Nicola Barker - The Yips

Nessa picks up her crayons and starts to draw, finally allowing Aamilah to relax and focus her full attention back on Valentine again. ‘Karim told me about the agoraphobia on our drive home this morning,’ she tells her, confidentially. ‘Salvatore told him about it at daycare. I just wanted to let you know that I honestly had no idea — none whatsoever — when I suggested you put on the robe and head outside in it earlier …’

‘Of course.’ Valentine nods, bearing her no ill will whatsoever.

‘Good,’ Aamilah sighs, relieved. ‘I mean I’ve never even considered asking an English girl to try on my robes before. My robe is a sacred thing to me. Not the garment itself, obviously, but what it represents.’

‘I completely get that,’ Valentine concurs.

‘Afterwards — I mean after I left here — I just thought, That girl is so oddly attached to the way she looks, the external part of herself, the superficial part of herself, and she dresses herself up but she never leaves the house. I just thought, That’s really weird. And then I thought, Allah has made her agoraphobic for a reason, of course. As a test. And Allah always tests the people he loves the most. “ Wherever tears fall, divine Mercy is shown …” She really needs to know that.’

Aamilah’s sharp brown eyes suddenly soften. She reaches out and pats Valentine’s arm. ‘Allah really loves you,’ she whispers, ‘he really, really loves you. I can feel it when I’m near you. This special atmosphere. This lightness. This sense of closeness. I feel your need. You remind me so much of myself. The Prophet — peace be upon him — once said, “The Faithful are like mirrors to each other” …’

‘Thank you,’ Valentine mutters, somewhat uneasily (unsure how much of a compliment she considers this to be).

‘Allah is compassionate and all-forgiving,’ Aamilah continues. ‘I know in my heart that he sent me here today for a reason. One of our Seven Articles of Faith is that good and bad is predestined by Allah. Like I say, everything happens for a reason, and I think — in fact I’m certain — that Allah wants you to love him. He wants you to stop hating yourself and to dedicate your life to loving him instead.’

‘That’s very —’ Valentine starts off, haltingly.

‘You don’t even have to think about it,’ Aamilah interrupts, ‘you just need to do it. This minute. Right now. Make that decision in your heart to turn towards Allah.’

‘It’s just …’ Valentine frowns, her eyes lingering on Nessa.

‘ Understand that all shall be well ,’ Aamilah quotes, serenely.

‘Right.’ Valentine nods.

‘I mean just give it some thought.’ She inspects Valentine’s face, intently. ‘You’re a beautiful girl. Imagine how amazing it would be if you focused all that loveliness on Allah instead of on the world. Imagine what a great gift you would be bringing him. If you stopped the tattoos and gave up the clothes and the make-up — all these barriers which stand between you and complete happiness.’

‘So you … you think I need to give everything up?’ Valentine’s somewhat taken aback (even rendered slightly resentful) by this stark prospect. ‘Doesn’t God — Allah — love me as I am?’

‘Are you happy?’ Aamilah demands.

‘Uh …’ Valentine thinks for a second. ‘No. Not especially. But there are things in my life that make me feel worthwhile — which give me a strong sense of …’

‘As Karim always likes to tell me,’ Aamilah quickly butts in: ‘ Paradise is encompassed by the things we dislike to do, while the fires of Hell are encircled by our desires. ’

Valentine stares at her, perplexed.

‘Sometimes it’s the very things we like the best — the things that fuel our egos — that make us unhappy. We just don’t realize it. We think the pain inside — the fear inside — is something that threatens the happiness those things bring us — but in fact it’s those very things — which we hold on to so desperately — that are the very source of our misery! When you let go of those things you let go of fear.’

Valentine ponders this for a while. She briefly remembers the dead Valentine of that morning — the un -Valentine — peeking blankly through her grille at the fine chrome-work on Karim’s car. She shudders, involuntarily.

‘Of course I’m running ahead of myself, here.’ Aamilah picks a stray cat hair from the knee of her robe, simulating nonchalance. ‘It’s just that I’m so excited by the idea of what it would mean to you and to Allah if you gave yourself back to him again.’

Valentine nods, mutely. She doesn’t really know what else to contribute.

‘There’s this brilliant website which I found very helpful when I was first thinking of reverting back to the one true faith myself.’ Aamilah reaches into a pocket inside her robe and removes a small piece of paper with a phone number and an address neatly printed on to it. She passes it over.

‘The phone number is my mobile. I want you to ring me on it whenever you feel like you need to. The internet address is for HowToBeAGoodMoslemGirl.com . It’s very basic but really useful. Sets everything out way better than I ever could.’

‘Thanks.’

Valentine takes the slip of paper and puts it down on the arm of the sofa.

A short silence follows. Outside, on the front step, Farhana is softly singing an indecipherable nursery rhyme to Badriya. Nessa listens from her spot on the floor, head cocked, intrigued.

‘So what about this little picnic of ours?’ Aamilah wonders, grinning.

‘Oh … uh …’ Valentine’s eyes turn towards Nessa.

‘We brought along a spare robe, just in case,’ she wheedles. ‘Farhana and I will walk either side of you. We’ll protect you. Nothing bad will happen. We’ll be your bodyguards. You’ll be completely safe with us, I swear.’

‘It’s not … I’m just not sure …’

Valentine slowly shakes her head. Her throat starts to contract. ‘Mum will be home in an hour or so. And I need to contact the bank …’ She starts to try and clamber to her feet. ‘In fact I should probably …’

‘We’ll be forty minutes, tops,’ Aamilah doggedly persists, grabbing the fabric of Valentine’s skirt to stop her from getting up. ‘We’ll just stroll down there in the sun, have a quick snack on the grass — feed the pigeons, maybe — then head straight back home again.’

‘It’s nothing personal, I just don’t think … I just really couldn’t …’ Valentine struggles to explain herself.

‘Don’t think. Just act!’ Aamilah exclaims. ‘Be our cousin for an hour. Be one of us. Stop being Valentine, full of doubt, always over-analysing everything. Be … be beautiful, happy, laughing Hamra, our retarded niece from Leicester.’

‘You have a retarded niece in Leicester?’ Valentine’s slightly perplexed.

‘Yes. Well, no,’ Aamilah modifies, ‘he’s retarded but he’s our nephew and he isn’t actually called Hamra. Hamra’s a girl’s name. It means “red” in Arabic. Red’ — she grins — ‘like a Valentine.’

‘Hamra,’ Valentine echoes, amused, softly touching her hair.

‘Red for love,’ Aamilah nods, encouraged. ‘Red for a rose. Red for …’

She casts around for further examples.

‘Red for blood,’ Valentine murmurs, anxiously, ‘red for danger.’

‘Red for sacrifice.’ Aamilah nods, her brown eyes igniting, enthused. ‘And for strawberries,’ she then quickly adds, with a shrug and a grin, ‘and cherries, of course, and post-boxes and … and red for a robin’s breast …’ — she jumps to her feet — ‘and fire engines’ — she heads for the door — ‘and poppies and ladybirds and …’ She pauses for a moment. ‘While I think of it,’ she muses, pulling on her niqab , ‘we made pakoras for lunch …’ She pops her head out into the hallway. ‘Hana!’ she yells. ‘Hana! Hana! Did you remember to bring the ketchup?’