Daughters Inherit Silence

by Rasana Atreya

  The clerk messaged Jaya the phone number of the couple and left.

  Since the traffic was not moving, Jaya called the couple and introduced herself. They reported that Ananta had eaten her snacks, had a glass of milk, and was working on her homework. Ananta came on the phone, sounding quite excited with this change in routine.

  Dinner time rolled around. The traffic was barely crawling. Jaya was still an hour away. The couple informed Jaya they’d put Ananta to bed. When Jaya reached the home of the couple, it was late at night, much past the hour one should be visiting someone. But the couple invited her in, insisted she have dinner before she carried her sleeping daughter home. And that’s how she met Prakash uncle and Paavani aunty.

  Now, as she walked alongside her new husband, Jaya wondered: could she leave behind this sense of belonging, this sense of community? Could she settle in a new country?

  She wasn’t naïve. She knew the problems with the society here, first hand. It could be extremely close-minded, it could be judgmental. But could she expect strangers to watch over her daughter if she was late coming home? Then have those strangers turn as close as family?

  On the other hand, was it fair to expect Kovid to give up his life?

  Since the time they were married, he’d been trying to make his time here worthwhile. Each day he got on his now high-speed Internet and researched clean energy in India. Then, he set out to various government agencies to understand what was being done; they were unwilling to work with him even when he offered them Kriti’s product for free. He was getting increasingly frustrated at the runaround he was getting. She didn’t blame him. The various nonprofits that did good work in India, did it by working around the bureaucracy, not with it. They knew how to slip under the thick layers of red tape. Kovid, not having grown up in India, wouldn’t know how to do that. He had tried talking to a couple of local NGOs. But their mission, and what Kovid wanted to do, were different. While these NGOs were invested in bettering the local environment, their focus was different. They were working on keeping waterborne pollution at bay. They were working with farmers to find ways to reduce consumption of herbicides and also water. Reducing the carbon footprint with green energy was not their stated goal.

  The kindly priest had certainly paved the way for them if they chose to remain in India. Whether the twin villages followed remained to be seen.

  * * *

  “Have you seen Bollywood movies?” Jaya asked. “Or Tollywood? Not the newer ones. The ones from the '60s and the '70s?”

  “Some. My mother used to be fond of them.”

  “We Indians love a good tragedy,” Jaya said. “Especially when it comes to true love.”

  “You do know I’m of Indian origin?” Kovid sounded amused.

  Jaya smiled. Having long, all-over-the-map conversations with her husband was one of the best parts of marriage.

  She’d missed that in her first one: she might have lost her own voice, but Anant had never been allowed to find his. She felt sad for the earnest young man she had married.

  “You okay?” Kovid asked, threading his fingers through hers. There was no one around, walking as they were in the uninhabited path along the brook. The fact that they were married, helped. Somewhat. Salaciousness from the scandal remained.

  “I was thinking of Anant.” She threw Kovid a quick look, not sure of the protocol of talking about her first husband with her second.

  “Oh?”

  “He was a good person, Kovid. I feel sadness for him that he lived so much in the shadow of his strong-willed father.”

  “Because he didn’t have the chance to grow as a person.”

  “You Americans have interesting ways of putting things, but yes.”

  Kovid’s lips twitched as he sipped at his coffee. Jaya shook her head, amused. He really was from Mars. Who ate and drank as they walked?

  “I think that’s why society cannot accept a widow remarrying.”

  “You Indians have an interesting way of jumping from topic to topic.”

  “You Americans have an interesting way of bringing food on the road.”

  “What do I care?” He winked at her. “I’m the crazy foreigner who gets to drink coffee as he walks with his gorgeous wife. Imagine what they’d say if I ate a sandwich as I skateboarded to work?”

  “You think I’m gorgeous?”

  He pretended to swoon and she laughed.

  “Do you actually do that?” Jaya said. “Skateboard to work?”

  “Sometimes.” He smiled. “You’d be surprised at the number of suit-clad men and women on skateboards, their work bags crosswise against their backs, weaving through bicyclists and pedestrians, on the streets of San Francisco.” As Jaya laughed, he said, “Back to your segue-free widow story.”

  “Careful with that last word. It isn’t a word we Indians know.”

  “I know you don’t,” Kovid teased. “The way you jump from topic to topic, with no transition whatsoever.”

  Jaya rolled her eyes. “Per Bollywood and Tollywood, the widow must remain a tragic figure, she must be venerated, she must remain an ideal others can only aspire to.”

  He nodded for her to go on.

  “This also ties in to other movies that were hugely popular. The grand sacrifice of love demanded by a parent. The ultimate sacrifice of two lovers giving up on their love for a person they deemed more worthy of that love than themselves.”

  “Hmm,” Kovid said. “So the depiction of slim widows in diaphanous white saris, long braids draping across their sinuous waists…”

  Jaya smacked him in the arm.

  He laughed.

  “I think they make widows in movies attractive precisely to highlight that their unattainability is the greatest virtue they have to offer to the society at large.”

  “Did you feel pressured by this stereotype?”

