Insects Are Just Like You and Me Except Some of Them Have Wings

by Kuzhali Manickavel

  •

  On the way home, Kalai looked down at her hands and began to miss them. She suddenly wondered if there were precautionary measures she should take, if there was some kind of compensation available somewhere.

  “Aparna used to say ‘bloody babies’, remember?” said Shivani. “She never said ‘bloody hell’ or ‘bloody fuck’. If it was something really mind-blowing she said ‘bloodybastardbitch’. No babies.”

  “Bloodybastardbitchbabies.”

  “I actually thought she would become a banker. Somewhere in Coimbatore or Trichy maybe. I thought she’d have a room at the YWCA and she would go to church on Sunday. She would convert to Christianity and go to church, that’s what I thought.”

  Shivani frowned and waved her forefinger in the air.

  “I think I was mostly right, no?” she said. “What do you think?”

  “I think that if it doesn’t rain soon my hands are going to explode.”

  •

  On their next visit, Kalai noticed that Aparna’s house was in exactly the same state as they had left it. The American relatives were still sleeping with their socks on, the local relatives were still cutting vegetables and Aparna was still wearing the same clothes. Her room smelled sour and a laptop was glowing on the bed.

  “I had Damayanthi’s email,” said Aparna. “She emailed back. And then I had to chat with her. I’m waiting for her to go to sleep. Isn’t it night over there? Shouldn’t she be sleeping now?”

  “I think she just pinged you,” said Shivani. “Hey-babe-you-there.”

  Aparna slumped down on the floor and yawned.

  “I actually saw this coming,” said Shivani. “I wrote it down. In red, see?”

  “She sent pictures of this trip she took to Vietnam,” said Aparna. “Why would anyone go to Vietnam?”

  “Or Germany,” said Kalai. “I never got why people went to Germany.”

  “Take me out,” said Aparna, getting up. “The two of you should take me out.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I’m getting married. Buy me lunch or something. Take me to a movie. You have to take me someplace.”

  They waited in the corridor while Aparna got ready. Kalai sat on the floor and tried to flex her fingers.

  “Why do we have to take her someplace? I don’t want to take her someplace,” said Kalai.

  “We’ll drive around and then she’ll get bored,” said Shivani, frowning at her chart. “I’m going to need another sheet of paper.”

  •

  They hoped that Aparna would eventually ask them to take her home but she didn’t. They ended up at Shivani’s place, which was perched like an afterthought on a corner of somebody’s roof. As soon as they arrived, Aparna sat down on the floor and took out a bottle of vodka and a notebook from her bag.

  “So Kalai,” said Aparna. “What do you say when people ask why you’re still single?”

  “I tell them my genitals fell off,” said Kalai.

  “How do you say genitals in Tamil?”

  “I don’t actually say genitals. I pat my upper thigh and say ellaamai veezhinthiduchu.1”

  “I hope you both have eaten something,” said Shivani. “You guys can’t be sick here, there’s no water. I only get water in the morning and evening.”

  “Do you know this old Tamil song?” said Aparna. “Kaalam oru naal maarum / Nam kaavalaigal yaavum theerum / Varuvathu yennee sirikindren / Vanthathu yenne azhukindren.2”

  “No but have you ever noticed how old Tamil songs sometimes sound Chinese?” said Kalai. “I think it’s all those twangy stringed instruments.”

  “How come there are no Tamil songs about genitals?” said Aparna. “How come I know the name for genitals in other languages but not in Tamil? Why is life fucked up like that?”

  Shivani suddenly appeared holding a plate of fried eggs.

  “What are you doing?” said Kalai.

  “You don’t eat eggs?”

  “Why are you giving us eggs?”

  “You have to eat something, I’m not having you two puking all over my house, there’s no water.”

  “Kanavu kaanum vazhkaiyaavum / Kalainthu pohum kolangal,” sang Aparna. “Thuduppu kuda baaram endru / Karaiye thaidum odangal3.”

  Aparna’s song slowly disintegrated into a mess of sobs. She crumpled into a hiccoughing pile of broken girl, her elbows and knees flapping as if they were unsure of what to do.

