The Other Half of Happiness Read online

  Praise for

  Ayisha Malik

  ‘Funny and sparky . . . a smart and acerbic romcom about a young woman writing a book on Muslim dating . . . Read Ayisha Malik’s book: it’s huge fun.’

  Jenny Colgan

  ‘Fun, fresh and funny.’

  Mhairi McFarlane

  ‘A courageous, revealing, fiendishly funny and important book. Genuinely ground-breaking.’

  Vaseem Khan, bestselling author of

  The Unexpected Inheritence of Mr Chopra

  ‘This is a must read and I do not say that lightly and therefore, you are most definitely, obliged.’

  XXY Magazine

  ‘This fictional diary of the dating travails of one righteous romantic is snort-diet-Coke-out-of-your-nostrils funny and will resonate with any woman who’s looking for love.’

  Red Magazine

  ‘A light hearted book crammed with witty humour . . . It’s an entertaining debut with laugh-out-loud moments – a contemporary love story you won’t want to miss!’

  Candis Magazine

  ‘Laugh-out-loud funny from the off, this witty, unapologetic, honest, fun and feisty tale fully deserves the buzz it’s been getting. We can’t wait for the inevitable film to follow.’

  Heat Magazine

  ‘Fans of Bridget Jones certainly won’t be disappointed, since Malik achieves the perfect balance of romance and humour.’

  The Independent

  ‘Move over Bridget Jones – there’s a new heroine charting her romantic disasters – this time minus the Chardonnay . . . refreshing and funny.’

  Sunday Mirror

  ‘Feisty, funny and relatable it’s the feminist romantic comedy you’ve been waiting for.’

  Elle Magazine

  ‘Best of the New Books . . . for fans of Bridget Jones’s Diary.’

  Grazia

  ‘Must-read . . . Liven up your daily commute or boost your bedtime routine with [this] page-turner.’

  Marie Claire

  ‘Most refreshing of all, Sofia doesn’t need to undergo some sort of wild identity crisis before she gets her happy ending . . . [a] sharp, funny but ultimately very normal portrayal of life as a British Muslim.’

  The National

  Contents

  December 2012

  January 2013

  February

  March

  April

  May

  June

  July

  August

  September

  October

  November

  December

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  A Letter from author

  Reading Group Questions

  Sofia Khan is Not Obliged

  Copyright

  For my sister, Nadia, whose dreams for me have always been bigger than my own.

  DECEMBER 2012

  ‘All’s Well That Ends Well’ by Yes, I’m Muslim, Please

  Get Over It

  On www.sofiasblog.co.uk

  Reader, I married him. But there was no band of Punjabis, jacked up on lassi. We had one imam and two witnesses listen to me and Conall in Tooba Mosque, Karachi, saying ‘I do’ three times (because by the third time you might’ve changed your mind).

  We padded down the white marble floors leading to the mosque’s entrance and took off our shoes. Imam frowned at me, asking where my parents were, as his eyes flickered towards my Irish soon-to-be-husband. I gave him the most pathetic look possible and said in Urdu, Conall squinting at me to try and understand, ‘Islam doesn’t distinguish between colours.’

  ‘Sofe . . .’ whispered Conall from the side of his mouth. ‘Whatever you’re saying . . .’

  ‘He’s a hypocrite,’ I said as the imam turned to speak to our witnesses.

  Witness One shot me a look. I lowered my voice. ‘Look at him – holding on to his rosary beads and racism.’

  Conall smiled at the imam. Generally, when he smiles he means it and maybe the authenticity of it was confusing.

  ‘We’re a product of circumstance and experience,’ said Conall to me. (He’d be a philosopher if he wasn’t a documentary photographer.) ‘That’s why I’m so understanding when you can’t tell the difference between things like the brake and accelerator,’ he added.

  ‘Everything’s the wrong way round here.’

  The imam cleared his throat before he asked me: ‘He is Muslim, haina?’

  For a moment I wanted to lie and say no – just to annoy him – but that would’ve been un-Muslim of me.

  ‘Yes. He is.’

