Funny Boy

by Selvadurai, Shyam

  At first I could not think of anyone who would explain the word “racist” to me and tell me the story of that body. Then it came to me that my father was very approachable once he was comfortably seated in the garden each evening, the second glass of whisky in his hand.

  So, one evening, I waited until I saw that dreamy, philosophical expression soften his features, then I approached him.

  “Appa?” I said.

  “Hmmm?”

  “What is a racist?”

  He turned in his chair and studied me. “Where did you hear that word?” he asked.

  I told him and he was silent for a moment, nursing his glass of whisky.

  “Appa, who was that person who was killed?” I asked.

  “It was Ammachi’s father,” he replied, after a moment. “Your great-grandfather.”

  I stared at him. I thought about the photograph of my great-grandfather which hung at the centre of all the pictures in the corridor at my grandparents’ house and I found it impossible to connect him with the dead man Janaki had described.

  “Why?” I finally asked. “Why did somebody do that?”

  “Because he was Tamil.”

  “But you’re Tamil and I’m Tamil and nobody’s killing us.”

  “This was twenty years ago, in the fifties, son. At that time, some Sinhalese people killed Tamil people.”

  “But why?”

  He shifted in his chair. “It’s too hard to explain. You’ll understand when you’re older.”

  “But I want to know now.”

  He looked at me, irritated. “It had to do with some laws,” he said. “The Sinhalese wanted to make Sinhala the only national language, and the Tamils did not like this. So there was a riot and many Tamils were killed.”

  From then on I began to listen carefully to the conversation of the adults to discover more about the quarrels between the Sinhalese and the Tamils. What I learned made me very uneasy, because I realized these problems were not a thing of the past.

  There was a group in Jaffna called the Tamil Tigers. They wanted a separate country and the Sinhalese were very angry about this. Ammachi often talked about the Tigers. She was on their side and declared that if they did get a separate state, which they would call Eelam, she would be the first to go and live in it. My father told her she was mad. This made Ammachi even more angry and they had many disputes about the Tigers. Now I understood why they had quarrelled so bitterly when I started school a year ago and my father had put me in a Sinhalese class. Ammachi said he was betraying the Tamils, but my father had said that there was no use in putting me in a Tamil class when Sinhalese was “the real language of the future.”

  I began to notice other things as well. In school, it was customary for classes to challenge each other to a game of cricket. Sometimes, instead of playing against other Sinhalese classes, the boys in our class played the Tamil class. When this happened, there was none of the usual joking and laughing, and when the match was over the players parted without shaking hands or patting each other on the back.

  The next rehearsal was on the morning of spend-the-day. It was only for the children and wives of the King of Siam. Anil was not there and we were spared the embarrassment of having to refuse his lift.

  When we came back for lunch, Janaki was waiting for us, a grim expression on her face. She asked Radha Aunty to follow her to the kitchen. When I attempted to go with them, she shooed me away and shut the kitchen door, so I ran into the side garden and stood beneath the kitchen window.

  “What’s wrong?” I heard Radha Aunty ask.

  “You’ll never believe, baba. This morning your Amma went to see the Jayasinghes to make sure that boy stops giving you lifts.”

  Radha Aunty drew in her breath. “What happened?” she asked.

  “When she came back she said she had fixed everything.”

  “How embarrassing!” Radha Aunty cried. “I can never face that boy again!”

  After a moment, Radha Aunty spoke again. “I must go there and apologize, Janaki.”

  “Baba!” Janaki exclaimed, “Are you mad or something!”

  “I must do it. Today.”

  “You know, baba,” Janaki said, “this evening I am taking the children for a sea bath. Come with us and then you can go and see him.”

  “But what if the children tell?”

  Janaki was silent for a moment. “Best thing is to take that Arjie with you. The children will think you have gone back to the house together.”

  When we went for a sea bath that evening, I could hardly contain my excitement. I knew that I had to act normal, otherwise the cousins, and especially Sonali, might suspect that something was wrong. The feeling of fear that we might get caught and the thrill of doing something forbidden made me want to squeeze Radha Aunty’s hand as we walked down to the beach. Radha Aunty seemed very calm and, had I not overheard her conversation with Janaki, I would have never suspected that she was planning anything.

  Once we were on the beach, the cousins left their slippers and clothes by the rocks and ran to the water, shouting with glee. Janaki, who was helping the smallest cousin out of her clothes, called to them to wait for her, but they ignored her. Instead of joining the other cousins, I stayed by Radha Aunty. Finally, the little cousin was naked, and she ran screaming with delight towards the water. As Janaki rushed after her, she gave Radha Aunty a quick look to tell her that it was all right for us to leave. Radha Aunty grabbed my hand and said, “Come, let’s go for a walk.” Now I saw that she was nervous.

