Monsoon Memories (32 page)

The pungent musky odour of rotting vegetables, fish and perspiration permeated the air, making her want to gag. She bought the bhaji, surreptitiously looking over her shoulder. A man standing in the back of an open truck piled high with juicy striped watermelons threw them down to his friend who stood, arms outstretched amongst the press, and caught them one by one, not missing.

Goosebumps. Despite the sweat beading her upper lip, saturating her sari blouse.

Piles of jackfruit, prickly green exterior yawning open to reveal the yellow fruit inside, juggled for space alongside baskets of mangoes, teetering masses of tomatoes, onions, dry red chillies and fresh green ones. Triangular flags depicting the lotus—Vote BJP—and the palm of the human hand—Vote for Congress; leftover remnants of the recent election campaign, flapped forlornly overhead. Next to the vegetable vendors sat the fisherwomen, chatting among themselves while managing to sell their fish and compete with each other at the same time. She thought she heard footsteps behind her. Thwack. Thwack.
Well, of course, there are hundreds of people here. Stop this now, Shirin.

People piled into the road, weighed down by their wares, and the bus drivers had to honk their way at snail’s pace through the throng. A cow stood still in the middle of the road, peacefully chewing cud, not caring about the build-up of buses behind, the persistent honks. Finally one of the bus conductors jumped down from the bus in front, chewing paan and shaking his head in frustration, the khaki bag hanging loosely by his side and blending with his khaki uniform; the bus tickets, a riot of blue, green and pink, peeking out. He gently gave the offending cow a nudge on her backside. Shirin stopped to watch and the footsteps she was half aware of stopped right behind her. She turned. A gaggle of women in matching bright pink churidars. She fought the impulse to run. She still had the meat to buy. Her mother-in-law would not be pleased if she went home without half the stuff: ‘I thought I heard footsteps. Someone was following me.’

The cow mooed gently and swished her tail right in the conductor’s face. Then it turned slowly round to look at the conductor, who was busy wiping his face with a multi-coloured checked handkerchief the size of a dinner plate, and very deliberately defecated right on the conductor’s feet. Someone clapped. Shirin turned to walk towards the butcher. Thwack. Thwack. Right behind her. A whiff of something pungent. She whirled round, bumping into someone, stepping on their toes. ‘Hey, watch out, you almost broke my chappal,’ a woman yelled in Shirin’s ear in Kannada. ‘Sorry. Sorry,’ Shirin mumbled.

The cow, with another swish of her tail, gracefully walked off the road and into the crush of people, who made space for it to walk past as if it were royalty, leaving the conductor holding his handkerchief and staring at the pile of cow dung adorning his feet.

Shirin was at the butcher’s, trying not to gag at the reek of chicken droppings and raw meat, trying to ignore the terrible squawks of the poor chicken she had selected for that evening’s supper, trying not to look at the blood slowly trickling down the drain by the side of the shop, when she felt a prickle at the back of her head. Hot breaths, rank, sour, lifting the hair off her neck. She turned, even as her heart thudded against her chest, as goosebumps played havoc on her skin. A pair of eyes. Empty. Leering.

‘Ma’am, ma’am, your chicken is ready. Did you want anything else?’

‘No, um, uh...’ she held out the money, grabbed the change and the bag the butcher was holding out to her, and ran. She pushed through the crush of people, ignoring the annoyed yells, the ‘watch outs’, the dogs following her, barking. Chappals hitting feet, slap, slap, slap, right behind her. She ran through the crowded roads, clutching the shopping bag close, reciting ‘Hail Marys’ in her head. Hoarse breaths, loud, harsh, gaining.
No.

The sun dipped behind a cloud and it was dark, all of a sudden. The ends of her sari caught on a stone and she tripped. Her sandal broke. Pungent breath upon her. She turned, looked into a pair of empty eyes. She screamed. A man urinating into the ditch on the opposite side of the road turned, yelled, ‘Are you okay?’ his voice drowned by the persistent horn of an approaching bus. She gathered the shopping and ran barefoot, sandals forgotten. She only stopped when she reached the gate to Vinod’s house and she held on to the bars, bent double, trying to catch her breath.

No harsh breaths except her own panting gasps. No chappal-thwacking footsteps. No goosebumps.

‘Are you okay, ma’am?’ the man squatting opposite the gate beside a giant pile of tender coconuts asked. ‘Do you want a drink? 50 paise only.’ He handed her an opened coconut, straw sticking out.

