Seconds

‘If this doesn’t work out, I would like the parting of ways to be…’ I paused.

‘Amicable?’ she suggested.

‘That’s asking for too much,’ I tried to make it sound like a joke. She did not smile.

I continued, ‘Well, let’s try to cut out all the bullshit, the headache, the grief, the delay and all that.’

‘Ok,’ she said.

‘Ok?’ I wanted to make sure.

She nodded.

I had thought a lot about that condition, the single-point ‘T&C’. I was sure about my priorities; even though it seemed an ominous start to the contract, by discussing how to end it.

‘I too have a request,’ she said, emphasizing the ‘too’ to make it clear that my condition had been taken as a request.

‘Yes?’

‘Let’s leave the past alone,’ she said.

I stared at her for a long while. I had expected that to be one of the plus points of the affair, to have someone to share the past, and the future; to understand, to rectify, or maybe that’s asking for the moon; a talking pillow perfect for therapeutic catharsis of the self.

‘Both sides…?’ I checked.

She raised an eyebrow. It is tough to negotiate with that.

I shrugged, to be noncommittal. She took my silence as an ‘aye’.

A month later, without much ado, we got married.

The first time, I had done it differently. Others had taken care of the selection, leaving only the final interview for me. The criterion applied then, inferred with hindsight, was: ‘a girl like my sisters’. The wise had warned that by lowering ‘standards/demands’, we appeared desperate, too eager to please, ready to be abused. It seemed like a good idea then; and it sounds great even now, in theory. Altruism is wonderful, outside relationships and business deals.

This time, I had worked alone. I browsed through matrimonial sites, with filters on sex (‘female’), status (‘divorced’), profession (‘employed’) and age (around mine, plus 3 years to minus 6 years; I am partial to multiples of 3). I concentrated on the photos. I found hers in the second month, an unsmiling face with blank tired eyes, a face which used to smile, and eyes that still captivate. I sent my photo and profile to her. It took her three weeks to respond that she is interested. We met at a neutral venue, talked for a few minutes, agreed on those two points and got married.

Two snags developed between the first meeting and the wedding.

The first was a minor issue. As soon as I announced my choice, well-wishers decided to do their bit for me even though I had explicitly instructed them not to interfere. They donned their private-eye costume, made enquiries about her, gathered gossip from various external sources, collated the information and presented the succinct feedback: ‘she is a wrong one’. Probably true, I had thought; but, to be spiteful, I told my set of near and dear that she must be then the right one for me. After the wedding, I confided to her about their findings (I assumed that discussion of ‘the past’ pertaining to events of mutual interest, after our first meeting, was allowed). She informed me that her folks had come to a similar conclusion through similar means: ‘he is not just a wrong one, but a nasty one’. She admitted that she had thought of pulling out. Ironically, my ‘T&C’ about how to withdraw rescued our affair. Even if it turned nasty, the exit seemed fine, so why not go ahead, she had thought. Rather flippant we were.

The other problem was a serious one. A week after our meeting, I lost my job at the ‘stable century-old’ company when it had to pay for its sins and filed for bankruptcy. I called her that day. I would have preferred a face-to-face meeting, mano a mano and all that, but my precarious jobless state did not permit me to leave town and fly to her place.

‘I have lost my job,’ I announced.

She remained silent.

‘Hello, are you there?’ I asked.

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Why aren’t you saying anything?’ I asked.

‘What can I say when it sounds as if you want to say something else,’ she said.

‘Say what something else?’ I asked.

‘That you want out,’ she said.

‘I did not say that,’ I protested loudly.

‘Isn’t that what you meant?’ she asked aggressively.

If we had been face-to-face, I would have tried to raise an eyebrow at that point.

I have to admit that she had managed to read my wavering mind. With only three weeks left of my second bachelorhood, I had grievous doubts about the suitability of the alliance and I was rather willing to take my job loss as an omen or balm or whatever to sooth frayed nerves or jitters or whatever.

‘No, I was only telling you that I lost my job,’ I said, sounding hurt and misunderstood.

‘And you want me to say that I want out,’ she persisted, mercilessly.

‘No,’ I said emphatically. God! She could be difficult.

I clarified, ‘Ok, I did expect you to say that.’

‘Ah…’

‘But, I do not want you to say that.’ What made me say that?

She remained silent.

I wanted to shake her shoulders till her dentures rattled and grey matter conformed correctly to pressure.

I asked with a calm voice, ‘Why aren’t you saying anything?’

‘I have nothing to say.’

‘Are you saying that it doesn’t matter to you that I am jobless?’ I asked, quite incredulous.

‘Do you expect me to quit the scene if you lose your job after we get married?’ she asked.

‘That’s different. Before marriage…’ I did not complete. I think I got her point then.

After all, we were not following the rules of the game.

I did not realize then that she was not bothered about my job or professional status or my income. Sounds unreal… that’s why I did not realize that for a long time.

Luck, good and bad, has its own funny ways. Two days after that call came another omen. I got a job offer from a firm that was keen to capture a few of us nouveau poor and jobless while we were uncertain and cheap. I called her again to tell the good news, and once again listened to the silence of her incongruous sang-froid. I wondered if she was going to be an emotionless Spock to my effervescent Captain Kirk. Such are the ways of second-hand marriages, I grumbled to myself.

The wedding was a quick affair. There were half a dozen in-laws on both sides to witness the coming together of outlaws. I got a cousin working at the Secretariat to facilitate a speedy registration of the marriage at the Corporation office. We caught the late evening flight. The two sets of perpetually miffed in-laws dropped us off at the airport. There were no tears or teasing, just hasty farewells and resigned best wishes. While waiting at the lounge, I wondered if I should try to convince her that we should add the ‘avoid in-laws’ clause to our charter for marital bliss. I made a mental note of that, not wanting to get into tricky quagmire before leaving enemy territory. While I was pondering over that hefty issue, she talked to me about her job prospects. She had quit her job and seemed confident of getting another in the big city where I worked. I copied her nonchalance with regard to my professional status and refused to give any opinion, not divulging the fact that I had none to offer because I was clueless about her line of work. Men of few words do seem intelligent and get more respect, don’t they? As a result of that, we talked little during our first journey together.

