Ibrahim & Reenie (34 page)

‘Well. We found something saying an Irene Lieberman had married a Jonathan Glickman in Cardiff, and then we checked the electoral roll, found Irene Glickman, wrote to you, and now you're here.'

‘And now I'm here.'

A human silence fell between them; the only sound in the room the faraway drone of a descending aeroplane.

‘You said my dad kept stuff by for me,' said Reenie.

‘That's right. Just a few bits and pieces. They weren't particularly wealthy, Albert and Vera. It's just a box full of things. There was no inheritance or anything like that…'

‘I never thought there would be.'

‘I'll just go and get it for you,' said Lauren, rising from the table and leaving Reenie alone in the kitchen. She heard Lauren climb the stairs, and the sound of her footsteps on the landing, then murmured words between Lauren and her husband, a cupboard door opening and closing, more footsteps on the stairs, and Lauren came back carrying a small, crumpled shoebox, placing it down on the table.

‘That's it,' she said. ‘That's everything, I'm afraid. Like I said, we could have brought it to you, or posted it…'

‘No,' said Reenie. ‘That's fine. I'm glad I came here.'

She lifted the lid off the box, releasing at once the dry, smoky scent of old paper and dust. Inside were trinkets, nothing of any worth. A pin cushion with rusting pins still embedded between its embroidered flowers. A small, yellowing copy of the
Lambs'
Tales From Shakespeare
. A handkerchief monogrammed with Reenie's childhood initials;
IL.
A black and white photograph of Reenie and her father, taken on a sunny afternoon in Margate. Few of the objects held any significance for her. Some stirred vague memories, none of them momentous, but finally she came to the picture frame, face down, at the bottom of the box. She knew it immediately, without having to turn it over, recognising the marbled pattern of its backing, and its creased support made of thick card. She knew, almost by touch alone, the single brass tack holding that support in place, and recognised the chip in the frame's corner where, as a child, she'd once knocked it down from the mantelpiece during a game, sending her father into a rage that terrified her. Fortunately the glass hadn't broken, and the frame – and its picture – was placed back on the mantelpiece, where it stayed until the day her father remarried.

Reenie lifted the frame from the box, turned it over, and looked down at a face she hadn't seen in sixty years. As a child the picture hadn't looked to her like an antique. All photographs were black and white or sepia then, and there was nothing, in the subject's clothes or the way her hair was styled or in the little make-up that she wore, that made it feel like a relic. It had been easy enough for Reenie to imagine this woman laughing, or smiling, or greeting her when she came home from school. In the years that had since passed, Reenie had forgotten almost everything about the portrait, to the point where she could no longer quite picture her mother's face. It was sepia; that was all she knew. And now the photograph looked old, so old, and the woman in it was a fraction of Reenie's age, little more than a girl.

‘He kept this,' said Reenie, her voice breaking until the last word was barely a whisper.

‘Yes,' said Lauren. ‘He kept all these things. For his sake, as much as anything, I think.' Lauren reached across the table and closed her hand around Reenie's. ‘He missed you so much.'

Reenie nodded without looking up at her. She couldn't take her eyes off the photograph, but neither could she forgive herself for the years she had lost and the family she would never know. Many years ago she had resigned herself to the idea that fate would have its way; that in leaving her family she had, in turn, met Jonathan, and that this was her happy ending, that it was meant to be, but there had always been regret. Of course she hadn't expected her father to be alive, still, or for even Vera to have lasted as long as she had, but without knowing for certain, neither were they dead. Rather, they were preserved, never ageing or changing with time. Now that the photograph of her mother looked like an antique, and this young woman was without grandparents or a mother, the past was definite, the outlines of that vague but constant sense of grief Reenie had felt brought into a clearer definition.

‘And where is he now?' she asked, wiping tears from her eyes with the back of her hand. ‘My dad, I mean. Where did they bury him? Was he buried?'

Lauren nodded. ‘East London,' she said. ‘Near where they lived. He chose the cemetery. I think later on in life he regretted some of the choices he'd made, and… well… he wanted to be buried there. We can take you there. I mean, if you'd like, we could…'

‘No, thanks,' said Reenie, standing and placing the framed photograph back in the box. ‘It's fine. Thanks, anyway. I've made it this far. Another couple of miles on the Tube won't make any difference.'

‘Fair enough,' said Lauren. ‘But before you go to his grave, there's something you should know.'

27

Aisha was waiting for him in the police station's reception, her handbag in her lap, knees close together, distracted and impatient. On seeing him, she stood and he paused, trying to take in – to accept – the sight of her as a woman. When he last saw her she was still a teenager, still girlish, but now her posture, the way she looked at him, everything about her was grown up.

DCI Garfield offered a mealy-mouthed apology for the inconvenience, qualifying it with several ‘Of-Course-You-Understands', and of course, he understood. He understood perfectly how the details tied in with their chosen narrative; the young man with his maps, found sleeping between the palace and parliament. He almost felt sorry for them, as the different pieces of the puzzle fell away, as the elements of his – Ibrahim's – version of events came together and made sense. They called his sister, checked with the hospital. They did
not
make any connection to arrests now seven years old or to the damage done at a cemetery out east, and why should they?

When he was out from behind the wall of glass separating the waiting area and the duty officer's small office, Aisha ran to him and hugged him, standing up on tiptoes to get her arms around his shoulders and his neck.

‘What were you
thinking
?' she said. ‘Camping? Near the Mall? Are you mental?'

‘I got here, sis,' he said. ‘Alright? I got here.'