  Imam asked Conall in English: ‘You tell people? “I am Muslim. I believe”?’ He furrowed his dark brows. I resisted the urge to sing ‘In a Thing Called Love’.

  ‘Sorry?’ said Conall.

  ‘You believe what we believe?’ Imam leaned forward. ‘Hmmm?’

  I rolled my eyes. Conall gave me a sideward glance.

  ‘Imam-sahib,’ I said, ‘even I don’t believe everything you believe. Let’s just say he believes enough.’

  Imam looked at both (Pakistani) witnesses. ‘Nowadays girls answer for their husbands.’

  I yawned. Conall nudged me.

  ‘He’s not my husband yet, so if you could hurry this along.’

  ‘Beta, these things shouldn’t be rushed. You must think if the person you are marrying will bring you closer to Allah.’ He looked at Conall again.

  But I’d already waited so long. Yes, my family wasn’t here, and yes, I hadn’t told anyone, but being in my thirties should have some benefit: like making my own decisions.

  ‘Beta,’ said Imam, his tone softening. Conall by this time was speaking to our witnesses. ‘We know in Islam there is no black, white, green, blue. This would be wrong. But people aren’t as forgiving as Allah. There is a reason they say you should marry what you know. Do you know him?’

  I wish I could say I took a Conall-like moment here: absorbing the weight of these words because they might shape my future. What I wanted to say was that I’d listened in the morning to a London-based sheikh on YouTube talking about the importance of interracial marriages in promoting unity. But I wasn’t in London any more. I was in Karachi.

  ‘Marriage is a gamble,’ said Imam, which wasn’t the most appropriate metaphor given we were in a mosque. ‘But at least with a Pakistani, you will understand how to play the hand you are given.’

  ‘Imam-sahib, I’m not here to play anything,’ I said. ‘I’m here to marry the man Allah has chosen for me.’

  Sofia Khan is author of Lessons in Heartbreak and Laughter, Ignite Press, to be published in April, 2013. Follow her on Twitter @SofiaAuthor.

  JANUARY 2013

  The Lie of the Land

  Tuesday 1 January

  10 a.m. Oh my actual God. There’s a man in my bed! A real-life man. I prodded Conall to make sure he wasn’t a figment of my overactive imagination. Then, sitting up in bed, I pinched myself in case I was dreaming – because these things can happen, and better to find out sooner rather than later. That’s when I caught a glimpse of my red pants flung over the fan on the ceiling, right next to my red hijab. (Doesn’t matter that I’m living in Karachi squalor; colour coordination is very important.) Would it be inappropriate to Instagram that?

  Note to self: Must not become person who pretends their life is perfect via the medium of social media.

  I really did get on a plane four months ago with Conall to come to Karachi, and last month I really did marry him.

  To Suj, Foz, Hannah: What should I do with him?

  From Hannah: Lucky for you I’m up for morning prayers to tell you that if he’s asleep I wouldn’t do anything.
Unless you want to be charged with assault.

  Hannah always makes very good points.

  From Suj: Jump him! Early start to gym. Sofe, get some exercise in too. Haha xxxx

  From Foz: For God’s sake. Wake him up. Doesn’t he know you need to make up for lost time? If I wasn’t on a break from men I’d elope with one of the hot South Americans here. Can’t believe you got married without us. Though at least you don’t have to worry about table settings xx

  As do Suj and Foz.

  ‘The pinging from your phone’s going to be the end of me,’ said Conall, putting his arm round me and drawing me closer.

  He opened his eyes. I imagine the blurry ceiling was materialising as he squinted at the fan.

  ‘Christ – are those your pants?’

  ‘You really should stop taking the Lord’s name in vain,’ I said.

  He looked at me, amused, as he brushed the hair away from my eyes. ‘Old habits.’

  There are times, as a practising Muslim woman, you have to take stock of your life – having a man in your bed for the first time would be one of them. No one really prepares you for it: having to weave this much happiness with this much fear of what could go wrong. If I hadn’t married Conall ASAP, then A) the film The 40-Year-Old Virgin would be plaguing my every still-unmarried day and B) maybe I’d have booked the next plane home and sat in my room for the rest of my life, swiping left or right on Tinder instead of having to feel all these things.

