The money, the education, the status, it had all failed to protect him. His dreams, his intelligence, his manners all amounted to nothing. White privilege had pushed him one finger at a time to the edge of the cliff and he had jumped. And as he fell, Zan promised himself that the day would come when his people would have justice. He would make sure of it. This would never happen to him or his family again.

CHAPTER 16

Two years later Jia took Zan’s place. She left home for Oxford University and quickly fell for its prestige and privilege. Privilege divided people into them and us, and was celebrated among the spires of Oxford.

Handing in essay after essay left little time for anything other than work, and it made the forgetting easier. Falling asleep before her head hit the pillow, or at her desk, there was little time to think of the troubles of family and home. Words like debate, discussion, opinion, argument – all considered unbefitting of a young woman in the culture of her parents – were encouraged here. Slowly, she began to revel in them. Her father’s pride in her achievements and her mother’s concern for her virtue were fed to her in equal measure. She took both on board; they kept each other in check.

Zan, who had remained true to his plans, enrolled at a university closer to home and continued living with his parents. The police had dropped their investigation, citing a lack of evidence. His evenings were now spent locked in his father’s study, learning the family business. Life seemed to return to normal, but the constant fear of a knock at the door stayed with them, as if a part of them had remained in suspended animation and could reanimate at any time.

When, four years later, Jia Khan came home and announced she had married, her mother, standing in the kitchen up to her elbows in flour, took the news with grace. Sanam Khan had been preparing for a storm, but in the end what had come was drizzle. Her daughter had brought home a young man. It would have been shameful in generations gone by, but it had come to be expected of Jia Khan.

Sanam Khan was reassured to see her daughter scarlet with shame, having dragged her chador from her bosom to her head. ‘A woman’s chador is her honour,’ was something she’d said often to her daughters, a way of reminding them of what was expected of them. She had predicted this day years earlier. ‘A woman knows her children, Akbar Khan,’ she had said as she packed Jia’s belongings for university. ‘And that daughter of yours will be the end of us!’ But she had been young once, and she knew the fears a young girl harbours before her parents. So when she saw Jia’s shame, she took her hand gently and asked to be taken to her son-in-law.