‘Should I carry the bride over the threshold?’ I asked, outside our apartment.

‘Let’s not risk a slip disc or cardiac arrest,’ she said with a polite smile.

So, she had checked me out physically, I noted. Younger me would have tried a rejoinder about the kilos she had to lose and such. Yes, I had checked her out. Filled out, I would say. In a good mood, it would come with the prefix ‘well’; and at other times, with the suffix ‘too well’.

She checked out my/our small ‘erstwhile bachelor’ pad and remarked sweetly, ‘Nice.’

Like every nice new recruit, she displayed enthusiasm, checked out the fridge and volunteered to rustle up a quick meal.

I decided to be nice and said, ‘How about getting a pizza?’ She agreed too readily.

I gave her the menu with the economical suggestion, ‘How about the large basic one with chicken and onion?’

‘I am a vegetarian,’ she stated.

Niceness ended then and there.

‘You are what?’ My heart pumped vigorously. ‘Why didn’t you say so before we got married?’ I asked.

‘You didn’t ask,’ she replied.

‘Is that so?’ I allowed a dramatic pause for tension to build up; and, for other skeletons to step out of the closet. ‘Who has heard of vegetarians in our place?’

‘I cook non-veg. but I don’t eat.’ 

Younger less-wiser me would have retorted, ‘Don’t bother. I will cook my own non-veg.’

Instead, I asked, ‘Is this some religious crap?’

She raised an eyebrow and the conflict ended.

The new morn and the days that followed brought the grim reality of living together in cramped spaces. Out went privacy and solitude, in came civil co-existence. We seemed and behaved like an odd middle-aged couple. She liked non-fiction, I loved pulp fiction; she liked politics, I hated that; she watched crappy Indian film and crime-shows, I preferred crappy Hollywood movies and slapstick comedy; she cooked well, I loved to cook but did so disastrously; I ate her cooking with a sulk because I had to enjoy the non-veg. alone, she tried to smile when she had to mouth mine.

A month after the wedding, and two weeks before her joining date at a new job, we went on a short honeymoon, a three-night stay at a nearby hill-station. The first night, we had wine, danced and tried to revive some old forgotten youthful exuberance but failed clumsily.

The morning after, she got up early for a morning walk.

‘Do you want me to come?’ I asked from beneath the covers, still sleepy.

‘No,’ she sounded too sure, ‘I want to do some bird-watching.’

I sat up in bed, the cold finger of dread tracing a line from the hypothalamus to the gluteus maximus, and feebly queried, ‘Are you into that?’

I guess my expression said more than that. She slipped out of the room without a word.

In college, even when febrile testosterones had decided an egalitarian attitude towards the fairer sex, I had studiously avoided one specimen of that lot – budding ornithologists. I had found that that species had serious views about life, environment and the ways of the birds and the bees; displayed disinterest akin to rigor mortis when they were not chasing the feathered creatures for a peek; and, their devotion had somehow prompted natural selection to endow them with facial features that would attract their love-interests. Quite generously, I called them Finkies, paying homage to Bertie Wooster’s newt-crazy friend Fink-Nottle (‘wears horn-rimmed spectacles and has a face like a fish’). That explains my concussed state in bed, being married to one of the Finkies hardly made good biography material, even though there was nothing piscine about her.

The second night, I touched her for the first time. She flinched.

‘Sorry,’ I said.

‘No, it is not…’ she mumbled, sounding strangely flustered.

‘I understand,’ I interrupted.

I did not understand but I could guess. Manuals would have instructed us to talk, to open the cold case of the past or to make sense with some conjecture about the present; but the disclaimer in fine-print warned about the risky procedure and unsure outcome: operation might be successful but patient might die. It was easier to bury.

Next morning, we had a courteous and pleasant breakfast together as usual.

It is possible that that’s all we wanted: to wake up with nice company, to return home after work to a calm life, without tantrums, mood swings and unacceptable demands. We expected flaws in products in a seconds’ sale, and we were happy with a reasonable fit. The partnership was an insurance policy, with barely-affordable premiums flowing out, hoping for support at some crucial later stage.

Our relationship soon reached a comfortable low plateau. I wondered if it was actually a saddle-point: would one wrong step make us head for the agreed polite exit, or were there paths to better states? In a movie or a book, an illness or an accident would have heralded sweet or bitter change. In life, the clock will tick and tick and tick. Months pass, seasons change, hair and teeth fall, bones become brittle, eyesight blurs, hearing fades, with the same play on stage for years.

In-laws came, stayed and left. There seemed to be a slight thaw but remained in cold-storage. She found my porn collection, dusted it without a word, and kept it in a more accessible place. I chanced upon a notebook of hers, open at a page with an incomplete poem that started with the line ‘creak ye ol’ machine for another dying day’. We did not discuss poetry. Poetry came a close second to bird-watching in my list of prejudices.

One lazy weekend, I trudged through Jhumpa Lahiri’s short stories, she watched a gruesome episode of ‘Wire in the Blood’; me sitting on the left side of the sofa, she sprawled over the rest, her head on a pillow next to my right thigh, her left leg on the arm of the sofa and the right over the back.

I raised my head from the mediocre collection of stories and commented on her form, ‘Hardly ladylike.’

‘Titian would appreciate it,’ she muttered.

I reviewed and agreed, ‘True.’

‘Hush…’ Carol Jordan and Tony Hill were inspecting the second brutally murdered victim in another ghastly episode.

I returned to beautiful but formulaic Lahiri.

After a while, I heard her say, ‘Hey, stop that!’

‘What?’

‘Your right hand…’

‘What did it do?’

‘It scratched the top of my head; then it fondled my ears and neck.’

‘Really…? It must have been trying to give you a tender massage.’

‘It made me feel like a pet dog.’

‘Hmm… you don’t look like one… where ye loving eyes?’

We returned to our book and crime-show.

Another weekend, she had the left corner, listening to jazz on iPod. Jazz shared the podium with poetry in my list. I watched ‘Lost in Translation’. She looked up when the movie started.

‘That’s a good set,’ she commented on the buttocks in transparent panties.

‘Yours are better.’

