When we finish, we ask our well-dressed waiter for the bill. It comes on a saucer of stale supari and sugar that looks like miniature cubes of ice. No one collects it for a long while, so we decide to pay at the counter near the entrance instead. There’s a middle-aged gentleman in a mustard brown shirt manning the place. His head of thick black hair, done up in a stylish ’80s pouf, is oddly mismatched with his tired, wrinkle-lined face. He also has a lazy eye, which adds to his weariness. Behind him, in stark cheerful contrast, are glass shelves lined with pink-rimmed prawn wafers and custard yellow crisps.
‘140,’ he says, taking the money from me.
I notice he has long, slim fingers. Maybe he, too, is a musician.
‘Are you the owner?’ asks Joshua.
‘Yes,’ he replies, counting out the change.
‘Do you also own Kimsang?’ Joshua points outside.
He shakes his head. ‘No, some Marwari man owns it now.’
‘And you? Where are you from?’
He seems amused and stops what he’s doing. ‘China.’
‘Which part?’
‘Hong Kong.’
‘How did you land up all the way here?’
I frown, unsure how Joshua’s candidness will be received.
Yet the man laughs as though no one has asked in a long time. ‘My family fled during the communist revolution, to Calcutta. My grandparents moved to Shillong in the late ’60s.’
‘Do you keep in touch with them? Your relatives in China?’
‘There’s no one left now…everyone’s gone. To Singapore, Philippines, Canada.’
There’s an awkward pause.
He looks as though he’d like to see us leave.
I pick up my change. ‘Thank you… bye.’
Outside, the day has creased into evening, clear but darkened. The sky is a deep, dying blue. A pale sun has set and left behind streaks of silver clouds. We emerge into a busy main road and are jostled by the crowd. Joshua offers me a cigarette. I refuse. He lights one for himself. Puddles of water reflect lights that quiver with every passing step. I feel the weight of everyone’s history press down on me like relentless rain.
The Keeper of Souls
It almost knocks us over. We jump aside just in time and avoid it by a hair’s breadth. A battered red Fiat travelling much too fast for these quiet residential roads, and, judging by the cacophonic death-rattle, also for its carburettor. We gaze, speechless, at its retreating tail-lights, speechless, our behinds pressed uncomfortably against a damp, moss-covered wall. We had narrowly missed falling into an uncovered drain swollen with that morning’s rain and yesterday’s garbage.
‘Maniac,’ I mutter grimly. I’d never learnt how to drive, but I’m certain somewhere in the handbook is a rule not to kill pedestrians. And their pets.
I must admit I seem more perturbed than Seth, our beagle, who swiftly reconvenes his mission to generously mark the neighbourhood with his scent. Apart from this, Seth has few dogged ambitions—to gnaw on our shoes even though he’s long past teething, and to hump my mother-in-law’s leg whenever she visits. I have him to thank for seeing her less than five times a month.
‘Come on, buddy. That’s enough.’
I pull Seth away from Bah Norman’s car. He is the colony’s rangbah shnong or chief, and it wouldn’t do to have our dog spray his tyres. Seth gives me a mournful look, as though to say ‘you’re ruining my imperialistic plans’, and grudgingly follows. Perhaps I can ask Bah Norman who the red Fiat belongs to—my wife and I moved back here from Delhi less than a year ago, and hadn’t yet familiarized ourselves with these crucial neighbourly details. The next time I bumped into Bah Norman, which was easy enough in a colony this compact, I’d make enquiries. For now, with the autumn chill sharp and crisp in the air, I decide to head home.
Our house was once a large, dilapidated godown that my wife, Vera, a very able architect, redesigned, renovated and refurbished, all within the space of a few months. Now, it sits squat and cosy at the end of a sloping gravelly drive, with enough open space for a small garden that I’m tending and bringing to life. It’s a project that keeps me pleasantly occupied—bougainvillea along the length of the wall, a bamboo thicket in one corner of the square grassy lawn, a stepping stone path flanked by low yellow-flowered purslane and a cluster of large, glossy ferns and wild wood rose by the gate. Perhaps, near the door, I’d place a row of orchids. My wife, who wasn’t what you might call horticulturally inclined, said she’d have chosen only cacti, particularly those that needed watering once in a hundred years.
