Free Kartography by Kamila Shamsie Page A

day and find I’m free of her? Ali twirled the stem of his glass between his fingers and tried not to think of that look in Maheen’s eyes when she put her arms around Zafar’s neck.
    â€˜I know you want to be alone, but I’m joining you all the same,’ Yasmin said, coming to stand beside Ali on the balcony, which overlooked the back garden. She took his hand in hers, and inspected the bruise beneath his thumb. ‘Must have hurt,’ she said. ‘Hammer?’
    Ali nodded. ‘It was dark. Missed the chisel, caught my thumb. How did you know it was me?’
    Yasmin shivered in the cold, and put her hands into Ali’s jacket pocket. ‘Zafar’s too lazy. And I saw the look on your face when Maheen put her arms around Zaf. What made you do it?’
    Ali took off his jacket and placed it around her shoulders. ‘Don’t know. Anger, love, frustration, all of the above. I hate emotions I can’t control. Hacking away at a bit of wood seemed a good way to release all that bottled-up stuff.’
    â€˜You should have told me you were doing it,’ Yasmin said. ‘I would have helped.’
    Ali raised an eyebrow. ‘Why?’
    â€˜Were you thinking of making some kind of amorous advances towards me about three months ago?’
    â€˜No...I mean, it’s not to say I would have any objection...I mean, you are... What? What’s wrong?’
    Yasmin leaned a head against his shoulder. ‘Bugger,’ she said.
    Ali regarded her bowed head with curiosity. Among all the women he knew, Yasmin was the only one he would really call a friend. More than that, she knew him in ways that constantly surprised him. She was probably the only person who would even consider it possible that controlled, aloof Ali could love Maheen enough to gouge her initial, and that of his best friend, into a tree. But why she was leaning her head against his shoulder and releasing a long stream of expletives he could not begin to fathom.
    If she stopped cursing, Yasmin knew she’d start crying. The bastard, the bastard, she said, losing the words in the folds of Ali’s shirt. No one else but Ali whose shirt she’d feel so comfortable weeping into. Zafar, you bastard. He had pulled her on to the dance floor at the Nasreen Room, just as summer was ending and Karachi’s evenings began to invite dancing and festivities again. Pulled her on to the dance floor, black shirt moulded tight to his chest, and said, ‘Don’t you think it would be nice if sometimes we saw each other without seventeen dozen other people around?’ A ‘yes’ seemed too simple an answer, too girlish, so instead Yasmin went the unfamiliar route of coquetry, fluttered her eyelashes, which he couldn’t see in the dark, and said, ‘I don’t know that my parents would approve,’ the laugh in her voice meant to convey what he should have already known: Yasmin was so in the habit of making her parents disapprove that to conform to their expectation would almost constitute filial betrayal. But Zafar’s face went still when he heard her and he nodded curtly and led her off the floor. ‘Good. Good answer. It’s just that I think Ali might put that kind of question to you, and I wanted to make sure you knew how to handle the situation. Reputation, Yasmin, can’t toy around with your reputation.’
    â€˜Are you crying?’ Ali said. ‘It’s not that I object, but there’s a handkerchief in my breast pocket which might come in handy.’
    Yasmin stepped back and blew her nose vigorously on the piece of cloth Ali proffered. ‘No one will ever marry me,’ she declared.
    Ali looked out towards the garden. He could hear Maheen’s laughter, though she was somewhere just out of sight. ‘I was thinking the very thing.’
    Without warning, Yasmin’s hand stung across his cheekbone.
    Ali put a hand to his cheek, and smiled. ‘I