She looked at me. I indicated with two raised eyebrows that my appreciation was true and sincere. She smiled, closed her eyes and listened to jazz.

I was enjoying the relationship between Bill and Scarlett when she observed yet again, this time Scarlett’s tits, ‘That’s a good set, too.’

I realized that I faced a test or a trap. I decided to be truthful, ‘That’s a great set, actually.’

She smiled again. I was not sure if I had passed or failed. Our airwaves seemed to match in the mental spectrum, even though the physical range still suffered static silence.

A few weeks after the first aborted attempt, we tried to make love. Everything seemed to be going according to plan: sufficient foreplay, responsive mutual interest and tender haste. I watched her face, those captivating eyes closed shut, her trembling full lips. And I saw a tear escape down the side. I could have missed that in the dark, but I could not ignore her pain. I guessed that she had gone dry. Like a punctured balloon, I went flaccid, removed myself and lay by her side, not touching. I felt rage and shame. I swore a silent oath never to be caught in such a situation again.

In that same breath, I said to her, ‘Promise me one thing – never allow me to do stuff that you don’t like.’

I turned away and pretended to sleep.

I could sense the turmoil on the other side of the bed. Maybe, with a kind word from my side, she would have broken her own condition and tried to make sense of the situation with stuff from her past, or my past. From the earlier sleuthing efforts of my near and dear, I had gathered bits and pieces to put together a rough picture of the circumstances that transformed a cheerful young lady to that scarred scared state. I think we share a similar past. But, it could be still different for girls and boys. We had thought of trying on a few other occasions, but had made no headway, hampered by my erectile dysfunction. It seemed easy to blame the past for that. But, I did not talk about that then, and I did not want to talk later, even if she discarded her ‘T&C’. There was this gnawing belief deep within that it would be trust deficit, rather than the past or any lessons therein, that would decide our future, or its early demise.

That night, and the other nights, always ended well at the breakfast table. We were like battle-weary warriors, without props like patriotism or glory or idealism or hopes of martyrdom, quite unsure of the war, ready for daily battles fought with decency and old-fashioned rules. I think we were ready to stop thinking if we had sacrificed life and passion, to live for some greater good. After all, what we missed was not like food or water or thought. We could be intimate even without that. We talked of having kids, adopted or ours; ready to live for them. Like the generation of our parents and those before, noble and practical, we seemed old enough to forget dreams, demands, poetry and fiction that could hurt us, to live without experiments that could bring down the shaky edifice.

The album of this new life together has images in a random sequence. There are moments of pain and rejection, but widely separated by vast stretches of decent calm, however artificial, kept the story going. I wondered if we were copying characters in an old novel; the decent behavior and the stiff upper lips from some representation of colonial heritage; and, probably, in a bigger house, we would have tried separate bedrooms. We learned to ignore the physical side, deemed irrelevant or extravagant, especially for ‘seconds’ like us. We knew that we could not demand everything; we should not demand anything. We also knew that a clean break seemed imminent.

One day, less calm than usual, she asked, ‘Should we meet a therapist or psychologist?’

I replied, ‘Doesn’t that usually come after the credits start rolling? I thought we agreed to part without that crap.’

‘Just checking,’ and she had dropped the topic.

The calm, polite and rather formal company probably kept us going. It was not all gloom and doom. The story had other sides. We wanted each other, to be with each other. I wanted to do stuff that made her happy, and she reciprocated. Nothing ostentatious or overboard, just minor things that gave the calmness some hidden depth. There seemed to be a tacit agreement between us to be that way till the quick decent ending. As for that eventuality, it was a question of when rather than whether that would happen. Maybe, that was a leftover from our past, to keep the bags half-packed at all times; or, to expect that of the other.

Time can fly by even if the moments that make it seem dreary. Our life settled into a comfortably numb routine. There was only one minor development. We started playing badminton.

We tried to fit in an hour of play every day, early morning or late night on working days, and at the earliest on weekends. We tried to get home from work early for that. We got irritated with colleagues who delayed our game. Even food was given a shove. I told her that her veggie muck would do for dinner on working days since the preparation of the extra non-veg. dish would have eaten into our playtime.

The open-air court was in between three apartment blocks. We were evenly matched. She had been a university champion or some such minor star. Our on-court behavior was the antithesis of the decorum off-court. When she had control of the game, she did not go for the point; instead, she took great pleasure in flicking the shuttle to all parts, chasing me around the court. I did the same when I dominated the play; and, if I could smash, I made sure I aimed it at her face or body. From behind cupped hands, she would whisper, ‘Is that a smash? You must have got it from your sister.’ I poked back, ‘Hey, finding it tough to move around. Come on, you aren’t playing your fat-ass brother.’ We had to whisper our sledging because of the apartments overlooking the court. The residents who stopped to watch our game usually left with a grimace, hardly pleased with the ferocity of our ‘friendly’ games. We never lost our senses though and the insults never crossed the line, definitely no mention of virility or frigidity or parents. We never carried the game off-court. Back home, we downed a jug of lime juice and munched a few bananas to cool down. On Saturdays, we shared two bottles of beer. Then, we extended our ‘fighting spirit’ with a beer race, downing the first mug with one long gulp and, the loser had to invert the glass over his or her head along with the remaining contents. The second mug was for returning to our normal charade.

A few months after our first anniversary, she asked if we could go for a trip, for a break from house-work. We got a week’s leave sanctioned, and clubbed with a few public holidays, we had about ten days. We did not want to waste time on travel and decided to ‘sack out’ at a beach resort. We packed our badminton rackets and a case of shuttlecock, just in case we felt like playing.

The resort was packed with tourists but the place was spacious. The food was good. The first day we swam together and took a long walk on the beach. We must have seemed strange to others, the only couple on the beach not in close embrace, not even walking hand-in-hand. We were just not used to public display of affection; or we were unsure, or scared. Back in our room, we made a few minor changes to our routine. We sat close, touching, caressing, talking, kissing, but like our badminton games, we drew a line we did not cross. We shifted the line gradually. At times, it felt like shaping moist clay on a potter’s wheel, meditative, near-reverential, praying that it would hold and not crumble.

On the third day, we were interrupted. We heard knocking on our door. I opened the door to find a young couple outside.