‘No, thanks.’ Trying to ignore the man’s crestfallen face—it was her mother-in-law’s money; she didn’t know if she would have to account for a tender coconut—she opened the gate and walked inside on jelly legs.

‘There was no need to run, no hurry,’ her mother-in-law said, a small smile on her face, holding out her hand for the shopping bag. ‘What’s this? This bhaji is rotting. Not fresh at all. And these tendli—my God... the chicken... only bones. Which butcher did you go to?’

The butcher. The Eyes. Shirin’s legs threatened to give way.

‘I’ll have to come with you tomorrow, show you who to buy from...’ At these words, Shirin couldn’t stop herself. She put her arms around her mother-in-law and gave her a hug.

‘Now, child,’ her mother-in-law said, awkwardly patting Shirin’s back, ‘There’s no need for this.’ But her voice was gentler than Shirin had ever heard it. ‘Come, we’ve work to do.’

Afterwards, they stood side by side in the kitchen, Shirin’s mother-in-law grinding masala for the chicken curry in the deafeningly loud mixer and Shirin chopping onions, trying to ignore the blisters on the soles of her feet, trying not to think of cooling Boroline, of Madhu in the crowded kitchen of her childhood populated with delicious aromas, drowsy dog and Nagappa’s cat trying to steal fish bones.

‘Not that way; that’s too big. Small pieces, like this.’ Her mother-in-law peered at her, at her runny nose, at the tears falling freely down her face, which she’d tried, unsuccessfully, to rub away using her sari blouse. ‘Here,’ she handed Shirin a cloth.

Shirin blew her nose noisily, chopping the onions the way her mother-in-law had showed her, not sure if her tears were due to the onions, homesickness or the scare she’d had.
Don’t think about that. Don’t go there.

‘He was such a busy little boy, always doing something,’ her mother-in-law said, as she soaked dry fish in cold water from the tap.

‘Huh?’

‘Vinod. You see this little wooden handle here?’ She pointed to the window. ‘He put that in. All on his own. When he was nine.’

As they cooked, her mother-in-law regaled her with stories of Vinod. Shirin listened, agog, tears forgotten as she tried to imagine this husband she was in awe of as a little boy. And as they sat together eating lunch—dry fish chutney, red rice, leftover fish curry, raw-jackfruit pickle—her mother-in-law started talking about Prem. ‘Vinod must have told you...’ Her voice was tentative. A question. Shirin nodded, mind flashing, without her wanting it to, to that morning at the market. She was sure it was Prem she’d seen. But she hadn’t really seen him. Only felt his breath on her back, too close. And the Eyes. As if they didn’t belong to a person at all...
Are you imagining things again?
But I did see the Eyes, someone did follow me. Did they really? And you’re sure it was Prem?
Prem carrying her bags, cracking jokes, bringing her sweets… Her appetite was gone. The food suddenly unappealing.

‘Growing up, he didn’t stand a chance,’ her mother-in-law was saying, ‘Vinod was better than him at everything, despite being younger. And it was our fault as well; we compared them all the time. On hindsight...’ Now that she’d started talking, her mother-in-law seemed to want to keep going.
Please stop, I don’t want to know
. ‘And then, when he was fifteen, he fell in with this crowd. Rich boys. And he discovered alcohol. We got the priests and nuns to talk to him, took him to the rehab clinic in Kankannadi, even stayed with him for a week in the retreat centre in Potta. Nothing worked...’

‘He can be so nice when he’s sober. You saw yourself yesterday.’ Her mother-in-law’s voice was a sigh. Her hand, which rested on the table, clenched and unclenched on a handkerchief. Instinctively, Shirin reached across, put her hand on her mother-in-law’s and squeezed. ‘It’s been hard for Vinod, you know. After he did his MBA in London,’ pride in her mother-in-law’s voice, ‘he was offered a job there. He really wanted to take it. But he had to come back, join the family business. Prem. We can’t handle him on our own when he’s drunk.’ A pause while her mother-in-law used the handkerchief to wipe her eyes, ‘Vinod wanted to tell you before the wedding. He doesn’t like to lie. We couldn’t find any girl from Bangalore to marry him. Everyone here knows. Doesn’t want to be associated with our family.’ She was being privy to her mother-in-law’s deepest secrets, Shirin realised, her darkest shame. She left her hand on her mother-in-law’s until her agitation stilled. ‘Shall I serve you more rice?’ she asked.

