Read Online White Teeth by Zadie Smith - Free Book Online
Authors: Zadie Smith
Tags: Fiction
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wasnât Morocco or Belgium or Italy, it was niceânot the promised landâbut
nice,
nicer than anywhere she had ever been.
Clara understood that Archibald Jones was no romantic hero. Three months spent in one stinking room in Cricklewood had been sufficient revelation. Oh, he could be affectionate and sometimes even charming, he could whistle a clear, crystal note first thing in the morning, he drove calmly and responsibly and he was a surprisingly competent cook, but romance was beyond him, passion, unthinkable. And if you are saddled with a man as average as this, Clara felt, he should at least be utterly devoted to
youâ
to your beauty, to your youthâthatâs the
least
he could do to make up for things. But not Archie. One month into their marriage and he already had that funny glazed look men have when they are looking through you. He had already reverted back into his bachelorhood: pints with Samad Iqbal, dinner with Samad Iqbal, Sunday breakfasts with Samad Iqbal, every spare moment with the man in that bloody place,
OâConnellâs,
in that bloody dive. She tried to be reasonable. She asked him:
Why are you never here? Why do you spend so much time with the Indian?
But a pat on the back, a kiss on the cheek, heâs grabbing his coat, his footâs out the door and always the same old answer:
Me and Sam? We go way back.
She couldnât argue with that. They went back to before she was born.
No white knight, then, this Archibald Jones. No aims, no hopes, no ambitions. A man whose greatest pleasures were English breakfasts and DIY. A dull man. An
old
man. And yet . . . good. He was a
good
man. And
good
might not amount to much,
good
might not light up a life, but it is something. She spotted it in him that first time on the stairs, simply, directly, the same way she could point out a good mango on a Brixton stall without so much as touching the skin.
These were the thoughts Clara clung to as she leaned on her garden gate, three months after her wedding, silently watching the way her husbandâs brow furrowed and shortened like an accordion, the way his stomach hung pregnant over his belt, the whiteness of his skin, the blueness of his veins, the way his âelevensâ were upâthose two ropes of flesh that appear on a manâs gullet (so they said in Jamaica) when his time is drawing to a close.
Clara frowned. She hadnât noticed these afflictions at the wedding. Why not? He had been smiling and he wore a white turtleneck, but no, that wasnât itâshe hadnât been
looking
for them then,
that
was it. Clara had spent most of her wedding day looking at her feet. It had been a hot day, February 14, unusually warm, and there had been a wait because the world had wanted to marry that day in a little registry office on Ludgate Hill. Clara remembered slipping off the petite brown heels she was wearing and placing her bare feet on the chilly floor, making sure to keep them firmly planted either side of a dark crack in the tile, a balancing act upon which she had randomly staked her future happiness.
Archie meanwhile had wiped some moisture from his upper lip and cursed a persistent sunbeam that was sending a trickle of salty water down his inside leg. For his second marriage he had chosen a mohair suit with a white turtleneck and both were proving problematic. The heat prompted rivulets of sweat to spring out all over his body, seeping through the turtleneck to the mohair and giving off an unmistakable odor of damp dog. Clara, of course, was all cat. She wore a long brown woollen Jeff Banks dress and a perfect set of false teeth; the dress was backless, the teeth were white, and the overall effect was feline; a panther in evening dress; where the wool stopped and Claraâs skin started was not clear to the naked eye. And like a cat she responded to the dusty sunbeam that was coursing through a high window onto the waiting couples. She warmed her bare back in
nice,
nicer than anywhere she had ever been.
Clara understood that Archibald Jones was no romantic hero. Three months spent in one stinking room in Cricklewood had been sufficient revelation. Oh, he could be affectionate and sometimes even charming, he could whistle a clear, crystal note first thing in the morning, he drove calmly and responsibly and he was a surprisingly competent cook, but romance was beyond him, passion, unthinkable. And if you are saddled with a man as average as this, Clara felt, he should at least be utterly devoted to
youâ
to your beauty, to your youthâthatâs the
least
he could do to make up for things. But not Archie. One month into their marriage and he already had that funny glazed look men have when they are looking through you. He had already reverted back into his bachelorhood: pints with Samad Iqbal, dinner with Samad Iqbal, Sunday breakfasts with Samad Iqbal, every spare moment with the man in that bloody place,
OâConnellâs,
in that bloody dive. She tried to be reasonable. She asked him:
Why are you never here? Why do you spend so much time with the Indian?
But a pat on the back, a kiss on the cheek, heâs grabbing his coat, his footâs out the door and always the same old answer:
Me and Sam? We go way back.
She couldnât argue with that. They went back to before she was born.
No white knight, then, this Archibald Jones. No aims, no hopes, no ambitions. A man whose greatest pleasures were English breakfasts and DIY. A dull man. An
old
man. And yet . . . good. He was a
good
man. And
good
might not amount to much,
good
might not light up a life, but it is something. She spotted it in him that first time on the stairs, simply, directly, the same way she could point out a good mango on a Brixton stall without so much as touching the skin.
These were the thoughts Clara clung to as she leaned on her garden gate, three months after her wedding, silently watching the way her husbandâs brow furrowed and shortened like an accordion, the way his stomach hung pregnant over his belt, the whiteness of his skin, the blueness of his veins, the way his âelevensâ were upâthose two ropes of flesh that appear on a manâs gullet (so they said in Jamaica) when his time is drawing to a close.
Clara frowned. She hadnât noticed these afflictions at the wedding. Why not? He had been smiling and he wore a white turtleneck, but no, that wasnât itâshe hadnât been
looking
for them then,
that
was it. Clara had spent most of her wedding day looking at her feet. It had been a hot day, February 14, unusually warm, and there had been a wait because the world had wanted to marry that day in a little registry office on Ludgate Hill. Clara remembered slipping off the petite brown heels she was wearing and placing her bare feet on the chilly floor, making sure to keep them firmly planted either side of a dark crack in the tile, a balancing act upon which she had randomly staked her future happiness.
Archie meanwhile had wiped some moisture from his upper lip and cursed a persistent sunbeam that was sending a trickle of salty water down his inside leg. For his second marriage he had chosen a mohair suit with a white turtleneck and both were proving problematic. The heat prompted rivulets of sweat to spring out all over his body, seeping through the turtleneck to the mohair and giving off an unmistakable odor of damp dog. Clara, of course, was all cat. She wore a long brown woollen Jeff Banks dress and a perfect set of false teeth; the dress was backless, the teeth were white, and the overall effect was feline; a panther in evening dress; where the wool stopped and Claraâs skin started was not clear to the naked eye. And like a cat she responded to the dusty sunbeam that was coursing through a high window onto the waiting couples. She warmed her bare back in
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