White Teeth

ard the news. Clara was two a

e-eyed! Kyan you imagine dat?"Archie couldn't imagine that. He couldn't imagine any piece of him slugging it out in the gene pool with a piece of Clara and winning. But what a possibility! What a thing that wo

nside the oily box with suspicion. "What's all this in aid .. . ?"Archie pounded

et a bloody cigar in the Euston Road for love nor money. Go on, Noel. How about

by. That calls for a bit of a party, don't it? Go on ... you won't know till you try. Just give it a nibble.""Just them Pakistani foods aren't always .. . I've got a bit of a funny .. ."Noel patted his stomach and looked desper

in the coffee room. It was a small office, there was little to talk about, so these two things made Noel second only to Janis Joplin, just as Archie was the white Jesse Owens because he came thirteenth in the Olympics twenty-seven yea

ie sighed. "On the Mothercare account. Yes, Noel, I've told Elmott to move the perforation."Noel looked

d good legs for a woman her age legs like sausages tightl

o be a father!""Are you, love

c possibility to solid fact. "Would you credit it!""Did you say blue eyes, Archie, love?" said Maureen, spea

the genes mix up, and blue eyes! Miracle of nature!""Oh yes, miracle,

don't it? An' neither of us is getting any younger, are we, eh? Are we, eh? None of us can turn back the clock, can we, eh? That Joan Rivers, I wish I knew how she does it!

funny," said Maureen sadly, for she had always fancied Archie a bit but never more than a bit because of this strange way he had about him, always talking to Pakistanis and Caribbeans like he didn't even notic

he's just found out he's going to be a daddy . yes, it'll have blue eyes, apparently .. . yes, that's what I said, something to do with genes, I suppose ... oh yes, all right .. . I'll tell him, I'll send him in ... Oh, thank you, Mr. Hero, you're

door

and Archie responded in kind, rapping the door too lightly and then too hard and then kind o

whites that owed more to expensive dentistry than to regular br

me, Archie,"

ero/ sai

ere, Archie,"

are, Mr. Hero

d I have never considered myself a racialist, Archie .. .""Mr. Hero?"Blimey, thought Kelvin, what an eye-to-face ratio. When you want to say something delicate, you don't want that eye-to-face ratio

of delicate situation, I would, as you know, confer with you. Because I've always had a lot of t

d Archie, because h

ept you on, Arch, because I could see straight off: people trust you. That's why you've stayed in the direct mail business so long. And I'm trusting you, Arch, to take what I've got to say in the right way.""Mr. Hero?"Kelvin shrugged. "I could have lied to you, Archie, I could have told you tha

ie. You would have made four. Do you understand

Hero," sa

om Sunderland, about thirty of us, nothing fancy, you know, a curry, a lager and a bit of a boogie ... as I say, it's not that I'm a racialist, "A racialist.. .""I'd spit on that En

she's a sort, a real beauty incredible legs, Archie, I'd like to congratulate you on them legs and the men, well, the men don't like it 'cos they don't like to think they're wanting a bit of the other when they're sitting down to a company dinner with their lady wives, especially when she's .. . you know .. . they don't know what to make of that at all.""Who?""Wha

erchief to his forehead. "Think nothing of it, Arch. Please.""Mr. Hero, could I.. ." Archie gestured towards the door. "It's just that I'd like to phone some people, you know, give them the news about the baby .. . if we've finished here."Kelvin nodded, relieved. Archie lifted himself out of his seat. He had just reached for the handle of the door when Kelvin snatched up his Parker pen once more and said, "Oh, Archie, one more thing.. . that dinner

the two women begin to see more of each other. Hesitant in the beginning a few lunch dates here and there, the occasional coffee what begins as a rear guard action against their husbands' friendship soon develops. They have resigned themselves to their husbands' mutual appreciation society and the free time this leaves is not altogether unpleasant; there is time for picnics and outings, for discussion and personal stud

hand, without milk, with lemon. Unwraps several layers of cling-film to reveal today's peculiar delight: savoury dough-like balls, crumbly Indian sweets shot through with the colours of the kaleidoscope, thin pastry with spiced beef inside, salad with onion; saying to Clara, "Eat

