by Diksha Basu
Mrs. Ray tugged at the string of her petticoat and allowed it to fall in a puddle at her feet. Yes, her thighs had some cellulite and her knees looked crumpled, but her legs were not so bad. Yoga had given her thighs a hint of a vertical line of muscle, and her body was strong. She did not look like a Bollywood star, but she also did not look like someone who had to spend her days in oversized nighties ignoring her body. Mrs. Ray pulled her jeans back on and put on a black sweater and a pair of small gold earrings. She went to her cupboard and found her brown wedge-heeled sandals and stepped into them. She dabbed perfume on her wrists and two coats of lipstick on her lips. She picked up her black eyeliner and lined her lower lids. She blinked in the mirror. She picked up the eyeliner again and lined her upper lids, lifting the line at the edges to create a slight cat-eye effect that she had not tried since her college days.
The doorbell rang at eight fifteen. Thank God Upen wasn’t the kind to show up at eight when invited for eight. Mrs. Ray walked through the living room to the front door and stopped to see the candles. How could she possibly have thought candles were a good idea? How embarrassing. She stooped to blow out the seven candles that she had lit across the room. A faint smell of smoke wafted through the air as the wicks smoldered. He would know she had candles lit earlier. The doorbell rang again and Mrs. Ray quickly waved her sofa cushions in the air to make the smoke disappear. She pushed the candles behind books and lamps and walked to open the door. Upen was there holding a bouquet with four orchids in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other.
“I hope you have a long vase,” Upen said, handing Mrs. Ray the flowers. “Or we will just have to drink four bottles of wine and place one flower in each bottle.”
She smiled and took the flowers from him—Shatrugan would be very suspicious of her accountant. Maybe she could have left the candles lit after all.
“Come in. Please sit. Make yourself at home. Shoes on or off is up to you—I don’t have any strict rules here,” Mrs. Ray said. “Would you like a glass of wine? Should I open this bottle? Or I can open the wine I have in the fridge, but it’s only Indian wine, I’m afraid. It’s hard to get imported wines in this neighborhood. I also have other drinks though—vodka, whiskey, gin. I can make you a gin and tonic if you prefer.”
She was talking too much. She hadn’t, she realized, had a drink with a man in this home since her husband had died. The only other men who even entered were workers—electricians, carpenters, plumbers—and Mr. Jha a few times, but always with Mrs. Jha, and always only for a cup of tea. No other men had entered her home in the past few years.
“Reema,” Upen said, laughing. “You seem tense.”
“No, no. Oh no. Let me just get us our drinks. Did you say wine? I’ll get wine. Oh no. Please—don’t come to the kitchen,” she said as he moved toward her. She didn’t want him to see her kitchen. Her kitchen was messy, countertops stained and sticky, the walls in need of painting. “Please just sit. I’ll bring us drinks.”
Upen grabbed her elbow and pulled her toward him. Her body tensed and tightened.
“Wine is fine,” he said. “But first let me do this because otherwise I’ll keep thinking about it until I do it and then we’ll both end up as awkward and tense as you are. So let’s get it over with and then we can enjoy the rest of the evening together.”
And he kissed her. He put both his hands on her shoulders and pulled her in and kissed her. She felt his beard, his skin, his lips and even, she inhaled sharply, a hint of his tongue. Her body remained tense; her arms hung by her side. She wished she could bring herself to reach up and touch him, to let him know she liked this, but she couldn’t move. He released her, let go of her shoulders, and stepped back.
“Was that okay?” he asked.
Mrs. Ray smiled and nodded.
“It was okay. No. It was more than okay. Thank you. For, you know, getting that over with,” Mrs. Ray said, smiling, calmer now. Her hands moved up to touch her own face, which felt hot.
“Try to participate next time,” Upen said, laughing. “We’ll practice. But for now, the wine.”
