Destiny Averted | Salmah Ahmed

That Tuesday, the 17^th of July 2007, was the kind of day that settles on your head like a cauldron of boiling water, before sliding down your nape and spine, not with fiery heat, but with the slow, insidious creep of melting wax. It gathered like clay, dust and sweat copulating, in the folds of your body causing a mutinous, unladylike itch. I had to remind myself that this privilege of scratching various crevices, private or otherwise, is reserved for men, who parade it with machismo in your averted face. Our rundown Toyota Corolla crawled forward, jerked to a stop, then darted forward a few feet like a mechanical squirrel. The vortex of noon traffic eased as the red light changed. “There are just too many people crammed in this city,” my father muttered as he clutched the steering wheel with strained pale knuckles. His fair neck and face flared in crimson blotches. A billboard advertising Green Star family planning dangled mockingly overhead. Streams of exhaust fumes billowed from the groaning steel demons with a dense poison lining every hapless pedestrians’ lungs like cotton candy.

I clutched a transparent A4 folder, its contents a testament to my modest academic journey. . Nestled inside amongst my IELTs test score (a decent eight, mind you!), lay various character recommendations. One from my English O-level teacher: ‘She has a good head on her shoulders when she chooses to use it,’ and random certificates galore courtesy of our lawyer, even my harmonium playing earned a place!. We were instructed by our lawyer that the more documents you could provide the British Home Office the better, to either ‘convince them, or confound them’.

A coarse hand rapped on the window, startling me from my thoughts. A stubbly face with peeling foundation and fuchsia lipstick peered inside. She adjusted a neon green dupatta on her voluminous caramel wig and flashed a smile. ‘Hai, such a pretty girl! Love your look,” she exclaimed,” her voice surprisingly articulate, “That black Chantilly lace bodice creates a stunning contrast to your white shirt,’ I blinked, surprised by her astute observation of my outfit. . “May Allah bless you with a husband and lots of children.”she finished with a wink. I lowered the window, knowing she was due a payment now that she had prayed for me.

“Shut the window.’ My father muttered gruffly. He was averse to beggars but surely, he must know the rules were different for transgender beggars.

“But Abbu, it’s bad luck. You must give her some money…”

“Shut the window, I don’t have patience for such leeches.”he barked slamming his palm on the horn, adding his own note to the narcotic symphony of impatience blaring around us.

I did as I was told. The transgender’s eyes widened in disbelief. She clapped her hands, this time in anger, muttered a curse under her breath, probably a lifetime of spinsterhood on me, and turned away from our car. This had the effect of macerating my already deflated spirits.

We were undertaking this expedition on Abbu’s whim. A single disquieting event that had spurred a sapling notion into a bean stalk of action. My fate was sealed by a Sindhi landlord’s bratty son who had taken a fancy to me in my accounting class. One minute, I had my eager face turned to the whiteboard, failing to grasp debit and credit principals explained in exasperated shrieks by a wiry bespectacled tutor, the next minute I was being crudely accosted and prepositioned by the young ruffian. My rejection, though justified, did not sit well with him. He was of the dynastic class that believed obedience by serfs and women was their God-given right. This conundrum threatened to spiral out of control when the ruffian landed outside my house, under the influence of either cocaine or teenage recklessness, with a band of equally ill-bred lackeys, and instructed our watchman, rather politely, to relay a message to me that I was to be duly abducted in a week if I failed to change my mind regarding his indecent proposal. With this ultimatum he gave me some time to think about it.

My father and I, along with a family of generational house-help and countless stray cats were the residents of a crumbling old mansion in Clifton. Our bungalow stood neglected and singular like an island amid a sea of apartment blocks that harboured no neighbourly feelings towards us. Abbu was certain an abduction attempt could be undertaken with relative ease and anonymity. Despite my assurances that barking dogs didn’t normally bite, he spent a harrowing night calling all his influential friends for help. An army general who he fondly remembered from boarding school as that boot-licker Sherry, picked up his call. ‘Rascal! You!’ I heard a boisterous whiskey-drunk voice boom from the landline receiver, ‘I thought you were lying dead at the bottom of the Arabian sea.’