‘Uncle, sorry to trouble you,’ the young man said. His girl stood a little away, looking inside, smiling sweetly, probably at her. The lad continued, ‘Uncle, can I borrow a condom?’

I am not sure what kept me from laughing aloud. It must have been their matter-of-fact nature. If they had been giggling or prancing childishly, I would have reacted differently, I am sure. I did not even feel like passing a quip about ‘borrow’.

I nodded and slipped inside. She went to the door and chatted with the young couple till I returned with three packets.

‘Thank you, Uncle,’ the young man said.

‘Aunty, see you around,’ the girl said.

We waved at them, like some affectionate uncle and aunty bidding farewell at a railway station. 

 The next day, around dusk, we were on the beach waiting for the sun to set. She was sitting next to me.

‘Can you sit in front of me, please?’ I asked her.

She raised an eyebrow, not the silencing one, just the questioning one. She moved. I gave her directions. She did not complain. She sat sideways, her legs tucked under, turned a little towards the sun, her face in profile. I watched the sun set, the reflection of that orange-red globe in her eyes, the dusk light filtering through her long lashes. She turned to look at me.

‘Don’t move,’ I ordered, like an artist to a model. She returned to her pose, a smile in her eyes.

We sat like that for a long time, till it was dark and the beach was deserted. We stood up, not hand-in-hand, not touching, enjoying the cool night air.

‘You love me,’ I told her.

She turned to me. I could make out a raised eyebrow.

‘Corny, I know,’ I laughed. ‘But that’s what I feel. Isn’t it better that way? What’s the point in telling you that I love you if you don’t feel it?’

She did not say anything. She kept staring. I guess I had gone on too long with the ‘corny’ stuff.

‘You remember my condition?’ I asked. She gave a slight nod. I continued, ‘I will break it. If we do part ways, I am quite sure I won’t give you up easily.’

She still remained silent.

‘Aren’t you going to say anything?’ I asked.

‘Do you want to play badminton tomorrow?’ she asked.

‘What…?’ I exclaimed. It took me a few moments to realize that she wanted to change the topic.

The next morning, at the breakfast table, we were polite and courteous, as usual.

‘Shall I get you pancakes?’ she offered.

‘Yes, please.’

She came back with a plate for me, ‘I poured maple syrup.’

 ‘Thank you, I said, ‘I ordered dosa for you, masala dosa, is that ok?’

‘Yes, thanks.’

We ate silently for a while.

‘Did you read today’s paper?’ I asked.

‘Hmm…’

‘That joker actually thinks he is going to be PM.’

‘Maybe, the country needs him,’ she said.

‘Are you serious?’

‘Strangely, yes.’

‘He gives me the creeps.’

‘Me too…’

‘Worse than your ‘Wire in the Blood’ stuff…’

‘You are probably right.’ She laughed and said, ‘I think I know who you want.’

I smiled but did not take the bait. Our politics could easily become like our badminton games.

‘She does not have a great set, you know,’ she goaded.

I laughed. ‘Would you like another cup of coffee?’ I asked.

‘Yes, please,’ she said.

I asked a waiter for two cups of strong coffee.

‘I need that to wake up,’ I said, ‘still sleepy, slept too little.’

‘Hmmm… same here.’ She then asked, ‘So, are you too tired for a game of badminton?’

‘Never, never,’ I said.

We finished breakfast, walked slowly past the foyer, towards our room, just another near-middle-aged couple, polite and formal in ways.

When we were near our room, I exclaimed, ‘Fuck!’

She turned to me, quite alarmed, looking around to make sure that we were not offending anyone, ‘What happened?’

‘Bloody fuck!’ I said again. I asked her, ‘Do you know the young couple’s room?’

‘Three doors from ours, why?’ After a pause, she said, ‘Oh…’ She grinned, ‘Did we finish our stock?’

I knocked at the young couple’s door. She stood behind me, looking away.

The young lady opened the door. I stepped aside and let her do the talking.

The girl raced inside. Her guy stepped out of the bathroom then, a towel wrapped around his waist. He turned to me and greeted cheerfully, ‘Good morning, Uncle. How are you?’

‘Very good, how are you?’

The young woman returned with three or four and handed it over to her.

‘Thanks a lot,’ she said.

‘See you around, aunty!’

This time, they stood at their doorway and waved us goodbye.

We entered our room and locked the door.

‘So, what about that badminton game?’ she asked. ‘Should I unpack the rackets?’ That had remained in our suitcase.

‘Oh, I don’t think I need the racket or the court, I am going to thrash you right here,’ I swore.

‘Really…?’

I pulled her roughly to me and kissed her.

I heard her say, ‘You love me, too.’

‘God, that does sound corny,’ I said.

We laughed.

An Apology And Other Stuff

Later, the weather would be blamed.

It had been a sultry Sunday afternoon. Low-lying dark clouds added to the pressure-cooker situation, promising little relief after days of relentless heat and humidity. The doors and windows had to be shuttered by four to keep out the mosquitoes. By five, the stench of burning plastic and rotting garbage from outside seeped within, suffocating, the dial of some claustrophobia meter turned to high.

At quarter to six, a man stepped out of his house, sweating profusely, breathing heavily, muttering as he drove the car out, ‘The beach, that’s what I need.’

The car a/c wasn’t working. He kept the window down. He enjoyed the rush of air. He had barely gone half a kilometer when it started raining quite heavily. He had to raise the window. He did not mind getting soaked but the inside of the car was getting drenched. Without the a/c, the glass got foggy, visibility was bad and the car quickly turned stuffy. At the next junction, he, clearly ill-tempered, decided to return home.

He did a u-turn, quite carelessly, and nearly crashed into a car that had silently turned up from behind. He braked and sat still, eyes closed for a while.

When he opened his eyes, he saw that the other car had halted. It was still raining. He could not see the driver clearly but the dark form seemed to be gesticulating angrily at him. The passenger-side window then lowered and the driver’s wife glared at him before delivering an opprobrious sermon.

‘What an ugly mug,’ he thought. He saw the driver step out, looking angry, ‘poor chap… to have a wife like that!’

He too stepped out, in the rain, and approached the driver.