They drank the first bottle of wine before they even sat for dinner, and they talked without a break, without a single awkward pause. Mrs. Ray couldn’t get the kiss out of her mind, but Upen seemed unaffected. He talked again of travel—his recent trip alone to Vietnam. Vietnam. She had just assumed she would never again leave India, but sitting here, listening to him talk, she was no longer so sure. After all, the Jhas, older than her, had just been to New York. Did she have to assume the doors to the world were closed for her?
“There’s so much of the world to see, Reema,” Upen said, and rested his hand against her thigh. “Japan. Have you been to Japan? I want to go there next. For the cherry blossoms.”
“Japan?” Mrs. Ray said. Of course she hadn’t been to Japan.
“And Cambodia. Of course all the usual places like Europe and Brazil and Argentina, but recently I’ve been excited about exploring more of Asia,” Upen said, the tension of his hand increasing and decreasing against her leg. “The world is just so endlessly fascinating.”
She would travel, Mrs. Ray decided. She would start small—maybe take a trip to Jaipur. And she would try to see the world as fascinating, she promised herself.
“What about you?” Upen said. “What’s on your bucket list?”
“Bucket list?”
“You know—list of things to do or see before you die,” Upen said.
“I’ve never heard that term before. Where does it come from?”
“I’m not too sure. I believe ‘kicking the bucket’ used to be a term for dying, but I’m not sure where that came from.”
“I doubt it was Indian. You say ‘kicking the bucket’ and I just think of moving the bucket aside when I’m finished with my bath; I don’t think of death.”
What was on her bucket list? Being in Mayur Palli day in and day out with nothing new was like being dead before dying. This kind of widowhood wasn’t that different from throwing herself on her husband’s funeral pyre. No, she was being dramatic, she told herself. It was the wine. She would give some thought to her bucket list. Right now, the only thing she could think of was that she wanted to kiss Upen again before she died. Mrs. Ray opened another bottle of wine as they sat down to eat.
“What keeps you here?” Upen asked halfway through the meal.
“Here, as in?”
“Here. Delhi, East Delhi. What keeps you here? Why don’t you move?”
“And go where? Start over how? This city, this country, doesn’t make it easy for single women. You know that. It’s changing—the next generation will have it easier, thank God. But where would I go? I don’t know anything else.”
“Come to Chandigarh,” Upen said.
Mrs. Ray laughed. She wiped her hands on the paper napkin and poured the last of the second bottle of wine into Upen’s glass. How had they finished two bottles already? She was going to have a headache in the morning. And, say what you will, a meal without a nonvegetarian dish just didn’t feel like a full meal, so the alcohol was having even more of an effect.
“I’m serious. Come with me. No, more than that. Marry me. Marry me and then come with me to Chandigarh,” Upen said.
“You’ve had too much wine. We both have.”
“That’s probably true,” Upen said.
“Should I put on some coffee?” Mrs. Ray asked.
“But let’s discuss this anyway. Even if it’s because of the wine. Let’s discuss it when we aren’t thinking straight so I can convince you—and myself. Don’t worry, I’m not completely insane. I hear how crazy this idea is. And I’m not sure either, but let’s just talk. And then we can revisit it tomorrow morning over breakfast. With coffee.”
So he was planning to spend the night, Mrs. Ray thought.
“You ask someone to marry you after kissing her just once?” she said, smiling and shaking her head. She stood and picked up both of their plates and walked toward the kitchen. Sh
e was still smiling to herself as she dropped the plates into the sink and ran water over them. She stopped for a moment and imagined having a home with him, picking out bedsheets, agreeing on a brand of soap, and deciding which pictures to frame for the wall. She pictured sitting on a balcony and having a glass of wine with dinner and discussing buying brighter bedside lamps so they could read in bed at night together. She imagined offering him dessert every night, not just tonight.
“Would you like—” she was shouting out to the living room when she turned and saw Upen standing in the doorway of the kitchen, bringing her the dishes from the dining table.