In the clash between political heirdoms and the Pakistan army, the see-saw of power had mostly tilted towards the stern-faced khaki lads. Sherry promised that the matter would be taken care of, and my father needn’t worry about such a frivolous issue. They proceeded to reminisce old school pranks. Thus, in an ironic twist, the ruffian brat was abducted by masked men, threatened, and eventually released on the condition that he would leave the country for good.

By the time I passed my A-level exams I had forgotten this blip, but it had marked my father’s heart like a crater. After giving the usual fried egg and paratha breakfast order to our cook, he slumped on the threadbare velvet upholstered chair and pursed his lips before opening them to emit a guttural enigma. ‘You should stay with your mother for a while.’

I raised my foot from the pedal of my Singer sewing machine, a lone, forgotten remnant of my mother, but kept hold of the fabric under the needle. Having no female relative to guide me in female fashion and grooming in my adolescence, I had taken to fending for myself and learned to stitch from YouTube tutorials, discarding the need to visit unreliable tailors in the dark recesses of fabric plazas.

‘In case you’ve forgotten, my mother isn’t in this country anymore. She re-married and lives happily in England with her two sons.’ I reminded him, making a mental note to purchase almonds in bulk or procure Gingko Biloba from Sadar and mix it in his tea to nip this apparent commencement of memory loss.

‘I know.’ He took a sip of his tea. His dark eyes, formerly flitting towards a circling fly, now impaled me with a keen look. ‘You will join her there.’

We had always shared a dynamic relationship that involved frank discussion on all topics, no matter how embarrassing. I had once confided in him how I had been groped in a bazaar, which on hindsight, wasn’t such a great idea because that had compelled him to religiously follow me everywhere. This idea though, wasn’t up for discussion. I found it humiliating to be bundled off to a woman who had abandoned me. My mother was simultaneously a fond memory and the definition of betrayal. Our phone conversations were mild and amiable. Me, bottling up my pent-up rage, and she, voluble in affectionate questions and questionable affection.

My father reversed the car in an empty parking space. A sirocco gave wings to dry earth, swirling it in our faces. I stumbled into a puddle of muddy water. My father dug a wad of tissues out from his back pocket, deftly bent down and cleaned the wet mud off my white sandals. The floodgates of anguish broke, and I buried my face in his chest. I loved him from the ends of his peppery comb over to the soles of his serviceable Bata loafers. My father extracted me from his embrace and nudged me forward. With each step I took towards the grey brick building ahead, I felt an expanding chasm tear open between us.

I walked into a small waiting room. A pock-marked middle-aged man sat at the counter behind a glass barrier reading the Urdu daily Jang. He punched a code in the token dispenser and handed me the ticket in mute disapproval. A screen was mounted on the wall and was supposed to beep whenever a token number was displayed. Twelve boys and two girls around my age sat scattered, their shoulders slumped, their feverish fingers running through their documents, counting, and checking, and occasionally swatting at flies. Their lips moved in silent practise of their memorised scripts. Hard backed benches were laid out in neat rows in front of the screen.

The wait stretched on for three hours. Afternoon heat swarmed around me like a hive and buzzed inside my head. I chewed on my clipped nails and felt sick when I tasted sweat. I dragged my feet to the counter man with some vague official title. ‘How long do I have to wait? My father is waiting outside in the heat.’

He shrugged without taking his eyes off his newspaper.

‘Can you give me a proper answer, uncle…sir?’ I stammered, unsure how to categorise him for socially acceptable discourse.

