False Friends by Stephen Leather Page A

half the family tagging along?’
    His father laughed. ‘What century do you think you’re living in?’ he said. ‘She’s on Facebook. She’s been told to expect you to ask to be a Facebook friend, to chat online for a while and see if you get on.’
    ‘You’ve already told her about me?’
    ‘Her father has, yes.’
    ‘How long have you been planning this?’
    ‘We’re not planning anything. I told you, I met her father at a conference and we got talking. You can at least get in touch on Facebook, can’t you?
    I don’t want her father to think that we’re snubbing her.’
    Chaudhry sighed. ‘Okay, I suppose I can do that.’
    ‘Manraj, there’s no pressure here, real y. There’s no need to make a big thing about it. It’s not like when your mum and I were introduced. Back then they almost put a gun to my head.’
    ‘Seriously?’
    His father laughed again. ‘Of course not seriously,’ he said. ‘But I was left in no doubt that I’d need a pretty good reason to turn her down. Things were very different back then and most marriages were arranged.’
    ‘And you were okay with that?’
    ‘Your grandfather is a pussycat these days, but thirty years ago he was as tough as they come. He was born in Pakistan, remember. Or British India, as it was then. He came over with nothing and it wasn’t like it is now, with benefits and handouts. The people in his vil age paid for him to come to the UK and when I was old enough to marry it was time for him to pay the piper.’
    Chaudhry leaned forward. ‘You never told me this before.’
    His father shrugged. ‘That’s the way it worked. Your mother’s grandparents helped pay for my father to come to this country. I had citizenship so if I married her then her parents and her grandparents could come too. Which is what happened, of course. Our marriage helped their family, and that was only fair because they’d helped my father.’
    ‘And what if you hadn’t liked her?’
    His father laughed out loud. ‘We’l never know,’ he said. ‘But I did have a few tense moments, I can tel you. They sent over a photograph but it was a group photograph and her face wasn’t clear because she was wearing a headscarf. There was no Skype back then and no Facebook. We managed a few phone cal s but she was shy and she didn’t speak any English.’ He shrugged. ‘I tel you, I was bloody shaking when I got off the plane.’
    ‘You flew to Pakistan to meet her?’
    ‘To marry her, Manraj. It was a done deal by the time I arrived in Pakistan.’
    Chaudhry’s jaw dropped. ‘And that didn’t worry you?’
    ‘I understood that I had an obligation to my father. How could I have refused? It would have been a slap in the face for him and for everyone who had helped him get to England.’ He sat back on the sofa. ‘Anyway, al ’s wel that ends wel . We were met at the airport by her parents and they drove me to their vil age in this rickety old truck that seemed to be held together with string. The first time we met her whole family was there, so were my parents, and she had her face covered. The minutes before she took down her veil were the scariest in my life. Then she did and . . .’ He grinned. ‘Wow. That’s what I said. Wow. I remember how everyone laughed. She was a lovely girl, Manraj. Like a supermodel. Her hair was just amazing; it came down to her waist and was so soft and shiny. And her skin . . . I tel you, the first time I touched her arm I—’
    ‘Dad, please,’ said Chaudhry, holding up his hands. ‘Enough. I get it.’
    ‘Get what?’ said his mother, arriving with a tray of tea things and a plate of chocolate cake that she had baked special y for him. She put the tray down on the coffee table and sat next to her husband.
    ‘I was just tel ing him about Jamila,’ said his father.
    ‘Oh, isn’t she lovely?’ said his mother, picking up the teapot.
    His mother wasn’t supermodel fit any more, thought Chaudhry, but she was stil a lovely woman.