‘Gardening is part of architecture, you know, like roofs and walls,’ I’d tease her.
‘But that would leave gardeners with nothing to do.’
My wife’s undisguised lack of interest probably stemmed from having lived most of her life in cities, both in India and abroad. Her father, a reasonably important foreign civil servant, was transferred from one sleek urban centre to another every three or four years—hardly time enough to grow roots of any kind. Even now when he’d retired, he and his wife divided their time between the capital and Shillong—restlessly moving from one to the other. While I, on the other hand, had grown up in a neighbourhood not far from here, in a house that overflowed with people and plants. My fondest childhood memories were of holidays at a tea garden in Assam where my uncle worked—of summers spent close to rich, red earth and sweet-smelling grass. It was one of the main reasons why I agreed to come back, to leave a job and a life I’d spent a decade building elsewhere, cramped in a flat in South Delhi.
‘See, I told you it was a good idea,’ Vera had declared as I’d nailed the name plaque ‘Kynjai’ over the letterbox. We’d decided to call our new house after the old Khasi name for the colony we lived in; it was suitable, we thought, for a quiet, peaceful place far enough from the overcrowded centre of town. It was a momentous event marked solely by the two of us with cheap champagne and Chinese takeout.
‘Vee, I came up with the name.’
‘Yes, you did, but I mean it was a good idea to come back here.’
I’d kissed her forehead and placed my arm around her waist.
Since she’d never really had a place to firmly call home, I knew this was important to her. To have our own house. Where, as we’d been discussing tentatively, we could bring up a child.
This evening, as with almost every other, I pause briefly at the gate. Light spills from the upstairs study—Vera is working—and the path lamps flanking the driveway cast a welcoming glow. Hanging from the rafters, our Indonesian wind chime tinkles softly. The top is in the shape of an intricate dragon, and the striker like a fiery flame; I’d picked it up on our trip to Jakarta after our wedding. People here believe that wind chimes conjure spirits, but we prefer to consider them a frail yet dutiful sentry against the outside world.
‘We almost got killed today,’ I say, walking into the study.
Vera is sitting at the largest table in the house, blueprints scattered around her like a parchment storm, each page weighed down by whatever happened to be closest at hand—an empty coffee mug, a pair of scissors, a stone I’d once picked up on a riverside picnic.
She doesn’t look up.
‘By whom? Those catapult boys?’
She’s referring to a group of young lads I’d told off about a week ago for hunting blue jays in the forest behind our house.
‘Nah, some crazy driver, nearly ran us down at the turning near Bah Norman’s house.’
‘You get them everywhere.’
I sink into a chaise longue by the window—my favourite seat in the house—and pop open the Diet Coke in my hand.
‘Probably a woman driver.’
She puts the pencil down. ‘I’d be annoyed if I didn’t know you were saying that just to get my attention.’
‘Poor Seth forgot to pee…for about ten seconds.’
Hearing his name, Seth gets up from his cushion at the other end of the room and comes snuffling over, his tail thumping against
the chair.
‘Come here, boy,’ calls Vera, and he bounds across, relishing the attention.
‘How’s it going?’ I ask, downing the Coke.
Vera draws her legs up on the swivel chair; she’s petite and can do that. ‘You know all those horrible stereotypical notions we have about the Jaintias? That they’ve got more money than taste?’
‘Yeah.’
‘They’re true.’
‘And it’s not because they’re resented by everyone else for accidentally finding coal in their backyards and becoming millionaires overnight?’
Vera holds up a blueprint. ‘Why would anyone in their right mind want white marble balusters with gilt-edged floral carvings on their terrace?’
‘To make the neighbours jealous?’
‘I tried telling them, as politely as I could…you know, beauty in simplicity, zen is so trendy, and all that, but they said they’re paying me to do what they want…’
I’d like to say ‘Which, to be honest, is true’ but decide against it. She looks flustered enough. Instead, I walk up to her and kiss the top of her head.