“How many times did you kiss your husband before you decided to marry him?” he asked.
“You don’t need to help with the dishes. Just sit. I’ve got some dessert,” she said, taking the bowls from him at the door and edging him back out.
“How many times?”
She smiled at him. “Zero.”
“Exactly,” Upen said, walking back to the dining room. “And you had a perfectly happy marriage. Bring some more wine. I think we have reason to celebrate tonight.”
Mrs. Ray returned to the dining room with another bottle of wine and a bowl of four gulab jamuns.
“Do you prefer your gulab jamuns hot or cold?” she asked.
“Either way, Reema. But what do you think? Should we do it? They say you’re only young once, but you’re also only middle-aged once. We should take advantage. Why leave all the fun, impulsive things to the youth? Look at it this way: at our age…well, you’re younger than me so let’s say at our stage, there’s less left to lose. Everyone else talks about us anyway. Your guard downstairs asked me if I was your accountant.”
Mrs. Ray laughed.
“That may have been my fault,” she said.
“We discussed this—the fact that arranged marriages have worked so well for years and years and years,” Upen said. “What’s the difference here? We know each other better than either of us knew our spouses before we married them. We just no longer have parents to set us up. But that shouldn’t stand in the way of companionship.”
“But your wife had an affair,” Mrs. Ray said.
“So? We were happy for quite a while. And then we weren’t anymore. That had nothing to do with the marriage being arranged or love.”
“You’re funny,” Mrs. Ray said.
“I’m being serious,” Upen said, no longer laughing. “The next generation gets to fall in love. Our generation had our love planned for us. But we’re stuck in the middle. What was arranged for us fell through and we can hardly go online looking for a fellow widow or divorcé—India doesn’t have those websites as far as I know, at least not yet. Hopefully they will in the future—I still think you should start a website for widows to find new love; aftershaadi.com, maybe? But until enough people start to think it’s socially acceptable, what are the rest of us supposed to do? We’re too young to give up, don’t you think? And it isn’t just that—God, that sounds awful. I don’t mean to say we’re each other’s last resort. I mean I like you—I really like you. And you like me. And we should be together all the time.”
Mrs. Ray handed him a bowl with a gulab jamun and one scoop of vanilla ice cream and took one bowl for herself. Upen put the bowl down on the table without touching the food and said, “I’m being completely serious. Spend the rest of your life with me.”
Mrs. Ray sat down on the sofa and put her bowl of dessert down on the coffee table.
“And if it doesn’t work, we get…divorced?”
“What happened to all your romance talk? Who mentions divorce in the middle of a proposal?” Upen said with a laugh, and sat down next to her. “Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, but yes, if it doesn’t work, we get divorced.”
“But, divorce…,” Mrs. Ray trailed off.
“What? Yes, divorce. It’s no longer the end of the world, you know. I’ve survived a divorce before. We’ll be gentle with each other; we’re too old to be petty. But we won’t get divorced! I’m trying to ask you to marry me; stop talking about divorce!”
He pulled Mrs. Ray closer to him on the sofa.
“I’m trying to think of a reason to say no, but I can’t seem to come up with any,” she said, smiling. What she wanted was to say yes. What she wanted was to throw her arms around him with happiness. What she wanted was to feel this way forever. Was it possible? Was it allowed? Who made the rules once your parents died and your husband died and your only friend moved away and the rest of the world seemed to forget about you? Could she just say yes and choose to be happy? Was it really that simple?
“Then say yes.”
“As simple as that?”
“As simple as that,” Upen said.
“But not a big wedding. That would be embarrassing.”
“A court wedding.”
“Maybe followed by a small dinner with our friends,” Mrs. Ray added.
“Why not?” Upen said.
“Why not,” Mrs. Ray said, and picked up her dessert bowl. Then she put it back down and leaned over and kissed Upen on the mouth.