g, the more the merrier. But I tell you, when I turned my head and saw that fancy ult

off! Two! Feeding one is enough!"Clara laughs and

. He wasn't there. I am not letting him see things like that. A woman has to have the private things a husband needn'

ys Alsana to Clara in a snooty, English way. "Too old to be so rude and too young to know any better."And then Clara and Alsana,

trust."But Clara is more cautious, because naming seems to her a fearful responsibility, a god-like task for a mere mortal. "If it's a girl, I tink I like Irie. It patois. Means every ting OX, cool, peaceful, you know?"Alsana is horrified before the sentence is finished: '"O K"? This is

"And then Neena, groaning at the turn the conversation is taking: "Well, I like Me. It's funky. It's different."Alsana loves this. "For pity's sake, wh

s her finger over tightly pursed lips, like a guard at the gate 'shush."But in response Niece-of-Shame puts on the thick accent, bats

at each other, but there's no communication. And in the end h

lationships like that any more. It's not like back home. There's got to be communication between men and women in th

e I want to know. The truth is, for a marriage to survive you don't need all this talk, talk, talk; all this "I am this" and "I am really like this" like in the papers, all this revelation especially when your husband is

families such as ours you should have learnt that silence, what is not said, is the very best recipe for family life."For all three have been brought up in strict, religious famili

billy word! I'm just talking about common sense. What is my husband? What is yours?" she says, pointing to Clara. "Twenty-five years they live before we are even born. What are they? What are they capable of? What bl

g through the niece-of-shame tongue-of-obscenity, '.. . is that not everybody wants to see into everybody else's sweaty, secret parts.""But Auntie," begs Neena, raising her voice, because this is what she really wants to argue about, the largest sticking point between the two of them, Alsana's arranged marriage. "How can you bear

ast room on a steaming Delhi day and he fanned me with The Times. I thought he had a good face, a sweet voice, and his backside was high and well formed for a man of his age. Very

ink I'm so stupid. But I am wise about things like men. I tell you' - Alsana prepares to deliver her summation as she has seen it done many years previously by the young Delhi lawyers with their slick

s Clara, who is the recipient of a secret (kept secret from Alsana and Archie) lending library of Neena's through which she reads, in a few short months,

I'd have to seriously consider abortion."Alsana screams, claps her hands over one of her own ears and one of Clara's, and then almost chokes on a piece of aubergine. For some reason the remark simultaneously strikes Clara

n himself to police the park (though his job as park keeper had long since been swept awa

zefowicz, if you call that being all right,

r when it comes to firing back. "I do, I do thankfully Allahhas arranged it that way.""G

the tears from squeezing out of the corners of her eyes. She ca

ts is this funny?""Not in my experience, Mrs. Iqbal, no," says Sol Jozefowicz, in the collected manner in which he said everything, passing his handkerchief to Clara

lara can keep the handkerchief and replacing the hat he had removed in the old fashion.

I am just beginning. You understand?"She sighs, not waiting for an answer, not looking at Neena, but across the way at the hunched, disappearing figure of Sol winding in and out of the yew trees. "You may be right about Samad .. . about many things. Maybe there are no good men, not even the two I might ha

,or swallowing the stuff from the streams. My Niece-of Shame believes in the talking cure, eh?"says Alsana, with something of a grin. "Talk, talk, talk and it will be better. Be honest, slice open your heart and spread the red stuff aroun

st as he reaches the far gate, Sol Jozefowicz turns round to wave, and three women wave back. Clara feels a little theatrical, fly

did they get for their trouble? A broken hand for Samad Miah and for the other one a funny leg. Some use, some use, all this.""Archie's right leg," says Clara quietly, pointing to a place in her own thigh. "A piece of metal, I tink. But he don' really tell me nuttin'.""Oh, who c

at the back of her throat, her signal for disbelief. "So look at it no, dearie, it must be done look at it close up. Look at what is left. Samad has one hand; says he wants to findGod but the fact is God's given him the slip; and he has been in that curry house for two yearsalready, serving up stringy goat to the wh