‘Cheer up…that’s why you’re here. To save Shillong from an onslaught of hideous architectural detail.’
Vera bends over the blueprint and mutters, ‘Too late for that.’
‘By the way,’ I stop at the door, ‘do you know anyone in the colony who owns a red Fiat?’
‘Nope. Anyway, I thought nowadays everyone only bought tasteless, oversized Safaris.’
‘Well, at least we can be sure of one thing.’
‘What’s that?’
‘The crazy driver wasn’t Jaintia.’
A few days later, over breakfast, Vera asks if I’d like to meet her cousin Charlie.
‘You mean I have a choice?’
She ignores the sarcasm and calmly pours milk over her cereal. ‘He called yesterday and said he might have a project for you.’
Charlie works as something or the other in the government. I was never sure what, and didn’t particularly care. I find him overbearing in the way government workers assured of fat salaries for the rest of their lives can be.
‘What kind of project?’ I ask.
‘He asked if you were still an animator…’
‘He didn’t say that.’
‘Okay, he asked if you were still making cartoons on the computer.’
It means nothing to mostly everyone here that I am a conceptual 3D artist who worked at a small yet increasingly successful production house in Delhi. I do not make cartoons. I animate fluids and flames—explosions, breaking glass, plumes of smoke, catastrophic waves of water. I am a superspecialist in disasters. A prophet of the apocalypse.
‘Better than some useless cog-in-the-wheel civil servant.’
Vera tries to hide a smile. She picks up an apple and slices it into almost identical-sized pieces. ‘Be kind, he did help us…’
‘…find good workers for the house. Yes, yes, I know.’
It’s the standard reason she uses to excuse fat man Charlie for all his crimes against humanity.
After that exchange, a placid silence settles over the dining table. Vera reads The Shillong Times, methodically eating fruit, while I listlessly munch on my marmalade toast and watch Seth chase after a bee. He cannot fathom why it keeps flying out of his reach. His jaws click as he snaps after it time and again. Sunlight pours in through the window—the special kind of light I’ve seen nowhere else, soft and honey gold.
‘You’ve already fixed up a meeting, haven’t you?’
Vera folds the newspaper and plants a peck on my cheek. ‘Three o’clock. This afternoon.’
Winter days are short in Shillong, and even though I leave an hour before the appointment, the sun has turned weak and mild, tugged gently away to the west, over a line of mist-green mountains. At the bottom of the hill, Bah Norman’s car passes by—the flash of a waving hand—and I remember the red Fiat. At some point, I’ll drop by to see him, I tell myself. I navigate my way through the town’s winding roads, flanked by half-constructed concrete buildings and filled with a steady stream of unwieldy traffic. It is gone now, the old Shillong of Assam-style houses with open verandas and pretty gardens, the quiet, somnolent way of life. My ever-pragmatic wife would say, ‘Stop being hopelessly nostalgic. Everywhere, everything changes. What I’m worried about is how they’re allowed to build high-rises in an earthquake zone.’
But I can’t help thinking of how things used to be when I was growing up in this small town with its little local eateries and family-owned shops. Everywhere else had felt so much further away—while all around me now were hoardings with advertisements for a dizzying array of cellphone connections, direct-to-home television, and super fast broadband Internet. I don’t know whether Shillong has caught up with the world or if the world has caught up with Shillong. Everyone seems somehow sassier, comfortable with or oblivious to the eroding power of change. By the time I reach Ward’s Lake, I am quite disheartened. I take a moment to peer through the wire fencing and am relieved to find that some things at least have stayed the same—the smooth grassy lawns that slope to lily-strewn water, the courting couples, here and there the bright bursts of red poinsettias.
The Secretariat building opposite the lake stands high and astronomically ugly, painted a curious, undecided pink. It is with no small distaste that I announce myself to Charlie’s secretary and take a seat in his office. He’s on the phone, one of several placed before him, and holds up a finger to signal that he won’t be a moment.
Ten minutes later, after I’ve been served tea and finished drinking it, he finally concludes his conversation.
