Meet Me In the Middle

by Vani Mahesh

  ‘Hi, Vivith.’

  Vicky shook his head with a wider grin.

  ‘Hi, Vivek?’

  He started laughing but shook his head vigorously.

  ‘Hi, Vivikth, then.’

  He nodded and sprawled on the chair.

  ‘Anu, don’t apply for TC yet from Indigo. Let us see how he takes to our school. If he is okay, then you can put him in here.’

  ‘I am sure he will be fine here,’ said Anu and she knew he would be.

  ‘I hope so too. This school is run almost like Sumitra’s. But what concerns me is the fees. You will be losing it at Indigo and will be paying here again.’

  Oh, she hadn’t thought of that! The fee here was eighty thousand, Anu remembered. She mustered her courage and asked. ‘Can you give us a concession? Whatever you can.’ She wanted to dig a hole and crawl inside it. She hated asking for discounts at reasonable places.

  ‘I will be able to waive the twenty-thousand registration fees. But can’t help with the fee component. I am answerable to the board.’ Janaki truly sounded helpless.

  ‘It’s more than enough discount, then. Can he attend from today?’ Anu smiled at the friendly woman.

  ‘Certainly. You be with him until he settles down. Let me walk you to the classroom.’

  It was a small classroom with kids working with various contraptions for a maths class. Vicky’s eyes brightened at the sight of those.

  ‘Pink Tower!’ He rushed inside and settled down next to a child. Soon, Anu was all but forgotten.

  Anu smiled at Janaki. ‘I think I will leave. He seems fine.’

  ‘Tell him and go. He should not panic not seeing you.’

  Anu agreed. ‘Vicky, bye, sweetie. I will pick you up later.’

  Vicky waved a happy hand without even looking at her. He was busy assembling a tower and chatting with his neighbour.

  Anu drove back feeling relaxed. Vicky was happy! But soon that happiness began to morph into a small worry. By the time she was home, that worry had turned into a full-blown panic. How was she going to tell Sanju about this? Already things were so tense between them. If she could somehow manage the fees, she need not tell him about this at all for the time being. Vicky mostly talked in the middle of running or biking and panting, so even if he managed to tell Sanju about the change of school, he would not understand him anyway.

  Now, she only had to pay Rathnamma’s ten thousand and this sixty thousand. And Anu’s account, as of that day, had fifty rupees.

  27

  That night Anu observed the father-son duo. While Vicky went hiding, Sanju kept finding him. There was no talk about school that evening, not yet. But it was bound to come. Sanju always asked a few customary questions about school and Vicky gave highly irrelevant answers to all of them.

  ‘Enough hide-and-seek. Sit with me. We will watch cricket.’ Sanju forced Vicky to sit next to him on the Sofa.

  ‘Let us play cricket!’ Vicky got a new idea for running around. ‘Watching is boring.’

  ‘We will watch for half-an-hour and then play. Sit now.’ Sanju wouldn’t give up on making Vicky sit.

  ‘I will play with Mommy then.’ Vicky came running to Anu.

  After chucking the ball at him a hundred thousand times, Anu sprawled on the floor exhausted. She had to keep her energy for a food battle with Vicky still. Though she made him sit on a high chair and strapped him to it while feeding him dinner, he still managed to make it a prolonged and messy affair.

  Just as she got up, mustering the courage to bring out Vicky’s dinner, Sanju’s phone chimed. Reading his message, Sanju broke into a happy smile. ‘Anu, Padma aunty says she has a surprise for us!’

  Anu had a minor heart attack. Padma aunty’s surprises were never good news; they were mostly some large and fanciful gift that she hoisted on them. In her favour, she bought expensive things but they were quite … hideous. It started when she had bought a matching saree-and-kurta combo for Anu and Sanju for the wedding reception. It was bright pink! Anu had her reception outfit carefully selected for both of them but Sanju had fallen in love with Padzilla’s gift.

  Luckily, Sameer had averted that catastrophe. ‘Wear a suit. If you wear this pink number, people will think you are a music teacher from the seventies.’ Anu was never more grateful to Sameer. For Sanju, though he never admitted, Sameer’s words were his commands. Anu’s mother-in-law had shoved the receipt to the saree into Anu’s palms when Padzilla wasn’t looking and had whispered. ‘Exchange the saree for something humans wear.’

