Bride for Javed

As I was passing the road on my bike, a short boy extended his hand, perhaps asking for a lift. I stopped. He had difficulty getting on the bike, but he managed to climb on. I met a 17-year-old boy who works as a barber, and his destination was somewhere in the middle of the road I was on. But this story isn't about this boy. It's the story of our Javed 'brother.' Why am I even using brother? Oh, right, I'm in Kashmir, that's why.

When I first met Javed, he was listening to a Hindi love song on his mobile. Suddenly, a word came up in the song where the girl was saying she would leave this body for her lover and for the sake of this love. Just then, our eyes met, and upon seeing me, he lowered his head and started giggling like a child. His mouth was wide open and his face was oval. If you looked at his brothers, you'd consider him a genetic defect of sorts, because all his brothers had straight chins and broad, muscular physiques.

There is something about the music; it gets stuck to you if you play it again and again. That's what Javed was hooked on to. But this story isn't about the union of me and Javed's music. Who is Javed, by the way? Javed is Mustaq Bhai's younger brother, and who is Mustaq? Mustaq Bhai is my teacher, who is teaching me the art of weaving a pashmina. Now you must have understood the threads of this story. There are many, but hold on to these and we will give them a spin now.

When I met Javed Bhai again, he looked muted, and after a while, I asked him what happened, asking if he could play something for me. He looked around, lowered his neck, and moved his chin towards me, whispering, "Not now, not in the mood," while giggling. Then I enquired about him—who is he and what does he do here? He moved himself close and said, "I am one of the youngest brothers amongst all of these, and I am not married yet." Marriage is a big deal in this house.

Perhaps this is worth telling how the accounts are run in this house. Javed and I sometimes spoke about the weather, sometimes when one of my threads got stuck in my hand, I would ask for his help, or sometimes when my hank got entangled because he knew how to untangle the thread. He confirmed that day that he also knew how to run a loom. That same day, I also noticed that whenever his elder brother would come around in the room, he would become uncomfortable and would exit the room as soon as possible, or at least try to, as I could observe by his body language.

Till now, every man in the house had asked me one thing in particular: whether I was married or not. I made up some crazy stuff so they could consider me a married man with many wives. They were happy to hear that, or maybe not. In my opinion, this house should be labeled as the 'Nikah' house, the Urdu word for Marriage. You enter this house and any corner you go, there is a sign: Are you married? If yes, you can enter this room. The father of all the brothers asked me many times if I was married or not; the brothers have asked me many times. This many times, no one has ever dared to ask me if I am married or not. The cracks were about to open.

One day, I entered the house. I saw Mustaq in a hurry while going towards the door; he said someone had just died and that I could sit in the room with his father. "I will be back soon," he said. Mustaq never came. The old man is a comic; he doesn't really speak, he mumbles, "Did you eat food?" but like this, "Did youu eat fast forward food." He sits on the top of his loom, kicks the spindle, and clanks the loom shafts. Once in a while, he comes down and makes "gud gud gud" sounds while pulling the hookah. If he happens to see you around, he would definitely present you his most important words, which are: "Hey, are you married or not?" All you have to do is say yes—even if you are a goat, just 'meh.' That same day, I found Javed alone, and we talked for the first time because there was no "pressure cooker" around—I mean, brothers.

I motivated Javed to go out on a bike ride since the weather was good, but I was praying inside that he didn't take this as an invitation for something else. Instead, he told me that he was tense because he wasn't getting married and was unable to find a suitable partner. "Tomorrow, some new people are coming, and previously, the people who came rejected him." Inside my head, I was imagining the entire family: the father is a priest giving sermons, one brother is a teacher, and the rest make pashmina—in fact, they all do it—but they have other side gigs too, explaining themselves and presenting Javed to the girl's family.

Javed asked his father if he could go out and get a shave because people were coming tomorrow, and he would like to look good. Actually, it was my idea to go and get a shave. We roamed around like hounding dogs looking for a place, only to later realize that it was Tuesday and no barber opens on this day. I don't know why. We managed to find a place where we had to wait for an hour. After the barber job, we went hunting for food, and after the food, Javed told me, "Hey, please don't mention this outing with my brothers, or else they will get angry at me." I was expecting something else like, "Can I blow you off here?" but I was relieved to hear that he wasn't gay.

Next day, big job, I am in the house. I meet Javed at the door. I point out to Javed that I can hear the love and the music of a wedding, but instead, he rushed away, didn't give me enough details. Back to the job while counting threads and taking them out and making hanks one by one. The mother enters the room while the father is clicking, clanking, and he comes down from his throne. They both talk, and the father gets loud and the mother is upset, making faces, pausing, looking at me, and departing from the room. The father irritatedly asked me, "Are you married?" But man, I was waiting for something else which I had predicted so precisely, I don't know how. The father said, "Could you please help me find a bride for my son? He is a nice boy. We need a Muslim girl."

The old man said, "We need someone who is healthy and a good household." The father explains himself and the condition of the entire family. "The party that came yesterday was not good; they were not up to par." I was wondering who rejected who, but that will remain a mystery forever.

I had to perform at this point, on the job immediately. I called a friend and asked him if he could ask his girlfriend, who is a Muslim, who could probably find a suitable bride for Javed, explaining Javed as a hopeless person in his 30's who spends time on Instagram and has a little belly and likes to sleep and has a power struggle with his other brothers. On the other side of the world, my friend showed consideration and said, "I would definitely help you and Javed, pointing out that if someone's house is getting settled because of me, I would do that for sure." My friend hangs up instantly.

After that phase, there was another momentous moment waiting for us. The father started watching videos on his phone; he was probably going for reels. Small videos that try to summarize everything in 30 seconds. I hear, "We are presenting you our daily list of women for you... This Madam ji is from this city and she is educated, with a 2 lakh per month job and is looking for a suitable man. She has a degree in this and that." Then another voice comes... "My client is a 32-year-old. She is looking for a retired person, any caste or creed, but Muslim. Madam ji does this and that and Madam ji does not mind this habit and that habit." After spending a few minutes, the old man grabs his pen and starts writing the phone number which is booming in his phone.

As I got busy with my threads that needed to be unwrapped from the loom as they were not done correctly, I moved one by one backwards, moving threads in the spinning handle, though these threads didn't belong here, but I was assigned a job to tie them and put them back as this is a part of learning the technique. The old man in this situation looked no further than to sleep as he lay on the ground with his head and tall hookah standing next to him. An audio came from his phone in Hindi that, "Brother, this is a story of a woman who is rich and invited one of her servants into her room. The audio was elegantly Urdu-ic and Hindi-ic, narrating the story, repeating some words like to spend the night with the servant and to avoid arriving at the point. The old man continued with the phone, "The woman is rich and she wants something from the servant." "This poor servant was offered 50 thousand dirham for a night, the 'wow' of the servant who was surprised why this woman is offering me this much."

The old man looked at me and smiled and put his phone off and went to sleep. Unfortunately, we couldn't find a bride for Javed that day.