‘Better that you don’t. He was smoking a cigarette,’ Jhoti said.
The women tsk-tsked. ‘Oh, here we go again,’ Sheena said in English, rolling her eyes at Nikki.
‘Smoking?’ Arvinder Kaur said. ‘He doesn’t strike me as the type. I’ve seen him at the temple a few times.’
‘He’s got respectable parents as well. Remember his wedding? There wasn’t anything like it.’
‘A very lavish wedding,’ Tanveer said. ‘Both bride and groom were firstborns. The celebrations were a week long.’
‘I’ve heard there are problems in that marriage, by the way. My daughter works closely with the wife’s family’s neighbours. They say she’s moved back in with her parents. That’s why I was surprised to see him. I thought he would have gone home as well, but I guess he’s stayed to work things out.’ Jhoti said.
‘Where is he from, again?’ Arvinder said. ‘His family is from Canada, no?’
‘California,’ Tanveer said. ‘There was a misunderstanding, remember? The girl’s father said, “My daughter is marrying an American” and everybody thought he was a gorah.’
‘They thought so because his name didn’t sound Punjabi,’ Preetam said. ‘It was Jason.’
Something seized Nikki. ‘Jason?’ she repeated. The women nodded.
‘Such a pretty bride, no? And the mehendi was so dark on her light skin. Everybody was teasing her, saying, “This means your husband will be wealthy, this means that your mother-in-law will be kind.”’ Preetam said.
Nikki excused herself to the ladies and pulled out her phone once she was out of the widows’ view. She felt as if her insides had been scooped out. Jason is married. He was married all along. Two forces of temptation pulled her in opposing directions: to call him and tell him what a bastard he was; to block his number and let him spend the rest of his life wondering how she figured it out. A silent reel of recent memories played on a loop in Nikki’s mind. She saw herself kissing him, in bed with him while his wife wrung her hands in another corner of London. She had never felt so foolish before.
Finally she sent a response to his message.
Don’t bother coming over. We’re done.
Without hesitating, she pressed Send.
Chapter Fifteen
Kulwinder’s phone was buzzing on the countertop where she had left it. When she noticed the unfamiliar number, she felt a flash of anxiety. She picked up just before it rang out, but did not say anything.
‘Hello?’ It was Gurtaj Singh.
‘Sat sri akal,’ she said with relief. He greeted her back hastily and then said, ‘I take it that your writing classes went over time today.’
She glanced at the clock. It was quarter past nine, not that the women would be in the classroom anyway. She had locked the door. ‘The classes aren’t running.’ She stopped herself from saying ‘any more’. ‘Today,’ she said instead.
‘Are you telling me that the lights have been on since the last lesson?’ Gurtaj asked.
‘The lights?’
‘I was driving past the temple after dinner out tonight and I noticed the light in the windows. You do realize, don’t you, that money will have to come out of the budget to pay those electricity bills?’
Kulwinder pulled the phone away from her ear so Gurtaj’s complaints became distant. She recalled shutting the room doors and locking them, and before that, as always, turning off the lights. Or had she forgotten? It was possible that she had been so enraged that she had left the lights on. Doubt rollicked in her stomach like a wave; something was not right. ‘I’ll go back in and turn off the lights,’ she said.
‘No need to leave your house in the middle of the night,’ Gurtaj said.
Did he just call to have a go at her then? ‘I never said I was at home,’ Kulwinder replied. She left a question as to where she was and what she was doing, and pictured the surprise on Gurtaj’s face.
Kulwinder marched briskly to the temple, her handbag tucked under her arm and her legs taking lengthy strides. It occurred to her that she might be followed again, but she felt a brazenness from earlier flowing through her blood. Sikhs are warriors, she remembered telling a very young Maya, whose eyes glowed with this knowledge, frightening Kulwinder. ‘But girls must act like girls,’ she had added. Since Maya’s death, Kulwinder had only allowed herself to feel the absence as short, shocking sparks. Now they had ignited something and Kulwinder felt she could breathe fire on anybody who crossed her.
All of the windows were black with night except the classroom and Kulwinder’s office. She felt a twist of fear but pushed on until she reached the third-floor corridor. ‘Hello?’ she called out, taking measured steps towards the door. There was no response. The light glared through the small window in the door. With a gasp, Kulwinder saw the damage first. The room seemed upside down. The tables and chairs lay toppled and helpless, their legs sticking up in the air. Papers were strewn in every direction, and streaks of red spray paint crudely marked the blackboard and the floor. Kulwinder clutched the fabric of her blouse because this was the closest she could get to her heart. She hurried to her office.
The vandals had done the same work here – turning over every surface, ruining the order of her work. The file folders had been tossed to the floor and one window bashed through.
There was the sudden slap of approaching footsteps. Kulwinder scurried through the door into her office and searched wildly for a place to hide. The footsteps became louder. Kulwinder picked up the heaviest thing she could find – an office stapler – and clutched it with both hands. The footsteps stopped and a woman appeared in the doorway. Wearing a midnight blue tunic with a silver chain-stitched border, this woman looked both familiar and strange.
‘What happened here?’ the woman asked, staring at the mess. Then Kulwinder recognized Manjeet Kaur. Kulwinder hadn’t seen her out of widow’s clothes in the last year.
‘Somebody …’ Kulwinder gestured helplessly at the mess. She had no more words.
‘Where are the other women?’ Manjeet asked. ‘I’ve been away but I returned to Southall today. I could see the classroom light on from my house and I walked over to give them a surprise.’
‘They’re not meeting here any more. I cancelled the classes.’
‘Oh. You found out, then?’
Still numb with shock, Kulwinder continued to survey the mess. The tidy desk at which she always sat with such pride had been gutted. One drawer hung open lewdly like a tongue.
‘I guess we should start cleaning up the place,’ Kulwinder said.
‘Absolutely not,’ Manjeet replied. ‘I started my day with leaving my husband. I’m not going to end it with cleaning up after another man.’