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Back Bitter Sweets Save as PDF
Chapters (41)
  1. Cover
  2. Dedication
  3. Nadim Rub’s Most Magnificent Deception
  4. The Alchemic Conception of
  5. The Puppy Love of Parvez Khan
  6. The Crushed Rose Petals of a
  7. The Relative Cost of Gold
  8. The Beginning of the Double Life
  9. The Triumphant Return of Ricky
  10. Of Sunflowers and Sunny Side Ups
  11. A Glorious Spring Wedding for
  12. The Importance of Not Forgetting to
  13. The Middle-Naming of
  14. The Married Life of Ricky Karim and
  15. The Musical Memories of Sharif Khan
  16. The Balti Ballads of Tooting Broadway
  17. Parvez Khan Mourns the Loss of Love
  18. Shona Khan Discovers Photos
  19. The Octopus in the Garage
  20. The Academic Pursuits of Omar Khan
  21. Between Greek Tragedy and
  22. The Balti Ballads Play Brick Lane
  23. The Trouble with December Evenings
  24. Châteauneuf du Pape in a
  25. Burnt Cookies and Driving Lessons
  26. Becoming Accustomed to a Face
  27. Ricky-Rashid Makes a Damning Discovery
  28. Shona Khan Makes a Damning Discovery
  29. Sharif Khan Meets an Angel in Tennis Shoes
  30. The Romantic Memories of Sharif Khan
  31. Omar Khan Celebrates May Day in Oxford
  32. Mrs Henna Karim Extends a
  33. The Dhaka Tea Party
  34. A Performance, a Bookmark and a
  35. Sharif Khan and the Terrifying Truth
  36. Won’t Let Us Have a Breakdown
  37. Confessions Across a Hospital Bed
  38. The Mother and Child Reunion
  39. Party in the Park
  40. Acknowledgements
  41. AN INTERVIEW

‘Dominic’s a Diamond, I mean a Bloody Nice Bloke,’ Bhai Hassan translated kindly for Parvez. ‘He’ll make you a couple of rings for a song if you get him the gold to work with.’ Parvez pulled out his beloved gold money clip and looked thoughtfully at it. The next day he replaced it with an inexpensive wallet, and the following week he was to surprise his wife with a shining copy of the wedding rings at Tiffany’s that she had admired, and a gleaming pair of delicate golden earrings that he had had made with the leftover gold.

Shona displayed an excitement for Parvez’s benefit which didn’t reveal how deeply it saddened her that her gift should have to be his loss, and which consequently could not show how deeply this act of unselfishness had touched her. She had lots of expensive, gem-set jewellery at home, mainly cast-offs inherited from her mother, but nothing that had been given with such love. Sitting in the squalid spare room of her husband’s cousin’s flat, she told herself she could do without money, without the trappings of privilege and the unthinking ease of life that she had been so used to, as long as she had Parvez.

art

The Beginning of the Double Life

of Ricky-Rashid