by Adithi Rao
‘How come you have it? He is so possessive about his things,’ she said.
‘When he threw me out of the house, he told me to take whatever I wanted with me. I left my saris, jewellery, everything. But he was the one who had introduced me to this book when we first got married, and I loved it. I read it many times over, even more than he did. So I took it when I left.’
‘Only this book?’
Lakshmi nodded.
‘He didn’t try and stop you from taking it?’ asked Maithili.
‘No. He owed me that much.’
‘Have you ever gone back to that house after that?’
Lakshmi shook her head. Maithili ran a finger gently over the name of their husband inscribed inside.
‘Why didn’t you scratch out his name and write yours instead?’ she asked, looking up at the other woman.
‘Because,’ said Lakshmi, with quiet dignity, ‘it is a part of him that belongs to me. Even he can’t take it away.’
Maithili looked at Lakshmi in silence.
‘You must hate him,’ she said at last.
Lakshmi shook her head.
‘Then you must hate me,’ said Maithili softly, sadly.
Lakshmi smiled and shook her head again.
When Shankarnarayana returned from work that evening, he found Maithili sitting in his wood-and-cane armchair, reading. He stopped and stared at her in surprised disapproval.
‘That’s my chair,’ he said.
Maithili looked up from her book and smiled. ‘Yes. That’s why I was sitting in it. It reminded me of you. Shall I get your coffee?’
She placed the book down and got up. A slight frown puckered Shankarnarayana’s brow. ‘I didn’t know you liked to read.’
‘I’ve been trying it out and I think I quite enjoy it,’ she called out cheerfully as she disappeared into the kitchen.
Accustomed to the scared, submissive girl of the past weeks, Shankara didn’t know what to make of this confident, self-possessed woman who seemed to have come into her own overnight. He came forward curiously and picked up the book, and gave a start. He glanced furtively in the direction of the kitchen. Then he turned over the book in his hand, examining it, handling it gently. On the first page he saw, as he had expected to see, his name written in fading ink in his own handwriting. Shankara became agitated. Maithili returned with his coffee.
‘Where …’ he said hoarsely, then cleared his throat and tried again, struggling for normalcy, ‘where did you get this?’
‘Lakshmi Akka lent it to me,’ she said matter-of-factly and placed the tumbler next to his chair. ‘I’ve finished the first three chapters and I can barely put it down!’
‘Good. Er … that’s good,’ replied Shankara weakly. He placed the book on the stool next to his easy chair and went to wash his hands and feet.
A few nights later, Shankara and Maithili were sitting up in bed and reading. Maithili had come to the end of her book and was deeply immersed in the climax of the story. A tiny frown of concentration creased her forehead. This past hour, Shankarnarayana had glanced up frequently to observe the changing expressions on his young wife’s pretty, expressive face. He smiled to himself when she blinked away a tear impatiently to get on with her reading. She was completely unaware of his gaze upon her.
When she finished it, she shut the book slowly, reluctantly, giving it a final caress before laying it aside. Shankara, without taking his eyes off his newspaper, reached out a hand and covered hers. She turned to him, startled.
‘You liked it?’ he asked, a smile in his voice, still not looking at her.
‘It’s beautiful!’ she sighed ‘And so sad! Why did they have to part when they loved each other so much?’
Shankara looked at her strangely. ‘That happens, sometimes. That’s life,’ he said. ‘But what did you think of the style?’
Caught off guard, Maithili replied, ‘I have nothing to compare it with, but it was simple. Yet it was deep. Er … or maybe it wasn’t? I mean…’
‘Why do you hesitate to say what you think?’ he urged. ‘There are no wrong opinions here. You are free to feel as you like.’
Maithili had never seen this side of her husband, but his manner gave her confidence. ‘Then yes, I think it was simple but mature. It made no judgements on the people and why they did what they did,’ she said.
‘You’re right,’ he replied. ‘The writer takes no sides. He just tells the story as it is. I’m surprised you picked up on that so quickly!’
Maithili smiled happily at her husband’s praise. Their eyes met and held, and they instinctively moved into each other’s arms.
