Part 15 (1/2)
Ah Kun swept into the room, tray in hand, and closed the door with a flick of her foot.
”Your Aunt has asked me to prepare this for you; bird's nest soup. This is the best brand and the herbal shopkeeper, you know the one at the corner of Petaling Street, kept it especially for us. It took me the whole night with a pair of tweezers to get all the feathers out. We do not want to eat feathers do we?” she asked jovially. ”This is very good for you in your condition. Tomorrow, I shall prepare another dish that is also very good for you; chicken with herbs, steamed for ten hours until it is almost blackened.”
”Please, no more. I shall get fat,” protested An Mei, getting up from her desk to take the tray from Ah Kun.
”Fat? No chance. You have been working so hard you are unlikely to get fat. You have to think of the baby. Do you good if you fit in some rest as well.”
An Mei smiled. ”What's this?” she said taking an envelope from the tray.
”For you. The postman delivered it this afternoon and I forgot to give it to you earlier. Remember! Don't let the soup get cold. I shall come back later to collect the tray.” Ah Kun closed the door gently behind her.
An Mei sat down and took the tray from the coffee table and carefully balanced it on her knee. She lifted the lid releasing the trapped aroma and breathed in deeply. Mmm. Good! No bitter herbs! She took a spoonful, gulped it down expecting the worst, and then licked her lips in pleasant surprise. Ah Kun had used rock sugar to prepare the dish. She took another spoonful and then turned her attention to the envelope. She looked at the back; there were no indication of where it could have come from. She slit it open and took another spoon of the soup. Lazily she flipped open the one page letter. She looked uncomprehendingly at the scrawl.
I DIVORCE YOU. I DIVORCE YOU. I DIVORCE YOU. Large writing that stared out at her in obscene boldness.
She dropped the spoon. It fell with a loud clang against the bowl and bounced to the floor. It crashed breaking into smithereens. The tray slid off her knee joining the debris of broken ceramics. The commotion brought Nelly running in.
”What's the matter? What's the matter?” she asked. Her eyes went to the letter in An Mei's hand. She saw the bold writing, large prints and the scrawl at the end. ”Hussein?” she asked incredulous. ”Not even a single attempt to contact you, and then this?”
Numbly An Mei nodded. ”I have no one to blame but myself, Aunt Nelly. At least, I have this.” She clasped her abdomen. ”Thank G.o.d, he doesn't know.”
”Oh An Mei! Are you sure you wish to go through with the baby? Will you be able to keep the child under Shariah law?”
”Yes! I will go through with it. And, yes! I will keep the child, no matter what! That is why I am so happy Hussein does not know.” The enormity of what she had to do struck her. She panicked. Wild-eyed, she clutched at Nelly, her fingers digging deeply into Nelly's arms. ”We have to keep my pregnancy a secret. At least until after I have consulted a lawyer.”
”I'll ask Jeremy if he knows of one. But if the matter is to be kept a secret, Jenny must not know because, for all her goodness, she is related to Hussein's family by marriage and she might let something slip. We must make your mother understand the need for secrecy; she is too trusting. She must not tell Jenny even if she is her best friend. This is too big a matter,” said Nelly. ”I'll warn your mother now.”
Night fell. As the shadows lengthened, the neighbourhood grew quiet. The members of Nelly's household had gone to sleep one by one. Only An Mei was still awake.
She was sat on the edge of the bed. Slowly, she slid off it and dropped on her knees. She let herself fall forward and her forehead hit the floor. A m.u.f.fled sob rose from her throat. A shudder went through her body. Twisting from side to side, she fought for breath; she sought to calm the overwhelming sense of loss she felt. She blamed herself for her own self-deception; to even tarry with the thought that a baby might change things. She told herself that she should have expected the break, even so the cruelty of seeing it in black and white emblazoned across an otherwise blank piece of paper had shocked her to the core. She sobbed convulsively. Gradually the sobs subsided. She got up and crawled into bed. I will call Casey and then Jeremy, she thought, and talk to them.
Chapter 32.
The office was little more than a cubicle, a box room with wall-to-wall shelves, jam-packed with files and volume upon volume of books. On the desk were more papers and files. A phone stood balanced on a stack of journals. Pushed towards one corner was a mug of coffee, its contents long consumed and the dregs black and congealed. Cigarette b.u.t.ts filled a huge ashtray; smoke spiralled from one perched on the side. The whole room was filled with a hazy fog. The air conditioner, an old grey metal Carrier, clanged energetically in one corner, its frame shaking in protest, as it poured out tepid air.