  Padma aunty’s next was a western-style large crib for Vicky. It was bigger than their bedroom and Vicky screamed the moment they put him in it. Anu had sold it to a US couple on OLX. Padma aunty’s list of gifts was endless. A very large oven that could bake five kilograms of cake. ‘Why should I bake a cake when they had bakeries on every street corner?’ was Anu’s reasoning. Then there was the plush floor carpet. It was so big and red, Anu had felt claustrophobic at the very sight of it. Finally, she had donated it to her maid, who had cut it to pieces that she used as foot rugs.

  So, now what? What was the surprise?

  The next morning, after dropping Vicky, Anu started stretching with Pete and Pooja. A few minutes into the session, two elderly ladies stood around tentatively, holding their yoga mats. Must be the middle-class mothers of some nouveau riche.

  ‘Can we join your class?’ One of them asked in Hindi. ‘We have not done any yoga before.’

  God, this class tag was starting to get to Anu. ‘This is not a class but you can do yoga with us.’ She replied in her broken Hindi.

  The women didn’t understand her. ‘How much fees?’

  Pooja took over. ‘No fees. Just do it.’

  The women looked delighted. ‘Free class!’

  They both spread their mats and looked at Anu expectantly. Sighing, Anu taught them Surya Namaskara. They were more awkward than Pete, to say the least. Once they wound up the session, one of them opened a box full of homemade biscuits. ‘Please eat. These are Nankathais.’ She offered it to the group.

  Pete looked a little doubtful at first but once he bit into them, pure delight spread on his face. ‘Well done, Anu. Keep recruiting. Make sure your prodigies pay you with food.’

  Pooja smiled. ‘This class is turning out to be very interesting.’

  Anu rolled her eyes. ‘This is not a class!’

  The women, before they left, spoke to Anu in the earnest. ‘Take some fees, beta. You are very good. Why are you doing the class for free?’

  Pooja began to laugh and mimicked Anu. ‘This is not a class!’

  In the following days, Anu’s non-class had four more elderly men and women for students.

  ‘Shall I make a sign that says the “Enter the waitlist for Anu’s Yoga and leave a box of homemade sweets?”’ Pete asked Anu as they sipped coffee after tennis. Pete insisted on paying every time and Anu had stopped even the tentative objecting.

  ‘Pete!’ Anu rolled her eyes. ‘Why did we become so popular?’

  ‘Among Octogenarians!’ Pooja groaned. ‘Why do I even come there?’

  ‘Anu’s Low-intensity Yoga for those who can’t bend! It might catch on,’ Pete nodded his head thoughtfully.

  ‘Given the number of sweets we are gorging on, it is more like Anu’s Weight-gaining Yoga!’ said Anu remembering that one of the women had brought Rasmalai that morning.

  Pete raised his coffee cup. ‘To unpronounceable yet delicious Indian sweets.’

  Anu walked home feeling happy and contented only to spot a large truck parked in the driveway. Sanju came scurrying out. Oh god! Did Padzilla buy them a truck as a surprise? Anu stepped inside the house fearing what awaited her. A large seven-seater sectional sofa stared at her in the living room. It had a matching centre table and two side tables. And, the whole ensemble was bright orange!

  Anu’s jaws dropped. Sanju chirped in excitement. ‘Look at this Anu! So perfect for our living room. Padma aunty has spent close to a lakh
on this.’

  Anu found her voice with great difficulty. ‘But we can’t accept such an expensive gift from her. She is retired and she needs to keep her money.’ Anu prayed fervently for that logic to work.

  Sanju looked thoughtful for a moment. ‘You are right. I should pay for it.’

  Anu was horrified. ‘Sanju, we don’t need a new sofa now. Where is the money? It is almost the first of the month and have you thought of the bills we need to pay?’

  Four delivery men stood around looking uncomfortable. If those men left, Anu knew she would be stuck with the orange monstrosity forever.

  Before she knew it, her pleasant reasoning tone got replaced by a brutally honest one. ‘I don’t really like that sofa. Our living room looks like an orange setting sky!’