‘I am extremely sorry,’ he said.

The driver seemed mollified by that, for a while. His wife’s harangue continued in the background. It was probably that that made the driver mouth some abuse at him, or his apology had seemed too easy.

‘I said I am very sorry,’ he said again.

This time, the driver decided that it was enough and turned back.

‘Wait,’ he said to the driver. The driver turned to him. ‘How should this end?’ The driver looked puzzled. ‘Do you think I deserved to hear all that crap?’ Even then, the wife was going on, clearly in no mood to be pacified. ‘We can’t end it like this, can we?’

He gave a slow smile and uncertainty crept into the driver’s eyes.

‘Does your wife know that she is going to be a widow or the wife of a killer?’

Love & Luck

I believe in the haphazard.

No, I haven’t surrendered

To that, but I do believe.

Take life, that drag

Through muck of tedium,

A rare jig, if one’s lucky.

I met her at a party

With too many guests,

She sat alone at a table.

I too sat alone (that’s not new,

So I did not think of luck)

Not at her table, but I got there.

You can guess the rest.

Movies, music, war and love  

We talked, from nine to three.

I took her to her place

And left with the promise

To have breakfast together,

The next Sunday, at the café

Near the church, where lovers meet

For sin, I mean, for appam and stew.

She knew what I meant

And brought a chaperon,

It was a tight fit at the table for two.

A quiet smiling character;

With no talk of movies, music, war

Or love, from nine to three;

We shared appam and stew (the other had something).

She made me aware of blue balls and red roses.

A tight fit it was, of lust, love & luck.

My Mother's Village

Some kids get to play with building blocks, dollhouses and train sets. I got my mother’s village. My father never took me there. But, not a week went by without dredging or touching up that past.

‘It’s four hundred and seventeen steps from your mother’s house to the river,’ he said, and I paced those in some rain-washed fantasy, feeling my toes curl away from sharp stones or sink into mud. I played spy-games, a spook in a spooky double-life, familiarized myself with the shortcuts through paddy fields and rubber plantations, the best spot to swim and the people, at the market, at the temple, my family. His stories invariably revolved around my mother, even when he talked about the other woman who could have been my other mother. Instead of fairytales with knights and monsters, I grew up with the demons he faced there, the uncle who stole from my mother or the man with three ears, and the many-headed ghosts that banished him, us, from that place.

A month after my father died, I went there. Violating the tacit agreement to leave that past alone was not easy. But, the vacuum left by him, or the depressing loneliness, made me want to reclaim that part of me I never had.

My father was in his mid-twenties when he was transferred, as a junior officer, from the city to the village’s lone bank. He married my mother in his second year there. 

‘Ours wasn’t a love affair in the strict sense,’ he admitted. Could not have been a strictly arranged affair either – his pedigree hardly matched with hers. I am not sure if they even talked to each other before marriage. But, he was hopelessly besotted with her.

‘I behaved like a love-struck teenager,’ he recounted with a shy laugh. ‘When I went past her house, I walked on tiptoes, peering over the compound-wall, just to catch a glimpse of her. Every evening, at the temple, I shamelessly stalked her, pretending to pray to every God that wasn’t there.’ He gave me his boyish grin before adding, ‘How I was tempted to follow her to the river when she went swimming… but I did not.’ I would not be surprised if he was being less than candid with me. We were indeed close but he was painfully prudish when it came to discussing such matters with his daughter.

Luck came his way through hard times brought on by a bad monsoon. My mother’s father faced a severe cash-crunch because of a few trades gone wrong. He approached the bank’s manager for a loan. As expected, the manager was not keen on disbursing loans then when default seemed certain. My father took an active interest in the loan-application, managed to convince his boss that there was sufficient collateral and facilitated timely loans to my grandfather. He gained the trust and respect of my mother’s family, and eventually, got her too. Only her eldest brother, the uncle who later stole my mother’s share, opposed the match but his protest did not amount to much then. A year later, my mother died giving birth to me. Her death plus mounting financial losses left my grandfather shattered. My uncle quickly assumed control of family matters and we, my father and I, became outcasts.

My father requested for a transfer and, left the village with me and his meager belongings. The details of the days that followed are sketchy. We lived with his relatives or friends. My father struggled with me, his job and, correspondence courses on corporate finance and portfolio management. When I was five, he got a job offer from an investment bank in Singapore. Our life became a lot easier. We moved from south-east Asia to Europe and then to the US, further and further away from my roots.

We lived comfortably. He could have left me in the capable hands of nannies and other support staff. But I had his clumsy housekeeping and awful cooking. I had to tuck in that tired storyteller who slept before me, and put up with ill-tempered tennis games which neither of us liked to lose. He came late for PTA meetings and stood like an errant schoolboy in front of my teachers. They were actually quite fond of him and also admired his efforts as a single father. I did not realize that he was burning too much fuel. I should have noticed the slouch and the breathlessness in the last few years before his early and sudden death at fifty.

I am twenty three and I feel lost without him, without his deep rumbling voice to comfort me, without him to lean on. I miss his stories, his quirky ways and intriguing contradictions. He claimed to be an atheist but he prayed after bath every evening. To or for what he prayed I never knew. I did wonder if he was praying or reliving an old memory. He was pragmatic and quite rational but, at the same time, he refused to keep photographs or diaries.

‘Nothing like the brain to store stuff,’ he said.

He did not have photos of my mother or her village. Whenever I sulked about that, he gave me a bear-hug and said that I look a lot like her. I think he was just trying to make me happy.

He hardly talked about his family. His parents died when he was in his teens.

‘You got half that trait from me,’ he mentioned in some wistful moment. ‘My side isn’t into marrying, and most are single and anonymous in nameless places.’ I think I have that trait too. My mother’s family is the exact opposite – large and attached, with all its flaws, but still attached. Maybe, that is why I went there.

I hired a car at the city-airport and stayed in a hotel the first day. I hardly slept that night. I got up early the next morning, forced myself to have a muffin with two cups of strong coffee before leaving at half past seven.