It happened four days after her wedding. Shirin was all alone in the house. Vinod, Prem and her father-in-law were at the office. Her mother-in-law had gone to visit one of the neighbours who’d had a heart attack and was recovering in Manipal hospital, an hour’s bus ride away. ‘Vinod and them will pick me up on their way home. Will you be okay?’ she’d asked of Shirin. ‘Of course,’ Shirin had replied, pleased to have a couple of hours’ solitude.

Jacinta had called just after her mother-in-law left. Her mother, who was not a phone person, had sounded enthusiastic.

‘There’s some good news,’ she’d gushed. Shirin had never heard her mother gush before, but there was no other word to describe it. ‘Deepak’s marriage is fixed. The girl’s name is Preeti. She’s very well educated, has done her MA. Very good family.’

Shirin smiled, saying, ‘Hmm...’ and, ‘Ah...’ at the appropriate places and counting the number of times her mother said ‘very good’, the way she peppered her speech with adjectives. Usually when Jacinta called, it was Shirin who had to make conversation while her mother listened. It was great to be at the listening end of her mother’s rare animation. She didn’t want to ask, but she did. ‘Do they know about Deepak?’

‘Yes.’ The sigh audible in her mother’s voice. ‘She… Preeti… limps. It is barely noticeable. Birth defect. One leg shorter than the other. They haven’t had many offers for her hand. She’s a sweet girl. Thin and fair-complexioned. Not very tall. Deepak likes her very much. The family is from Mangalore. Good family. Deepak told her straight out. They were upset, of course. I think the parents didn’t want to go ahead. Then Preeti piped up and said, “We can always adopt.”’ Her mother paused to take a breath.

‘She sounds very nice,’ Shirin said.

‘Yes. The engagement will be here. Once the date is decided, I’ll let you and Vinod know.’

Shirin felt a sudden painful rush of homesickness. She could practically smell the grass, taste Madhu’s fish fry and see the hibiscus flowers swaying gently in the breeze. She ached for the easy familiarity of home.

‘Oh, I almost forgot. Deepak’s got a job in Bangalore. With Infosys. Very good-paying job.’ Pride in her mother’s voice. ‘He’s moving there in a few months.’

Her brother would be here, near her. ‘That’s wonderful!’

‘You’re all moving away,’ her mother sighed. ‘He said he’ll visit home regularly.’

‘Of course he will, Ma.’
Wish I could come home now, just for a bit, just to rest my head on your shoulder, to lose myself in Madhu’s embrace
.

‘How are you?’ her mother asked

‘Okay.’

Jacinta hesitated. ‘You are happy, aren’t you, Shirin?’

‘Yes. Vinod is very nice’

‘And your in-laws?’

‘They are nice too.’ What else could she possibly say?

‘Okay then. Take care. Give my love to everyone’

‘Wait...’ Shirin said, but her mother had already disconnected.

There were so many questions Shirin wanted to ask, so much she wanted to tell and so much she wanted to know. If it had been Madhu on the phone, Shirin would have said, ‘How are you? What did you cook for lunch? What have you made for dinner? Do you miss me? Do you fill the void I have left behind with busyness? Do you remember me when you make my favourite dishes?

‘Madhu, I was brought up to believe that making a good match was my duty as a daughter and that being a good wife was my vocation. Why didn’t anybody tell me how hard it would be? When I got married, I thought I had done my job, ticked all the boxes and got the certificate. But nobody prepared me for after.

‘I didn’t realise that I would spend lonely nights in my husband’s chaste arms wondering why my marriage had not been consummated, that I would spend long days slaving to please my in-laws. You taught me to cook. But nobody taught me how to deal with my in-laws, the complicated dance I have to perform to keep everyone happy. Nobody told me what to do about my brother-in-law—who I am pretty sure followed me to the market and spied on me—who sometimes looks at me in a way that sends shivers down my spine. Do I tell Vinod? How, when I am so shy, so tongue-tied around him? When all I can think of when I’m in his arms is why he doesn’t make love to me. And what if he takes his brother’s side? Dismisses my worries as fancies of imagination? After all, he’s known me less than a week and his brother his whole life.’

Shirin conducted imagined conversations such as these with Madhu as she cooked, washed dishes and scrubbed clothes, when waves of homesickness caught her unawares. She ached for the uncomplicated life she had led in her little village where everyone had known her from the time she was a babe in arms. She ached for mango trees, wide open spaces and the comfort of Madhu’s arms. Instead, what she had was dust, crowds and the complicated feelings that Vinod’s arms aroused in her.

Vinod: his kisses, the way he looked at her. Tonight would definitely be the night, she thought. Tomorrow, she would no longer be a virgin.