Read Online I Can't Think Straight by Shamim Sarif - Free Book Online Page A

‘That’s the good news. Dad did. AND – he didn’t tell Mum.’
    Leyla tried to slip past and into her room, consumed by a head spinning mélange of fading excitement from her day with Tala and guilt at upsetting her father. But Yasmin blocked her way.
    ‘Not so fast. You owe me. Big time. Leaving me alone with the cousins from hell. And not even for Ali. Where were you anyway?’
    Since returning from Nairobi, Yasmin had begun to suspect that her older sister was enjoying some sort of double life. Although that phrase might be an overstatement – what Yasmin had intuited was more of a hidden aspect, an interior world, as yet insubstantial and undefined. She took pleasure in the idea because for too long, Yasmin had been all alone in the vanguard of fights for liberty of action, thought and speech against her parents, while Leyla, it seemed, had been content to accept the terms of the small dictatorship without complaint, on the grounds that she had no compelling reason to re-volt. Despite being two years younger, it was Yasmin who had been the first to decline the offer of a place in the family business; who had left home and lived on her own in Kenya; and it was Yasmin who had first had a boyfriend. This apparent lack of need, the lack of desire, which Yasmin found in her sister – for privacy, for wider experiences, for men, had confused and annoyed her intensely.
    Since her return, however, and even more noticeably in the past couple of weeks, Leyla had seemed more real – more like a person in her own right. The regular rhythms of their lives in the vast, old, Surrey house had not changed, but that afternoon’s amazing development, the uncovering of a lie from Leyla of all people, had sharpened Yasmin’s sense that her sister was changing. As uplifted as she was by this idea (for Leyla’s sake, as well as her own – and it would be so good to have someone to fight with her), she still did not want to let go of the fact that Leyla had knowingly abandoned her in hell for the entire afternoon. Yasmin led the way up to the third floor attic space which her father had converted into a larger room for her, complete with her own sitting area and small bathroom, while she was away. He had done this to ‘incentivise’ her to return (a crucial element in retaining key company employees, he explained, and he saw no reason why the principle could not extend to family members too), an attempt which Yasmin recognised as bribery, even as she accepted the offered space. They sat at opposite ends of a sagging blue sofa.
    ‘You’re having an affair with someone, aren’t you?’ was Yasmin’s opening line. She grinned. ‘And it’s not Ali. Is he English? Even better, is he black? Mum will die.’
    Leyla tried to sigh but could only smile. ‘No, on all counts.’
    Yasmin looked deeply disappointed. ‘Are you sure?’
    ‘I think I’d notice if I was having an affair. I just went to hang out with a new friend of mine. But you know you practically need a medical certificate to miss our family events.’
    Yasmin’s sigh attested to the truth of this statement. ‘I need to get my own place,’ she said. ‘So do you.’
    They considered this silently for a few moments. Neither of them had nearly enough money for a deposit on a flat. Nor would their parents sanction a move out of the family house without a marriage certificate.
    ‘Why don’t you just marry Ali? You’d be out of here at least.’
    ‘You know why I won’t just marry him,’ Leyla said sharply. ‘I don’t love him, and he doesn’t love me.’
    ‘Then why are you going out with him?’ Yasmin asked quietly.
    There was no succinct reply to this question. The answer would always be unconvincing and was caught up in a complex tangle of issues, including the fact that Ali was fun to be around, that the relationship pleased her parents and gave her time to try and overcome her own natural leanings.
    ‘Who’s your new friend?’ Yasmin asked. Her