‘Call me Sadiq. And what’s the rush, bibi?’ He took of his thick glasses and pinned me with a glare. ‘Can’t wait to get out of here? You think a lifetime of red carpets, riches and accolades is waiting for you? You’re in for a surprise. Both my sons got rejected four times for different visas. They took my six grandchildren, boarded an illegal fishing boat from Turkey to Greece for a better future.’ He spat a blood like mess in a steel container by his side. ‘They never made it. They lie dead somewhere at the bottom of the Aegean Sea. But I’m sure you’ll get a visa being the crème de la crème of the youth here.’

I stood reeling in the aftermath of his diatribe. ‘This isn’t my choice. My father thinks it’s not safe here, that there’s no future here for me, for any of us…’ I waved my hands to include the other anxious visa applicants.

‘If young people like you keep leaving in droves, people with skill, brains, and education, how will our country prosper? You can change things here. You can create business opportunities, help the underprivileged, find solutions to old problems that our generation can’t imagine….’

‘Only to be shot one day, given the political situation?’

‘You can be shot anywhere.’ His shoulders slumped and he dropped his gaze to the newspaper on his desk. I shifted my weight on my heels and fired the last arrow left in my quiver.

‘You should know girls here don’t normally choose their fate.’

He emitted a resigned sigh. Token number 15 flashed on the screen. I levelled my dupatta at the back as the georgette had a habit of slipping coquettishly like a sixties Bollywood siren.

‘Please have a seat.’ The English visa officer in his early thirties motioned to the chair. He gave me a tight smile. ‘Miss Pal-waa-shaa Ay-lam?’

I nodded, knowing it was hopeless to correct his pronunciation.

‘You will have to speak up, I’m afraid.’

‘Yes, that’s my name.’

‘Why do you want to come to the UK?’

‘To study.’

He looked up in mild surprise. ‘It’s bizarre that sixty years post-independence you people haven’t managed to build enough worthwhile universities to educate the youth of your country.’

‘We do have worthwhile universities.’

‘Then why do resourceful young people like yourself take the first chance they get to run off to countries like the UK for higher education?’

‘Resourceful people look for opportunities to increase their resources, like the British when they first came to India on the pretext of trading with the East India Company and took over all its resources.’

‘You’re calling us usurpers?’

‘I was calling you resourceful.’

He avoided eye contact and shuffled a few odd papers.

‘And where will you be doing this studying?’ He asked at length, as if this was a ruse for more sinister activities like spearheading a drug trafficking ring or a terrorist cell.

‘London School of Business Excellence, as is stated on the application form.’ I imitated his tone.

‘Why did you choose a business college, why not a university?’

‘It’s cheaper. You must have noticed by now that we’re quite a poor country.’ I gestured at a painting of the Thar desert behind him, to demonstrate he’d left the sprawling fertile pastures of the UK and was in semi-arid to arid land that was facing a severe water shortage.

He peered at the college acceptance letter, holding it up with his thumb and forefinger like a curious species of arthropod. ‘Interesting. I haven’t ever heard of this college before.’

‘It’s not in the same league as Oxford or Cambridge so I doubt you would have.’ I shot back and I saw his set lips crack in faint amusement. He readjusted his mouth in its habitual downward slant.

‘Do you have any family in London?’

‘No.’ The lawyer had specifically instructed me to answer in the negative if this question popped up. Having family in the UK meant I was never coming back, and I was to convince the visa officer of the opposite.

His forehead folded in multiple lines. ‘Are you sure, Miss Ay-lam?’

My own forehead felt like the site of a storm. He pushed a tissue box in front of me and I grabbed a handful and dabbed away.

‘You don’t happen to have a mother living in London, by any chance?’ His expression didn’t bear any hostility, just curtailed amusement that rebelled at the edges, eyes crinkling and lips twitching.

‘I’m sorry, I do have family in the UK.’

‘Sure? Because you know, we don’t allow members of the same family to come to the UK. It’s against our foreign policy.’

‘Really?’

‘No.’

I muttered a prayer of thanks under my breath.

‘Why did you say that?’

‘It’s easy to forget about a mother who abandons you when you’re ten.’

