by Mahesh Rao
“There’s not enough going on, and I’ll have to do something about that. If I don’t make things happen, nothing ever gets done.”
It seemed like an opportune moment.
“So have you met anyone, Dee? Any guy on the scene?”
“No one.”
“Really? No one at all?”
There was no response from Dimple. She was lying on her back, looking at the ceiling, her eyes half closed. There was a tiny droplet glistening in the corner of her eye. It happened to Ania too—her eyes watered for no apparent reason. But she couldn’t be sure; perhaps Dimple was still upset about the men in her life, about Fahim. Ania had held herself out as a smart, knowledgeable friend who knew what was best for Dimple. She still felt an ache to somehow be proved right.
“You heard about Fahim?” asked Ania.
“What about him?” said Dimple, turning toward her.
“Getting married.”
“I saw something on Facebook.”
“What an asshole.”
“It’s a free world. Let him get married to whomever he wants.”
“Yes, but to pretend that he’s into someone and then suddenly, ten minutes later, he’s married to somebody else. Honestly, no one has heard of this woman, and none of us can even imagine where he picked her up. I mean, how could we have known that he’d turn out to be such a creep.”
“You know what, we really don’t need to discuss it. Not because I’m all upset. I realized that I probably didn’t even like him that much. I just thought I did. Does that make sense?”
“Of course it does. But it doesn’t change the fact that he’s an asshole. I’ll keep my eyes open. There’s got to be someone else.”
Ania thought it best to change the subject.
“How was your trip? Did you manage not to kill your mother?”
“Uff. I left early. Made up an excuse about being back at work. It was like being trapped in childhood again.”
“I can totally see that.”
“She was just so difficult, as usual. Pushing her crazy politics down my throat, disapproving of everything I do, but not openly. I couldn’t stand it. And now I feel guilty for leaving early.”
“I’m dying for a cigarette. I’m allowing myself one a week. I’ll just have one quickly on the balcony. Stay here if you want, it’s baking outside.”
She slid open the French doors and perched on a rattan chaise longue, slipping into a practiced performance, leaning back as she exhaled and stretching her long legs out, even though her only audience was Dimple.
“We should do something next week.”
Dimple nodded and sat up. Among the debris on the desk, she spotted a framed photograph of Ania’s parents that she hadn’t noticed before. Dileep did not look greatly different; today there was more of a tightness around his features and his hair was trimmed short, having lost what he had probably once considered a charming rakishness. Ania’s mother was everything Dimple had imagined: hair swept back, a shock of red lipstick, the long strand of pearls. The lights were blurred in the background, and they were both dressed for a party. There was a stiff formality to his gaze as she leaned in to him, one hand curled awkwardly against his chest.
Ania came back into the room and closed the French doors.
“You really look so much like her,” said Dimple. “You didn’t know her at all?”
“No, I was just a few weeks old when she died.”
“How did she die?”
At last, she felt able to ask the question.
Ania returned to her spot on the bed.
“I’m sorry, that sounded so nosy,” said Dimple.
“It’s okay. You can ask. It was a car crash. For years I didn’t understand what she was doing in a car on her own, late at night, on a lonely road near Manesar. And so soon after I was born.”
Ania lay back and looked at the ceiling as she spoke.
“But she wasn’t on her own. She had gone for a drive with her lover, and that’s when it happened, a head-on collision. He was dead on the spot, and she died a few days later in the hospital.”
“Oh my God.”
Ania nodded.
“Your dad knew about this?” asked Dimple.
“I don’t know. He obviously found out when the accident happened. But maybe he knew all along.”
“You’ve never talked about it with him?”
“Of course not.”
“Then how did you find out?”
“Nina told me. Nina Varkey, she’s a friend of my father’s. A poisonous bitch of the first order, but she has her uses. I’m sure she couldn’t wait to tell me.”
Ania rolled over onto her front.
“Her lover. He told her he was an artist, a painter, and a sculptor, the kind of thing she would have lapped up. But he was nothing of the sort. He would take her to a friend’s studio and pass off all the work there as his own. She paid him crazy money for the pieces because she was so in love with him. And that’s all he was, a con man. She threw it all away for that. Everything, including her own life.”
“My God, this is so sad.”
The song playing on the laptop faded into nothing, and a deep quiet settled over the room, broken only by Sigmund’s gentle snores. The lilies on the desk were drooping, a dusting of pollen on the pile of books next to the vase. Dimple let her head fall back on a cushion. Ania’s arm dangled off the bed, and her finger strayed up and down a groove on the parquet.
“She tried to abort me. They had ended their affair, and she decided that she would try to rebuild her marriage by getting pregnant. And then a couple of months later, he reappeared and they started up again. He was furious about the pregnancy. He punished her for it. He would make her pose for hours but never draw anything. She would be on the floor, naked, on all fours, like a dog, waiting for him to tell her she could get up. And worse things, such degrading things.”
Dimple laid her hand on Ania’s arm.
