Layla AlAmmar - The Pact We Made

The Borough Press

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Publishers 2019

Copyright © Layla AlAmmar 2019

Cover design by Holly Macdonald © HarperCollins Publishers Ltd 2019

Cover photography © HMoodboard/Getty Images

Layla AlAmmar asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008284442

Ebook Edition © March 2019 ISBN: 9780008284466

Version: 2019-12-09

‘[A] fascinating glimpse into the complex and contradictory life of a modern Kuwaiti woman … full of personality and touches of humour’

Guardian

‘So beautifully written and so important, and so cleverly crafted, it can’t be a debut. But it is’

Joanna Cannon

‘ The Pact We Made deals with one woman’s search for independence’

ELLE

‘A Kuwaiti #MeToo novel of muffled suffering and a bid for freedom – absorbing, brave and compelling’

Leila Aboulela

‘Brilliant book about the pressures of being a 30-year-old unmarried woman in Kuwait – the struggle for modernity amidst patriarchal tradition – and the cultural failure to acknowledge trauma. What a debut’

Pandora Sykes

‘Fascinating, nuanced and understanding’

Observer

‘Truthful and courageous, radical and lyrical. I loved it’

Hanan al-Shaykh

‘One of those books you ration so it doesn’t end too soon, it’s beautifully written and unbelievably powerful. I loved it’

Katie Lowe, author of The Furies

‘Kuwaiti writer Layla AlAmmar’s debut is, on the surface, the story of a woman about to turn 30 and under pressure to find a husband. But it’s a layered exploration of Kuwaiti society and culture as well. And it’s a look at grief, trauma and the expectations placed upon young women that will resonate with women across the world’

Sarah Shaffi, Phoenix

‘A timely and deeply affecting debut with a voice that needs to be heard, at a time when it matters most’

Charlotte Philby, author of The Most Difficult Thing

‘Set in contemporary Kuwait, AlAmmar asks us to reimagine the lives of modern Muslims as they struggle to reconcile the freedom of choice with the customs of their faith’

BBC Radio 3 Free Thinking

‘A complex novel championing feminism in the Arab world’

The National

‘ The Pact We Made is a book about marriage, but it would be a mistake to think that it is a conventional love story. Instead, it’s a book about familial and cultural expectations, the lingering effects of trauma, and healing and loving yourself again. Also resistant to easy judgement is Dahlia, who is a complex character, unsure of how to navigate a life and roles that have been thrust upon her. But it’s no coincidence that she is named after a flower, something that is so easily damaged but that, with some care and attention, the right kind of light and tenderness, can be restored to something newer and stronger … In Dahlia and The Pact We Made , AlAmmar has created something strong and lasting, a book about a woman battling to exist on her own terms in a world which wants women to stay quiet. Dahlia and AlAmmar are making their voices heard, and that’s a great thing’

The New Arab

To Mom, my first reader, for handing me a book all those years ago.

‘At a very early period she had apprehended instinctively the dual life – that outward existence which conforms, the inward life which questions.’

Kate Chopin, The Awakening

‘No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.’

Nathaniel Hawthorne

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Praise for The Pact We Made

Dedication

Epigraph

Chapter 1: The Marriage Pact

Chapter 2: Hush

Chapter 3: A Grotesque Pandemonium

Chapter 4: A Marauding Heart

Chapter 5: The Architect

Chapter 6: Snow Globes

Chapter 7: They Spin Finely

Chapter 8: The Sleep of Reason …

Chapter 9:… Produces Monsters

Chapter 10: Who More Is Surrendered?

Chapter 11: Tantalus

Chapter 12: He Cannot Make Her Out

Chapter 13: What One Does to the Other

Chapter 14: Hunting for Teeth

Chapter 15: A Cowslip’s Bell

Chapter 16: Fifteen Candles

Chapter 17: Those Specks of Dust

Chapter 18: When Day Breaks

Chapter 19: There It Goes

Chapter 20: You Will Not Escape

Chapter 21: It Is Time

Chapter 22: I Have Chosen

Acknowledgments

About the Author

About the Publisher

We were eight years old in my first memory of the marriage pact. Mona and I were at Zaina’s house. Her oldest sister had just gotten married, and we were bursting with talk of all that we’d seen and heard at the wedding. We looked like mummy brides, wrapped in her mother’s headscarves. Mona had found ribbons and flowers which she’d braided and pinned into our hair. We took turns being the bride while the other two played the parts of sisters, supporting the train, giving admonishing smiles during the Yelwa , and bobbing up and down in exultant dances.

‘When she came through the door, everyone was so quiet,’ Zaina said, standing at the door to her room, holding a bouquet of fake roses. ‘All the lights went out and there was just a spotlight on her, and then “Heb AlSa’ada” came on and she started walking. Like this.’ She took solemn steps forward, her feet drowning in the heels we’d pilfered. Mona held and re-draped her train as she walked. I was supposed to sing the song, but I was imagining walking down a long aisle with a spotlight on me while everyone stared. It wouldn’t be like weddings we saw on television where the man stood at the end. It would just be me and a never-ending aisle leading to an empty settee. I could trip and fall, walk too slow or too fast, forget to smile at the photographer or drop my bouquet. Anything could happen.

‘Dahlia!’ Mona whined, drawing out all the syllables in my name. I started singing, but Zaina had already reached the desk chair we were using as a kosha . She turned to look over her shoulder while Mona metamorphosed into photographer, snapping shots of Zaina smiling, laughing, and looking coy. I knew what was coming next; I always got the groom’s role.