That night as they made love, Maithili held her husband in her arms and felt a sense of belonging at last.
The book lay on the dining table next to a shopping bag and a small purse containing money. Inside the bedroom, Maithili was getting dressed to go to the market. The rice drum was nearly empty and needed to be replenished, as did the sugar container and the lentils. Tayavva was to accompany Maithili that day to help her carry the groceries home.
Shankarnarayana was going over some business documents when his eyes fell on the book across the room. He went over to look at it thoughtfully. Then he picked it up, carried it to his writing desk and sat down. From the drawer, he withdrew an inkstand and his old Parker pen. He filled it with ink, and on the first page, below his own name, he wrote another one.
Lakshmi.
Maithili came bustling out of the bedroom ten minutes later, dressed in a mustard-and-red silk sari. Shankarnarayana, now back in his easy chair, looked up from his paperwork and watched her raise her arms to fix her necklace in place.
‘I’m going to the market. We’ll be a little late coming back. There are many things to buy today.’
‘Hmm,’ said her husband.
Maithili slipped the book into the shopping bag in the hope of bumping into Lakshmi at the market. She picked up her purse and left the room, calling to Tayavva to hurry.
An hour later, at the Sheshadri household on Wadiyar Street, Lakshmi and her sister-in-law deftly put away the vegetables Lakshmi had brought home from the market that day.
‘I’ll wash my hands and come, Attige,’ said Lakshmi to Sheshadri’s wife. ‘Then we can begin cooking.’
She began to hang the shopping bag up on the hook behind the kitchen door when she felt the weight of the book that Maithili had returned to her inside it. She took it out and went to her bedroom. In one corner was a wooden cupboard with glass doors, filled with English and Kannada books.
Lakshmi opened the cupboard to slide the book back onto the shelf, then hesitated. She looked down at the faded blue cloth binding, recalling the story within, the lines that she had read and re-read so many times that she knew them by heart. She began to flip through the pages, stopping on a passage here, a sentence there, starting from the back and making her way to the beginning. It was always interesting to read a story whose ending she already knew. To read it in reverse. It was like living in a flashback, armed with the inevitability of the ending.
The pages flipped until they opened on the first. And that was when she saw it. Her name, written below her husband’s. She looked at it again, just to be sure she hadn’t imagined it. But there it was in fresh blue ink, written by the same hand and with the same pen that had inscribed the one above it.
She smiled through her tears as her fingers caressed his name and then hers. She shut the book and slipped it into its place on the bookshelf, taking care to close the glass doors of the cupboard before leaving the room.
10
About Grandfathers and Trees
The Madras–Shivamogga Express pulled into the Rudrapura Railway Station at twenty-three minutes past four in the afternoon, half an hour behind schedule. A ten-year-old boy waited at the entrance of a coach for the train to come to a stop. He disembarked, holding a small bag in his hand. In it were idlis and a bottle of water for the journey, both of which were still untouched. A man stepped do
wn after him and lifted a suitcase from the train. The boy had wandered a little ahead and was standing there by himself, looking around the deserted platform with dim eyes. The man joined him and, after a moment, gently touched his head. The boy looked up at his father, who smiled and indicated the exit with a nod.
They walked to the metal gates and handed over their tickets to the guard. The guard seemed to have been expecting them and opened his mouth to say something, but the boy avoided his eyes. The guard glanced uncertainly at the father, who shook his head slightly. So he said nothing and let them pass through the exit into the road outside. There, a few autos and cycle rickshaws were lined up, waiting to ferry passengers to their destinations.
Perhaps it would be best to stop here and let the boy Avi tell his own story. The story about grandfathers and trees…
At 5 feet 4 inches, my ajja is the tallest man in the world. He is plump and cuddly, has laughing eyes, bright silver hair, and big funny ears. He can waggle his ears without touching them, just by wiggling his eyebrows, and he can stick out his tongue and touch the tip of his nose with it! In case you think that’s easy, you should try doing it some time. Go on, try it … See how hard it is? Don’t worry, I can’t do it either, and I really tried. I practised till my jaws ached and my nose got a catch (I’m not lying; your nose really can get a catch if you twist it round hard enough). It still didn’t work.
