Gavin teased, “So will you be getting one of those arranged marriages then? I suspect a fancy bird like you would be quite the catch.”
She said, “No, not yet,” but wondered if her mother had indeed begun. “I have a couple more years before I’m considered an old maid. My family is originally from the state of Gujarat, the state Gandhi was from, that borders Pakistan. There are so many different communities of Indians living in Bombay and most people get married within their own community, especially Gujaratis.”
Gavin said, “I work with a couple of Pakistani blokes in the kitchen. Are they like Gujaratis?”
Jyoti laughed. “No. Pakistan and India have fought several wars.” She explained how she was at first confused by the term Paki—a word that some British used to describe all brown people. “Most Indians would find the word abhorrent,” she told him, “not only because it’s derogatory, but also because to be compared to a Pakistani would be the greatest insult to most Hindu-Indians.”
“So your parents don’t like Pakistanis? What about Irish?”
She considered telling him how her mother would have a fit if she knew about the two of them seeing each other but decided instead to say, “Actually, my parents are reasonably open-minded,” which was true, compared to most Gujaratis. “But there are levels of racism in Hindu-Indian culture.” Jyoti smiled, hoping he wouldn’t be repulsed by it, explaining, “The worse thing you could be is a Pakistani Muslim. But I suppose if you were filthy rich it might not matter.”
They laughed, but Jyoti less so, knowing how much truth there was to the joke. “What’s your family like?” she asked.
“My parents divorced when I was nine. Me da’s in Yorkshire. See him once a year. Mum’s in Dublin. I grew up with her. My parents were one of the first ones to get divorced on our Cath-aholic street. We stopped going to church and became outcasts. But nowadays, only half the people from our street go to church, and just about as many are divorced.”
“Do you go to church?”
“Only at Christmas with my mum. It’s fantastically boring.”
Jyoti told Gavin how her mother went to the temple every day, how she fasted on auspicious days throughout the year.
“Do you fast as well?” he asked.
“Not since I’ve been here. But I did back home.” She realized it wasn’t something she ever questioned, she just did as her mother did. “I’m not terribly religious but I kind of miss the temple. I took it for granted—the incense, the bells, walking barefoot on the cool marble floor. I promised my mother I’d go to temple here every week but I’ve only gone a couple of times. It’s just not the same as the one at home. Should I feel guilty?”
“No,” Gavin said. “Catholics invented guilt.”
He asked about arranged marriages again. She explained, “It’s virtually every parent’s dream to have a child with a fortunate kundali. They’re even used in arranged marriages to see if the young couple might be a suitable match.”
Gavin was fascinated. “So do you know yours?”
She’d never told anyone. Kundalis were as self-indulgent and gimmicky as the horoscopes she loved reading in the back of her Bollywood magazines.
“Come on, out with it,” he said.
She said, “Well, I think he said something about being intelligent and that I would have a perfect marriage with my equal, my soulmate, and have at least one son. How sexist! He didn’t even mention if I’d have any daughters.”
The setting sun cast a brilliant wash of colours over the sky: bright oranges suffused with pinks and crimsons, creamy magentas melting into shades of azure blue, all beautifully reflected on the duck pond. From far off, faint sounds of celebration were heard: car horns honking and young people shouting with glee into the evening air. The city was no doubt celebrating the election results. Gavin held her hand as they watched the ducks in the pond.
GAVIN WALKED JYOTI home, holding hands. Were they officially a couple? She wasn’t sure how these things worked. Jyoti reminded herself to ask her friend Carmen who’d noticed Gavin on campus recently and surreptitiously raised an eyebrow at Jyoti to indicate he was cute. They’d talked about it a bit after the movie they’d all went to but Jyoti had avoided the subject.
It doesn’t matter what Carmen-Farmen thinks! You’re here for your studies! Her mother’s voice was reasonable this time. Soon, she’d be back home and Gavin would forget about her. He’s a cook, for god’s sake!
At the door to her flat, Gavin said, “Well, I suppose I should be getting along.” They kissed.