Aisha's car – she passed her test two years ago; Ibrahim had forgotten to send a card – was parked several streets from the station, in Covent Garden, and for a moment Ibrahim stood on the kerb, looking down at the car with apprehension. He would happily have walked to Newham, sure that he could navigate his way there through a kind of blind instinct, but he knew this would be the final straw, and would piss her off more than anything he'd done this last nine days, and so he climbed into the front passenger seat, and they drove out of Covent Garden and headed east.

‘So… you okay?' said Aisha.

‘Yeah. I'm okay.'

‘What happened to your face?'

‘My what?' He flapped down the sun visor and saw his reflection in its small mirror. ‘Right. Yeah. My face. I had a bit of trouble. In Gloucester.'

‘Right. And that's where you were two days ago, yeah?'

‘Yeah.'

A minute or so of silence passed between them. He looked out through the windows, waiting for a familiar street, a landmark, something he might remember, something to reassure him that he
could
have found his own way to Newham, if he'd wanted to. Eventually, when that silence became uncomfortable, he asked, ‘How's Dad?'

He was ashamed he hadn't asked earlier, but had known what her response would be.

‘How do you fucking think? He's had a stroke. He can't speak properly. He can't walk. Oh, he's dandy, Ib. Fine and fucking dandy.'

‘Aish, please, don't swear.'

She looked at him across the car, appalled, and let out a short, desperate laugh.

‘Don't swear? Don't
swear?
You've got a fucking nerve.'

‘I didn't mean it like… I just mean it sounds wrong. You swearing.'

‘Right. Because I'm your little sister, yeah?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well, I know you have trouble thinking about anyone outside your little world, Ib, but I'm actually twenty-one now, so I'll say what the fuck I like,
thankyouverymuch
.'

‘Aish…'

‘Ib, don't. Alright? Just don't. I'm not… I'm not
mad
at you. I'm just having a bit of a hard time of it right now, okay? I've been the one staying at the hospital. I've been the one phoning everyone, giving them updates, and a fat lot of good they've been. The family, I mean. Oh, don't get me wrong, they've got a billion remedies for every illness under the sun. Except a stroke. If he'd had a heart attack they'd say' – she adopted a strong, sing-song Punjabi accent – ‘he was eating too many sweets, or that he shouldn't fry everything, or that he should cut down on
ghee
, or that we should call a
hakeem
…' She let out a short, ironic laugh; almost a gasp. ‘But a stroke? They just don't know. None of us do. I look at him, and he looks so
small
, Ib. It's like he's shrunk, or something. And it's like half the life has been sucked out of him, like he's lost the will to live. I can't…' she paused as they neared a junction, the only sound in the car the rhythmic tapping of the indicator. ‘Sometimes I can't even look at him. It's just too much. And I really could have done with you being around this week.'

Ibrahim craned his head back and sighed. ‘I'm sorry,' he said. ‘It's just, it's difficult. Even getting here. Even
thinking
about getting here. And with me in Cardiff…'

‘I know, Ib. And I know
why
you had to go to Cardiff.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘Yeah. Dad told me. After the bombings. Not long after your accident. We were watching the news, and they were talking about extremists, and he said you once got yourself mixed up with those nutters at the mosque that got raided. Is that true?'

His inability to answer her was all the answer she needed.

‘Ha!' She laughed. ‘My brother the terrorist.'

‘Aish. It's not funny.'

‘Oh, I don't know. I mean, look at you! It all makes sense now. Remember that time you tried getting us to wear the
niqab
, and me and my friends just laughed at you? Remember that?'

‘Aish…'

‘We were
thirteen
. And you and your mates thought we should go around dressed like ninjas?'

‘Aish, please. It's not funny.'

‘Yes. It is.' She gave him a sideways glance, smiling, expecting him to smile back, but he didn't. ‘Someone's had a sense-of-humour bypass, I see.'

Little more was said for the remainder of their journey, though it took almost an hour and a half to reach the hospital. It was midday, and from Holborn to Limehouse the traffic moved at a listless, grinding pace. When Aisha spoke, it was to the traffic lights or the drivers of other cars, yelling insults and curses at the top of her voice.

Ibrahim, meanwhile, kept his hands on his knees and took slow, deep breaths. He had left his Valium behind some place, perhaps in Reenie's tent – wherever it was, it was in neither his bag nor his wallet when he left the police station – and though only a Sunday afternoon central London was still busy. So many cars, so many people. Cyclists weaving in and out of lanes. Motorbikes tearing between cars and buses and trucks. Armies of pedestrians pouring out into the road at every crossing. Thudding, almost industrial-sounding music blaring out of every souped-up, two-door cabriolet that passed them. This was London at its worst; a vortex of people and noise, the traffic smells of exhaust fumes and hot tarmac, the warm, damp air and stern sky promising rainstorms.

At the hospital in Newham they walked through vanishing-point corridors and the cloying stench of bleach and illness until they came to their father's ward. The man lying in a bed that looked more like a machine was small, but more than that he was
old.
His hairline had receded further in the years since Ibrahim last saw him, and what hair remained was streaked through with white. The colour had drained from his skin, leaving him a bloodless grey, like something carved from stone. Ibrahim wondered, for a moment, if they had entered the wrong ward, if Aisha had made some mistake. The man in the bed was barely recognisable as his father.

Aisha walked around the bed, taking up the chair at its side, and gestured to Ibrahim that he should do the same, but he could only stand and look down at the shrunken, grey old man beneath the blanket. His father was sleeping, and silent, and Ibrahim felt a jarring moment of resentment for him, an emotion he'd never give voice to.