Don't Say the Jinn Word

The door slammed. It vibrated throughout the small three-bedroom detached house in Seven-Kings. Furious muttering could be heard from the pavement outside, fading with each passing step Dad took. The fight had been explosive. Something about not making fresh food for dinner that evening. I didn’t care anymore. These fights were a part of my usual daily routine and were as normal as breathing the crisp, cool air outside.

Any second now and my bedroom door would slam against the white chest of drawers behind it. Three. Two …One. My bedroom door smashed into the furniture with a resounding bang.

“Are you happy now?” Mama shrieked.

My face remained buried in the thin pillow I had had for years. Nothing much changed in our house. We had the same furniture and pillows since I was born.

“Typical! Just typical. Here I am slaving away cleaning the house and here you are asleep!”

I lifted my head an inch as swung my gaze to the furious rants of the little Asian lady burning a hole in my clothes-strewn carpet. My mum was a tiny woman, but her presence could be felt from a mile off.

“Your Papa is furious! He wanted fresh food but you didn’t make any! If I am not at home then you should make it, shouldn’t you?”

I remained silent while Mama berated me. I didn’t have a leg to stand on. There was no reason why I didn’t cook dinner that night. I simply didn’t feel the need to eat and spent the last two hours of my evening tucked in bed with a good book, engulfed in a world that existed several-hundred years ago. Reading was my everything. I devoured books like other people consumed air. I was even on a first name basis with Mrs Sloane at the local library in town.

History was never a subject that fascinated me. But during the first year of sixth form, I discovered a change stirring within myself. It started as an itch. Somewhere in my brain and overnight I went from an obedient daughter straight into the daughter I was today. Detached from family, detached from friends and detached from my daily environment. I couldn’t tell you exactly how this change came about. All I remember is walking home from the corner shop one night, on a mission to buy fresh milk for Dad’s tea, that a strange feeling had overcome me. I stopped to catch my breath on the filthy, grey curb whilst the wind wrestled with my headscarf, threatening to release my long dark hair into the cold night.

I arrived home with no intention to make tea. I was craving isolation. Faking sickness, I ignored Mama’s disapproving glances and headed to my room, the only safe haven in the chaos of the house. There I took out my phone and searched for far-off destinations that would allow me freedom to just be me. But first I had to figure out who “me” was. One year on and I still was none the wiser.

Mama man-handled me down the stairs and into the kitchen where I saw my little sister wiping tears from her gaunt cheeks. She was only three years younger than me. My heart ached when I saw that she was upset. All her life, I had been there for her. I felt I was more a mother to her than our real mother was to us. At the tender age of 15, she shot death-stares in my direction as she furiously chopped a couple of onions into cubes for tonight’s dinner. That should have been my task but we all know that didn’t happen.

I smiled as my fear of her being upset was cast aside. The onions were the real culprit here. I squeezed her shoulder and took my place beside her to prepare the dinner. Just as the rice boiled, Dad stormed into the kitchen demanding his meal.

He had been walking off this frustration. He walked all the way to his brother’s house and brought him back.

“My daughters have already served dinner!” Uncle bellowed in his deep booming voice.

My jaw clenched as his presence loomed over my shoulder. Comparing his family to ours was his favourite pastime.

“What are you preparing? Biryani? Only? No chicken curry or dhal to accompany it?” He tutted his disapproval and proceeded to lecture us on what makes a satisfactory dinner. “This will not fill me up!”

“But I thought you had already eaten Uncle ji?” Amaara, my sister, dared to speak up.

Her reward was a quick clip around her head. Mama’s slap put an end to that conversation.

I giggled inwardly. I didn’t know if my sister was being brave or stupid. Amaara shot a sidelong glance at me, and we both did our best not to burst out laughing.

“Salt?” she whispered against my cheek.

Her one word set me off in peals of laughter. She had just reminded me of how a couple of weeks ago she added salt to Uncle’s tea instead of sugar. Uncle choked on his tea for ages and Mama scampered around fetching water for him to gulp down. That day, both Amaara and I were punished for the incident with a good slap and no dinner.

We lived a few doors down from my uncle, his wife and his 3 daughters. A few doors too close in my opinion. Our area was called Seven-Kings. It was a mid-sized town in East London, filled to the brim with an Asian community that prided themselves on knowing their neighbour’s business.

My uncle, just like my dad, was a traditional man who believed a woman’s place was behind a big metal pot that simmered on the cooker. The men in the family were firm believers of the woman doing all the work. Both in the house and out. Our women worked in the corner shops, factories or as dinner ladies in the local schools. My mum prided herself on catering for the local primary school down the road, whilst dad drove an Uber around London. Uncle worked as a factory supervisor bossing around the timid ladies under his eagle-eyes. His wife being one of them. She was a poor soul who did as she was told.

It often baffled me how our women could be so weak. When I was growing up, I didn’t know better. I did everything I was told to do and at the age of 16 had become a world-class Pakistani cook. Shame no one was aware I could cook so well. Not even my own family appreciated the dishes I created.

Dinner was served and Uncle was the first to dig in. He huffed and puffed his way through two helpings, all the while complaining how bland the biryani was. His noisy chomping was enough to put me off my dinner and I sat sullenly pushing the rice around on my plate. I was aching to return to my room. The book that lay flat open on my bed was beckoning me back into the 1920’s where somewhere in the Arabian lands lay a tomb-raider who was crushed under a rock. I had to find out if he managed to free himself before the authorities showed up.

As I scrubbed the dinner dishes, the kettle boiled noisily blocking out the sounds of Uncle’s content sighing. He had beached himself in Dad’s armchair and was watching ARY News whilst Dad snored softly on the sofa.

What a life, eh? I hated it. I yearned to be free of domestic chores and travel around the world like all the insta-stars did. These influencers had no idea how lucky they were to live such a carefree, happy life.

I clenched my fist over the water glass I was washing and heard a soft crack. Immediately, I eased the pressure. The last thing I wanted was to be punished for breaking the glass. Uncle would be the first to smack me one. It was just after 10.30pm when Amaara and I managed to escape to our rooms. This was my favourite part of the day. I locked the door behind me and grabbed my book off the bed, delving into the scene where I had left off. The tomb-raider had a sacred jewel in his pocket, he had to retrieve it to free the love of his life from her captors. Little did I know at the point, that the events of the next few days would lead me on a journey where I too would be fighting to free the love of my life from his captors.