‘These contractors are such a hassle,’ he says. ‘Can’t live with them, can’t live without them. Like women.’ He laughs generously at his own joke.
I don’t.
‘Vera is doing well?’
You spoke to her yesterday, you should know. ‘Yes, thank you.’
‘Must come and see the house.’
‘You must.’
‘Heard the workers did a good job.’
‘They did.’
‘Busy nowadays?’
‘There are some assignments coming in from Delhi…’
Not really, which is why I’m here in your office
‘Good, good…’ One of the phones ring, and he answers, then asks the person to call him back later.
Enough shilly-shallying, I think. ‘Vera mentioned something about a project?’
Charlie carefully places the tips of his fingers together. ‘Quite so…I don’t know whether you’ll be interested, of course, but you see, we’re revamping the Meghalaya State Tourism website…giving it a new look, more clean and modern…’
I silently object to the use of the word ‘clean’ in relation to anything concerning the government, but I try to seem keen and interested. For Vera’s sake.
‘And we’re looking for someone to work on it—design and all that. Of course, we’ll provide you with the content material. And because this is going to family,’ he smiles at me indulgently. ‘Our rates will be very generous.’
‘How much do you mean?’
When he tells me, I have to check myself from gawking. It’s a criminally large amount considering the work itself isn’t the most challenging.
‘So, think about it, and let me know.’
I say I will, in a few days.
‘Tell me, why did you move back here?’ He gestures vaguely at the window. ‘Shillong is so backward; you can’t compare it to Delhi. And Vera has lived all over the world.’
I can tell him that, when it comes to my line of work, he’s right. I will have to depend on the kindness of my colleagues in the capital to keep projects coming my way until I can find steady work in town or around the area. But sometimes, I could explain, one makes adjustments and sacrifices, especially for someone they love. That home and ageing parents also matter. That there is such a thing as living a life of grace.
However, I don’t need
to because the phone rings again. Before he answers, he hastily bids me goodbye. I’m glad the meeting is over. When I step out, the sky is overcast, but it doesn’t look like rain. The air is cold yet dry. I take a taxi halfway home to Dhankheti, sharing the back seat with a family from a village near Sohra. I gather from their conversation with the chatty driver that they’re in Shillong to have someone seen at the hospital. ‘He’s meant to visit our village every week,’ the man says, referring to a government employed doctor, ‘but he hasn’t shown up for six months.’ They huddle in their places, awkward and uncomfortable, overwhelmed by the sudden, bustling vastness around them. I think of Charlie in his office, his desk, his phones, his short fingers. As darkness rapidly falls outside the car windows, I remember a line in the book on Khasi dreams and mythology I’ve been reading recently. It explains, most severely, that ‘There are nine circles of punishment a sinful soul passes through. The last of which is the worst and called the realm of the dog.’ I’m hoping like crazy that this is true.
The next evening, I take Seth for a walk earlier than usual. The house is empty and quiet; Vera has errands to run in town, after she meets, albeit grudgingly, her Jaintia client. Seth is pleased at this unexpected treat. He gallops along and happily greets a group of schoolchildren who fuss over him for a while. As we approach the turning where the Fiat nearly hit us, I see Bah Norman in his garden, giving instructions to a lady watering the flower beds.
‘Kumno,’ he shouts across the hedge. He’s a man with a slight, ageless frame and a booming voice.
‘Hello, Bah Norman.’
We make polite conversation, about the weather and how it promises to be another biting winter, the local football clubs, and a little politics in relation to some multi-crore scam in town recently unearthed by an activist. Then I ask him about the red Fiat.
‘Why?’ he asks, a frown flitting across his face.
‘It almost knocked us over,’ I reply, gesturing to Seth who is vigorously sniffing at a street lamp.
‘I’m sorry to hear that, and in our colony…If I’m not mistaken, the car belongs to Dariti. She lives there,’ he says pointing up the hill, ‘in the last house near the forest. I can have a word with her, if you like, but…it’s strange considering she hardly ever goes out.’
Boats on Land: A Collection of Short Stories Page 19