I got to the village junction around nine. I did not have to ask for directions. The market looked the same. I spotted the changes – half a dozen brightly painted houses, a hardware store, a reading room and couple of rubber traders. The old ration shop has become a large provision store. Otherwise, the junction seemed as it was twenty five years back when my father was there. The teashop’s ancient glass case displayed thick dosa, banana fritters and puttu. The ‘fancy’ store exhibited bangles, stationery, dresses for kids, buckets, plastic and aluminum vessels. Only the plastic covers for mobile phones that hung over the counter indicated that the shop has moved with time. The Muslims still live near the market, by the roadside, on the border of my mother’s family property. I wondered if the tension between those two sparring parties has reduced with time. My father had tried to be an intermediary. He told me that the fight started when a cow strayed from the Muslims’ side to the other property, and that the situation had worsened with a dispute over a common path. The Muslims were, in fact, the first customers he roped in for the bank. That’s also how, and when, he met that other woman. ‘That wasn’t easy at all, but I tried…’ He did not elaborate. That crush lasted for a few months, till he was totally crazy about my mother. 

I turned left at the junction. People stared at me and young men on the road took their time to make way. My mother’s family property at one time stretched, for a mile or two, from the junction to the temple and to the paddy fields lying further to the south. To the east, it extended till the river and the boundary to the west was the village school where my mother studied. The market area too used to be theirs. Some generous grand-uncle or great-grand-uncle gifted that land to the village. With each passing generation, as the family-tree grew dense, the family property got partitioned and sub-divided. The dependents and the workers were also given their share. Every house on that route must belong to some relative. I was tempted to stop the car at each house, step out, introduce myself and gather relatives. But I stuck to my plan, to be a tourist there to visit the temple.

I parked the car near the temple. I had taken care to dress in a traditional churidaar outfit, with just an inconspicuous bindi and a simple gold chain, leaving behind my nose-rings and ear-rings. I did not want to attract attention. I entered the temple. I am not religious and prayers have never been a part of my daily routine. There, I prayed the way my mother must have done, a pose my father had often imitated and not too difficult to copy.

I was startled when I felt a sweaty palm on my arm.

‘Sarasootty…’

I recognized the half-wit who helps at the temple. He has aged but the thick lips and the kind puppy eyes of my father’s portrayal were unmistakable.

He repeated, ‘Sarasootty…’

He got agitated and his hands jerked nervously. He then left my side and ran towards the temple’s office. I was watching him when another voice addressed me from behind, from within the temple.

‘Kutty (kid), where are you from?’

My father used to fume about that query, ‘Do they want to know who I am or can they figure that out if I tell them where I come from?’ I had tried to reason with him that they just wanted to know his roots, to figure out his lineage. ‘Is that the sum total of who I am?’ I could understand his frustration – without a recognizable lineage.

I turned around to face an unfamiliar middle-aged temple priest. Earlier, I had thought that the mumbling from within the temple was part of the morning prayers. Seeing him tuck a mobile phone at the waist, in the folds of his mundu (dhoti), I guessed that that prayer had been to a terrestrial subject.

I said, ‘A friend told me about this temple, and since I was passing by this village…’

‘Is this friend from this village?’ he probed.

‘I think so. She lives in the city. We work together.’

‘Lots of people from outside come here these days. Even I am not from here,’ the priest said.

‘How long have you been here?’ I asked.

‘Two years.’

The half-wit returned with a large dollop of payasam (sweet offering) on a banana leaf. He offered that to me, still chanting, ‘Sarasootty… Sarasootty…’

‘Hey, stop that… what has got into this fool?’ the priest scolded the half-wit, ‘Whenever he sees a woman he likes, he goes on like that…’

How could I tell him that ‘this fool’ Achu, short for Achuthan, used to call my mother ‘Sarasu-kutty’ or ‘Sarasootty’? Her name was Saraswathi. Achu was a few years older than her, son of one of the maids, and he grew up in my mother’s house. I held Achu’s hand. He looked thrilled. I too was very happy, to be mistaken for my mother. I barely managed to hold back the tears.

I left the temple after a few mandatory rounds around the sanctum sanctorum. I took the steep downhill path towards the paddy fields. The other road to the east would have taken me to my mother’s ancestral house. I was not yet ready for that. While walking, I had the payasam, eating straight from the leaf, unabashedly licking it clean.

There are no houses near the temple, around the upper part of the path. That area must still be with my mother’s family. They gifted the land near the paddy fields to their work-force, long before my father’s time in the village.  I am not sure if the workers returned the favor with loyalty. With land of their own, electricity connection, television, mobile phones, other modern appliances and, most probably, a family member in the Middle-east, old allegiances must have been easy to forget.

The situation was a lot different a century back, when the upper-castes on the other side of the paddy fields controlled the area and the workers were landless laborers. Those upper-castes’ days were numbered, thanks to their lavish lifestyle, imprudent ventures and senseless in-fighting. Creditors fed on them like vultures and they had to sell their property cheap. My mother’s family was one of the few who did not try to benefit through such ‘cursed’ deals. But only when they were destitute did the upper-castes visit my mother’s house. They still sat like lords, refusing to drink or eat, but took home ‘gifts’ of rice, coconuts and other produce. They borrowed jewelry from my great-grandmother for rituals and festivities they refused to give up.

‘People will never change,’ my father commented, ‘they will always find someone to bow to, someone to trample on.’ He told me that, even during his time, the workers, though they were treated very well, never entered my mother’s house and had their meals served outside the house. Without any background to boast about, he too must have been an outcaste or outcast by way of caste or class, till he turned out to be useful for my mother’s family.

I walked past those workers’ huts and took a path that cut through the paddy fields. Kids stopped their games to watch me. Their parents must have paused too. Maybe, one or two must have said to each other, ‘Who is she? She looks so familiar.’

I made way for a group of women who crossed me on the same path. They smiled and I reciprocated. I could make out the curiosity in their eyes. I am sure that their first question would have been, ‘Did you come here today?’

My father used to list the villagers’ rhetorical questions. Near the river and with a wet towel in his hand, they asked him, ‘Have you been swimming?’ Close to the market, carrying a bag of shopping, ‘Did you go to the market?’ When he got off the bus, after a trip to the city, ‘Did you come back by bus?’ Though we laughed at that, I could sense that he was not making fun of them, just sharing happy reminiscences of my peculiar lot.

