Tani folded his hands on the table. The room seemed several degrees hotter than it had been upon their return from Ridley Road. He said, “I’m not doing tha’， Pa.”
Monifa drew in a deep breath. Simi’s eyes became as round as old pennies. Abeo looked up from his food and said, “What is this that you just said to me, Tanimola?”
“I’m not doing it is what I said. I’m not meeting some virgin you’ve picked out for me, and I’m definitely not marrying anyone when she turns seventeen.” Tani heard his mother murmur his name, so he faced her. “This isn’t the Middle Ages, Mum.”
Monifa said, “In Nigeria, Tani, these things are arranged so that—”
“We don’t live in Nigeria, do we. We live in London and in London people marry who they want to marry when they want to marry them. Or at least I do. I will. No one’s picking out a wife for me. And I’m not getting married anyway. Not now and definitely not to some guaranteed African breeding virgin. Tha’s mad, innit.”
There was a tight little moment of the kind of silence that echoes round a room. Abeo broke it, saying, “You will do exactly what you are told to do, Tani. You will meet Omorinsola. You are promised to her and she is promised to you, so we will have no more discussion.”
“You,” Tani said, “are not the ruler of me.”
Monifa gasped. Tani heard this and said, “No, Mum. I’m not going to Nigeria or to any other place just because he decided it.”
“I head this family,” Abeo told him. “As a member of it, you will do as I say.”
“I won’t,” Tani said. “If you thought I would do, then you’re mistaken. You can’t force me to marry anyone.”
“You will do this, Tani. I will see that you do it.”
“Really, eh? Tha’s what you think? D’you plan to hold a gun to my head? Tha’ll look good in the wedding photos, innit.”
“You watch what comes out of your mouth.”
“Why? What will you do? Beat me up like—”
Monifa quickly said, “Stop this, Tani. Show your father some respect.” And then, “Simi, go to—”
“She stays,” Abeo said. And to Tani, “Finish what it is you wish to say.”
“I’ve said what I wanted to say.” At that he rose from the table, his chair screeching on the lino. His father did the same.
Abeo’s fist clenched. Tani stood his ground. They stared each other down across the table. Abeo finally said, “Get out of my sight.”
Tani was happy to do so.
THE NARROW WAY
HACKNEY
NORTH-EAST LONDON
Detective Chief Superintendent Mark Phinney wasn’t surprised to find his brother waiting for him. Paulie had arranged everything in the first place, so he had a vested interest, more or less, in how Mark liked what he’d found waiting for him inside Massage Dreams. Besides, Massage Dreams wasn’t far from either one of Paulie’s two pawnshops, and well within convenient walking distance of their parents’ house and Paulie’s own. At least, Mark thought, his brother wasn’t lurking inside the damn place, in its tiny lobby. Instead, he’d taken himself the short distance from Mare Street to The Narrow Way, and there he was sitting on one of the benches in the middle of the pedestrian precinct. Mark saw him at once as he rounded the corner. On Paulie’s face was that knowing leer with which he’d always greeted his younger brother whenever—as an adolescent with spots on his face—Mark had returned from what Paulie had assumed was a date but actually was hanging about with a group of mates from school, all of them misfits like Mark himself, three of them girls. Paulie’s words then were always the same when Mark arrived home: “Get any, mate?” to which Mark would reply, “If I did, you’re not hearing about it.”
Today’s leer, though, had nothing to do with adolescent girls, although it did have to do with getting some in one of the back rooms of the day spa, which happened to be more than a mere day spa if one had the right currency, as they did not give change or accept credit cards when a man purchased this particular service.
Paulie said, “So . . . ?” and when Mark didn’t reply at once, “It took long enough, Boyko. What’d you do? Have more than one go?”
Mark said, “I had to wait twenty minutes for her. Let’s go. Mum’ll have dinner nearly ready.”
“That’s it?” Paulie said. “Just ‘I had to wait twenty minutes for her’？ I went through a lot of favours to get you an appointment today, lad. That’s how popular the place has become. So was it good? Worth the money? Was she young? Beautiful? Haggard? No teeth? What’d she use? Hand, mouth, tongue, some other body part? I reckon between the tits would do nicely, eh? No? Hmmm. P’rhaps under her arm? Or did you go the full monty with her?”