Page 32 of First Comes Marriage
‘I don’t know.’ Reshma wasn’t sure how to articulate her thoughts and tell Haniya what was going through her head. She could barely make sense of it herself. ‘Since we’ve been married, I’ve got the bare minimum from Zafar. He’s never been unkind or uncivil, but then he’s not like that with anyone. But we’ve never established the connection I wanted with him. The connection I’ve seen between Uncle Jawad and Auntie Bilqis, or now between Saleema and Nomaan.’
‘I have to say, I was surprised he didn’t know you liked Italian food. I let the sniffling thing slide because I thought maybe he’s never sniffled in front of you.’
Reshma grinned at that. ‘Zafar’s not a sniffler, and thank God for that. I’d have gone batshit crazy.’
‘Grounds for divorce if you ask me.Sorry, Judge, he sniffled too much and wouldn’t blow his nose.’
They both giggled before Haniya sobered and looked at Reshma closely.
‘He seems different out here, though. And maybe this was exactly what your relationship needed. Time and space. Don’t forget, you two hardly had a chance to get to know each other and forge a connection before you got married. Things like that don’t happen overnight, or even over a year. And, to be fair to him, anyone can see that despite Uncle Nasir being there, it seems like the entire weight of the Saeed family sits on Zaf’s shoulders, and that includes their family business.’
Reshma rested her head back against the cushions, her mind going over what Zafar had said to her last night. She’d come to that conclusion herself too. There was a great deal of pressure on Zafar, and no matter how capable he was, he was a human at the end of the day and with all those balls he was juggling, it was inevitable that he’d struggle to keep each and every one in the air.
It was just her luck that the ball he had dropped was their relationship.
But he’d picked it up and was now giving it the attention he hadn’t so far and he’d proved how much he cared when he’d stood up for her to her father. The man who was the poster boy for uninterested.
‘He’s different now without any of those responsibilities demanding his immediate attention, but what about when we go back home? What if it’s the time and place that’s making him say he wants things to be different between us? What if when we go back and all those responsibilitiesare there, we fall back into the same groove? I can’t carry on like that, Niya.’
‘Reshma, darling, no one can offer you a guarantee on that front. That being said, I think you’re being a tad unfair on him and you’re jumping way ahead. Rewind a bit. You said he apologised to you and he wants things to be different. Surely that’s a great starting place? If he really wasn’t interested, or if his work was really that much more important, wouldn’t he have left when you told him he could go back?’
Reshma plucked another biscuit out of the packet and nibbled on it. She ate in silent contemplation, letting all the thoughts bounce around in her head, along with her inner demons and insecurities. She wanted to believe positive things, but her experience had set her default at negative, making her doubt herself before she did anything else.
‘I don’t know. I honestly don’t know what to think or believe anymore. My brain is going through phases of going blank and then remembering everything but seeing it through a distorted lens in which everything looks negative, except when it comes toourfamily. You know Auntie Bilqis gave me your grandmother’s jewellery?’ she said, going off on a tangent and making Haniya blink owlishly for a moment before she smiled at her, as though she’d known the plan all along.
‘You knowourNaano thought of you as her granddaughter just as much as she did me. She’d be happy for you to wear her jewellery and I’m more than happy for you to have it. Mum is over the moon about passing it down to you, what with you being her favourite.’ There was no censure in her voice or resentment. Just affection.
She shuffled closer to Reshma, clasping her hand with hers. Reshma rested her head against her cousin’s shoulder,who was more like a sister to her, and Haniya rested her head against Reshma’s.
Reshma swallowed the lump in her throat at Haniya’s words, determined not to cry. ‘I can’t help it, Niya. I want to believe that I deserve love and attention and someone who cares as much as anyone else, but I can’t help but feel that it won’t happen, or that there are strings attached, or that it’ll be short-lived. The only people I don’t feel that with are Uncle Jawad and Auntie Bilqis.’
‘Uh, rude.’
Reshma tutted as Haniya sniggered. ‘You know that includes you. And even though Auntie Ruqayyah has been amazing, the fact that she lives here and we live in London puts a natural distance between us, though I feel the same way about her when we’re together too.’
They sat in silence for a few minutes, Reshma soaking in the comfort of nearness from the cousin who’d accepted her with open arms when Uncle Jawad had taken her home to stay with them permanently. Not once had she resented Reshma’s presence in their lives and neither had her brother Shoaib, treating both Haniya and Reshma with a little bit of love and a great deal of tolerance, as brothers were wont to do.
‘Permission to call a spade a spade, please?’ Haniya said cheerily and Reshma laughed at her question.
‘Like you need my permission. And that phrase has always confused me. Why a spade? Why not … I don’t know’ – she grabbed the bottle that had been on the side table next to the sofa – ‘a bottle. Let’s call a bottle a bottle.’
‘O-K. I think you really might be losing it, so I’ll say what I want to say while there’s still an active brain cell between those ears. What happened between your parents isn’t on you.’ She untangled herself from Reshma’s sideand turned to face her. ‘I’ll repeat that for the brain cells at the back. What happened between your parents isn’t on you. And after Auntie Hafsa passed away, whatever Uncle Ahsan did isn’t on you either. All the crap you’ve seen as a child is something no adult should have to deal with, so the fact that you went through all that as a kid sucks, but none of those things were because of you, Reshma. You are amazing and more deserving of love than anyone I know. But you need to stop considering it a favour when you are on the receiving end of it. You act like someone’s attention is a great favour they’re bestowing upon you.’
Reshma wrinkled her nose, but she couldn’t refute what Haniya had said. She knew that deep down that was how she behaved in most of her relationships.
‘I’m both surprised and glad that you said what you did to Zaf. He should definitely have made a better effort over the past year and it’s kind of disappointing that he hasn’t, but that doesn’t mean you should ignore any effort he makes hereafter. Sure, don’t go all in, but don’t keep him all the way out either. Not unless that’s what you want deep down.’
Reshma groaned. ‘I don’t know what I want deep down. And can you stop being so mature and wise right now.’
‘Is that what you really want?’
Reshma dropped her head on the cushion in her lap so her answer came out muffled against it. ‘No.’
‘Yeah, I thought as much.’ Haniya went quiet for a couple of minutes before speaking again, her voice gentle. ‘Deep down, you want to believe in love. You want to be that special person for Zafar and you want him to be that special person for you, but you’re too scared to say it out loud and commit to it fully because you’re afraid you’ll be rejected by him like you have been by various otherpeople in your life before.’ Reshma sucked in a breath as Haniya really called a spade a spade. ‘And wanting that doesn’t mean that what you have with us isn’t enough for you. Wanting something with Zafar doesn’t negate what you have with us, it’s different. You need to allow yourself to go all in, Reshma darling. But if you want to make Zaf work for it, then there’s no harm in that,’ she said with a cheeky grin and a wink.
‘What if I go all in but he—’
‘Don’t think like that, Reshma. Give the guy a chance. I accept that you two didn’t conventionally choose each other, but Mum and Dad saw something in him, which is why they introduced him to you, otherwise they wouldn’t have. I reckon you both liked something about each other to go ahead and get married, so trust that.’
