She pauses for a moment. ‘I’m Grace.’
‘That’s the best name a girl could ever have.’ I shake her hand; soft and small and curiously warm.
‘You got cold hands. Warm them in your pockets.’
‘Army don’t do that.’
We walk the length of Forge Row and then cross into Albert Road. During the day, we wouldn’t be doing this. Not Grace and I, not together.
Even in daylight little can be seen through the windows of any of these houses, dirty lace curtains slung across each one. The doors are locked, and five times daily they open as the men escape for prayers at Best Street mosque or any of the five other mosques within a mile (some converted from previous incarnations and others cavernous, purpose-built institutions) that now compete with the original. Behind the lace curtains could be a birth, a wedding, a hundred women mourning a death, but you wouldn’t know it as you pass by outside. It occurs to me that Grace is right: we Pakis are secretive. Brightly coloured cars fitted with extra-wide plastic wheel arches sit quiet and innocuous as their owners sleep, yet during the day these lads are always coming up fast, nodding to a beat, engines revving out of flared exhaust pipes and loud Indian music playing on custom sound systems. They wear a permanent scowl and have hungry, suspicious eyes. Their thin territorial ambitions and short-cropped hair remind me of the skinheads that moved on after the developers levelled the Mash Tun.
Seeing Grace and me together, the locals would jeer and laugh, shout insults, take off their shoes and show us their soles, lob stones from across the street, chase us out of their territory — and before I got home the scandal would have reached my parents and Azra.
Grace stops outside a narrow Victorian house part way along the third terrace we come to. She must be one of the few gora inhabitants still here. A poster has been placed in next door’s window — the familiar white face of our first-in-command fills the frame, airbrushed to thin down his rotund cheeks and disguise the easy-blue blemish of the albino. His eyes, normally milky, have been painted the faintest brown — brown for the people — and somehow they appear sincere and kind. Above his bearded, benevolent face are the words ‘Bismillah Events Presents — Live in Conversation with Dr Mustafa Al-Angrezi (the English)’. The event is to be held at a community centre this evening; brothers are instructed to pass through security at the front entrance and sisters at the rear. So my brother Mustafa who mourns his brother Faisal the martyr will at six o’clock mourn another, and he will have a twinkle in his eye and spout propaganda and they will listen; yes, after my shahid at eleven, they will prick up their ears and listen.
Mustafa is barely recognizable in the altered image. It is also vanity that compels him to take the appellation Al-Angrezi. Of course, he would justify himself in his usual wily way, perhaps squeezing my bicep while whispering, Brother Akram, we each tweak our assets. He is correct, of course. In war each side takes what advantage it can.
I turn towards Grace. She stands perfectly still outside her house staring back at me, perhaps wondering what I make of the poster. The light from an upstairs window bisects her face, dark and light. She fumbles in her pockets for keys then inserts one into the lock.
She turns the key and stops. ‘What is your story?’
I shake my head.
‘You can’t be right, walking around at this time of night dressed like you’ve got an appointment with the Queen. I’ll do you a tea.’
‘Got to crack on.’
She adds quickly, ‘There’s toast, if you want it?’
‘We Pakis only accept at the third time of asking.’
‘Suit yourself.’ The door opens and without another word she enters and closes it behind her. I stare at the green paintwork, wet with dew.
Moments later the door reopens. ‘Shoes?’ she requests.
I hand them over and smile.
‘No story, and by the looks of it, no car,’ she continues in a sterner tone. ‘You had better come in out of the cold.’
I hesitate. Suddenly I am aware of a hot prickly sensation where I earlier shaved off the beard. I imagine welts spreading across it and self-consciously knead it with my fingertips.
‘Come in or we’ll have the Pakistanis talking.’ She stands to one side to let me in.
To slow the action down I whisper a Bismillah.
The front door opens directly into a living room. She fumbles for a light switch, races to a corner to turn on a table lamp and turns off the main light. Then she looks at me, clearly pleased with her efforts. There is a small sofa in a blue fabric with an ample scattering of cushions, a wooden coffee table, and a sideboard on which is placed a small television set. Two shelves above the television contain a collection of porcelain dogs. The walls are painted pink. I stand, waiting to be asked to sit.
‘You want a story and the only story I can think of is this, but don’t take offence.’ My gaze moves across the dogs. They come in various colours and sizes and some are arranged around a ceramic feeding bowl. ‘A prostitute happens to pass by a dog, its tongue lolling out with thirst. Taking off a shoe, she fills it with water from a nearby well and offers it to the animal. For her act of kindness, Allah forgave her for being a prostitute.’
Grace notices me eyeing the arrangement. ‘Collect them, when I’m good. Not always good, though — I can go for months under my duvet.’ She laughs. ‘You’re lucky, you’ve caught me good.’
It’s a long time since I have been this close to a white person, and I shiver. Now that I can see her in the light, she is fatter than I thought. Her face, although young, appears marked as though underneath the thick layer of make-up she has bad skin. She smiles, exposing the silver front tooth. It seems to move, and then, with a practised motion, flips onto the tip of her tongue. She retrieves it and rolls it between her fingers into a ball.
‘Kit Kat foil,’ she says, exposing a gap in her mouth. There it is — the flaw I wanted — and feeling immediately more relaxed I offer her a broad smile.
‘Milk and sugar, or do you want something stronger?’ Her shoes drop to the floor and she kicks them underneath the sofa. With one hand smoothing the cloth around her rump, Grace swivels on her toes and goes into the kitchen, leaving the door between the rooms ajar.
The ceramic dogs feel smooth and cold to the touch. I hear the kettle boil in the next room, the hot liquid pour, and the rattle of teaspoons against porcelain. Grace returns with two steaming mugs and places them on the coffee table. She lands heavily on the sofa. ‘So the prostitute thing — would I be forgiven?’
‘If you believe in that sort of thing.’
‘What you doing dressed like that? You been to a party or something?’
‘It’s the armistice remembrance event at eleven,’ I say.
‘Yeah, what for?’
‘It signifies the cessation of hostilities. In World War One.’
Grace gazes at her watch. ‘Good eight hours until eleven.’ She sighs and continues in a louder voice, ‘Take your hat off, and drink up, it’s better while it’s hot.’
The tea has been mixed with whisky and burns my throat.
‘How come you don’t have a car? Pakis always have cars.’ As she lifts the mug to her face a shadow falls across her pale chin, and where her fingers wrap around the mug there are thin, stained creases between the joints, blue and brown, as though coloured in with pencil. Her hands grow visibly redder as they grasp the warm mug. It startles me that gora skin is so permeable, soaking up like a sponge, and as though to confirm my sudden theory, when she puts down her mug and smiles, the lower part of her face is flushed from the conducted heat.