I followed a path eastwards towards the river. A good part of the paddy fields has been reclaimed for tapioca, banana, rubber trees and houses. How long will those green swaying fields last? Farming must be difficult even for my mother’s folks, without their old loyal workforce. I daydreamed about returning to my roots, to be one of those tech kids who fashionably shift to farming. I nearly laughed out loud.

At the periphery, an old lady sat outside a house, hunchbacked with age, watching me closely as she made a betel quid for herself, expertly handling the betel leaf, tobacco, slaked lime and arecanut. She called out to a person inside. An old man came out, looking quite fit for his age, smoking a beedi (local cheroot). They looked at me as if they had seen a ghost. I recognized them. They are cousins of my grandparents. He used to have a tea-stall, and played volleyball with my grandfather. I smiled at them and walked away quickly. I did not want to hear them call me, ‘Sarasu…’

I took a muddy path, opposite that house, leading to the river and then walked upstream along the bank to the stone steps at the old bathing spot. The river seemed strange. It has receded a few meters, as a result of illegal and indiscriminate sand-mining, and the once-serene flow seemed treacherous with rapids, undercurrents and unknown depths. Instead of the old sandy bathing spot, I found an ugly mound of rock, weeds and wild grass. I watched men pile sand from the bottom of that ravaged river on to a boat. Even the plot next to the bathing area was not being spared, excavated for clay, and left looking like an ugly pock-scarred face. I remembered that that property belongs to the man with three ears, the brute with whom my father had a big fight. He controls the sand-mining business in that area. I took a few photos, with my phone-camera, of that sad wretched place. I wish I had photos of the paradise it once was.

Two men on that boat shouted at me. I ignored them. I sat on those steps, head on my knees, lost in my thoughts. I thought about my father and mother swimming there.

I was brought out of that reverie by those two men. They had taken a route through the property of the three-eared man, circled behind my back and caught me by surprise.

‘What are you doing here?’ one of the men asked harshly. Both looked like thugs, bare-bodied except for a lungi (colored dhoti or sarong) worn low at the waist, the lower part folded up and obscenely hitched high till upper-thigh. They came closer.

‘What are you photographing?’ the other asked.

‘Nothing,’ I said.

‘Give that phone to us. Let us look at your nothing.’ They reached for my mobile. I moved backwards.

‘What’s going on here?’ a voice interrupted their advance.

I turned to that side, relieved. But that relief did not last long when I realized that I was staring into the mean eyes of the man with three ears. I stared at that large, dark, sweaty face. True to my father’s description, his ears and nose were similar and incongruous on that head – small, round, puffy, like cauliflower florets. That’s why my father called him the man with three ears.

‘What are you two up to with this girl?’ he asked.

‘Sir,’ they drawled, ‘she was taking photos.’

‘Let her take, no?’

‘She must be a journalist. A troublemaker…’

‘And, what if she is? Are you going to throw her in the river? Now, get lost, you two…’ The thugs went away sulking. The man turned to me, ‘So, are you a journalist?’

‘No,’ I replied. I knew that journalists and the police hardly bothered him, having politicians and the local administration in his greasy hands.

‘Who are you then?’ the man asked.

‘I am a tourist,’ I said. He seemed amused. I wanted to wipe that smile off his face. ‘Someone told me that this used to be a beautiful place.’

‘Yes, it was,’ he admitted, and even looked sad for a brief moment, before the old cunning look returned, ‘So… who is this someone who told you that?’

‘My father, Rajaraman,’ I said. I wanted to remind him of a person who stood up to him. ‘He worked in the village bank, about twenty five years back.’

‘Are you really Rajaraman’s daughter?’ the man asked, smiling broadly.

I nodded.

‘How is he?’

‘He died a month back.’

‘Really…? That’s sad.’ Strangely, he sounded earnest.

‘He told me about you…’ I said.

‘Did he…? Lovely chap he was… so full of life. He used to come here every day. We used to have swimming races, you know. He swam well…’

I nodded. I knew what he was up to – whitewashing the past.

I gathered courage and prodded, ‘He told me that you had started your business just then.’

‘Hmm… that’s right…’

I decided to disrupt his pensive mood, ‘Didn’t he argue with you about this?’ I tried a dramatic sweep of my hand to indicate the sad state of affairs.

He spoiled the act, still refusing to be the villain, ‘Oh yes, not just him, everyone was against this project at first, even me! Everything seemed so uncertain then. But, people quickly realized that they could earn in a year what they could not dream of gaining through decades of farming. Lots of people in this village benefitted, you know… what’s the phrase? Ah yes, climbed ashore instead of drowning. Your father was always after us, to open accounts or to put fixed-deposits in the bank.’ He laughed. ‘We used to run from the scene whenever he showed up. But, he was a jolly chap, and straightforward. People here really liked him.’

I should have felt proud and pleased, or disgusted. I did not like the way he had airbrushed history. I excused myself from that man’s company and left the spot, running up those stone steps and not stopping till I was on the road, panting, breathless. I could see my mother’s house from there, about four hundred and seventeen steps away.

According to my plans, I was not supposed to visit them on that first trip. But the meeting with the three-eared man somehow made me feel a need to enter my mother’s house.

The house has been renovated. But the cowshed was still there, to the left, at the back, behind the well, even though there are no cows now. My mother had a calf she called Unni. There was no one outside. I opened the gate, went up to the door and rang the bell. I heard slow footsteps. The door opened and I knew, without a doubt, that I was looking at my uncle, the one who stole from my mother.

‘Yes…?’ he asked me. He was tall, fair and fit. He must be my father’s age. He stared at me, unblinking, like a serpent.

I did not know how to introduce myself. I tried a partial truth, ‘This is my first visit to this village. A friend told me about the temple and that I should meet you.’

I should have said, ‘I am Saraswathi’s daughter.’ But, I did not want to be chucked out without a chance to enter my mother’s house.

‘Come in,’ he said kindly. I felt uncomfortable with his courtesy.