“Really, it’s fine, darling,” said Ania. “I’ve known all this for a long time. I got the whole story from Nina. My mother confided in her.”
“I wonder if your dad knows that you know.”
“How would we ever talk about these things? And how could he think I wouldn’t find out one day? Nothing ever stays a secret in Delhi.”
They lay on the bed, listening to Sigmund’s snores, the steady rhythm of that deep rumble, a remarkably human sound. Dimple thought it would be wrong to look at the photo again after all she had heard, as though she were trying to satisfy an insensitive curiosity, but she could not stop herself. The way Ania’s mother leaned in to her husband looked even more mannered, a prominent vein traveling all the way up her neck. She looked straight at the camera. Her eyes were huge and blank.
* * *
—
FAHIM AND MUSSOORIE were back in Delhi. There had been a whirl of dinners, with friends demanding a proper wedding in India, a party at the very least: they would not be cheated out of their chance to celebrate their union. Mussoorie had regained her sangfroid almost as soon as they returned to India. She teased, she charmed. Her laughter rang out in rooms already filled with music and chatter.
“Well, we have to decide what sort of event we want: a low-key celebration with friends or more of a showcase,” she said, working at her laptop in the sitting room of Fahim’s apartment.
“A showcase for what?” asked Fahim.
“For us.”
She decided that the latter, in spite of the expense, would reap greater dividends and began to put together a list of people who ought to attend. He looked over her shoulder, scanning the document.
“It’ll be pretty embarrassing if half these people decline or just don’t show up,” he said.
“I don’t see why you have to be so negative. The trick with these sorts of things is you’ve
got to make people desperate to come. Get the right sort of people talking. You need to build it all up. You need buzz.”
He knew that he had to get back to work. There were urgent stories he ought to pursue. A fifteen-year-old boy’s skullcap had been ripped off his head moments before he was stabbed to death on a train. Claiming to have discovered a cow’s carcass, a mob dragged a dairy owner from his home and set it ablaze. Two young men were found swinging from trees.
But he was flooded with despondency and trepidation, struck by an acute paralysis. It had been so long since he had nosed around in the field, he worried he would ruin what was left of his reputation, cutting corners, failing to notice clues that would be obvious to any good reporter. Years earlier, he had heard that another journalist planned to head out to Gujarat early the following morning to cover the discovery of an enormous stash of arms at a private warehouse. Fahim had managed to get the last seat on the last flight that night and then traveled by taxi, potato truck, and a hired moped to arrive at the village on the edge of the Thar Desert by daybreak. The scoop was his.
It seemed like someone else’s life. Even the memory was elusive.
A few days ago he had been offered the opportunity to host a show called Indian First, in which Muslims would be invited to declare their love for and allegiance to the country. The aim was to show them in their home environments performing patriotic tasks—cheering on sports teams, petting cows—which would lead to a greater sense of national unity.
“I’ve decided about the show,” he said.
Mussoorie looked up from her laptop.
“I’m not doing it,” he said.
“Why not? Darling, it’s exposure, isn’t it? And we do need the money. Come on, they’re desperate for you. It really doesn’t matter whether it’s for your talent or because they’re so relieved you’re not some bearded Saudi-supporting lunatic. You just have to make the most of it,” said Mussoorie.
“That’s offensive,” he said.
“Oh please, you said to me yourself that you’d got lucky, getting gigs playing the acceptable Muslim. How is this any different?”
He stalked out of the room, nearly losing his footing. He bristled at his own words being used against him, words uttered in moments of self-doubt, not intended to erase the years of genuine dedication and accomplishment that he had once brought to his profession, and certainly not offered to her with any kind of license to comment on his aptitude or merit. She had no understanding of how difficult it had been to get this far.
He walked into the bedroom and looked at the tea tray on the floor, the curtains still drawn, the unmade bed. His libido had not returned. Mussoorie would lay her arm over his or nuzzle against his shoulder, and when he did not respond, curl herself into his body. There was no point in pretending to be asleep; she knew that it was improbable. She tried more subtle approaches: tracing light circles on his palm with her little finger, pressing gently against him with her hip. He feigned headaches and stomach upsets, but minor infirmities could grant only a certain degree of abstention. Always present were the accusatory memories of their rampant premarital sex life, the sidling of a hand in the back seat of a car, the frenetic thrusting in a spa’s shower room.
Eventually he had to confront the stark fact that he no longer desired her. He initiated the conversation, and he could tell that she was grateful; he admitted that it was a physiological affliction, probably caused by stress, and assured her that she was in no way to blame; he agreed to go and see a doctor. It bought him some time. That night, for the first time in weeks, he slept straight through for five hours.
One night he had a clear vision of her future infidelity, as though it were being projected on the bare wall in front of him. There would be ostensible research trips and meetings with important contacts, probably in other cities: a couple days spent in a hotel where the blinds would silently close at the touch of a button. Mussoorie would always be one to explore all options. They were so similar in that respect. He was surprised to discover that he felt no anger or jealousy. He felt a sort of relief. It would make time for him to think. And perhaps it would even benefit him in some way. Mussoorie would pick her lovers with care. She was in her own way generous and pragmatic. Her ambition and industry would carry them both.