‘I see.’ His face sobered. ‘By the way, I haven’t been to Oxford or Cambridge. I graduated from Birbeck and then somehow decided this was the right career choice for me.’ He waved his arms at the small cubicle space in despair almost knocking over a teacup that stood divorced from its saucer. He raised the teacup. ‘The tea is great though, Kaa-Rack.’ I felt a pang of pity for him and relented with a smile. It wasn’t easy living in Pakistan unless you were born here or were a thrill junkie who regularly threw themselves off cliffs for fun. ‘Alright, I’m approving your visa.’ He picked up a stamp and hammered it on my form, its cry reverberating off the walls with grim finality like the writ of fate. ‘Please collect your documents from the counter outside.’

‘Thank you!’ I felt like I had passed an unfathomable advanced math exam. I collected my documents and attempted relief-induced nonsensical humour. ‘If you hadn’t, I would never have a chance to meet Prince William. I would like to marry him.’

I was standing up, half turned towards the door when his next words confounded me. ‘What about me?’

I gaped at him, a cautious bull in a China shop, aware everything could come crashing down at the slightest movement. The moment stretched on for many deafening strokes of an ornate mahogany clock above his head.

The seriousness in his expression morphed into an abashed grin. ‘Good luck with your studies. Bye.’

Female instinct, more reliable than ovaries, warned me he hadn’t been joking, and if I had simply said, ‘Yes -you’ll do as well, kind sir’, I would probably be off to the UK on an entirely different visa.

I breathed out and laughed the way one does when they want to divert attention from their shaking knees and hands. I headed to the reception desk. ‘I’m staying.’

Sadiq raised his bushy eyebrows. ‘I thought your fate wasn’t in your hands?’

‘If I don’t reclaim it now, I’ll never be able to.’

I walked out, feeling new. Dark clouds had begun to gather overhead. Rain in Karachi brought momentary joy and prolonged misery. It was a dichotomy that defined everything in the city, like patriotism and immigration. I found my harried father surrounded by a group of transgenders squawking at him. By the look of defiance on his face, he was standing his ground. The transgender beggar with the neon green dupatta looked like their leader as she was heading the fight for retribution at her signal slight. With arched eyebrows and an impressive height that dwarfed my five feet ten inches tall father, she presented her argument. ‘It wasn’t that you refused to give me alms, but you insulted our kind which is unacceptable. Your insensitivity merits reproach. Do you know what we suffer daily?’

I stepped between the opponents and held up my arms to halt the argument. ‘I have a proposal for you.’ I addressed the leader. ‘But first I must ask if you ladies know how to stitch?’

She laughed. ‘Girl, who else would stitch our clothes for us? Look, I created this beauty myself.’ She gestured to her emerald Anarkali dress with beadwork and ruffles imitating the play of sunlight and shade on forest foliage.

‘In that case, I would like you to work for me.’

‘What?’

‘Yes, I’m starting a fashion label and your keen eye for fashion impressed me. Also, your strength of will in pursuing my hapless father all the way here.’

Abbu interjected at this point with a shriek. ‘What’s wrong with you?’

She contemplated my offer. ‘How much will you pay us?’

‘Nothing in the beginning.’

‘I get it. You’re a young chicklet just starting out, you will need a street-smart woman of the world like me by your side. I am willing to work with you, not for you, as equal partner.’ She held out her hand for a handshake.

‘No one is starting any business; you’re leaving the country.’ Abbu objected in the background.

I shook her hand. ‘Palwasha Alam.’

‘Mona, no last name and I prefer it that way.’

Salmah Ahmed is an accountant living in London. She has studied a fiction writing course from Faber Academy and is working on her debut novel. Her work has been published in TMYS June 2022 Review, a print anthology by the literary magazine ‘Tell Me Your Story’ in collaboration with the Global South Colloquium, University of Victoria. Her poem ‘Tourist Eyes’ was published in the print version of The Aleph Review-Volume 7. Her short story ‘The Khwaja Sira’s curse’ was published in the online commonwealth magazine adda.