  We climbed up the rocks and crossed the railway tracks. “We’re dropping in at Anil’s house,” she said to me, trying to sound casual.

  “Yes,” I replied.

  “What do you mean ‘yes’?” She looked at me carefully and then shook her finger at me. “You listened to our conversation, didn’t you?”

  Since she didn’t really seem annoyed, I nodded.

  “Honestly, you’re something else.”

  She took my hand and we walked along the railway tracks until we came to the road on which Anil lived.

  Anil’s house was about the same size as my grandparents’. When Radha Aunty lifted the latch of the gate and banged it down a few times, a golden retriever ran down the driveway and barked at us. After a moment, Anil came out onto the front steps. He was wearing a sarong and a banyan. When he saw us, he stood still in surprise. I looked anxiously at his face to see if he was angry.

  “Hello,” Radha Aunty said cheerfully, as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened. Yet as she spoke she gripped my hand tightly.

  Anil came down to the gate without replying.

  “What are you doing here?” He sounded more concerned than angry.

  “I wanted to see you,” she said. “May I come in?”

  He nodded and opened the gate. At the sound of the gate opening, a man called out from inside the house, asking who it was.

  “Nobody,” Anil cried back. “Just a friend.”

  As we walked up the driveway, the man came to the front door and looked at us. I could tell it was Anil’s father because he was fair-skinned and slim, like Anil, but much shorter. His face was thin and sharp and he was balding. “Who is this?” he said to Anil, nodding towards Radha Aunty.

  “A friend,” Anil replied, embarrassed by his father’s rudeness.

  Anil’s father scrutinized his face for a moment and then said to him, “Have you no manners? Go and put on a shirt.”

  Anil hurried into the house. Once he had gone, his father said to Radha Aunty, “You are Miss Chelvaratnam, no?”

  Radha Aunty looked at him in surprise.

  “I know all Anil’s other friends,” he said.

  He indicated for us to follow him inside. As we entered, Anil came out of his bedroom buttoning his shirt. He glanced anxiously at his father and then at us, as if he expected something to have happened. “Come and sit down,” he said.

  When we were settled in the drawing room, Radha Aunty said, “I came to apolo
gize for what happened this morning.”

  Anil waved away her apology. “It was nothing.”

  “What do you mean nothing?” his father said to him. “It was downright insulting.”

  “My mother gets –” Radha Aunty started to say, but Anil’s father interrupted her.

  “Coming here and accusing my son of this and that and the other. As if my son was desperate for a bride or something.”

  Anil threw him a warning look which he ignored. “We are from a good family as well. High-country Sinhalese, we are. Last thing we also want is for our son to marry some non-Sinhalese.”

  “I understand,” Radha Aunty said and looked at her hands.

  “No, you don’t understand,” he said, and wagged his finger at her. “It was very high-handed of your mother to come here and do that.”

  “Thatha,” Anil said firmly, “this is not your concern.”

  “Oh yes it is,” he replied. “Our family name has been insulted. I shall not take this lying down.”

  Anil turned in his chair and called down the hall for his mother. I noticed that someone was standing behind the curtained doorway at the end of the hall.

  “Menik!” Anil’s mother called out sharply from behind it. “Come here!”

  Anil’s father became silent.

  “Menik! Come here. Soon!”

  Anil’s father rose reluctantly from his chair. Before he left us, he raised his finger and said, “Be careful. We Sinhalese are losing patience with you Tamils and your arrogance.”

  Anil leaned back in his chair and groaned in mortification. His father walked down the hall. I felt relieved to see him go, for I was beginning to feel frightened of him.

  Anil looked at Radha Aunty and said, “I’m so sorry.”

  Radha Aunty smiled bravely. “It’s all right.”

  “Can I get you anything to drink?”

  She shook her head and stood up. “Have to get back. I just came to apologize, that’s all.”

  We walked down the driveway in silence. When we were at the gate, Anil said, “I didn’t know that you were engaged.”

  “I’m not,” Radha Aunty replied.

  “Your mother said …”

  “She lied.”

  “Oh,” he said, and then was silent.

  Radha Aunty lifted the latch.

  “But there is someone?”

  “Yes.”

  Radha Aunty pushed open the gate and we went out.

  “And you will marry him?”

  Radha Aunty paused and then put the latch back into place. “Yes. I think I might.”

