The Secret Lives of the Amir Sisters: the ultimate heart-warming read for 2018

‘No, I won’t,’ answered Bubblee.

‘Bubblee – for so long your dad and me have let you do what you want. Do you know the talk we have to hear when people know you live in London?’

Why don’t my parents ask me about marriage? Do they think I’m too fat and unattractive to be married? They wouldn’t be wrong, but aren’t your parents at least meant to see the best in you? Isn’t that the point? Dad was standing behind Bubblee. She didn’t see him until he said: ‘Malik.’

Bubblee turned to look at him.

‘Your amma and I have talked about it and we think it would be very good if you married him.’ He glanced over at Mum who was staring at Bubblee, a frown etched in her brows.

I opened the can of ghee, trying to concentrate on the sizzling onions, trying to forget that Malik – last I remembered – was thirty-two. Only two years older than me – wasn’t that the perfect age for me? I reached into the cupboard and got the cheese tube out, squirting it in my mouth while they weren’t looking.

‘But I don’t even know him,’ Bubblee exclaimed. ‘Anyway, I have to go back to London tomorrow. Sasha has an exhibition and I promised I’d be there.’

Mum adjusted her purple sari and lit the hob. ‘Sasha is not more important than your family.’

‘You shouldn’t spend so much time with just one girl,’ said Dad, clearing his throat. ‘Please, Bubblee,’ he said, taking her hand. ‘Open your mind that you might like something that your parents think is good for you. Why would we want to see you unhappy?’

‘But I’m happy now,’ she replied.

Mum and Dad were both turned towards Bubblee – me hovering in the background, frying onions. I wondered: what does happiness really feel like?

*

The following day everyone else went to the hospital as Bubblee drove me to my shoot. She’d given in and worn a pair of jeans with a kaftan, which made me think that sometimes she could do things, against her principles, just to keep the peace. She’d called Sasha and let her know she wouldn’t make her exhibition.

‘And no-one appreciates it,’ she said to me, one hand gripping the steering wheel and the other resting on the gear-stick. ‘That I’m putting my life on hold. It’s all expected.’

Weird how she didn’t expect it of herself.

‘Farah needs us all here,’ I said.

She took a deep sigh. ‘I know, I know. God, there’s no need to make me feel worse than they do. It’s just Mum is impossible and Dad nods at everything she says. It’s infuriating.’

‘At least it’s not the other way around,’ I replied.

Let’s face it, Bubblee would’ve been up in feminist arms.

‘Doesn’t make much difference, given that Mum’s intent on ruling my life and telling me what to do. All because it’s expected that I’ll get married. It’s expected that I’ll be a good little wife.’ She beeped at someone, who I’m pretty sure had the right of way. ‘Like good old Farah.’

We all know that Bubblee’s ideals – however weird they seem to me – stop her from liking the fact that Mustafa married our sister, but I never understood the strength of her opposition to it. It’s not as if we get to like everything in life, but we accept it and get on with it. There are a thousand and one things I’d change about mine: not having a driver’s licence being one of them; losing weight; being able to walk into a room with the same confidence that all my sisters seem to have. I might cry about it in my own room but I don’t make a song and dance about it to everyone – how uncomfortable would that be? There are some things that you just keep to yourself.

‘Did something happen?’ I asked her.

‘What do you mean?’

‘For you to hate Mustafa so much.’

She paused at a traffic light. ‘I don’t hate him. He’s fine.’

‘Then what is it?’

She looked at me like I was an idiot who’d missed the point completely. ‘Why did Farah settle for fine? All this playing house is so … conformative.’

I didn’t really understand what she meant by playing house. I thought that was just life – you meet someone, you fall in love, then you marry them. Wasn’t that just being happy?

‘God, I hope Mae doesn’t do the same,’ she added, picking up her phone, checking for messages then throwing it back down. ‘What another waste it’d be.’

‘Is that what I am?’ I mumbled.

It wasn’t meant to come out loud at all, but somehow the words tumbled out. I hoped she hadn’t heard them.

‘What? Don’t be silly. You’re just you.’

What did that mean? Maybe Bubblee just had higher hopes for a sister who’s her twin and the other sister who’s so much younger than us, she’s practically a different generation.

‘What I meant was …’ continued Bubblee, but not quite finding the words, it seemed.

I scratched at the skin around my fingernails, peeling it as I felt Bubblee’s eyes on me.

‘You just seem content with everything,’ she said. ‘I mean, you like staying in your room and getting on with your own stuff. Oh, you know what I’m saying.’

Actually I didn’t. ‘Yeah, yeah. I know.’

‘It’s just, with Farah, it’s like she could’ve wanted more.’

I looked up.

‘That came out wrong,’ she said. ‘It’s like Mustafa came along, made her fall in love with him, and she never got the chance to see what she could’ve been, because she was too busy being in love with him.’

I nodded at her, even though with every word she said I felt something pinch at my insides.

‘You’ve had more time to figure out what you want. And this seems to be, just, you know … you.’

What was me? A thirty-year-old who’d failed her driving test a hundred times and had nothing but a portfolio of nice pictures of her hand because her face isn’t worth photographing?

‘And it’s great. You’re a hand model,’ she added, glancing at me with encouragement.

It didn’t exactly sound like she actually thought that was impressive.

‘Listen, if you’d got married at twenty-three to someone who was just fine I’d probably be furious with you too.’

Except no-one wanted to marry me or be with me at the age of twenty-three. Or any other age, come to think of it. Bubblee began to look like she was trying to pass some really uncomfortable wind so I just smiled and said, ‘Of course’ before pretending to be really interested in the sky.

‘Are you okay, Fatti?’ she asked.

‘Oh, yeah. You know. Bit grey out,’ I replied, as we got to my destination.

Bubblee said she’d wait for me in the car as I went in and sat to have my hands made up.