I entered my mother’s house. An elderly lady and a younger one came to the drawing room. I recognized my aunt but not the cousin. They smiled and remained silent. My cousin went back within. My uncle took the old armchair that used to be my grandfather’s. He showed me to a sofa. My aunt sat next to me. He mentioned some details about the temple. I hardly heard what he said. My cousin returned with a glass of lemon juice and plates of savory. I thanked her. She smiled shyly and stood next to her mother.

I blurted out, ‘I am Rajaraman’s daughter.’

He looked surprised, and sounded confused, ‘Rajaraman…?’

I wanted to shout, ‘Yes, the brother-in-law you chucked out.’

I managed to say calmly, ‘He was a junior officer in the bank. About twenty five years back…’

He pretended to think for a while. ‘Oh yes, I remember Rajaraman.’ He slapped his lap, and laughed, ‘How can I forget him? Where is your father now? Still with that bank…?’

‘No, he died last month.’

My uncle lowered his head and remained silent for a while. I think my aunt let out a sigh, or a low moan. I saw my cousin shake her head sadly. My uncle said, ‘He was here for two or three years. Twenty five years back! How time flies…’

Having decided to unsettle the man without any delay, I asked, ‘Was the village facing a tough time then because of a bad monsoon? My father mentioned that he had to arrange large loans...’ and, after what I considered to be a pregnant pause, I added, ‘for everyone…’

‘Loans…? I don’t think we ever needed that.’ He looked smug and slightly irritated too. ‘I thought the manager dealt with loans. Wasn’t your father a junior officer then? I don’t mean any disrespect, of course…’ That, of course, sounded as if he meant the exact opposite. He quickly added, ‘I remember that period very well because we celebrated my sister’s wedding on a really grand scale… and, we wouldn’t do that with loans, would we?’

I wanted to stop him and ask him about his sister.

But he continued, ‘You see, I was a young man then, studying in the city and gave two hoots for this place. Whenever I came here, during vacations, my father exhorted me to learn from Rajaraman. Your father was absolutely in love with this place, so fascinated by everything. I think he knew each and everyone in this village. We used to joke that he knew the village better than us… though, that’s probably true… we really don't give a damn about each other.’

I wanted to scream, ‘Stop this nonsense. I know what you are trying to do. Do you really have to block us out… totally?’ I remained silent, nodding my head as if I was taking in all that he said.

‘He and his camera were inseparable,’ I heard my uncle say.

I thought of replying, ‘Don’t you know that he hates photos?’

‘Come, see these photos,’ he stood up and pointed at some framed photos lining the wall. I got up too, feeling a little faint but still holding on. ‘He took these… he was quite a good photographer…’

He pointed at a photo of himself, another of a wedding, and then, that of the lady in the wedding photo, standing alone. Next to that were photos of my grandparents. The last three had fresh garlands around the frame, like bouquets on a gravestone.

‘Who is that?’ I pointed at the third photo.

‘That’s my sister, Saraswathi,’ he replied, ‘she died a few months after her wedding.’ His voice was choking. ‘I think your father was here then.’

I looked at the wedding photo. That lady was putting the wedding garland on some man I could not recognize. The lady did not look like me. Or maybe, she did.

‘How did she die?’ I asked.

‘There were some complications during pregnancy and her blood pressure shot up. We didn’t get her to the doctor fast enough.’

‘And the baby…?’ I asked.

‘My sister died in the fourth or fifth month of pregnancy.’

I could not take any more of the falsehoods. I remember sitting there for some more time, the man discussing whatever. Then, I left that house. In the car, staring blankly at the closed temple, I wondered about the lies that floated around me. How can they change the past like that? Did she die in the fifth month or after childbirth? Who was the father of that child? Did my father leave the village with that child? Even to me, that sounded like the plot of a B-grade movie.

I decided to make one final stop in that village. I drove to the junction, and turned right. I ignored the same old curious stares, feeling less friendly towards the whole lot. I stopped at a house after the market. I had to meet that other woman who could have been my other mother.

I knocked at the door of the old house. A lady in her fifties opened the door. She was Jasmine’s mother, a jolly character, talkative, very curious and asked lots of questions. I told her that my father used to work in the village bank and that he had talked to me about Jasmine and her father. I got to know from her that her husband died a year after Jasmine’s wedding, and that, after marriage, Jasmine lived in her husband’s house further down the road.

We were standing outside, in the courtyard, while we talked. I noticed with interest that there were breaches on all sides of the compound-wall.

She followed my stare and remarked jovially, ‘Our cow keeps going there. Now, how can you tell a cow not to break a wall, huh? And, whatever the dumb animal does, they have to do too… to go to the market, they say… as if there’s no other way but through here. First, them on the right…’

‘But, those are Muslims… aren’t they?’ I interrupted.

She laughed, ‘Why… they can’t be stupid? They were the first. Then, the others joined in…’ she pointed towards my mother’s property, ‘all copying our stupid cow. What can one do? That’s been going on for ages, even when Jasmine’s father was alive. Ah! That’s what neighbors are for, is that not so?’

She laughed again. Put that way, I could do nothing other than laugh with her. When I took leave, she cautioned me about Jasmine’s husband and mother-in-law, ‘they are very strict and orthodox’.

I walked to Jasmine’s new home. I covered my head with the dupatta (scarf). Her mother-in-law was haggling with a worker. When I asked for Jasmine, she dismissed the worker and called for her son who later called for his wife after I explained to them that my father used to be a friend of Jasmine’s father. Jasmine came outside. She looked young, more like mid-thirties rather than the mid-forties I had expected. Her husband and mother-in-law stood on either side of us.

I asked her if she remembered her father’s friend, a young bank officer. She shook her head at first. Then she went inside and returned with an old steel box. She took out a bank passbook from that, and handed it over to me.

‘That’s my first passbook. My father opened that account for me,’ she said shyly.

I opened it. I recognized my father’s signature within. The passbook also mentioned that Jasmine was a minor at the time of opening the account, and that her father was the guardian of the ten-year-old. Then, Jasmine took out an old photo. It was that of Jasmine, a cute young girl with pigtails and a bold smile, sitting on her father’s lap.

‘The bank officer took this photo,’ Jasmine said.

‘He was my father,’ I told her.

‘Oh, really?’ that’s all she had to say. I had exhausted my questions. I thanked them.

I returned to the car and left my mother’s village.