  Sanju looked shocked at first and then hurt. ‘Hey, what do you have against Padma aunty? She tries to win your affection but you keep rejecting her.’ He added after a pause. ‘I lived in the house your father gave you! So you can accept the sofa my aunt is giving me.’

  Anu felt incredulous. ‘My father did not have an orange house delivered to you, Sanju. You need not have lived there.’

  ‘Well, your father had a little chat with me and explained how it made economic sense not to rent a place but live in the one he already had! So, yeah, no pressure there!’

  Anu started to feel drained. ‘Fine. You want this sofa so badly? Then we will keep it. But it is going to the basement.’

  Though Sanju tried to look hurt and stern, Anu swore what she saw in his eyes was a relief. As the sofa got moved section by section, Anu wished she could return it for money.

  28

  Shwetha came by the next day. They were going to have a beer at this small garden pub outside Verdant Green, a place mostly the drivers from the community frequented. But who cared. Neither she nor Shwetha was in the mood to shell out big bucks for beer and boiled vegetables—that is all they ate when they drank midweek.

  ‘Anu, where is your TV? Neither in the living room nor the family room. Whatever is the difference between the two anyway?’ Shwetha sounded annoyed after walking from one room to the other.

  ‘Hmm …’ Anu shrugged taking away the magazines from the sofa. ‘I don’t know about the other houses but our living room had a TV and the family room Vicky’s bicycle.’

  ‘And now? There is only air and sunlight in your living room. I want to catch at least a bit of the Grammy rerun.’ Shwetha sat on the sofa with a thud.

  Anu placed a plate of homemade biscuits one of the women who joined her for yoga had given her. ‘Sanju moved it to the basement.’

  Shwetha got that can-you-get-more-weird look. So Anu further explained. ‘I asked him to move the sofa his aunty gifted us. He said if that is the case, the TV moves too. To make the basement a complete entertainment room.’ Anu grinned biting into a biscuit. ‘But the joke is on him. Since he moved it to the basement, he has almost stopped watching TV. I bet the big orange sofa scares him!’

  Shwetha sighed. ‘Your lives are too complex for me to understand. Let us head out for that drink then. They might have a TV in the sitting room.’

  It was only eleven but the garden bar was open. One of the neighbour’s driver nodded at Anu, looking highly embarrassed. There was also the gardener, spending the money Anu gave him the previous day. He should be treating her for the money he charged her.

  ‘Madam, you are in our place.’ The gardener belly laughed.

  ‘All because you were at mine.’ Anu mumbled and Shwetha duly broke into a giggle.

  The gardener said something sheepishly and turned back to his drink.

  ‘So why this surprise visit in the middle of the day, Shwetha?’ Anu took large gulps of her cold beer.

  Shwetha leaned closer to Anu smiling. ‘Guess what? I am getting married in a month! Then, I am moving to London with Dini.’

  ‘What! You can’t do that! Sameer is moving to Dubai and you to London?’ Anu almost broke into tears. Spirits made her feel too much.

  ‘Hey hey, at least congratulate me first! I will be there for only six months. Then Dini has agreed to move to Bangalore for good.’ Shwetha squeezed Anu’s hand. ‘What is going on with you?’

  Anu thought of pouring out her woes but decided against it. Shwetha would never back her decision to change Vicky’s school without telling Sanju. She couldn’t talk about the money problems because then Shwetha would jump in to help. Anu never took money from friends. She couldn’t tell Sameer any of her problems for the same reason.

  Anu smiled bravely. ‘Things are not too bad. The yoga, tennis, walks with nannies—getting used to it all.’ Mothers in Verdant Green sipped their tea by the poolside while their nannies played with the kids. Anu knew more nannies than moms. One of those nannies had even asked Anu how much she got paid because she dressed so well.

  ‘Good, Anu. I am hoping for some luxurious time in London myself. But Dini says he leads a very below-average life there. How can he when he lives in such a rich country?’

  Oh, Anu knew it! She could in fact write a book titled ‘How to successfully lead a poor life in a rich neighbourhood.’

