Authors: Cathy Ostlere
Karma (10 page)
She might be a prostitute!
Amma cries.
What will the neighbours say?
They will say we are kind and generous,
Barindra answers.
Mina, We took in Sandeep when he needed a home, and now we will take in this girl.
I don't know why we are the only family who is so committed to saving orphans. How many did Gandhi adopt? None.
Well, perhaps he should have. His own children resented him terribly. Besides, Mina, it's just for a time. Until we find her family. And it's the right thing to do,
Barindra insists.
You'll see.
What I will see is this family spiral downward. Soon we will have no caste at all and have to clean the toilets!
When she storms oï¬, Barindra takes me aside.
Don't worry, Sandeep. Families arenât supposed to be peaceful. Good families are like steel. Stronger when heated. Then they can withstand anything.
Well, if this keeps up, the house could go up in flames while we're sleeping and none of us would have a blister.
This is how we heard about Maya
Every Saturday afternoon I squeeze into a post office telephone booth with Amma and Barindra. It's the weekly call with Parvati. We exchange news. Amma scolds. Barindra thanks her for the money she sends for Amma's Ayurvedic doctor. (He rubs sand on her leg for ten rupees a visit!)
I've grown accustomed to the glass door steaming with communal onion sweat. Our bodies curled, sticking to each other like soft brown turds nestled in the pipe of a toilet. (Nice image. Maybe I am a writer!)
I must wait my turn to talk to Parvati (
No, not outside the booth!
insists Amma) while enduring the scent of curry breath yellowing the air with questions:
-Â Â How is the temperature of Jodhpur, Parvati? Ah! Same as here.
-Â Â What is the price of rice? Chicken? Bananas? Aiii! You pay too much! You must haggle like Sandeep to get a good price!
-Â Â Have you bought yourself a new sari instead of giving your money to the ungrateful poor?
Did you hear that cousin Sunita will marry in the spring? And she is five years younger than you!
But last Saturday, the conversation didn't wind through the same old subjects and predictable rants.
My sister jumped right to Maya. Denying her mother the pleasure of the weekly gossip.
-Â Â Throw the stubborn girl out on the street, Parvati! She'll find her tongue quick enough.
-Â Â But Amma, if she's not Indian, she'll never survive. No, we must try to help her. Put Pita on the phone.
That's when Amma forced the door open, releasing a cloud of pungent angry vapor.
(A genie escaping a bottle?) She wept and screamed openly on the post office floor. Amma had realized that when Barindra heard the girl's plight, he would be compelled to oï¬er aid.
Mina, I cannot hear Parvati if you make so much noise!
Barindra shouted through the glass.
So Amma picked herself up and went home. She waited until we walked through the door before saying,
Who names a child Maya?
And then Amma barfed.
One who lights the way
Parvati gave me the name, Sandeep. (She had to, she said. After the storm, I didn't remember anything.)
She was just sixteen when she reached under the cooling bellies of a collapsed herd of black and white goats. She thought they were only skins.
She had heard a cry. A faint bleat. A kid? But there was a child's foot. Where there shouldn't have been a foot.
How many hours? A day or more did I sleep under the goats' protection? No one knows. There was no one left alive to tell.
What I remember is being lifted out of a darkness damp and soft, then held against a beating heart. A breath on my face blew the grains of sand from my crusted eyelids. A goddess smiled down me. The face of love.
(Oh shit. Now
I'm
writing sentimental crap.)
Years later, Parvati confessed that when our eyes locked, she knew what she would do with her life.
There's no better joy, Sandeep, than knowing you've saved a life.
Usually when I get to this part of the story, some girl is letting my hands wander.
A son
It was Barindra who carried me in.
I have a son, Mina!
he exclaimed. Amma broke down in tears. Parvati said she actually pulled her hair out in rage.
She blamed the matchmaker (now dead).
That witch waited too long to find me a husband so all I could get was you! And now you bring me this orphan!
