In the afternoon of 11th September 2009 she, like people across the globe, was summoned to the television. Terrorists had attacked the Twin Towers in New York and other places in the USA.
After the events in the USA, many people looked suspiciously at the British Muslim population. Attacks on peaceful British Muslims rose; Tariq was suddenly very busy with appeals for legal protection from many people of Pakistan and Bangladesh origin in and around Nottingham. Both he and Kate were - like virtually everybody else - appalled at the attacks, but, as Tariq said, 'The world is much more appalled when people die in America than when they die elsewhere as a result of violence.' They took part in the endless debates which followed about the source of the bitterness against Americans, and what best could be done to make Britain a decent and safe place for all who live here. As a result of all the confusion, Kate, who gave birth two weeks later, insisted on calling her new baby daughter 'Clarity'. 'I want her to see clearly and think clearly and feel clearly' she announced.
The last eight years have been busy in dozens of ways. Ismail, born in June 1997, started school in September 2001 at the nearby primary school. Emmeline and Clarity followed him. The teachers made lots of jokes about the three children, all at the same school, and all prepared to argue. None of them was in the least shy, though Ismail was perhaps quieter than the girls and extremely hard-working. In 2008 he moved on to the local comprehensive school, along with most of his friends. Emmeline loved dancing and has begun to convince her parents that this is a most beautiful art. Clarity, when she become six years old, insisted, to her mother's alarm, that she wanted to take karate lessons. (Karate is now very popular as a sport for children.) Clarity keeps her father and brother entertained by all her karate routines, but Kate is still bothered. 'Is this clear movement, is this clear thought?' she asks. Tariq points out that karate requires clear-headed discipline, and jokes that human rights legislation should ensure that human beings are not bound by the whims of their mothers.
Once the children were at school, Kate took further training and is now qualified to act as a legal advisor to immigrants. She visits immigrants at different stages of their experience: those who are waiting for their cases to be heard, those who are newly settled and those who are being deported and returned 'home'. She is also active in a charity that tries to help immigrants who have been victims of torture, rape and other savagery. Tariq, by now a real expert in our changing human rights law, and Kate spend much of their time together discussing the cases of their clients - and arguing. They think of themselves as very happy -but constantly aware of the pain that is inflicted on so many around them, through no fault of their own.
The house in Nottingham where Kate and Tariq live has a separate flat on the top floor - which in this case is the second floor according to English custom, the third floor according to Russian custom. Large, well-built nineteenth century houses are often adapted in this way. In this flat in 2001 lived Jonas and Stephanie. Jonas' brother, Clifford was also living with them.
Jonas and Clifford are black, Stephanie is white. All three were born and brought up in Nottingham. In 2001 Stephanie and Jonas were both 22, and Clifford was 18. Jonas as a boy started helping out a garage where cars were serviced and repaired. He enjoyed the work, and when he left school, he went to the College of Further Education to study car maintenance. Then he worked in various garages in the area, until he found himself working on lorries. He loved the lorries. Stephanie was a secretary in a small business dealing with imported spare parts for certain types of lorries. That is how she met Jonas.
During the next few years as the Khan children were growing up downstairs, Jonas found a chance to build up a small lorry repair business of his own. He began by renting space in a garage where he was working, and then found premises on a small industrial estate on the edge of the city. By 2008, aged 29, Jonas is doing very well. He and Stephanie have moved out of their flat and are now paying a substantial mortgage on a semidetached 1960s house in a pleasant housing estate nearer his business. The business is still small, but his customers are satisfied, he is employing a young man part-time, and he has his eye on bigger premises.
Meanwhile, Stephanie found herself getting rather bored with her job, just as Jonas began complaining about all the paperwork in his business. So she became his company secretary, began to sort out his accounts, taxes, and the forms necessary for registering a business. She enjoys the increased responsibility and has now taken on a similar job for a friend. Jonas pays her and often grumbles at the need to do so, but in fact they both know that this is a very convenient arrangement. Stephanie is 29 and has just given birth to her first child, Denise. Jonas rejoices at being at last a Dad. He has two sisters with children and is tired of having no role but 'Uncle'.
Clifford, Jonas' young brother, entered Nottingham Trent University in September 2001 to do a B.Sc. degree course in Civil Engineering. He graduated in June 2004, and found a job in Sheffield, a major city in Yorkshire, 100 kilometres to the north. First he worked with a private firm to which he had applied on the recommendation of his university tutors. He was delighted to be given the job against considerable competition and he worked there for three years. Late in 2007 he transferred to working with Sheffield City Council, as part of the team dealing with the city's infrastructure. By this time he had a girl-friend, Lily who works for a city courier firm. They feel very settled in Sheffield, a city that will certainly require people with Clifford's qualifications for as long as he wishes to work for them.
Kate and Tariq are professional middle-class people with two incomes. When Jonas and Stephanie moved out, they discussed whether to move to another house themselves, rather than have people living in a flat above them. They could afford to do so; but they did not really need extra space. Downstairs they had a large kitchen, a comfortable sitting room, and a playroom which was used for all kinds of practical work. It had a television in it - strictly controlled by Kate. Tariq and Kate had a large bedroom looking out over the street, and at the back of the house were three smaller bedrooms, one for each of the children. The children often moved into each other's bedrooms, because of the frequent guests who arrived at the house, but they enjoyed living all in a heap. Neither of their parents was obsessed with housework, so family life moved along in clutter where there would always be a space for friends.
They decided that they did not want to enlarge their house, but that they would like to buy the freehold of the whole house and then rent out the top flat. It took more than six months to sort out all the legal implications. Buying houses in England is a slow and complex process. Eventually their scheme was accepted, so then they had to renovate the top flat and replace much of the equipment. Local 'health and safety' officers came to inspect the work and ordered them to make various (expensive) additions. They were just about to advertise for tenants when Kate had an urgent call from an old university friend, Stella. Over the next two hours Kate heard a long and involved story.