Parents’ Evening, by Nadia Rahman

An original short story extract set in the twentieth century.

Asif had translated for his father at the doctor’s, at the council offices and once, terribly, at the police station when the shop window was smashed. But he had never had to translate himself.

Mrs Thorogood smiled at them both across the little desk in the gym. She had his exercise books in a pile and his report in a brown envelope, and she spoke to his father slowly and loudly, the way English people did, as though his father were standing on the far side of a river.

‘Asif is a very able boy,’ she said. ‘Really very able. His essay on the Great Fire was the best in the year.’

Asif turned to his father and said it in Punjabi, and he watched the words land. His father’s back straightened. He nodded once, gravely, as if accepting a delivery he had long been expecting, and Asif felt a warm, ridiculous glow spread through his chest. He wanted to say it again. He wanted to say it loudly enough for the Hendersons at the next table to hear.

‘However,’ said Mrs Thorogood.

She went on for some time. Talking in class. Homework handed in late, or not at all. A detention in March that had not been signed for, because Asif had signed it himself. She was not unkind. She simply laid the facts out on the desk one by one, like a shopkeeper counting change, and every one of them landed on Asif and stayed there.

His father was waiting. His face was still lit with the first sentence.

Asif heard himself speak. He said that Mrs Thorogood hoped he would keep working hard. He said that she was pleased with his handwriting. He said it smoothly, without hurrying, and the lie was so easy that it frightened him.

His father put a hand on his shoulder, heavy and warm, and said, ‘Shabash.’ Well done. Then he turned to Mrs Thorogood and thanked her in careful English, ‘Thank you, madam, thank you,’ and shook her hand for much too long.

Mrs Thorogood looked at Asif over his father’s bent head. She did not speak Punjabi. She did not need to.

Walking home past the shuttered shops, his father talked all the way about university. Asif carried the brown envelope against his chest like something that might go off.

How does the writer show Asif’s thoughts and feelings as he translates at parents’ evening?

You should consider:

• what the writer says about Asif
• the writer’s use of language to show his thoughts and feelings

You must refer to the text to support your answer, using relevant subject terminology where appropriate.