Mrs. Jha had hardly been able to make eye contact with Rupak since he had arrived at two a.m. She had not even been able to go downstairs to see him even though she was wide awake when she heard the taxi pull up outside.
“You sleep,” Mr. Jha had said. “Tomorrow will be a long day. I will open the gate and let Rupak in and make sure he is okay.”
Under any other circumstances, she would have refused. In fact, she would have insisted on being at the airport to greet him. But tonight, she did not know how to face him. When her husband went downstairs, Mrs. Jha got up and looked out the window. The taxi pulled into their driveway and Rupak got out, looking less sloppy than he had been of late. He was wearing dark jeans and a long-sleeved shirt with actual buttons. His hair was cut neatly and his face was clean-shaven. He had made an effort because he knew he had failed them, Mrs. Jha thought. Her son knew he was a disappointment. She saw Mr. Jha patting him on his back while laughing, and she felt grateful to her husband for being nice to Rupak. She wanted to go downstairs and hold him and hug him and tell him that it was going to be okay and they would help him overcome this and whatever other problems he had, but she also wanted to slap him across the face and tell him that she had raised him better than this. She had not raised him to do drugs. But she did not say any of that. Instead she went back to bed and pretended to be asleep when Mr. Jha came back in.
In the morning, Rupak and Mr. Jha were both fast asleep and Mrs. Jha was grateful for the silence in the house. She was starting to get used to the quiet mornings and the sound of birds. In Mayur Palli, she had not realized how much she missed the quiet. There, mornings were filled with sounds of people living lives—dishes clanking in kitchens punctuated by the hissing of pressure cookers, neighbors paying milkmen, maids gossiping in hallways, cleaners listening to loud Bollywood music while washing the cars parked downstairs. In Gurgaon, all she heard in the mornings was the distant rumble of a truck on the main road. Mrs. Jha made a cup of tea and sat with it and the cordless phone on a cane chair on the small marble patio in front of the front door. She was about to call Mrs. Ray to find out how things were going with her and Upen when Rupak came out and joined her on the porch. She hung up the phone while it was ringing.
“Papa seems pretty excited about me meeting the neighbors. Do you need me to do anything before they come over?”
“No, nothing. You settle in. I’m sure you’re tired. You relax. I’ll see to everything,” Mrs. Jha said in a rush. She was startled by the phone ringing in her hand.
“Hello?”
“Bindu? Did you call just now?” Mrs. Ray said. “Is he home? Is everything okay?”
“I did, but I’m just a bit tied up now. I’ll give you a call back later tonight or tomorrow morning.”
“Okay, call soon. I have some good news to share,” Mrs. Ray said.
“Maybe I’ll come to Mayur Palli next weekend and se
e you. I miss it,” Mrs. Jha said. She looked over at Rupak sitting on the cane chair, looking like an adult.
“Is that Reema Aunty? Tell her I say hello,” Rupak said.
“So we’ll speak soon,” Mrs. Jha said, and put down the phone.
“She was in a rush but we’ll invite her over soon. I better go see what your father wants for breakfast,” Mrs. Jha said, and got up, picked up the newspaper, empty cup, and cordless phone and went back into the house.
Drugs. That had never been her world. Even when she was young, she was never rebellious. She knew that when she was in college, many people in Delhi were experimenting with drugs, but she had never gone near any of it. What was she supposed to say to him? Was she supposed to ignore it? Was she supposed to act happy that he was home?
“I really wish we were having a quiet family dinner tonight,” Mrs. Jha said to Mr. Jha in their bedroom. The windows were large, nearly floor to ceiling, but outside all you could see was darkness. They hardly ever bothered pulling the curtains shut in Gurgaon. Mrs. Jha wondered what they would look like to someone standing on the street. Yellow lighting, a bed with more pillows than two people would ever use, and a normal, well-to-do middle-aged couple getting ready for an evening with friends. Mr. Jha held his skinny tie from New York up against his collar. He was wearing brown slacks and a darker brown collared shirt.