  “Oh, completely. When Anant died, I was only twenty-six. I completely expected to die a widow, because there’s almost never a second chance for ladies who’ve had the misfortune to lose their husbands. I remember a time, maybe a year into my widowhood. I had a large wart on the side of my nose. It had been growing for a few months. I made an appointment with the dermatologist and had it removed. I remember my neighbours talking disapprovingly.”

  “Why would they disapprove?”

  “Because, as a widow, where was the need to be so conscious of my looks? Or was there? Oh, the speculation!”

  “I’m sorry, honey.” He gave her a quick hug. “My own experience has been so different from yours. I dealt with the grief of losing my wife, of my daughter losing a mother. But I didn’t have to provide justification for my existence.”

  Jaya shrugged.

  “Do you really think movies make that much of a difference?”

  “I wish they didn’t, but yes. Till Karan Johar came along with his immensely popular movies, karva chauth was a relatively low-key North Indian festival, where ladies who chose to, fasted from dawn to dusk for the health of their husbands. We have a college WhatsApp group.” At the look on Kovid’s face, she said, “Yeah, yeah. No proper segue, I know. Anyway, on the group, my North Indian friends tell me that even in southern cities like Hyderabad, there is now pressure to create a grand spectacle, sort of a public affirmation of their deep concern for their husband’s wellbeing. Not fasting is no longer an option.”

  “If it helps, you don’t have to fast for me. I think I’m doing quite all right.” Kovid winked.

  “I wasn’t planning on it,” Jaya teased.

  46

  Jaya

  “We really need to talk,” Kovid said.

  Jaya nodded reluctantly. She knew what was coming. They hadn’t got around to discussing the shifting part. Or the staying part. They should, but hadn’t. To give him credit, Kovid had brought it up a few times. As far as she was concerned—if they talked, it would become real. And, if it became real, she’d have to face up to it.

  “We cannot put this off indefinitely.”


  “I know things haven’t been going well at the computer centre,” she raised a hand when he’d have spoken, “and I know you can support us. But I need to do something for me.”

  “But that something isn’t happening on the ground. You’re doing it online, anyway. Could you not do it from San Francisco?”

  “Aren’t there rules that prevent me from working until I get the right visa? I know of highly educated ladies who’ve spent their lives in frustration because they don’t have the right work permit.”

  “True, but I’m a citizen. As my wife, you should be able to get your Green Card fairly quickly.”

  “With things being the way they are, it could be any number of years.”

  Kovid shrugged, unable to deny it.

  “I have a friend from school,” Jaya said. “Radha. They lived in Switzerland for a few years, then shifted to the US. When she was waiting for her Green Card, she started doing photoshoots for low-income single mothers. Then she helped them create LinkedIn profiles for their job search. Though her portraits were professional quality, she did not accept money because it was against the rules. Her website clearly stated that the service was free.” She pursed her lips. She hated the next part. “Anyway, she was returning with her family from a trip to Costa Rica when a customs official searched her luggage and found business cards for her website. He refused to believe she wasn’t charging for her services. After seven years of following the rules so her Green Card would not be jeopardised, she was deported to India, right from the airport.”

  “Wow. How did the family deal with it?”

  “Her children were in the 9th and 10th grades when this happened. This was two years ago. They didn’t want to deal with the stress of having to start high school in a new country. So she practices medicine in Hyderabad, while her husband is in the US, waiting for the children to finish high school.”

  “I’m truly sorry this happened. But maybe this is more exception than norm?”

  “It’s the years of not being allowed to work that scares me, Kovid. I don’t know how I’d handle that.” Besides, there was also her new brother-in-law. It had been excruciating to exchange awkward Deepavali greetings over Skype.

  He sighed. “How about I look into working here? In the meanwhile, I could get your Green Card process started. If it really takes that long, we can reevaluate.”

  “Thank you,” she said, grateful for the reprieve. Work-wise, it was a lot easier for Kovid. As a person of Indian origin, he wouldn’t need to jump through the hoops for his work permit.

  Life in the village might be a struggle in some ways, but it was comfortable in so many others. The meddlesome neighbours, the unsupportive mother, the restrictions society placed on her—these might cause her angst, but it was angst that was familiar. She didn’t want to shift to a foreign country, and have to relearn what to fight, and what to learn to live with.

  47

  Jaya

  Five months later

  “I don’t know if we can go on like this,” Kovid said. “We’re in limbo, Jaya.”

  Jaya’s shoulders slumped. Kovid was still running in circles, butting heads against the famed Indian bureaucracy. He’d set aside his sister’s dreams for when he shifted back to America. For now, he wanted to use his time to set up a small multi-speciality hospital in the village so medical care was more accessible. He already had the doctors lined up. But palms had to be greased, and Kovid was vehemently against paying bribes. Not that she blamed him.

  Jaya’d set up her computer centre soon after Ananta was born. Her business partner had eased the way for her. Now that she thought about it, bribes had to have been involved. She was troubled to realise that she didn’t know for sure. Regardless, Kovid had made no progress at all. Instead of the hospital he’d envisioned, he was helping out at the local clinic, bandaging cuts and bruises.

  Jaya, on the other hand, was doing very well. She had clients, and not just in India. She was providing protection against cyber attacks to clients from around the world.

