Funny Boy (11 page)

Radha Aunty and Anil met each other the next Saturday at rehearsal. The week that had passed seemed to belong to another lifetime. The presence of the curfew and the sleepless nights in which every sound was a threat of danger seemed unreal. Towards the end of the week, however, the riots subsided in the rest of the country and it became clear that the trouble would never reach Colombo.

When we walked in through the gates of St. Theresa’s, Anil was waiting for us. He stared at the bruises on Radha Aunty’s face with a mixture of anger and tenderness.

“Does it still hurt?” he asked.

“Yes.”

We began to walk towards the rehearsal hall.

“I came to see you, but you weren’t there,” Anil said.

Radha Aunty nodded, but she didn’t give an explanation.

“Your sister seemed so angry at me that I thought it was best not to return.”

Radha Aunty didn’t respond. Anil glanced at her and I wondered if he, too, had noticed that Radha Aunty had changed.

The rehearsals started late that day because the moment Radha Aunty came in, the cast and Aunty Doris crowded around her with exclamations of sympathy and horror over her
wound. As Radha Aunty told her story, I noticed that Aunty Doris looked from her to Anil, a worried expression on her face. When Radha Aunty had finished, everyone was silent. Then Aunty Doris clapped her hands to indicate that it was time for the rehearsal to begin. The girl who played Tuptim was sick and so Radha Aunty was asked to take her place for that day.

They were rehearsing one of the last scenes in the play, where Tuptim, the king’s newest concubine, is captured while trying to run away with her lover. Anil played one of the guards who would bring in the slave girl. I was sitting on the steps by the stage, and from time to time I glanced at Anil and Radha Aunty in the wings. Anil was seated on a stool and he motioned to Radha Aunty to share the stool with him, but she shook her head. Anil looked at her a little puzzled. When it was time for the guards to bring in Tuptim, Anil and the other actor took Radha Aunty by the arms. At their cue, they brought Radha Aunty in and threw her to the ground. As she fell on the floor, Radha Aunty exclaimed out loud, then sat up, rubbing her elbow.

“What’s wrong?” Aunty Doris called out.

Radha Aunty glanced angrily at Anil and said to Aunty Doris, “I was thrown too hard against the floor.”

The other cast members looked at the guards and especially at Anil. Somebody said, “For God’s sake be careful, the girl is bruised enough.”

“Aday,” another one said, “this is not Jaffna, you know.”

At this remark, everyone in the cast laughed.

Anil crouched down next to Radha Aunty, concern on his face. She stood up and walked off. When they went into the wings to make their entrance again, Anil tried to touch her hand, but she moved it away.

He looked at her for a long moment and then his expression changed.

After the scene was over, we rehearsed the march of the Siamese children. I was concentrating so hard on my cue that only after I had made my entrance, bowed to the English governess, and gone to my position on the stage did I notice that Radha Aunty was no longer with the other Siamese wives. I glanced across the stage and saw that Anil had not left. He caught me watching him and he frowned slightly as if asking where Radha Aunty had gone. I shrugged to say I didn’t know.

We rehearsed the scene three or four times and still Radha Aunty didn’t return. When we were finished, I ran down off the stage and out of the rehearsal hall. An actor was seated on a bench outside the hall. I asked him if he had seen Radha Aunty, and he nodded and pointed in the direction of the toilets. I went down a passage that led from the courtyard to the toilets. Radha Aunty was not there. Then I heard a sound from behind the wall of a classroom across the way. I crept around the corner and saw Radha Aunty sitting on the edge of the classroom verandah. She was crying. When she saw me she quickly brushed her hand across her face and said angrily, “What are you doing here?”

“I was searching for you,” I said meekly.

“Go away,” she said and turned her head away,
I just stood there.

“Are you deaf?” she cried at me.

I turned and left. In the passageway I heard footsteps approaching. Then Anil appeared. When he saw me, he stopped. “Where is she?” he asked.

I shook my head.

He regarded me carefully and then strode past. I turned and followed him.

When Radha Aunty saw him, she rubbed her face against her sleeve and stared ahead. Anil stood in front of her for a moment. Then he sighed and rubbed his forehead. He noticed that I was looking at them and he said sternly, “Go back to the rehearsal hall.”

The expression on his face was serious and I felt suddenly frightened. I turned away and went back towards the hall.

When Radha Aunty returned later, rehearsals had already finished. Anil was no longer with her.

Aunty Doris was walking slowly around the hall, closing windows and picking up scripts. Radha Aunty began to close the windows on her side of the hall. When Aunty Doris heard her shut the first window, she turned in surprise in our direction. Then a slight frown appeared on her face. She turned back to continue closing up the room. For a while all that could be heard was the slamming of the windows and the click of the latches, the sound echoing in the empty hall. Radha Aunty and Aunty Doris worked their way around the hall, until they met at the last window.

“I want to be let out of the show,” Radha Aunty said, not looking at her.

Aunty Doris nodded. “I’m sorry, child.”

After a moment she closed the last window, clicking the bolts into place. It was then that the full implication of what had happened came to me. It was so clear now that I was surprised I had not seen it before, that I had not understood the moment I saw Radha Aunty with that bloody bandage around her head that her relationship with Anil was over.

Radha Aunty walked towards the door. “Come,” she said to me, “it’s time to go.”

She left the hall and started to walk ahead of me towards the gates. I trailed after her, feeling a terrible sadness grow in me. When I reached the gate she was already halfway up the road and I had to hurry to catch up with her. At the bus-stop I stood under the awning with the other passengers. Radha Aunty, however, stood at the edge of the pavement, glancing down Galle Road, her head tilted back slightly. She stood tall and straight, her hands behind her. A bus appeared and she held out her hand, commanding it to halt. It came to a stop and we got in and sat down. The bus began to move again, taking us in the direction of my grandparents’ house.