  “Don’t cry,” said Kalai, even though it seemed like a very useless thing to say.

  “I want to know how this happened,” sobbed Aparna. “How did all this happen?”

  “Nothing happened,” said Kalai.

  “Exactly!”

  “Nothing happens to a lot of people.”

  “Then what’s the fucking point?”

  Kalai became aware of her wrists, dangling beside her like broken tree branches. She couldn’t feel her hands and for a second she wondered if they had fallen off.

  “How about a boiled egg?” said Shivani. “Or an omelet?”

  •

  Aparna sipped her vodka with a straw while Shivani dusted her bookshelf, swept the floor and rearranged her refrigerator. The plate of fried eggs hardened on the table and Kalai felt her hands grow heavier under the strain of the rainless sky and alcohol. She remembered a cartoon character whose hands kept changing into large hams and she thought, so that’s what they mean. This is what they were trying to say. She began to bounce her hands on the ground, watching her fingers flail and curl like fat worms.

  “I’m going to ask the landlady for extra buckets, evening water will be coming soon,” said Shivani. “Make sure Aparna doesn’t puke. If she does, make her puke in the garbage can.”

  “What if I puke?” asked Kalai.

  “What did I just say, puke in the garbage can. I don’t have a special place for your vomit.”

  Kalai slumped against the wall, overcome with mournful feelings and nausea. She saw herself laden with possibilities, each one hanging from her chest like a dead baby. Be proactive Kalai, she said to herself. Make a fist. Pray for rain. Wear a sari so the young men can see your waist. Carry your breasts like offerings. Don’t fart in public.

  Aparna suddenly lurched up, clutching her notebook.

  “Have you ever felt like all you had left was the box?” she said. “Like you used everything else and then there was just the box?”

  “What box?” said Kalai.

  “Sometimes I think how we’re born with these things—”

  “Birth defects.”

  “No, we’re born with things and they’re like… ice sculptures. And it’s like if we don’t do something with the ice sculpture it melts and we are left with nothing. There’s just the box. I mean if ice sculptures came in boxes, that’s all that would be left. You know?”

  “That’s birth defects, what you’re talking about. Sometimes they go away. I had a mole and I thought it would go away once.”

  Aparna stumbled across the room to the balcony, which had enough room for half a person to stand in. She climbed on the cement railing, swaying slightly.

  “Kalai I’m so sorry your genitals fell off,” said Aparna. “I don’t know how you’ll find a man now, considering you aren’t very good-looking.”

  “What are you going to do?” said Kalai.

  “Jump I guess. I can’t think of anything else worth doing, can you?”

  “Be proactive.”

  “This is proactive. It’s something as opposed to nothing.”

  “Oh, then that’s different. Then yes.”

  “Then you think I should do it?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “You think I should jump off this balcony and kill myself.”

  “I really do.”

  Aparna nodded and climbed down again. She walked towards Kalai with huge, careful steps and then paused, as if she was thinking about something.

  “You stupid, scummy fuck,” she said.

  “Hmm?”

  Apar
na suddenly began hammering her notebook into Kalai’s ear.

  “YOU STUPID SCUMMY FUCK,” she shrieked. “Is that what you do? Is that what you say when someone is about to jump off a fucking balcony?

  “Stop that!” yelled Kalai.

  “You bloodybastardbitch! What the hell’s wrong with you?”

  “You’re hitting my ear!”

  “You stand there and tell me to jump? Is that what you do? You scummy dumbfuck!”

  Kalai tried to cover her head with her hands but she couldn’t feel them anymore. They’ve finally exploded she thought. It’s finally going to rain.

  •

  Kalai was floating above twisty canals filled with vodka and ships. Her hands had become so huge that her fingernails were falling off, crashing into the canals and creating small tidal waves. The sailors whistled at her from below and said hey baby, hey girliegirlie.

  “Thank you, you are too kind,” Kalai called out. “Do any of you gentlemen know if it will rain soon?”

