fact, because I think it
'
s your brain. Are you sure those thugs didn
'
t beat you up too?
'

‘
I don
'
t want to talk about it anymore.
'

‘
Why not?
'

‘
Because there
'
s no point. My mind is made up, and you
'
re dismissing everything I
'
m saying as nonsense anyway.
'

‘
But it is nonsense! Do you know how many girls on this campus are interested in him and jealous of you? Do you know how few men there are like him in Pakistan? Do you know some people have to import them? I
'
m just pointing this out because it seems to have passed right through your colander of a mind.
'

‘
Well, you can tell those girls they
'
ll have their chance soon enough.
'

‘
Don
'
t tell me you
'
re going to break up with him already!
'

‘
It
'
s been more than two years, Kulsoom.
'

‘
Two years isn
'
t such a long time. Most engagements are longer. Give him a chance.
'

‘
We
'
re going to graduate soon and I want to walk away from this hellhole with no attachments.
'

‘
That
'
s the exact opposite of what a sane woman would want. Everyone will say you wasted your entire college education.
'

I didn
'
t dignify that with a response.

‘
You know sometimes I do think you
'
re arrogant. You think you
'
re better than the rest of us.
'

‘
Because I don
'
t want the things you do? So the things you want are the right things and anything else is wrong? That makes you arrogant, not me.
'

Kulsoom stiffened a little,
‘
No I
'
m not saying I know I
'
m right and you
'
re wrong. I could be wrong. I
'
m just saying I believe in the pattern that has been laid for me. And I can
'
t help feeling they
'
re the right things because there don
'
t seem to be any other things.
'

‘
Sure there are.
'

‘
Like what?
'

‘
Work. Art. Science, even. Some people dedicate their whole lives to research.
'

‘
Most of those people are men.
'

‘
There are women too.
'

‘
Very few. And they
'
re also married.
'

‘
So if I don
'
t get married, it won
'
t be worth anything.
'

‘
That
'
s not what I
'
m saying. You know you
'
re already worth something.
'

‘
Then what value will a husband add to my life that I can
'
t get on my own?
'

‘
Respectability. No one takes single women seriously here, and single working women might as well walk around with targets on their backs. Every man you come in contact with will make a play on you.
'

‘
And I
'
ll repel it.
'

‘
That won
'
t make a bit of difference and you know it. You remember that lady professor in the Visual Arts department who was unmarried? The boys harassed her and the girls hated her. Even her colleagues were so catty to her. She had to leave, you know.
'

‘
So even an odious, abusive, sloth of a husband is better than no husband at all? You
'
re an educated woman K, how can you believe such things?
'

‘
Because I
'
m a realist. I
'
ve read the same books you have, I watch the same TV, wear the same clothes, I even dream of the same things sometimes. The difference is I know where dreams end and reality begins.
'

‘
Don
'
t you think we
'
re a little too young to be getting married?
'

‘
Do you live in a box? Anytime after puberty is the right time! We
'
re the perfect age! And we have degrees. Girls like us are what everyone wants right now. And you even have a wonderful man who
'
s willing to risk his all for you and yet you
'
re spouting garbage about not being ready. No one
'
s ever ready to be married, not even married people. Besides, you won
'
t be complete until you
'
re married and a mother.
'

‘
Who says so?
'

‘
The Quran.
'

And that was the end of that argument. You couldn
'
t argue about religion. We just didn
'
t know how to without getting all upset about it.

Kulsoom had been like a runaway locomotive once she
'
d gathered momentum. I missed her.

‘
I missed you too.
'
Kulsoom was sitting on the other side of Omar.
‘
You should have written to me more. Maybe one friend was all it would have taken to keep me from killing myself.
'

‘
It wasn
'
t my fault.
'

‘
Omar,
'
Kulsoom winked at him across my feet,
‘
when will she understand everything is her fault?
'

‘
Thirty-four per cent, at least, of the total population suffers from depression and anxiety, and that
'
s only in this city!
'
I waved frantically to get their attention but they ignored me.
‘
You don
'
t get to leave that kind of baggage behind, ever, not even if you leave the country. How was I supposed to help you if you were so far away?
'

In 20-20 hindsight, even her insistence on marriage being the balm for all womanly ills seemed the desperate belief of a dreamer, not a realist. She had to believe there was some bond or person out there who had the power to raise her above her own pain. When she realized it wasn
'
t true, she couldn
'
t deal with it.

‘
Why do we insist another person will make it all better?
'
I whispered to them, tired of the shouting. I had been the only one of my friends to disavow that belief, at least in public. That was another one of those ubiquitous dichotomies of life in the Land of the Pure, the public face and the private face.

‘
You know why she left you don
'
t you?
'
Kulsoom turned to Omar.

He looked at her in silence. His cheekbones seemed to be getting sharper by the second. A nimbus of light appeared to frame his face. His shoulders seemed to be expanding to fill the room.

‘
She wanted to impress the First Years with what a rebel she was. The independent woman idea was just getting to be popular then.
'

I turned away, fuming. When I looked down again, Kulsoom had gone. Omar and I were alone again. The telephone by my bed began to ring. It rang incessantly, insistently. I ignored it. Omar finally picked it up.

‘
Ayesha.
'

He listened to the sound at the other end of the line. The phone was to his ear, but I could hear it clearly. It sounded like a thousand multi-clawed insects trying to dig through the roof.

‘
Tell them I
'
m not here,
'
I blurted suddenly.

‘
You tell them.
'
He held the phone towards me.

‘
Do it for me please.
'

‘
I can
'
t Ayesha. You don
'
t like it when people try to help you.
'

Truth.

Somewhere someone was playing music.

‘
Are you thinking about the dancing?
'
Omar whispered gently into my ear. The noise of the claws on the roof had diminished. Now I could hear some sort of tribal beat, like the trash you hear on FM on weekends these days.

‘
I
'
m thinking about the dancing.
'

SUB CHALAYGA

BACK OF RICKSHAW.

~

‘D
o you even know any of these people?
'
he had called after me as I
'
d stalked out of one particularly bleak foray into Karachi
'
s nightlife.

‘
No, and I don
'
t want to,
'
I had shuddered at the thought of the man who had come up to dance behind me, so that I was caught between the two of them like the filling of a sandwich. Omar had not seemed to mind, in fact he
'
d smiled a greeting to the other man, but I had been so offended I had pushed him away and left. Pushed Omar, that is, not the other guy. Another reason I was angry. Why couldn
'
t I vent my rage at its triggers and not its hapless witnesses? I
'
d ask my mother, but she obviously didn
'
t know.