Parvati heard Amma was lucky to have a marriage match at all. As eldest, she should have married first, but good matches for her two younger sisters had come quickly. Eventually, Amma was betrothed to her middle sister's husband's brother. Ten years younger. But the dowry was doubled. (Allowing Barindra to complete his teacher training.)
In spite of the diï¬erences in caste, age, temperament (and one leg shorter than the other), the marriage was a good one. Barindra let his wife lead him around by the nose. A child was born to them: the excellent daughter, Parvati.
But when I arrived (the dusty goat child), Amma knew things would change if she couldn't produce her own son. The house rocked for months with the hopes of conception. (Barindra was pleased with this new longing in Mina.) But the noisy sex yielded no new life, so Amma announced her childbearing years were over and reluctantly cared for me.
Parvati has always said that I was a child who brought happiness and resignation to this family.
But what child doesn't, Sandeep?
Be yourself
Parvati phoned last night.
-Â Â When you see Maya, just be you,
she says.
-Â Â What does that mean?
-Â Â Be natural.
-Â Â I'm not natural?
-Â Â I mean don't fuss over her. Don't treat her like she's ill or special or strange. Just, you know, be yourself.
Parvati's the only one who thinks
being myself
is a good thing.
Amma thinks I don't need any reminding.
I am too much
myself
, and that's my flaw. She's ready to have me dropped oï¬ in the middle of the desert so I can be
myself
in the landscape of my lower birth.
Let him go back to his roots. To his proper destiny
, she tried to convince Barindra.
But Barindra thinks otherwise.
Don't be yourself,
he urges me.
Be better! Reach beyond your birthright! The world is your oyster!
(A bivalve mollusk trapped in a shell?)
Carve your path but not in sand,
Sandeep! Sculpt it into something that won't blow away. An education!
Somehow, Barindra's belief in me is even worse than Amma's assessment. He seems to think that my casteless tribal status is not a deterrent in becoming successful.
Gandhi changed this country so a boy like you could rise up!
Amma is more realistic.
A senior secondary school diploma would be a remarkable achievement.
(But the world won't let you go any higher.) She didn't have to say it out loud.
Parvati believes I should choose my path.
Be whatever you want to be, Sandeep, but at least be the best.
So I'm a guide now. Lighting the way for tourists who want to explore a city where Sheh'rzaday could have told her tales! The most eloquent tout in all of Jaisalmer! And I give HALF my earnings to my parents. So no one can say I'm not a good son, even if I'm adopted and ugly. And a drop out.
Shrine
Amma is on her knees. Her head bowed to the silver images. Ganesh and Krishna. Two ghee lamps burn bright yellow. Jasmine flowers wilt on the pedestal. I tiptoe past, but she sees me with the eyes in the back of her head and stops her devotion.
Sandeep?
Yes, Amma.
Do you ever wonder what I pray for?
No.
Never?
It is none of my concern.
Hmm. But you must wonder a little. Youâre a curious boy. At some point in the last eleven years you must have wondered.
I say nothing. A technique learned from Barindra.
The less you say, the less you can be accused of.
Well?
You have a secret life, Amma. I respect that.
Hmm. I hope you don't have a secret life, Sandeep.
No. Never. I have no desire to prostrate before a god.
That is not what I meant! I meant . . . oh, never mind. Sandeep, are you not afraid for your soul? That it may wander this earth for a thousand lives?
No, Amma. You and I both know I'll return to the desert one day. Perhaps my soul waits for me there.
Hmm. Like the secretive fox. A reminder, Sandeep? You're not to touch.
Touch what?
You're not to touch the girl. Parvati's orphan. Even if sheâs already been touched. Do you understand?
Perfectly.
All right. You will go to the train station in the morning. The Jodhpur Express arrives at nine. I do not want to be seen in public with her. And thank God, Barindra will be at the school. So that leaves you. Bring her quick. Straight here. Understand?
Yes, Amma. I understand perfectly.
Awake
I cannot sleep.
Amma and Bahrindra are making their night noises. Old Dadima too. She snores like her son and daughterin-law. Three trains rumbling into the station.