  “Blow us a kiss and we’ll tell you.”

  “Oh I couldn’t possibly.”

  “Throw down your panties then.”

  “I can’t get them off, my hands don’t work.”

  “You’re a waste of time,” said the sailors, spitting into the canal. “We hope you get struck by lightning.”

  Kalai watched the ships disappear into tiny pink and orange sunsets. She thought it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to be struck by lightning, to drown in twisty canals filled with vodka.

  •

  Kalai woke up on the floor with a pillow under her head. Shivani was sitting beside her, reading a magazine.

  “Sleeping beauty!” said Shivani.

  “She hit me in the ear, da,” groaned Kalai, clutching her head.

  “Hey guess what! I got four extra buckets of water today! You could even have a bath if you want! I mean, as long as you don’t wash your hair. And not a long bath also.”

  “I can’t hear anything, it’s all ringy.”

  “Want to see a doctor? There’s one just down the road, his name is Dr. Elvis Siluvairajan, does some kind of Muslim herb medicine or something. Which is strange I guess, considering his name is Elvis Siluvairajan.”

  “Where are my earrings?”

  “I think they flew off when she hit you. Some were on the floor but I think you’re missing a few.”

  “They’re probably inside my ear. She kept hitting my ear.”

  “They’re probably in your hair.”

  Kalai closed her eyes and tried to think of proactive things but she could only remember the sailors and how they spat into the canals.

  “Did you write this down?” asked Kalai.

  “Did I write what down?”

  “That she kept hitting me in the ear like a crazy person? I think you should write that down.”

  “I can’t remember where I put that paper, did you see it anywhere?”

  Shivani picked up a magazine, shook it out and frowned.

  “Oh well,” she said.

  Kalai took a safety pin from her necklace, opened it and stabbed her thumb, feeling a wave of relief as the blood ballooned out like a tiny ruby.

  1 “They all fell.”

  2 “The times will eventually change / Our troubles will come to an end / I laugh at what the future holds / I weep at what the past has held.”

  3 “Every dream in life / Is just a design that will dissolve / Even when the oars become a burden / The boats start looking for the shore.”

  The Entomologist’s smile is a tiny half moon, weak and incapable of casting any light.

  “They will reconsider?” he asks.

  “No, there’s nothing they can do,” says Malar. “You have to leave.” Her mouth is sticky and sour from the heat but the Entomologist has only one bottle of water in his room. She wonders what will happen if she dehydrates and dies here.

  “You told them who I was?” he asks.

  “Yes.”

  “And what did they say?”

  “They said there’s nothing they can do. You have till Friday.”

  “Perhaps I should write them another letter.”

  “That won’t help.”

  The Entomologist runs his fingers along the wall as if he is trying to find a secret door.

  “Uncle, Friday means Friday. Okay?”

  Malar watches as his hands crumple like dying spiders.

  “Say okay.”

  The Entomologist nods but doesn’t say anything.

  •

  Malar knows how to make killing jars. She has chronicled the life and death of the coconut beetle and arranged local butterflies in alphabetical order. She has paid the Entomologist’s electric bills, swept his floor and made arrangements for his drinking water because she is a good person.

  In the night she dreams that his room is carpeted with a thick green meadow. The sun glows in the corner, stabbing the grass in broad, fierce lines. Two large butterflies skirt the walls and the Entomologist chases them with a net and bottle.

  “Don’t clap your hands!” he says as he disappears under the sink. Malar looks down and sees millions of tiny butterflies burrowing into her palm, trying to fly from the tips of her fingers. She clenches her fists and feels the floor liquefy between her toes.

  •

  The next day Malar finds the Entomologist sitting on the floor with a pen and paper.

  “I’m writing another letter,” he says. “I don’t think the other ones were strong enough.”

  Malar takes down his butterfly collection and arranges the boxes on the table.

  “Why don’t you wait?” says the Entomologist. “I think they might reconsider. This is a very strong letter.”

  Under his bed she finds newspapers bundled and stacked like building blocks. The Entomologist once said that words were sacred and should never be touched with the feet. Malar drags the bundles out to the head of the stairs. Then she kicks them down, one by one.