Rajan Nagendra was engaged to Radha Aunty on Appachi’s birthday. There was great excitement in the air that evening. I sensed this from the way all the relatives in my grandparents’ garden turned to look at us expectantly when we came in,
thinking we might be the Nagendras. Radha Aunty was in her room. All the aunts and other female relatives had crowded in and I went and stood with them. She was seated in front of her mirror while Kanthi Aunty arranged jasmines in her hair. Her hair had been pulled back and made into an elaborate coiffure on top of her head, and her face had been carefully made up so that she looked a few shades lighter. She wore a dark green Manipuri sari with a gold border. As I looked at her, I saw that she now resembled the Radha Aunty I had first imagined. But, as she glanced at me and then away, I saw that her eyes had lost their warmth.

There was a whispering at the door and Mala Aunty came in a little breathless. “The Nagendras have arrived,” she said. A flutter of excitement passed through the room. For a moment, there was a look of panic on Radha Aunty’s face. Then her expression became impassive.

“My! He’s absolutely charming,” Mala Aunty whispered to one of the other aunts.

We followed Radha Aunty as she made her way down the corridor. All the relatives had come in from the garden to watch the proceedings. The cousins, too, were there. Rajan Nagendra stood up when she came into the drawing room. He had a tall, powerful physique and strong features, and I could see why Mala Aunty had described him as charming. A hush descended over the entire party.

“Hello,” Rajan Nagendra said and extended his hand to her. “How are you?”

“I’m fine,” she replied, and shook his hand.

He presented his parents to her and she shook hands with
them as well. The pastor, who was seated next to Appachi, stepped forward. Then one of the aunts brought the rings on a cushion for him to bless.

As the pastor began his prayer, I gazed at Radha Aunty and Rajan Nagendra and thought of the first time I had heard about the marriage proposal, how I had looked around this drawing room and imagined it transformed by the preparations for the wedding, the buying of the sari, the making of the confetti, the wrapping of the cake, the pala harams and jasmine garlands. I knew that soon all this would come to pass, that I would find myself in the midst of that family wedding I had so longed to be a part of. But I felt no pleasure, for I knew that, although everything would happen in the way I had dreamed, there would be something important missing.

The pastor now instructed Rajan Nagendra to place the ring on Radha Aunty’s finger. Suddenly I couldn’t bear to watch the ceremony. I turned away and walked down the corridor towards the kitchen, not quite knowing where I was going.

Ultimately I found myself in the back garden, the one in which only a few months ago I had played bride-bride. The girls had forgotten to take down the altar from the last time they had played, and it looked bedraggled now from a recent rainfall. The garlands of araliyas had come undone and lay broken and crushed on the ground. I thought of bride-bride and all those elaborate ceremonies I had invented, how I had thought that weddings could not be anything but magical occasions. How distant that time seemed, a world I had left far behind.

Inside the kitchen, Janaki was pounding something with the mol gaha. As I listened to its rhythmic sound, I thought of her love-comics and how fervently I had believed in them; believed that if two people loved each other everything was possible. Now, I knew that this was not so. I sat on the steps, resting my chin on my hands, and looked out at the garden. I stayed like that for a long time, as the mol gaha pounded away monotonously in the kitchen.

I
BECAME
aware of something new in our lives when my parents began to go out regularly to cocktail parties, dinner parties, and dances at the Oberoi Supper Club. They had new friends, too, Sena Uncle and Chithra Aunty, and it was with them that they went on these evenings out.

Also, every Saturday afternoon Amma and Chithra Aunty would take Diggy, Sonali, me, and Sanath, Chithra Aunty’s son, to the Intercontinental Coffee Shop and treat us to such exotic food as hamburgers and strawberry cake. Then we would go shopping at Cornell’s Supermarket. Cornell’s had opened up recently and it was the first American-style supermarket in Sri Lanka. It was a wonderful place, for there on the shelves were items like blueberry jam, kippers, and canned apricots – things I had read about when I was younger in Famous Five and Nancy Drew books but had never actually tasted. From listening to my father’s conversations, I
understood that this sudden availability of imported goods had to do with the new government and something called “free economy” and “the end of socialism.”

One Sunday, my parents took Diggy, Sonali, and me south to spend the day by the sea. Sena Uncle, Chithra Aunty, and Sanath came along in their own car.

I was thrilled at the prospect of a day spent swimming and picnicking on the beach. When we had piled into the car, however, I noticed that there was no picnic basket in the back. I asked Amma where she had put the basket, and in response both she and my father laughed as if they had a secret. “Those picnic basket days are over,” my father said, but would not say any more.

I was even more puzzled when, instead of parking by the road in our favourite spot, my father drove on till we came to a series of hotels. We had often looked at these hotels wistfully, knowing that we would never be able to afford to stay in any of them. Now, much to my amazement, my father brought the car to a stop in front of one of them. The hotel was still under construction, and above the gate a sign said
PARADISE BEACH RESORT
. The gatekeeper saluted us smartly as if he knew my father. Then he opened the barrier for us. Once we were inside the grounds, I saw that a section of the hotel was complete. When the cars stopped in front of this section, a man came hurrying down the steps to greet us. My father introduced him to Amma as the manager, Mr. Samarakoon. Sonali pulled at my hand to come with her and explore. Together we went up the steps, along the open hall, and out to the sea. It was the most
beautiful stretch of beach I had ever seen. The sand was white and soft and the sea calm. When we had washed our feet and were making our way up the beach, Sonali said to me, “You know what? This hotel is our hotel.”

I stared at her. “Who told you that?” I asked.

“I heard Amma and Appa talking about it.”