  From Suj: BTW Han, see you tonight. Foz, bring a hottie back with you. Everyone being in different countries is a joke. When the hell are you both coming home? xxxxxx

  I felt a sudden pang and shook Conall’s arm.

  ‘Hmm?’

  ‘Suj and Hannah are meeting tonight.’

  ‘Mm,’ he replied.

  ‘I wonder where they’re going.’

  Silence. If home is where the heart is then why does mine constantly flit towards London happenings?

  ‘Do you think they’ve made a booking? Han will have done. I’ll message Suj to make sure she’s not late.’

  ‘OK.’

  I waited for a little more input.

  ‘You don’t care, do you?’

  ‘About Hannah and Suj’s dinner plans?’ he replied.

  ‘You could pretend to be interested,’ I said.

  He opened his eyes and pulled me closer. ‘Were you this annoying before we got married?’

  ‘No. I saved this part especially.’

  Billy, our adopted cat, popped her ginger-and-white head out of the bathroom door and meandered over. I took a biscuit out of the drawer for her. Does Conall actually find me annoying? I’d probably find me annoying if I were married to me. I looked round the room with its flaking paint and grimy curtains – the lonely desk in the corner, which is meant to be a work area but instead only reminds me that I have no work. If I’ve decided to live in this cesspit, it must be love. More’s the pity. Anyway, I did my Isktikhara before marrying him – that foolproof prayer which, once you’ve decided to do something, makes your path easy if it’s good for you, and difficult if it’s bad for you. That moment, when we sat in the mosque, there was nothing but ease. (Apart from the imam’s negativity, of course. But negativity is not a sign. I think.) And it wasn’t just because one day I might be asked to take part in a documentary about real-life forty-year-old virgins.

  ‘Do you think Mum’s forgiven me?’

  ‘Since yesterday?’ he asked, eyes closed again.

  ‘What other ways can I say sorry? Maybe a card?’

  Her face swims in front of me every time I think about it. She’d waited thirty years for me to get married and then I went and did it without her, not six months after Dad died. I’m such a brown disappointment. Waves of guilt slosh around my stomach: the natural conclusion to an unnatural wedding.

  ‘She’ll come round,’ said Conall.

  I could only imagine Dad’s disappointment if he were alive: the peering over the glasses; the shaking of the head. It made me want to slink back under my covers. I looked up to tell Dad I was sorry, except it didn’t seem appropriate when I caught sight of my knickers. Plus, they only served as a reminder that it wasn’t an I’d-change-things-if-I-could sorry. My guilt swelled into the size of a hernia.

  ‘You’re a grown-up, Sofe. Well, most of the time- –’

  I hit Conall with my pillow but looked at his face, which manages to be, by turns, both grumpy and kind.

  ‘Just when I think you’re a bit brown you go and say something so white,’ I said.

  ‘I didn’t know being a grown-up was race-dependent,’ he replied.

  ‘Look at me, Conall,’ I said, pointing to my face. ‘I’m a Paki – oh, bloody hell,’ I added as he shot me an unimpressed look. ‘Pakistani.’

  ‘No, please, carry on perpetuating racial slurs.’

  Typical – as if the guilt hernia wasn’t bloated enough.

  ‘The point is, there are certain things a Pakistani daughter shouldn’t do – one of them is to marry outside her race. Fucked up royally there, didn’t I?’

  ‘What are the rules on Pakistani daughters swearing?’ he asked.

  ‘Secondly, if she does decide to jump racial ships, then to at least do it in front of the community. That way they can gossip about it at her wedding, behind her back, like normal people.’

  He put his hand behind his head and stared at the ceiling. Did he regret it? Was he wondering how to use my hijab to strangle me? Or even strangle himself? Was he having converter’s remorse?

  ‘No point dwelling on it,’ he replied.

  ‘Yes, thanks. That hadn’t occurred to me.’

