The Khan Saima Mir (best short novels TXT) 📖

up phrases against each other before finally settling upon his response: ‘There is nothing you could tell me that would make me leave. I want this baby and I want you.’

His naive confidence saddened her, but she wanted to believe him. She wanted to believe that he would still love her if he knew about Ahad, about what she had attempted to do to him in the hospital on the night he was born. She wanted to believe that he would still feel the same if he knew what had happened the night her father was killed, and Benyamin was taken. But she knew that openness, trust and honesty were for other people. People with simpler lives, who carried smaller burdens. Her choices had taken her down a path that few would accept and fewer still understand. A path that had her believe spousal love was the domain of the weak and that familial love was the higher calling. It was the warrior path, the path of self-sacrifice, trodden by few – the qurban, the Pukhtun.

‘I can’t give you anything. And there are things about my life that would make it very difficult for you to stand by what you say. You don’t know what you’re asking for,’ she said.

Her words vexed him. ‘I do, Jia. You think I don’t know that you’re running your father’s business now? What kind of journalist would it make me if I was the only man in town not to know what sort of criminal network your father headed up?’ he said. Then his tone softened. ‘But I love you. Not some vague idea of you. But you. You with the half-finished cups of tea with the tea bag still left in them. I miss the smell of your hair, and finding all my razor blades blunt because you’ve used them, and the weirdly organised crockery cupboard. I want us to be a family. I know what life is about, Jia, I’m not under any illusion. You’re a complete hard-arse, and I’m OK with that.’

‘That’s not it,’ she said.

‘What else is there? Tell me something that would keep me away, then. Life isn’t black and white, I get it, and you’re trying to clean up your father’s mess and I want to stand by you while you do that. You’re a good person, Jia.’

His words weighed her down. They were so far from what she was that they left her lonely. The human capacity to lie to oneself, to pretend that the obvious was not so, no longer surprised her, but that Elyas was willing to deny evident truths in order to be with her did.

But then she thought of the pregnancy… Maybe it was enough, or he was enough, or maybe enough was enough, and rationality returned. The Khan needed a spouse, some semblance of normality. A woman without a husband in this city was a target for talk, and that was something she didn’t need. She remained silent for a time, and when she spoke her response was measured. ‘If we were to be together you would not be able to ask questions about my work. There are things I wouldn’t be able to talk to you about. Things I will never be able to tell you,’ she said. Elyas nodded. ‘It was only recently that I realised how much my father really loved me. He was a good man, a great man, and I misunderstood him. He lived by his own rules and ancient laws, and for a long time I thought that was wrong. I believed in the British justice system. I believed that hard work and honesty was the answer. I know now that although many claim to live that life, few in fact do.

‘Maybe in a few decades our people will have become equals in this country. But it’s unlikely. British courts speak of honour but they set up secret courts to judge us. They hold our sons without charge for years, they put our husbands in planes and send them to the US for crimes they say have been committed on British soil, all the while hiding the menfolk of Elizabeth and Mary and Katherine behind their skirts. In the West, justice and mercy is reserved for the light-skinned, the Christian-named.’

‘That is what you believe?’ Elyas said.

Jia’s eyes were dark like coal. ‘This much I know: if your name is Mohammed or Ali or Usman, you are a rapist or a terrorist, you’re a danger to society. You are guilty unless you can prove innocence,’ she said. ‘But those with power will find respect wherever they go. They are a law unto themselves. They belong to every country and to none. My father knew this and he was right.’

‘I respect your views,’ he said. He moved forward and took her hand. ‘I know you, Jia Khan,’ he said. ‘I know that whatever you do is for others. And I know that we are better together. Let me help you.’

Jia considered his words and knew that it was time to tell him the truth. Her eyes locked on to his. ‘There is a bitterness inside me. It comes over me slowly,’ she said. ‘And it makes me want to wipe the happiness right off their privileged faces. I watch people struggle, good people, kind people, struggling through life with bills and poor health and clever children born on the wrong side of the tracks. I pray to God to help us. I recite the Durood over and over, asking Him to help the people of Muhammad, but I cannot tell you who I am praying for any more. Who are these people? Are they the ones who stand in the mosque, who are wealthy enough to give alms to the poor? What about the women who sell their bodies to feed their babies? The men who get high to hide from the shame of their past mistakes? The sinners who pray in the cover of darkness and feed