He picked up the tea tray and returned to the sitting room.
“I think it’s going to be cooler today,” he said.
“Yes, not so sticky.”
He sipped the last of his cold tea. Trivial conversation seemed to be the best way to keep from unkindness.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
ANKIT TOOK DIMPLE’S hand and led her off the pavement, glancing at the upper floors of the buildings.
“Take care, okay? These bastard children are throwing water balloons,” he said.
Spotting a couple of shadowy figures crouching behind some plastic sheeting, he yelled: “I’m warning you, I’ll break your legs if you try anything.”
He kept his gaze directed upward. Perched on a ladder was a young man tinkering with a jumble of electricity cables. His elbows jutted out at awkward angles, and for a moment it seemed he might topple off and come crashing to the ground. Ankit and Dimple stopped just as a starburst of gold and blue flashes sparked out of the tangled wires.
“This street is full of barbarians,” he said. “But at least they’re barbarians I know. They’re easy to fix.”
He gave her a playful nudge.
It had been a morning of errands. Dimple had sat in the passenger seat fiddling with the radio as Ankit had sped recklessly across overpasses, wheeling in and out of snarls of traffic, swerving into empty side roads. He would park in front of a staircase or in the middle of an auto stand and then dash out to pay a supplier or pick up a package.
“I’ll be back in two seconds. If anyone starts shouting, just look helpless, okay?” he said, leaning in through the window to plant a kiss anywhere on her face.
Dimple had found a station with a sensational playlist, and together they had belted out the numbers, a theatrical extravaganza in Ankit’s battered van, attracting amused looks from hawkers and traffic police. She knew she could hold a tune, but Ankit’s voice was exceptional, inhabiting a saucy falsetto for a whole verse and then in the next breath plunging into a disconsolate baritone.
For weeks after his night of shame at the farmhouse, he had tried to apologize to her in person. Eventually, the messages stopped coming. She had realized over time that what she nursed was not the memory of her humiliation but her disappointment that he had resigned himself to her absence. The time had come for her to be modern again. She bought a bottle of Old Monk and went to his shop one evening at closing time. He saw her just as he was pulling down the shutters. They had ducked under the half-closed shutter into the shop and sat on the counter, drinking out of plastic cups in the pale gleam from the streetlight.
Ankit continued to hum as they walked up the stairs to his family’s flat. At each landing they caught a glimpse of the old man on a balcony across the street, wrapped up in a shawl and wooly hat in his rocking chair, even on a warm autumn day. Ankit had told Dimple that his mother and sisters would be away at a wedding, but when he opened the door, music blared out of the back room and the whole flat smelled sharply floral and metallic: hair spray, deodorant, and nail polish.
“They must still be getting ready,” he said.
The door to the back room swung open, and his mothers and sisters emerged in a haze of silk, gold, and lipstick.
His mother stopped when she saw Dimple.
“Oy, one of you turn that music off,” she shouted.
The bass stopped thumping and silence flowed into the room.
Dimple stepped forward and gave them each a hug, an awkward negotiation of shoulders, elbows, and handbags. It had been months since she had come to the house, and it was clear that they had settled upon some sort of wary
explanation for her absence.
“Aren’t you going to be late?” asked Ankit.
“Oho, since when have you cared so much about people being on time?” asked his elder sister.
“Eesh, Ma, did you pour the whole bottle of perfume over yourself? That’s not going to help you find a husband,” said the younger sister.
“You shut your mouth,” said her mother, reaching out but failing to give her a cheerful smack.
There was a shuffle around the room as Ankit cleared newspapers off the sofa, his mother looked for her keys, and the sisters took turns in front of the long mirror in the hallway. Dimple stayed standing. She could tell that they were treating her like a suspicious package; even if the contents were not liable to explode or burn, they would at the very least produce a nasty shock.
“Stupid, look what you’ve done,” shrieked the younger sister.
She held up a gold tassel that had come off her pallu.
“I knew you were stepping on it.”
“You did that. I didn’t even come near you.”
“Stop it, you two, you’re making us late,” said his mother.
“But, look.”
The tassel was waved in her face.
“Here, give it to me. This will take one minute,” said Ankit.
He rummaged in a drawer and pulled out a needle and a couple spools of thread.
“This one,” he said, settling on the lighter gold.
In one deft movement he had threaded the needle.
“Don’t move,” he said, reaching for his sister’s pallu.
They watched as he reattached the tassel, his hand sailing through the air in quick, exaggerated motions, as though conscious of its audience.
“There,” he said, bending to snip the thread with his teeth. “Now stop screaming and go.”
“Oh thank you, bhaiyya,” she said, spinning ’round to give him a hug.
“Beta, sorry we have to leave you, but come again soon, okay? Don’t leave it so late next time,” said his mother, putting one hand on Dimple’s shoulder.
