Unmarriageable(105)

QITTY: My sister Alys gave me the magazines. Mode’s last issue was published in October 2001. They were forced to close down. It wasn’t circulation. They had plenty of subscribers and were growing by the day. They were forced to shut doors because of lack of advertisements. Top designers only wanted to design for skeletons. Their Loss. Fat Stocky Short Squat Women Are Here. We Exist. We Are Visible.

HAMMY: Marrying Jaans was Sammy’s choice, and staying with him is her choice too. My ring? Two-carat solitaire. Yes, he is one of Jaans’s good friends but nothing like him. My fiancé is a gem of a person. No, I was never interested in Valentine Darsee. Who is spreading this rumour? What will my fiancé think if he finds out? For God’s sake, Valentine is one of my baby brother’s best friends. I’ve always seen him as just another brother.

JAANS: Shaadi equals barbaadi, marriage equals misery, a socially constructed battleground. My wife, Sammy, agrees with me. Chalo, what to do, bale bale.

BEENA DEY BAGH: Jab mian biwi razee tho kya karey qazi. When the bride and groom are willing, nothing the priest can do to stop the wedding.

JUJU DARSEE: My brother couldn’t have found anyone better than Alysba Binat.

ANNIE DEY BAGH: I’m so excited that my boyfriend is coming to attend the weddings. Yes, he’s Nigerian. Why the face? What’s bothering you? That I have a boyfriend? That he’s black? Both?

MRS SYEDA SHIREEN KALEEN NéE SHERRY LOOCLUS: Of course it is necessary to have an income of one’s own beyond pocket money. I have never believed otherwise. But what a pity that homemakers are unpaid and so undervalued. Yes, Alys and I are planning to open a bookstore, and I will be in charge of translations. We are very excited. If my husband objects, my secret weapon, Annie dey Bagh, will have a word with him. That always works.

ROSE-NAMA: Miss Alys was always my favourite teacher, and I was one of her teacher’s pets. My mother switched my schools because she didn’t like the alternating uniform/free-clothes days. Or the new British School Group motto: ‘Home Is Everywhere on Earth. Be Honest. Be Kind.’ Or the introduction of a mandatory comparative-religion class. Or, as per new guidelines, a class on the history of marriage and sex.

TAHIRA: I’m so thrilled for Miss Alys and of course Miss Jena. Next on the list of duties is the good news that they are expecting. Thank you! My baby is due soon.

RAGHAV KUMAR: I knew something was up between those two.

HIJAB’S MOTHER: Of course my daughter is best friends with Mrs Lady Wickaam. Did you know Jeorgeullah Wickaam is Valentine Darsee’s and Annie dey Bagh’s first cousin? Wickaam is such a humble boy. Wants to make it on his own merit, so prefers to keep a distance from his relatives.

HILLIMA: My girls. They are like family.

MOTHERS IN DILIPABAD AND OTHER ‘-ABADS’, ‘-PURS’ AND ‘-ISTANS’ ACROSS PAKISTAN, TO THEIR DAUGHTERS: If Alys Binat and Jena Binat at their advanced ages can grab such catches, then you have no excuses.

DILIPABAD GYMKHANA VIPS: Pinkie Binat has exceeded expectations in training her daughters in the art of hook, reel, grab. All in favour of acknowledging her now and then? Done! Let’s buy an outfit or two from her debut collection.

SOCIALITES IN SOCIAL LIGHTS: Congrats to AlysDarsee and JenaBungles. Wishing them all the best on their Happily Ever After.





EPILOGUE




One Year Later



Lady stood at the window in the Dubai apartment, looking at Jumeirah Beach in the moonlight. The glass was not as clean as she liked, and Wick did not take kindly either to smudges. They’d paid a pretty penny for this place, one of the finest in town, but you had to spend money to make money. You had to look the part. She would have an extra-sharp word with the maid about the windows. Lady patted her lips, pleased with the Botox, wondering if she should go plumper, bigger always being better.

‘I’m bored,’ she said to Wick’s reflection in the window. He was lifting weights. What a handsome man she’d managed to marry, Lady thought for the millionth time. Dracula and Bungles did not come close. But. Then. Their money. Wick had turned out to be an even bigger flop with finances than her father. Alys and Jena had sent her some money to spend as she pleased and she was not going to tell Wick, because, unfortunately, he had the annoying habit of thinking the money her sisters and mother sent her was meant for him. She could make money modelling, but Wick, like her father, did not want her to model. However, while her father was controlling, Wick loved and respected her too much to bear the thought of other men doing the dirty with her pin-ups.

They’d had a rough patch for a while there, when she’d found out about his children, but that part of his life was behind him now. It wasn’t even as if it was his fault alone – he was irresistible to women. They would have to learn to resist him, because there was only one lady for him now, she always reminded him, and that lady was Mrs Lady Wickaam.

In fact, more than being upset with Wick, Lady was still annoyed with her family for barring him from Alys’s and Jena’s weddings. She would have boycotted in protest, except they really had been weddings of the year and Wick had encouraged her to attend. Best, he’d said, to stay in her sisters’ good books.

‘Let’s go watch a film,’ Lady said as she turned away from the window. ‘Or eat out.’

Wickaam mumbled something about their budget.