  •

  Malar is sitting on the grass in the Entomologist’s room. She can hear the newspapers at the bottom of the stairs, wailing and cursing her with constipation and perennial bad breath. A large butterfly with shoe brushes on its feet hovers next to her, waiting for an explanation.

  “Well it’s not like I could carry them down by myself,” Malar says. “It’s not like he was going to help me.”

  Another butterfly with cobweb wings flutters above her head. The newspapers hope that Malar will get vaginal warts and grow a beard.

  “Things are so much easier with a killing jar. It’s quieter, you know,” says the Cobweb Butterfly. “Have you ever been inside a killing jar?”

  Malar rolls her eyes.

  “I can’t fit inside a killing jar, silly.”

  “Nobody can,” says the butterfly.

  •

  The next day Malar brings a borrowed suitcase. The Entomologist has barricaded himself into a corner behind his butterfly collection.

  “I’m not leaving,” he says.

  “Yes you are.”

  “What can they do? Will they throw me out in the street?”

  “Yes.”

  “They can’t do that. I’m an academician. I’ve been here for twenty years.”

  Malar begins piling his clothes into the suitcase. The scent of naphthalene settles on her tongue and she realizes that the Entomologist has always smelled like insect repellent.

  “What about the butterflies?” she asks.

  “I’m not going anywhere,” says the Entomologist.

  “You can take them in your hand or I can put them in the suitcase, there’s still room.”

  “You’re not listening to me.”

  “Or we can pack them tomorrow,” she says. “I have to see the landlord about your key now anyway.”

  The landlord thinks that Malar is a saint and a blessing. Sometimes he makes his wife bring her ginger tea.

  “Did you try speaking to the new owners?” asks the landlord.

  �
��They said there’s nothing they can do.”

  “That’s a shame. It’s a blessing you’re here to help him at least. Else imagine! Where would he go?”

  Malar thinks the Entomologist would probably sit in the street surrounded by his butterfly collection. He would sit there until someone ran him over.

  “I’m not doing anything great,” says Malar and the landlord shakes his head vigorously.

  “No, no. You’re a blessing. You’re really a blessing. Have you managed to pack everything?”

  “Everything except him,” she says and they laugh. Malar feels her teeth flash like pieces of broken glass.

  •

  It is raining in the Entomologist’s room and the clouds are bumping against Malar’s forehead like bundles of wet cloth. The butterflies are under the sink, shaking the water from their wings.

  “It’s almost done you know,” says Malar. “All I have to do is get him out of the room.”

  “You’ll never do it without a killing jar,” says the Cobweb Butterfly.

  “I don’t need a killing jar. Besides, he won’t fit.”

  “It’s not that hard,” says the Shoe Brush Butterfly. “Everything in this world can fold, you know.”

  Malar doesn’t think she will be able to fold the Entomologist that far. Even if she does she has a feeling he will break the bottle.

  “I really don’t think he will fit,” she says.

  “Nobody fits into a killing jar,” says the Cobweb Butterfly. “They have to be put.”

  The rain begins to pound into Malar’s skull like a shower of gravel. She wonders if she will catch a cold.

  “Well good luck,” says the Shoe Brush Butterfly. “Good luck from both of us.”

  The butterflies dip and soar into the thunderstorm like tiny slips of paper.

  •

  The Entomologist cuts a wobbly diagonal with his toes—sometimes an arc, sometimes a line. Sometimes he doesn’t seem to be moving at all. Malar looks at his bloodied eyes and marvels that the ceiling fan didn’t break.

  Before hanging himself the Entomologist smashed every single one of his butterfly specimen boxes. Malar thinks he probably threw them on the floor, one by one. Or maybe he put his foot through them. She is not sure if he crushed the butterflies himself or whether they simply fell apart once the glass was broken. She finds a few specimen tags; Gossamer-Winged Butterfly, Brush-Footed Butterfly, Skipper Butterfly. She irons them out with her hand and places them on the table in alphabetical order.