  After Shwetha left, Anu felt severely empty. She will have neither Sameer nor Swetha close to her anymore. Maybe that is why fate pushed her to Verdant Green so that she had more to worry about than her friends moving away.

  It was a week into the new month when Rathnamma talked to Anu. She had avoided talking to Rathnamma all week. ‘Madam, when will you give me the rest of the salary?’

  ‘My husband says by the fifteenth. Half on the first and the other half on the fifteenth.’ Anu pushed her hair back and tried to sound confident.

  ‘Then, please ask your husband to clean the house for fifteen days. I am not a bank to take money in instalments.’ Oh boy, Rathnamma looked scary the way she stood with her hand on her hips with her nostrils flaring.

  ‘Okay. Fine. I will talk to him.’ Anu mumbled. Rathnamma looked angry enough—not to mention strong—to kill her with bare hands.

  Anu had roughly spent an extra five thousand on the gardener and Geetha for babysitting. The last time she had tried to withdraw a thousand, the machine had rebuked her with a message that said she had no money left.

  Vicky’s Principal Janaki had asked her gently to complete the formalities at the school and pay the fees. So, now the money problem was real.

  That evening, as she sat watching Vicky ride his bike, Anu’s phone chimed with a message. Since she had the phone in hand, she opened it right away. What was that she was seeing? A lakh and a half deposited into her account! Such things happened only in fairy tales, didn’t’ they?

  Once her initial euphoria died down, Anu’s memory returned. The money was from her father. Well, he had started some yearly investment for Vicky and every year he deposited money into her account. That amount got auto-deducted a few days later and vanished.

  Except for this year, Anu thought, if she could stop that auto-deduction, the money could be hers! For the time being, of course. She knew nothing about either the investment or where that money went. She thought of calling her father casually. But the two of them hardly spoke on the phone. It would be too suspicious if she did so now.

  Where was her bank statement? She remembered all those emails she got from the bank telling her how to open the attached statement. Well, she deleted them all. She liked a clean inbox.

  How about going to the bank? But her account was in Vijaynagar and the manager knew her father too well. Could she go to their branch here? She felt the itch to call Sameer but he would not help her with the bank. He would simply give her the money, somehow. She could not let that happen.

  She had worked in the bank after all. Well, for a year where she mostly sent people to wait in a queue. But she should still be able to handle a simple affair like this.

  ‘Hey Anu, what is the deep thought?’ Sanju shook her gently. He had parked his car five feet from her and Anu hadn’t even noticed.

  �
��Oh, nothing. Go on inside. I will make coffee.’

  ‘Anu,’ Sanju hovered around her in the kitchen. ‘Do you have any money in your account?’

  ‘What!’ Anu jumped back in horror. Did he read her mind? ‘I don’t. I have nothing.’

  ‘Calm down! That is why I asked. You will need some for your expenses, right? You don’t have your job now. How much do you need?’

  How about seventy thousand? Anu was tempted to ask. But then, she was also really touched by Sanju’s gesture. ‘I don’t know …’ She trailed off. She had never asked him for her expenses so far. Whatever she earned, she spent.

  ‘I will transfer five thousand. I know it is less than what you made. But you know how it is now.’

  Anu handed Sanju his coffee and asked gently, ‘How are you doing money-wise? This is a crazy month.’

  Sanju said weakly. ‘I am fine. When is the next instalment of Vicky’s fees?’

  Anu had another wicked thought. Could she take that fees money from him and pay at the other school? God, this was how criminals and frauds were born!

  29

  Anu found a branch of her bank near Vicky’s school the next day. She could not find her account number but she knew they could pull up her records based on the name. Luckily, she could find photocopies of her PAN card and Aadhar by rummaging through a stash of papers Sanju had kept.

  ‘Can you please tell me where my auto-deduction is going?’ Anu asked the dapper-looking young man assigned to her.

  He flashed her a strange look before asking. ‘This is your account, right?’

  ‘Of course. But only one of my accounts.’ Anu smiled indulgently. ‘So I can’t remember the details.’ Lying was an art and she had mastered it by practising it on her mom all her life.

  ‘It is not an auto-deduction, ma’am. It is by cheque and it is going to …’ He kept typing away. ‘Let me see. To your post office account.’