  He turned towards me. ‘Go back to sleep, Sofe,’ he replied, pulling the covers over me. ‘I love you when you’re asleep.’

  I laughed as Billy nibbled at the biscuit. The beeping of car horns, as usual, hadn’t stopped all night, and were now accompanied by the bleating of sheep – all lined up, naturally, outside our block of flats.

  ‘It’s like Dante’s Inferno meets Animal Farm,’ I said.

  I miss the small things: hot water; being able to scroll through Twitter without gasping for Wi-Fi. A cockroach skirmished in the corner. Vom. It says something about my personal growth that I didn’t actually vom. I picked up my slipper to kill it when Conall grabbed my arm and pulled me back under the covers.

  ‘Be useful for once and keep me warm,’ he said, sliding his hand on to my bum. ‘Aren’t you cold without your pants?’

  ‘What do you mean, “for once”?’ I said, wrapping my arm around his. ‘I’ve opened your eyes to a new way of life. Before me you were all sullen and now look . . .’ I sighed. ‘Before Sofia. You can call it BS. As in, that’s what life used to be.’

  Although, when I open my eyes, I’m not sure I haven’t converted to his way of life. His breath tickled the back of my neck as he laughed.

  ‘Shut the fuck up.’

  I enveloped the blanket around us to block out the Karachi cold – and my negative thoughts – when there was a knock on the door.

  ‘Come in,’ said Conall, which begs the question: doesn’t he think a person should get dressed before you let someone into your bedroom?

  The door creaked open and there she was, peering into the room with her darty eyes and long limbs, already kitted out for the day. How I’ve ended up sharing a house with this woman, along with a documentary film crew, in the middle of the worst parts of Karachi, rather than the huge, marble-floored, multi-storeyed houses that my dad’s side of the family live in I’ll never know. Well, I do know: Conall. I looked at Hamida, who lowered her gaze. She’s readiness personified. I wonder whether this is one of the reasons she was so unperturbed when her husband – who we’re never allowed to mention – left her.

  ‘Oh, sorry. Con, I thought you’d be ready.’

  I hate it when she calls him Con.

  ‘We can talk later,’ she said.

  She glanced up at my hijab and knickers. I told myself t
o be reasonable. You can’t dislike a person when they’ve not technically done anything wrong. It must be the unnatural pressures of being married and living as if in a commune: not the way her gaze flickers between me and Conall, the odd time I catch her staring at me or the way she never laughs at anything I say. I thought Conall was tough to break.

  ‘No, it’s fine,’ said Conall, pinching my bum as he got out of bed.

  I smiled at her. Hammy didn’t return the favour. She glanced at the ceiling once more before they left the room to talk about their film documentary. I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling too. Purpose. That’s the thing. Although I’d envy them both a little more if their purpose didn’t include filming in a slum. This was depressing because the idea of coming here with Conall for some charitable reason was great in theory, but not quite so fulfilling in practice. This is why you should never attach yourself to another person’s purpose. As a thirty-one-year-old, relatively independent, emotionally self-sufficient woman, I should’ve been wise enough to know this.

  ‘But that,’ I said, picking up Billy, ‘is what makes this love malarkey so tricky.’

  I put her back down and looked at my phone. Wi-Fi had gone again.

  ‘Why does nothing work here?’ I said, shaking the phone.

  ‘Talking to yourself again?’ Conall was standing over me, hands on his hips.

  ‘Lamenting. To Billy,’ I replied.

  He looked around for Billy, who’d disappeared. Much like my sanity.

  ‘Most couples have a few good years before lamenting,’ he said, sitting next to me.

  I tugged on his black beard, flecked with more grey than a few months ago. Is this life’s doing or mine? I do love his beard, and not just because it sets off the unusual blue of his eyes (although it’s a pleasing by-product) but because it’s homage to his Muslim-ness.

  Note to self: Give money to charity as thanks for fact that I get to sleep with my next-door neighbour, turned friend, turned Muslim husband.

  Then he gave me this look. A serious one. Well, a sexy serious look, so I wasn’t sure whether he wanted to have a shag or give me a lecture.