The last time I tried it was in Ajja’s green Standard Herald on our way home from the railway station. That was nearly ten months ago and that was the last time I tried it, because once your nose gets a catch, the pain is enough to teach you not to try it again.
I rubbed my nose and saw my grandfather wink at me through the rear-view mirror of the car. My mother and he had been discussing tender-jackfruit curry, but he seemed to know that I had hurt my nose. We were almost home. Ajja told me that Srikanth, my summertime best friend, would have to go to school until Friday; Christos Convent usually closed for vacations a day or two after my school in Madras did. Ajja also told me that Hesarillada Angadi was now selling five new flavours of ice cream. This held very good promise for the holidays! I settled back in my seat to look out at the passing scenery. It was comfortable. Nothing in Rudrapura ever changed. I could always tell what was going to happen next. Outside Vishnu Talkies, the latecomers would be rushing across the road to get inside the theatre because the show had already begun (Ajja would slow the car down to let them pass). Then we’d drive past the Nameless Shop, and the smell of Narayani Aunty’s coffee would fill the air. Aunty would wave to me and I would wave back, my eyes searching for Srikanth even though I knew he’d be away at school. And then we would take a left from the Nameless Shop and turn into our lane, and I would spot Ammama, my grandmother, waiting eagerly for me in the veranda with her face pressed to the grills. That is what happened every year, and this one was no different.
The car turned into the open gates of Ajja’s driveway. It was a lovely little cottage full of fruit trees and flowering creepers everywhere. There was a sign on the front door that read: Dr Bhaskara Puthu, MBBS. My heart lifted at the sight of the board and Ammama and home.
I jumped out of the car and rushed up the steps into my grandmother’s arms, ignoring my mother who was yelling: ‘Aviiiii! Wait till the car stops properly!’
Then, leaving my mother to greet her mother, I returned to the car. Together, Ajja and I hauled out the heavy suitcase from the boot and put it down on the driveway. I was panting from my exertions, and when I looked up, I saw Ajja looking down at me in the way that made his eyes twinkle and tell me things without words.
Over the years, Ajja’s eyes have told me many things: that he feels happy when I come home to him and Ammama; that every time I go away at the end of the holidays, he misses me. They tell me that there isn’t anything he wouldn’t do to help his patients feel better. And then, one day they told me that he was a magician.
It’s a long story. I’ll share it with you. But please don’t tell anyone else, because it is a secret.
Three summers ago, me, Srikanth, Pamban, Manju, Ranjini, Checha and the rest of the gang were tearing around the back garden of our house, playing lock-and-key. Checha was the den and was trying to get Sri out. But he was very good at dodging and she gave up and came after me instead. She tripped on a stone, grabbed at me to steady herself, and sent me flying onto the cement pathway that lined the garden. It was a bad fall, and for a moment my whole body went numb. Then came a sharp, shooting pain, as if my knees were on fire. The others crowded around me, frightened. Checha kept apologizing. I could see that she was feeling awful and I wanted to tell her that it was okay, but the pain was so bad that I couldn’t speak. Amma and Ammama heard the commotion from the kitchen and came rushing out. Amma was frightened at the sight of all the blood, and Ammama began to scream. Sarayu and Checha were crying too, and I was just preparing to lose my head when Ranjini came running out of the house with Ajja. My grandfather had his medical bag with him and took in the situation in one glance.
‘Everyone step back a little, don’t crowd around,’ he instructed briskly. Then he turned to my mother and said, ‘Shailu, take your amma inside … No, Janaki, go inside. I’ll take care of him.’ He spoke firmly, cutting across Ammama’s protests. Amma led my weeping grandmother into the house with many anxious backward glances. Ajja squatted down on his haunches and took me by my shoulders.
‘Do you trust me?’ he asked in a voice only I could hear.
I stared into my grandfather’s eyes, mesmerized. Something in his expression calmed me down and I stopped crying. With a hiccup, I nodded.
