The Secret Lives of the Amir Sisters. Nadiya Hussain

didn’t really understand what she meant by playing house. I thought that was just life – you meet someone, you fall in love, then you marry them. Wasn’t that just being happy?

      ‘God, I hope Mae doesn’t do the same,’ she added, picking up her phone, checking for messages then throwing it back down. ‘What another waste it’d be.’

      ‘Is that what I am?’ I mumbled.

      It wasn’t meant to come out loud at all, but somehow the words tumbled out. I hoped she hadn’t heard them.

      ‘What? Don’t be silly. You’re just you.’

      What did that mean? Maybe Bubblee just had higher hopes for a sister who’s her twin and the other sister who’s so much younger than us, she’s practically a different generation.

      ‘What I meant was …’ continued Bubblee, but not quite finding the words, it seemed.

      I scratched at the skin around my fingernails, peeling it as I felt Bubblee’s eyes on me.

      ‘You just seem content with everything,’ she said. ‘I mean, you like staying in your room and getting on with your own stuff. Oh, you know what I’m saying.’

      Actually I didn’t. ‘Yeah, yeah. I know.’

      ‘It’s just, with Farah, it’s like she could’ve wanted more.’

      I looked up.

      ‘That came out wrong,’ she said. ‘It’s like Mustafa came along, made her fall in love with him, and she never got the chance to see what she could’ve been, because she was too busy being in love with him.’

      I nodded at her, even though with every word she said I felt something pinch at my insides.

      ‘You’ve had more time to figure out what you want. And this seems to be, just, you know … you.’

      What was me? A thirty-year-old who’d failed her driving test a hundred times and had nothing but a portfolio of nice pictures of her hand because her face isn’t worth photographing?

      ‘And it’s great. You’re a hand model,’ she added, glancing at me with encouragement.

      It didn’t exactly sound like she actually thought that was impressive.

      ‘Listen, if you’d got married at twenty-three to someone who was just fine I’d probably be furious with you too.’

      Except no-one wanted to marry me or be with me at the age of twenty-three. Or any other age, come to think of it. Bubblee began to look like she was trying to pass some really uncomfortable wind so I just smiled and said, ‘Of course’ before pretending to be really interested in the sky.

      ‘Are you okay, Fatti?’ she asked.

      ‘Oh, yeah. You know. Bit grey out,’ I replied, as we got to my destination.

      Bubblee said she’d wait for me in the car as I went in and sat to have my hands made up.

      ‘Beautiful,’ said the woman, admiring my hand as she gave it back to me.

      I wondered what it’d feel like for someone to look at all of me and say that?

      When we got to the hospital the nurse was checking Mustafa’s vital signs.

      ‘Well?’ I asked as the nurse left the room.

      Farah shook her head, rubbing her tired eyes.

      ‘No change,’ said Dad.

      Mum asked me how the shoot was as Bubblee went and sat on a chair. Mae was obviously on her phone. I stood around for a bit before noticing that it’d started pelting down with rain. As I sat, facing the door, dying for some prawns and cheese on crackers, this figure appeared, drenched. I couldn’t quite see his face under his dark-grey trilby until he removed it, holding it against his chest. Then our eyes met. I noticed his dark lashes and slightly hooked nose, his chest rising and falling as if he were out of breath. When he smiled at me it was the weirdest thing – it’s like there was something familiar about him, but I couldn’t decide what.

      ‘Kala. Mama,’ he said, looking away from me and at Mum and Dad.

      They both turned around and got up.

      ‘Malik,’ said Mum as she burst out crying.

      He put his arm cautiously around her, pursing his lips.

      ‘Shh, shh. He’ll hear you. You know my brother doesn’t know what to do when someone cries,’ he said in Bengali.

      This made Farah smile for the first time in days. It didn’t seem to have quite the same effect on Bubblee, who sat as if glued to her chair.

      ‘What a surprise – everyone gathering around the man who enters a room,’ said Bubblee, quietly, glaring at him.

      For a moment I wished I could be like Bubblee – unafraid to say what she thinks, not caring how people might react. I was ready to give up my seat for him, go and get him a drink, ask him what his favourite food is, and there was Bubblee, looking as if ready to murder him. Malik’s gaze fell on Mustafa, lying there with tubes attached to machines.

      ‘He will be okay,’ he said, so assuredly it made me wonder what I’d been worrying about. If I’d accidentally given my sister the evil eye, then he was here to do the opposite – to make things better. What was that feeling of familiarity? Maybe it’s because he looks a lot like Mustafa. Of course I knew of Malik – he’s family, after all, but it’d been so long since any of us had met him. He wasn’t able to come to England for Mustafa and Farah’s wedding and we hadn’t been back home in over twenty years. Last time we saw him we were all just children. I hadn’t realised that my nails were digging into my palms as I stared at him. I stood up.

      ‘Have my seat,’ I said.

      He looked at me and smiled. ‘Fatima.’

      Was it me or did he hold my gaze a little longer than normal? Then he looked around at all of us and said: ‘How you’ve all grown.’

      His eyes settled back on me. I pulled my skirt down, trying to cover my thighs. Why hadn’t I put on a bit of make-up before leaving the house? It was only when he’d taken my seat that I realised I’d put him next to Bubblee, who’d turned around and pretended to look out of the window, even though it looked like it might give her a crick in her neck.

      ‘I remember, when we were children, you were the one who pushed me when I called you a girl,’ he said to her.

      Mum laughed and said in Bengali, ‘She was always spirited.’

      ‘I didn’t push you,’ she said. ‘I punched you. And you went crying to your amma.’

      He observed her for a moment before looking back at his brother.

      ‘Bhabi,’ he said to Farah. ‘We are all praying for him.’

      She looked at him, grateful. What was she thinking when she looked at Mustafa like that? What exactly was going through her mind? Mum and Dad went through the story with Malik about the police coming to Farah’s and telling her about the accident, us all rushing to the hospital, Bubblee coming up from London, how difficult these past few days have been, but how glad we were that he was here. Malik rubbed his eyes and continued to stare at Mustafa.

      ‘Amma and Abba wouldn’t be able to look at this,’ he said.

      Then he took Mustafa’s hand, leaned forward and kissed his forehead. ‘That’s from Amma.’

      ‘You should’ve told us what time your flight was getting in,’ said Dad. ‘Someone would’ve come to collect you.’

      ‘We would’ve sent Bubblee,’ said Mum. ‘This isn’t right – you’ve flown all this way, come straight here and didn’t tell us. You know Jahangeer is away, so you are now the man to come and look after us.’

      I