1 HOW MY LIFE CHANGED

The first time Jamal and Nabila were pronounced husband and wife, he was chatting on his Blackberry and she was pushing the food around her plate with a sterling silver fork.

The French Impressionist table legs groaned heavily under his weight as Uncle Dauda hoisted his large frame to its feet. He then raised a glass of non-alcoholic wine although his slurred speech would make Nabila's mother suspect otherwise. Clearing his throat roughly, his baritone drowned out the festivities of clinking glasses and high laughter that dominated the surrounding tables. Looking at the 20meter high photograph of the happy couple displayed in the Grand Foyer of the Hilton Hotel, Alhaji Dauda adjusted his emerald green baba-riga and began "It seems like yesterday my niece informed me that she had met a young man who she wished to marry and now I am pleased to introduce to you the newest Ango da Amariyya in town, Jamal and Nabila Mujahid." The applause stunned the bride and groom out of their respective reveries and looking to Rabi, Nabila merely reflected the expression her little sister wore. She strained her fake smile as far as it would go and waved till her wrist was sore, she was tired and just wanted to go home. Then she glanced at her husband and realised that she would never return again to her brightly lit bedroom with its lilac walls and large view of the garden. She would never again have her own bathroom. She would never again walk Didi, her Black English Spaniel, while sipping on the zobo that Oda, their chief cook of 14years, brewed specially for her.

Nabila wanted to cry; Rabi rushed forward and hugged her, rubbing her back "It's almost over Nabsy. Then you and Jamal can go away and be alone ok." Nabila looked at Jamal as his second cousin Mahmoud pumped his shoulder and slapped his back in congratulations.

Jamal's lanky frame shook and he rolled his eyes at her barely containing his exasperated smile. Nabila giggled and it stopped to matter that she had been up since dawn, her jewellery weighed her down, or her gold lace itched, or her makeup was so heavy she was sweating even in the air conditioned hall, even the theme of green stooped making her feel nauseous. She stopped resenting her mother for turning her wedding into a circus, it was okay that her wedding idea had been used to spun an Ovation photo opportunity; the constant flash of cameras no longer gave her headaches, not even the stupid reporter who kept trying to shove his microphone under her nose. Rabi pulled away to look at her sister's tired face just in time to see genuine warmth sneak across it.