An Mei looked at the chaos and then at the man behind the desk. The apprehension in her eyes seemed to amuse him. He smiled showing a row of teeth yellowed by nicotine. He had come highly recommended by Jeremy.
”He is a good man,” Jeremy had said. ”One of the best in his field. Don't judge him by appearances. He practises civil law, but he is also familiar with Shariah law. What he does not know, he will find out, but even so he may need to refer you to a specialist in Shariah law.”
She swallowed hard and tried not to breathe in the fumes. Nelly held her hand, squeezing it rea.s.suringly.
”Take a seat,” the lawyer said, waving them to two chairs on the other side of the desk. ”Thank you for coming in. Jeremy has given me a brief outline of your situation. Perhaps you can now fill me in on the details.”
An Mei opened her mouth to speak only to end up coughing and spluttering. She tried to disperse the spirals of smoke coming her way. Nelly in her concern jumped up and took a wad of paper brandis.h.i.+ng it vigorously to fan the smoke away.
”Sorry, sorry, I'll get rid of this,” the lawyer said, taking the ashtray and tipping its contents into the over flowing waste bin behind his chair. He turned to face them again, a cigarette between his fingers. It was the one that had been perched on the ashtray earlier. He had stubbed it out.
”Apologies, I can't think without one of these. I will just hold it; I won't smoke. My name is Tan. People just call me Jay Tee.”
An Mei remained silent. She stared at the cigarette poised in his hand as though mesmerised. Fear and exhaustion from sleepless nights seeped through every limb in her body. Then slowly, as though the words had to be dragged out of her, she asked. ”Will what I say in this office stay in this office?”
”Client confidentiality? Absolutely!”
His eyes were steady. Jeremy had the utmost trust in him. They had been to school and later university together. ”What you say will stay with him,” Jeremy had said.
Yet she hesitated until Nelly prompted. ”An Mei,” she said. ”Tell him.”
So for the next hour, she described her situation to him. He did not interrupt her and despite his obvious addiction to cigarettes, he did not light up again. His forehead was a ma.s.s of creases as he concentrated on her tale; his eyelids were half closed, but when he looked up after she had finished, his eyes were alert, bright.
”Can he divorce me like this?” she asked showing him the letter. The words ”I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you,” scrawled across the page.
”Unfortunately, yes! You are a Muslim. Your case, which comes under family matters, falls under the jurisdiction of the Shariah court. Although the legal system in Malaysia is a dual system based on both English common law and Islamic law, the civil court has no jurisdiction over matters that fall under the Shariah court's mandate. If you were not a Muslim, the situation would be completely different. Under Shariah law, a Muslim man can divorce his wife in this way. It just has to be confirmed by a court. A Muslim woman, by contrast, has to prove her case before she can divorce her spouse.”
”What about any children ensuing from the marriage?” asked An Mei, her face bleached of colour.
Mr. Tan stared at her, his eyes br.i.m.m.i.n.g with curiosity, his spectacles halfway down the bridge of his nose. He suspected that his client was not telling him everything. ”It is fortunate,” he said, clearing his throat, ”that you do not have children from the marriage.”
He paused to give An Mei time to clarify. But An Mei continued her silence. Her eyes cast down on her hands lying limp and lifeless on her lap.
”Divorces that involve children are always messy even in a civil court,” said Mr. Tan, ”but it is even more so in a case like yours. Under Shariah law, a mother generally has custody of a young child. By young, it means below seven to nine for a male child and nine to eleven for a girl. However, you have to understand that the father is considered to be the primary guardian under Islamic family law even though the mother has custody. If the mother is to remarry, the whole question of custody can be thrown open if there is uncertainty over the welfare of the child.”
He paused to let his words sink in. He saw the fear and apprehension in An Mei's eyes. His suspicion grew. He watched her face closely.
”In your case, were you to have a child, the situation would be even muddier,” he continued. ”You were a convert to Islam. And you have embraced the faith for only a short time. I am pretty sure that to qualify for custody, you would have to demonstrate that you would be able to bring the child up to follow the true Muslim faith.”
An Mei's hand flew involuntarily to touch her face. Her lips trembled.
His expression softened. He realised his suspicion was correct. He looked sympathetically at her.
”There is a general perception that mothers who have converted to Islam could not raise their children according to Islamic ways.” He coughed and reached for his packet of cigarettes then checked himself. He drummed his fingers on the table, rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat!
”Without doubt, if you are found wanting, that is if you were found not to be practising the faith, you would be disqualified from having custody of the child.”
”Any excuse could be used to say a woman is not practising the faith,” she replied, her voice faltering.
He shrugged his shoulder and raised both hands to indicate that that could well be so.