A Pair of Jeans and other stories by Qaisra Shahraz Page B

can I come and see you at home, and then we can talk together with your parents?”
    “Of course you can, Miriam, but really, you’ve now got me all worried, I must say.”
    “It’s nothing to fret about. I’ll tell you in a short while. Hudah Hafiz.” Her voice and thoughts were calm again.
    Miriam switched off her phone and faced her mother. Fatima noted the distinct mutinous line of her daughter’s mouth. She struggled to say the right thing but not want to bruise her daughter’s ego further. She had a duty, however, to advise her as a mother, but the right words just failed to spring to her aid. Finally, she softly offered: “Miriam, that wasn’t the right thing to do or say.”
    “The right thing to do?” Miriam ejaculated – stung. “Do you think Farook’s parents have done the right thing by me?” she hissed, her betrayed eyes darting an angry beam of light at her mother.
    Fatima realised her blunder. It was a mighty wrong thing to say under the circumstances. Of course her daughter had the right to feel as she did. So Fatima attempted to placate her with her next words.
    “I am sorry, Miriam, I didn’t mean that. It’s just that I thought that instead of you contacting Farook, it should be us, your parents, doing it in the first place – that is the seemly thing to do.”
    “Oh Mother! There you go on again about ‘seemly’ things. There is nothing ‘unseemly’ about me contacting my own fiancé.” She laid extra stress on the word “own”. “After all, I am engaged to him, am I not? Or have you forgotten that too?” Angry heat was rushing out of her cheeks.
    “No I haven’t forgotten! There is no need for your sarcasm.” Fatima snapped back, also now quite flushed, beginning to get irritated with her daughter and the situation in which she presently found herself.
    “I just mean that your father and I should go firstly to visit Farook and his parents to discuss the matter. Do you think that we don’t care about you – about how they have jilted you, and on what grounds? After all, it’s a matter of our
Izzat
, our honour, the way we are being treated so shabbily – that our daughter is dropped like a sack of potatoes. I was under a great deal of shock when I listened to Begum earlier today on the phone, but now the shock has worn off, and like you I am very, very angry.” She passionately ended, hoping to clarify her own feelings and position to her daughter.
    Miriam shrugged. “You can sort that out with father, Farook and his parents, but I am going to see Farook personally and right now, mother!” A defiant tilt arched her eyebrows above her flashing eyes. Hoping that her mother had understood the message, Miriam swept round and went upstairs to her bedroom.
    Fatima stared after her daughter helplessly – she was in a real dilemma. She wanted to tell and advise Miriam that she shouldn’t meet Farook, until they themselves had met his parents. At the same time she felt deeply for her daughter and wanted to support her in any way that she could. Never before had she felt the gulf between Miriam’s generation and her own so keenly. The generation and culture gap lay between them as wide as the ocean. She never did this sort of thing in her youth. Unthinkable! No matter what happened, the parents saw to everything. It was they who resolved problems; children did not take things into their own hands.
    Pakistan was so far from Britain; it was another place and she was thinking of another time. As her daughter had said, it wasn’t a matter of what was the right thing to do convention-wise, but it was time for positive action. If Miriam thought she had a right to consult Farook about this matter, then she had every right to do so, and she, as her mother, would support her! Times had indeed changed. They lived and were brought up in different worlds, traditions and cultures. Above all, the world was quickly changing around them.
    Returning to the lounge, she stood listlessly in