‘We can’t get married just like that,’ said Shona, taking refuge in being sensible to avoid being overcome by the superb honeyed sweetness of the moment. ‘What about witnesses, and all that sort of thing?’

‘I’ll drag them off the street if I have to!’ said Parvez with romantic gallantry. ‘Ho!’ he shouted to a couple of students cycling towards them. ‘Do you want to be our witnesses? The lady has just agreed to marry me.’

‘Drunk,’ muttered one of the students to the other as they sailed by.

‘You see,’ Parvez repeated with faux dejection, getting up from the grimy path to sit beside her on the bench. ‘No one thinks I’m funny apart from you.’ Dusting the dirt from his knees, he added, ‘Fortunately I wasn’t wearing my best trousers today - it must be fate. If I’d decided to wear my good trousers this morning I might not have been able to propose at all.’

‘You are the funniest puppy in the world,’ said Shona, finally giving in to the moment. ‘And yes, I will marry you next week, in front of witnesses dragged from the street, in my best travelling sari and with trainers on so we can run away when they come to get us.’

‘Goldie, I think I might have to kiss you anyway,’ said Parvez as Shona, laughing delightedly, swatted him away, her sombre mood lifted entirely.

‘Buzz off, strange boy,’ she said cheekily, flapping at him ineffectively.

‘Bzzz,’ said Parvez, avoiding her swatting hands and moving closer. ‘Bzzz,’ and he took her in his arms and kissed her like they did in the movies, oblivious to the curious looks and outrage of the rest of conservative Karachi parading through the park in their Sunday best.

Shona went back to her studies, and told the girls on campus that she’d be flying home straight after her last exam to explain why she wouldn’t be around for any post-exam celebrations. She told the family she was staying with the same thing. Shona dissembled guiltlessly; she had lied for the past three years in order to keep seeing Parvez, so that the girls thought she spent far too much time holed up at home, and the family thought she spent far too much time socializing on campus. Before picking up her books to do some last-minute revision for her French literature paper, she picked out the sari in which she’d decided to get married. A gorgeous, orangey golden silk - like the sunrise on her new life with Parvez.