  Ten months had passed since their wedding. None of Kovid’s leads were panning out, and his parents were still not talking to him.

  And, maddeningly enough, the Green Card had come through.

  Kovid had offered to extend his stay to a year, and now that time was coming to a close. He had tried to be accommodating; he had tried to make it work. But he wasn’t happy here. It would have been so much easier if he’d been the kind of man who complained. But he just dug down harder. He had done what he could. Now it was Jaya’s turn. It was time to give America a chance.

  48

  Jaya

  The bus hurtled through the night. Over highways and bypasses it raced, over speed bump and potholes. It reestablished contact with the ground, bringing Jaya’s chin down hard on the windowsill.

  “You okay?” Kovid winced, massaging his nose. He’d been sleeping, his forehead resting against the seat in front.

  Jaya nodded, rubbing her chin. The highway was now winding its way through the centre of a small town.

  The bus towered over traffic as it forged a path between a tempo loaded down with female labourers, and a two-wheeler weaving through traffic. The man riding pillion on the two-wheeler held in his grip the feet of a flock of live chicken tied together.

  The bus brushed passed the chicken.

  Jaya saw angry squawking, the air conditioning insulating her from the sounds. She pulled her sweater closer.

  “This guy means business,” Kovid said. His voice was grim. The oversized bus swayed like a tall tree in heavy wind. His fingers gripped on the seat in front so tightly, they were bloodless.

  Jaya didn’t blame him. She regretted getting on the bus about a minute after the bus shot out of the terminus. The driver, barely out of his teens and fuelled by Red Bull, seemed the kind of young man who laughed in the face of death each minute of every day.

  “Why are we on this bus again?” Kovid’s face had taken on a greenish tinge.

  “Your idea,” Jaya reminded helpfully. “I suggested the State Transport. You were concerned with travelling in comfort while I was trying to prioritise life and limb.”

  “You’re too funny.”

  Way up in the front, on the flat screen TV suspended over a massive windshield, a “mass” movie, as opposed to one that had “class,” came to life.

  “Volume, volume,” passengers from the back shouted, and the driver obliged.

  Kovid muttered something uncomplimentary under his breath.

  “It was nice of Radha to invite us to her cousin brother’s wedding,” Jaya reminded him. Now that they’d decided to shift to America, she’d started reaching out to friends again. She wanted to reconnect in person before she left.

  “Tell me something,” he mumbled. He sounded sleepy, but the bus driver wasn’t making it easy. “Why do the Indian people call cousins ‘cousin brother’ or ‘cousin sister?’”

  “To distinguish them, of course.” At the look on Kovid’s face, she laughed.

  Kovid pushed his seat back, dug out a handkerchief, and threw it over his eyes. In five minutes, he was snoring through the raucous movie.

  Jaya shook her head, pressing her nose against the window. She had mixed feelings about this trip. Radha—the doctor friend whose family lived in the US—was also distantly related. Which meant that Amma, even if she wasn’t able to make it to the wedding, would hear of Jaya’s presence there. It wasn’t every day your daughter attended a family function with a man who wasn’t the one the family had married you off to. And, Amma being Amma, she would take this very personally.

  Jaya sighed. You couldn’t pick a friend without there being a chance that you were also related. Especially if you were from the same state. Beerakaya peechu chuttam: a relationship similar to that of a mature beerakaya vegetable, dried out till only the fibrous structure, or the peechu, remained. The peechu had many threads that connected to each other, enough that they were impossible to unravel. Relationships in the v
illage were complicated, intertwined like the threads in nature’s loofah as they were.

  The bus had adroitly navigated past the village and was back to hurtling down the highway. Going cross-eyed as the street lights flashed past, she closed her eyes.

  You could take a horse to water, Nanna often said, but you couldn’t make it fart. She smiled at her father’s nonsensical twist. But it was true—you could build state-of-the-art highways and fancy rest areas, but you couldn’t magically inject traffic sense into drivers.

  The free-for-all unnerved Kovid: The goats, the motorcycles, and all manner of traffic—vehicular and mammalian—darting across the highway.

  She could have driven—it was only five hours on the highway, and she’d driven on this one more times than she could count. In fact, Kovid had suggested it. But he wasn’t comfortable driving in India, and she didn’t want to be the one driving up to a wedding-full of relatives and friends, a new husband in tow.

  The estranged offspring hadn’t fallen too far from the family tree. Here she was, falling into the same hole-in-the-ground she had accused her mother of dwelling in: she didn’t want people to think less of her husband because he wasn’t the one in the driver’s seat.

  When she was first married—to Anant—she gave up driving because her father-in-law demanded it: if her husband couldn’t drive a four-wheeler, she shouldn’t be able to, either. The dowry they used to buy the car had also paid for its driver.

  How we are conditioned to protect the fragility of the masculine ego, Jaya thought wryly. In her widowed years, she’d felt no pressure to cater to anyone. Now that she was married again, she was back to protecting her protector.

  * * *

  “Hey, Sleepyhead. Maybe we should consider getting off.”

  Jaya blinked. The bus was pulled in at an angle and many passengers had already disembarked.