Daniyal Mueenuddin - In Other Rooms, Other Wonders

‘Do you know why they sent you the honey?’ he asked her at breakfast, as she devoured her second slice of crisp toast with quick little bites, finishing and licking her fingers.

‘Because they think I’m too thin?’

‘Because they think it helps you get pregnant.’

He said this with a little moue, knowing that the subject irritated her. Perhaps it would be better, to leap into childbearing in this first surge of their marriage, to begin the new life with a new life beside her. She tried to imagine herself loving the child, but could think only of the pain, her body torn and stretched, the body that she cared so much about, which she had entirely lived for, its pleasures, wine and intoxication, clothing herself, pleased by herself in the mirror, undressing in front of men, silently expectant. And then, to be hostage to the child, fighting against it, finally with a sigh of relief becoming absorbed in applesauce and feeding, adoring its little feet and hands, buying it costumes printed with bunnies and ducks. Murad certainly wanted her to become a mother, to be mothering, even at the cost of losing interest in fashion and appearance, making baby talk, finding her joy in a child’s first tooth and its first words.

Before the marriage they luxuriated in their plans, at parties ignoring the other guests, during long picnics, making lists of things to buy, apportioning responsibilities, making resolutions. She saw that now the plans must be renegotiated, reconceived. She had believed that her personality would be subsumed in their larger personality as a couple, living into each other, but already the strangeness of the initial engagement wore off and she went back to being — exactly — herself. A little crack opened up as if in the perimeter walls of the compound at Jalpana, through which a poisonous scent, like very strong attar, overpowering, overripe, musky, seeped into their life together — the pull of her old life, of other lives. Why did he have to speak so slowly, to explain in such detail the mechanics of the sprinklers in the greenhouses?

Already, just three months since they first slept together, she found herself pulling away when he began to touch her. He always did it the same way, on top, and became shy when she suggested, by her movements, not even in words, that they try other positions. The persistence of his shyness, which placed a limit on their physical intimacy, had disappointed her — when they first met she had thought him piratical and dominating, and had imagined that as they became closer and freer with each other that spirit would come to the fore, energy that would master her, but playfully. A friend had given her a bachelorette present of stockings and a garter belt brought from America. As a surprise, thinking to break up the routine of their lovemaking, one evening before Murad came home from walking the fields, she put them on, lying on the bed otherwise naked, candles lit. He said, ‘So that’s how you wear those!’ and then, instead of joining her in bed, he brought a clipper from the bathroom and trimmed a broken fingernail, sitting on the windowsill and speaking of a problem on the farm, a woman in the village whose husband beat her, and who had come to Lily asking for protection. Coloring, mortified, she had pulled the covers to hide herself, and when he left the room angrily threw the stockings in the fire. Accustomed to rush and passion, to first times, making love with Murad became a chore, something she wanted, but that required effort and planning.

They had been too long on the farm, a month, then a month and a half, then two and a half, but neither had yet raised the question of returning to Islamabad. Neither could bear to leave the farm now while matters stood as they did — Lily knew this of herself, saw it in Murad. She would lie in bed and dream of food, of steak tartare at Ecotex, a restaurant in Islamabad run by a young Spaniard in his own house, or of foie gras and duck rillettes, which a shop in Paris sent to Mino. The two of them would wolf it down on buttered toast, to line their stomachs before going to a party. She missed Mino, missed the life of the city.

One evening Lily and Murad sat in the living room where they now usually had dinner, eating while reading or watching Lily’s television shows — they joked about being like an old married couple. Restless, Lily kept piling more and more wood into the fireplace, poking and shifting the logs. Her colored pens were scattered on a table, she had been making impossible elaborate designs for dresses, fantasies. Now she sat down again and began doodling. They had been flirting all evening, Murad serious and busy, reading a book about greenhouse farming, Lily making excuses to disturb him. Idly wanting to startle him, oppressed by the hot room and his methodical studying, she wrote in large red letters on a sheet of paper, Anal Sex at Noon Taxes Lana, drew hearts all around the script, folded the paper into an airplane, and fired it at Murad.

‘Let me guess,’ he said, reading it, putting his book down and smiling at her. ‘You’re bored.’

‘It’s a palindrome. Mino taught me. It’s the same backwards and forwards, get it? Anal sex? Works both ways?’

‘Very witty. You really profited from that boy’s company.’

She sat next to him on the sofa, kicked off her little embroidered slippers so that they went flying, one into each corner of the room, and lay down with her head in his lap. ‘But I am bored, it’s true,’ she said petulantly.

‘You sound like you’re eight years old. Why don’t you read your book, my love?’

‘Bo-ring! Don’t tell me — you’re going to say being bored means you have no inner resources.’

He looked down at her face and stroked her hair. ‘I was going to say something along those lines. It happens to be true.’

She sat up again, went over by the fire, and threw in another log, then took the tongs and stirred the burning chunks, sparks flying up and popping.

‘Maybe I don’t have inner resources then.’ She rummaged around some more in the fire. ‘Murad? I’ve been thinking. Let’s have some people up this weekend. Won’t that be fun? We’ll have the gardeners light diyas all over the lawn when they arrive. It’ll be a housewarming. That’s the best way, instead of us going to Islamabad. They’ll definitely come, those guys all love doing things at the last minute.’

‘I suppose you’re right. It’s difficult being alone together. You need refreshment — I’m used to this life, and I’ve got the farm.’

She felt this as a reproach, his lugubrious tone, as if the guests were only for her.

‘You make it sound like I’m a baby needing her bottle. We just got married, we’re young. We should play.’

Not waiting for his answer, she sat down at the table and began cutting a piece of colored paper. ‘Come on, Mr. Lone Wolf. I’ll make a funny invitation and someone can go on the day bus to Islamabad tomorrow and deliver it.’

Standing up and observing her for moment with his hands in the pockets of his khakis, he walked over and took her face in his hands, kissed her on the lips. ‘Well, I guess that’s decided, right down to method of delivery! Actually I’m glad.’

She wrote to Mino, inviting him to the farm that weekend — he had promised at the wedding to visit soon — and asking him to bring some amusing people. In the card she giddily called herself ‘the ChÀtelaine of Jalpana,’ and joked about battling scorpions the size of cocker spaniels, living with her husband and the camels for company. An illustration on the front of the card showed her, Murad, and a camel sprawled in planter chairs sipping martinis, all three wearing T-shirts that said, in purple letters, The Home Team!