‘Then I will make the pain go away,’ said Ajja. Shielding me from the others’ view, he passed his hand over my wound and muttered an intonation that sounded like ‘Oompha! Pyausaay!’
For a second, all the shouting and crying noises in the background faded away. I felt as if I was sitting inside a seashell and could hear them all, but from a great distance away. The next second, the stinging in my knees disappeared and I felt calm. I blinked and looked down. My eyes widened in disbelief. The wound was gone … and Ajja was quickly binding up my knee!
‘You’re a magician,’ I whispered tremulously, wiping my nose with the back of my hand.
Ajja looked up from what he was doing. His face was very solemn, but his eyes twinkled at me in a laughing, naughty way … And I knew I was right!
‘But why are you putting a bandage?’ I whispered, perplexed.
Ajja shot a quick glance at the others, and I caught on that he didn’t want anyone else to find out his secret. We must be the only ones to know, me and Ajja. And now you.
My grandfather, Bhaskara Puthu, had been a doctor with the Burmese army during the Second World War. At that time, the British were occupying Burma, the country of his birth, where his father had settled when he himself was a young man. Ammama left India to join Ajja there after she married him. My mother was born there, but once she grew older, my grandparents packed their belongings and brought her back to India to live in Rudrapura, Ammama’s hometown. I think a part of Ajja remained in Burma forever; in the chill winds blowing through the Hukawng Valley through which he had trekked to escape the Japanese insurgency; in the corridors of the Rangoon Medical College where he had studied to be a doctor; in the slanting eyes and gentle manners of the Burmese people whom he continued to love long after he had left the place.
Ajja left Burma without any of his possessions. All he returned with was Ammama and Amma, a suitcase of clothes … and the magic of Oompha! Pyausay!
So now that I’ve told you that story, I must get on with the rest of the telling. Where was I? Oh yes, we had just arrived home for the summer holidays, and had just finished lunch – the tender-jackfruit curry and rice that Ammama had prepared. I was feeling a little strange in the head, with the rocking motion of the train still going on inside it. Ajja suggested that I take a nap so I’d be fresh by the evening when all my friends came to play. The whole gang knew,
of course, that I would be arriving that day. I had written to Sri and he had told the others.
Kulla had a new dog called Chikoo whom he had adopted last June. It had been a puppy then, and Kulla had found it lying in the street with a broken leg. Ajja had healed it and now it was fine. Sri promised that Kulla would bring Chikoo to play with us the day I arrived in Rudrapura. I was excited about seeing my friends again and meeting Chikoo (who, Sri assured me in his letter, was the most beautiful dog in the world). I lay down with my eyes closed but couldn’t go to sleep. However, gradually the train movement in my head grew less. At four o’clock, I was ready and waiting on the veranda for everyone.
They trickled in one by one or in small groups. Last to arrive were Manju and Kulla, with Chikoo gambolling around their legs and tripping them up. The rest of us laughed watching them approach in this manner. Manju patiently stumbled for the third time when Chikoo dashed past him, and we could hear Kulla curse and scold the dog affectionately from all the way up the street. His shouting didn’t seem to have much effect. When they reached the front gate, we rushed out to greet them and admire Chikoo, who was by far the ugliest mutt I had ever seen. He had furry ears, one of which flopped downward while the other stood straight up. The floppy one shot into the air to join its mate at the slightest noise or excitement. Chikoo had a long, ungainly tail that wagged non-stop, a big silly grin, and an awkward body with gangly legs, one of which stuck out in a crooked way from the accident he had had as a puppy. But his brown eyes were so soft and loving that they convinced me, before the end of the summer, that he really was every bit as beautiful as Sri had described him in his letter.
Chikoo spotted my grandfather coming out into the back garden to water the coconut tree and hurtled across the yard and into his arms. He never forgot that Ajja had healed him, and he adored my grandfather. Ajja hugged the excited animal and allowed him to lick his face. Watching them, I realized there was one other being in this world – a furry, odd-looking one – who knew about the secret of Oompha! Pyausay!