Their tongues exploring each other’s wine-stained mouths triggered something deep inside her—it felt a little like being on a Ferris wheel: just when you reached the apex and began the journey back down there was a slight moment of weightlessness, of uncertainty, a slight loss of equilibrium, and in that moment you were scared, a little unsure, but thrilled, because even though you knew the chances of plummeting to your death were infinitesimally small, it was possible, and not knowing with any certainty of what would happen next is what Gavin elicited in her, a type of vertigo that she’d become addicted to.
She said, “Stay,” and closed the door behind him.
What if he’s a rapist?
The new voice that spoke back to her mother shocked her and she let it grow.
What if I’m in love with him? What if he’s the love of my life? The one that my kundali foresaw?
On the couch, she clambered on top of him and kissed him with reckless passion.
From underneath Jyoti, Gavin said, “Um, m-m-maybe we should slow down?”
She looked at him and saw in his eyes that like her, he was a bit afraid, a virgin. She let her desire lead her and kissed him deeply. They undressed each other while kissing and their bodies entwined.
- 23 -
1997
AFTER CLEANING THE ENTIRE FLAT, Jyoti repositioned a few knick-knacks on the mantel. She wanted everything to be perfect for her mother’s visit. They hadn’t seen each other in eight months. On the one hand, she missed her family, but she’d also gotten accustomed to living on her own, and was now a little anxious at the prospect of her mother staying with her for two weeks.
How ungrateful! We’re spending a small fortune on you in London and this is how you think of your parents? The least she could do was show her mother around the city: museums, parks, a musical in the West End—maybe Les Misérables. Gavin had taken Jyoti to bohemian theatre, which was always in odd venues like at the back of pubs, outdoor parks, or abandoned car washes in the suburbs. Some of the shows were interesting, others baffling, but of course that kind of theatre would only perplex her mother, if not induce an arrhythmia from the language or nudity.
No, Jyoti reminded herself while rearranging some of Dr. Asli’s tiny porcelain ballerinas on the mantel, I will not think about Gavin.
When Gavin had come by the LSE to pick her up a few days ago, she’d broken the news to him while hundreds of other students milled about. Rather then tell him of her mother coming, she’d simply said, “Sorry, I can’t see you for a little while. I need to focus on my thesis in order to graduate.” It wasn’t exactly a lie. He was puzzled at the abruptness of it.
She felt terrible but couldn’t risk him knowing of her mother being in London. He’d show up with a goofy smile and his messy hair, expecting the three of them to go for a picnic, totally unaware of the stroke his presence would cause. She’d thought about introducing him as a classmate, but the charade wouldn’t last long. Her mother was nosy enough to figure out the truth. Jyoti hated being duplicitous with Gavin, but there was no alternative. She was only doing this to protect her mother, who had a history of blowing things out of proportion, and was on god-knows-what types of medication for her ulcer.
Jyoti was so steady in her resolve that day with Gavin that she didn’t even give him a chance to respond (she hoped, without any malice, that he was at least somewhat heartbroken). She knew that if she’d let him, he would’ve convinced her to chang
e her mind, so instead she quickly walked into the nearest campus building and left the poor boy standing with mouth slightly agape. As she walked up the stairs, it gutted her to think that he’d find some other girl soon. There were probably many cute girls at the restaurant where he worked who’d love to date him.
As she dusted the bookshelves now, she told herself that the time they’d spent together was special and she’d always remember him, but there was absolutely no use in carrying on further. Pretending otherwise was delusional. Their romance was a fling. They had next to nothing in common. And yet, there were many so things they still hadn’t done that they’d talked about, like taking a coach to Oxford for an overnight trip, perhaps the Glastonbury music festival, where Radiohead were playing (at first she didn’t see what the fuss was about—the lead singer sounded whiny, but after a few listens the CD had grown on her, the music and lyrics intelligent, nuanced yet evocative), and still she would’ve been happy to do none of those things and simply remain in London with him and carry on as they had with him sleeping over on weekends, watching Simpsons reruns on Sunday mornings with a full English breakfast cooked by Gavin, followed by a walk in the park with a newspaper that Jyoti read while Gavin sketched—he’d taken up drawing again (was that a sign that she’d stirred something in him, proving that they should be together?).