Iâve heard that in some countries, families sleep apart. Siblings in their own rooms. Parents separate. Imagine the peace. No startling cries from your motherâs bad dream. No waking up to find a sisterâs braid tickling your face like a rat's tail.
But with walls between the sleeping bodies there wouldn't be whispers to overhear.
A strange girl of unknown origins? A mute with that name? That name! It's a bad omen, Barindra! What were you and Parvati thinking?
What were we thinking? We are Hindu. The girl may be Sikh. There is a debt to pay.
That is not the name of a Sikh girl! And besides, we didn't have anything to do with what happened in Delhi, Barindra. It is not our fault!
Yet by not helping the victims, we are just as guilty. And forget the name, Mina. It's common enough.
Barindra, I've listened to that name shouted in my home every night for the last eleven years. And you think it's just coincidence!
In the dream
She walks out of the desert wearing a golden sari. Her hair is long, to her waist, blowing in the wind. In her hand she holds a pink shell.
She puts it to her mouth and makes a sound.
It sings my name across the sand.
Maya
, I call to her.
It's what I always shout when I have this dream.
November 14â21, 1984
Train station
Shit.
Don't be late, Sandeep,
Parvati insisted.
She might run.
Run? To where? There's nothing but desert and Pakistan west of here.
And who wants to go to Pakistan?
But shit. I am late.
I take the steps two at a time.
Dodging porters balancing suitcases on their heads. Squeezing between a family walking seven across like a line of protesters.
Slow down, you little asshole!
a man shouts after I leapfrog oï¬ his smallest child's head.
Sorry! Thank you!
I call over my shoulder. Amma insists I be deferential. (
You're a shepherd boy, after all.
)
Now where would she be in this dung-odoured, sweat-stained sea of questionable humanity?
Maya hates crowds Parvati said. Kicks at people if they get too close. Well, good for her. Some people deserve a good kicking.
I run through the carriages. Third class smells like piss. Second class like wet goat. (Strangely comforting.) An AC sleeper? Would Parvati be so extravagant?
I swing open the doors of every compartment. Empty.
Empty.
Empty.
And then I see her.
Blue jeans. T-shirt.
Huddled next to a window.
A bag on her lap.
A face still as stone.
It's just a girl, I tell myself. (Disguised as a boy.)
I'm good with girls.
But my stomach lurches.
And my heart rate is definitely increasing.
(Even skipping.)
Her face is perfect.
A long slender nose. Soft curled eyelashes.
Skin polished like dark wood.
She is named well. Goddess of Illusion.
Maya looks like a statue.
Listening
Hello, Maya.
Silence.
I am Sandeep.
(Smile.)
Parvati's brother?
Silence.
I am very pleased to meet you.
(Deep bow.)
Kuch nahin!
(Not even a flicker of an eyelash.)
I am deeply honoured to come to your aid, Maya. Honoured indeed to accompany you to the humble home of the Patel family.
(That should do it.)
She turns toward me. Her gaze settles on my face. There is no expression, no emotion. Yet when her dark eyes find mine, I am suddenly dizzy. Like I'm slipping under a black wave soft as silk.
I have never seen, never known such sadness.
Where is my voice?
Chai! Chai!
The repeated staccato sound bursts into the car like automatic gunfire.
Chai! Chai! Chai! Chai!
An apparition in the shape of a small boy appears holding a clay cup in two hands.
Chai?
Not waiting for an answer, he pours mud-coloured liquid from a dented metal pot.
I raise my hand to stop him, but Maya is quicker. She hits the boy's arm without blinking. Tea spills across his chest.
Aiii aiii hot chai hot chai!
IT wasN'T thaT hOT!
I shout. (Why is my voice cracking like a twelve-year-old's?)
Get out of HEre! NoW! NOw!
The boy lands a sharp kick to my shin, then runs.
ShIT!
My leg throbs. A hammer against bone.
I hop up and down to shake oï¬ the pain.
We should go now, Maya,
I whisper.
But she's already moving. Backpack in hand. Sliding down the narrow hallway.
(Why did Parvati send an idiot boy for me?)
What? Did she just say that?
Great. Now my ears aren't working either.