Oh my god, what is wrong with you? You can’t even go two minutes without thinking of him! While sweeping the kitchen floor, she thought of Bombay, the warm sea air, the familiar smells of khichdi and dhal dhokdi cooking in the kitchen. She looked at a few of Kiran’s wedding pictures Chaya had sent, but the beautiful saris and jewelry and henna didn’t fill her with pangs of jealousy, of longing for home as they once had.
As she repositioned a little bronze bust of Wagner on the bookshelf (Dr. Asli was an opera fan), Jyoti thought of last Sunday morning when she and Gavin had been eating their perfectly poached eggs, grilled tomatoes, beans, and toast, and he’d asked, “How many boyfriends does Dr. Asli have?”
There were a couple of photos of Dr. Asli on the beach with young men who Jyoti had always assumed were family members or platonic friends or younger colleagues. She’d never entertained the thought of Dr. Asli being gay.
As Gavin poked his poached eggs with a fork and the bright yellow liquid spread over his toast, several things ran through Jyoti’s head quickly: how Gavin’s hair, no matter how messy, always seemed perfect; how she’d lived in Dr. Asli’s home all these months and not noticed he was gay; how Gavin’s eyes in the morning sunlight were the most exquisite green; how it wasn’t the fact that Dr. Asli was gay that shocked her, it was that she’d been oblivious to it all these months while Gavin recognized it in just three or four visits; how she’d always chalked up the prints of muscular Greek men on the living room walls to Dr. Asli’s interest in the human body; how she lived a sheltered and boring life; how for a genius with a superb kundali and high IQ she was actually pretty stupid; how Gavin’s poached eggs, unlike hers, were always perfect—not too runny, not too hard; how she wanted to be with him forever.
While cutting into her grilled tomato, Jyoti had let out a little laugh, as though she’d known all along Dr. Asli was gay. “Oh, I don’t know. He probably has lovers all along the coast of Spain.”
Now, as Jyoti finished cleaning for her mother’s visit, she decided to hide a couple of the framed photos of the doctor on the beach with young men. Even though Jyoti doubted that her mother would be able to intuit the doctor’s homosexuality from the photographs, she didn’t wish to cause a scandal. Normal, functioning gay men just didn’t exist in her mother’s world in India, and she wasn’t sure how her mother would react to Jyoti living in a gay man’s home. Since she was a little girl Jyoti’s parents had always sheltered her from anything that could have possibly hurt or shocked her and now she felt compelled to shield them similarly. Jyoti wasn’t sure why they treated her with such fragility. They let her brother take the local buses and trains but insisted that their driver take their Jyoti baby wherever she needed to go in the car. Having some time and distance from them made it clear that although they wanted to protect their only daughter, it was also very sexist to be treated as though she were a pretty canary in a cage. She wondered if she’d given them reason to handle her so delicately. She’d always been somewhat shy, but now she felt as though she’d come out of her shell. She wondered if eight months ago she might have been somewhat put off by the thought of living in a gay man’s home. Of course she wouldn’t have admitted it to Gavin or anyone in London, but she might have had private apprehensions about it since she’d never known any openly gay men in India. Now she felt more mature, more worldly than the wide-eyed girl who’d left home for the first time. Her parents had warned her not to go exploring around the city by herself, made her promise it. But as Gavin had begun to take her to concerts and art shows and films, the unknown in the world was no longer a nebulous thing to be afraid of, or judged. Gavin’s easygoing effervescence and impulsiveness had rubbed off, and Jyoti wondered if her mother would notice the difference in her, be shocked by it, find it inappropriate, cavalier, whorish. Jyoti decided to hide a miniskirt she’d recently purchased at the bottom of her underwear drawer.
A wave of anxiety swelled and she found herself in the bathroom, smelling the deodorant that Gavin had left behind. She threw it in the rubbish along with his toothbrush. But the look on his face when she’d broken the news to him two days ago was still fresh in her mind. He’d been blindsided. And yet, she couldn’t explain to him how it would break her mother’s heart to know her only daughter, her little Jyoti baby, was going out with a cook! Of course Jyoti would never tell her mother of them having sex. (It had only happened three times—the first time, after the evening at St James’s Park, was a strange jumble of things: pain, embarrassment, pleasure; the second and third times were much better. She had had no idea sex could make her feel so happy and confident, so tranquil, so connected to another person on a molecular level, and she yearned for more!) But she feared that her mother would find out no matter how much she denied it.
She didn’t know how to explain to Gavin that her mother would literally have a heart attack knowing Jyoti was no longer a virgin. He’d laugh at the Victorian-ness of it—not out loud, of course—he’d keep a straight face, but she feared deep down he would be laughing. The fact that she couldn’t explain it to him or the fact that he was incapable of understanding it proved that they were just not meant to be together.
She’d confided things to him that she’d never shared with anyone else. Like how her parents had a loveless marriage. They were more like roommates. The only reason they didn’t get a divorce was because it would’ve been too scandalous for their friends and families. Before coming to London, Jyoti had never even considered how dysfunctional her parents’ relationship was, but now she could see that they really only stayed together for pragmatic reasons and she couldn’t help but wonder if they secretly would’ve been happier married to other people. After sex one night, when she and Gavin were lying together in the dark, she wondered if her arranged marriage would be like her parents’ relationship, and while Gavin stroked her hair, she considered instead what life would be like if she remained in London: she could get a job in the city with an investment firm that paid handsomely, get her own place, be independent, go out for dinner on the weekends with friends, travel a bit, be happy. But what friends? She had no real friends here apart from perhaps Carmen and Gavin. Carmen would likely be heading back to Spain at the end of the term and although Gavin had a sympathetic ear, he’d probably take off to Timbuktu soon.
She checked the clock now, put on her coat, and took out the rubbish. The flight was due in an hour. She could picture her mother in her seat on the airplane, doing what she always did on long journeys, silently praying with a mala in her left hand, deftly moving each of the 108 sandalwood beads while the plane hurtled towards Heathrow. Jyoti felt the fluttering of butterflies in her stomach but she bolste
red herself with the thought that she was no longer the little girl who had left Bombay. She was a woman. In some ways she knew more about the world than her mother did because her mother had most likely never experienced the kind of passion she had with Gavin. She wondered if it’d ever been different between her parents. Somehow she couldn’t picture it. But she, on the other hand, had experienced something else. Was it love? Maybe it was just desire, ecstasy. Nevertheless, she’d acquired a certain amount of maturity, worldliness, and Jyoti took some solace in that as she headed out the door.
- 24 -
1997
JYOTI WOULD’VE PREFERRED TO WALK through St James’s Park as it was a sunny spring afternoon, but her mother was waiting for her at home, and so she took the tube. At Temple Station, Jyoti fought her way onto a crowded train. She kept her head down, not wanting to run into him. She’d been going to school earlier in the mornings to avoid him, had successfully gone more than a week without seeing him—had not even uttered his name. Quit him altogether. Cold turkey. Almost. He still found his way into her thoughts while studying, walking, bathing. The nights were the worst.
As the train lurched into motion, she reminded herself her mother would return home in a week and Jyoti would be able to call him. Hopefully he’d still be in London.
At the next stop, more people boarded and passengers were shoulder to shoulder. When she’d first arrived in London, Jyoti was repulsed by the idea of being confined so tightly among strangers but had eventually become accustomed to it. While the train swayed, she expertly kept her textbook open with one hand and continued reading. With no nearby railing to clutch on to, she widened her stance and wedged herself tightly between other commuters and their bags to keep from falling.
An Extraordinary Destiny Page 16