  As we went towards the beach again, I thought of all that had happened at Anil’s house. Now I was beginning to understand why Ammachi had been so angry. Part of her anger was because Anil was Sinhalese, but another part, I now saw, had to do with her fear that Anil and Radha Aunty were in love with each other. I felt she was wrong. Anil and Radha Aunty didn’t act like people in love. They were more like friends. I found myself thinking of Anil. He didn’t fit my idea of what a lover looked like. He was fairly tall and, though not thin, his body was angular and a little awkward. With his large eyes, full lips, and thick, curly hair, which hung almost to his shoulders, he looked like someone too young to be a lover. Also, he was not serious enough.

  At the next rehearsal, when we came in through the gates of St. Theresa’s, Anil was leaning against the wall of a building as if waiting for someone. We greeted him, and from the way Radha Aunty and Anil smiled at each other, I could tell they were thinking about that day we had gone to his house.

  “Did you get into trouble for seeing me?” Anil asked.

  Radha Aunty shook her head. “My mother doesn’t have any spies on your road.”

  We walked together towards the rehearsal hall.

  “Why does she hate the Sinhalese so much?” Anil asked.

  “Her father was killed in the ’fifty-eight riots.”

  He was silent for a moment. “And you? Are you anti-Sinhalese?”

  “No.”

  “Would you allow your child to marry a Sinhalese?”

  “Yes, definitely.”

  “And yourself?”

  “What?”

  “Would you marry a Sinhalese?”

  Radha Aunty glanced quickly at him and then looked away. “Probably not.”

  “Why?”

  “Because.”

  “So then you are anti-Sinhalese.”

  “No!”

  “But you just said –”

  “What I meant was that, yes, in principle I would. But now …”

  “There is someone.”

  She nodded.

  They were both silent. They didn’t seem as friendly any more.

  It was a full day of rehearsal, and a lot of people went to Green Cabin for lunch. There were only two vehicles to take us to the restaurant – a minivan belonging to one of the girls and Anil’s car. By the time Radha Aunty and I got to the gates of St. Theresa’s, the minivan was full. Radha Aunty grabbed my hand and hurried back inside the gates again. “Let’s sit down for a while,” she said to me and pointed to some steps.

  “But we’ll miss the ride.”

  “Never mind. We’ll take a bus.”

  I looked at the fixed expression on her face and I saw there was no point in arguing, but I couldn’t see why she would give up the comfort of a lift to Green Cabin to stand in the mid-day sun and wait for a bus.

  When we arrived at the restaurant, all the tables were taken and the cast occupied the row of open-air booths that were detached from the main part of the restaurant. Radha Aunty held on to my hand as she went from one booth to the other, looking for a place. Anil was in the last booth with a group of his male friends. When he saw us, he moved a little and indicateci that there was enough space for both of us. Radha Aunty hesitated, and then quickly ushered me into the booth ahead of her, so that I was seated between them. As Radha Aunty looked at the menu, I saw Anil’s friends glance at him and smile. He returned their looks with a stern expression.

  When the waiter had brought their food, he began to take Radha Aunty’s order. Anil insisted that Radha Aunty have his lamprais but she pretended she had not heard him and ordered one from the waiter. She also ordered a plate of pastries for me and two glasses of lime juice. Once the waiter had gone, Anil repeated his request, but she shook her head.

  “Then I shall wait till your lamprais comes,” he said stubbornly.

  “Why is that?” Radha Aunty asked rudely.

  His friends had begun to eat, and they looked at each other in amusement.

  “Because you are a lady and it would be impolite.”

  Radha Aunty shrugged dismissively. “Think of me as a friend, not a lady.”

  One of the boys at the table made a noise that sounded like a suppressed laugh. Radha Aunty fixed her eyes on him. “You should be careful,” she said, “there are bones in the chicken and we wouldn’t want you to choke.”

  At this all the boys started to laugh helplessly and even Radha Aunty grinned. “Honestly, you all are quite mad,” she said.

  After this, the atmosphere eased and Radha Aunty chatted with them until our food arrived. By now, the boys had almost finished, but Anil was still waiting to eat with us. Radha Aunty had scarcely begun to eat her lamprais when the waiter brought the finger bowls and bill for the other boys. Radha Aunty looked at them in alarm and said, “You’re not going?”

  They nodded. “Have to go and do an errand for the pater,” one of them said.

  Another one put his hand on Anil’s shoulder, gave him a steady look, and said, “Anil, machan, we will see you later.”

  The others grinned. They went into the main part of the restaurant and we heard them laughing. The other cast members were getting up to leave as well. Radha Aunty called to some of the girls to come and sit with us, but they shook their heads and said they were going across the road to Sharaz to do some shopping. Soon the only ones left were the three of us. Radha Aunty began to eat qu
ickly now, as if she, too, had to do something before rehearsals began.

  “So,” Anil said after a silence, “where does he live?”

  “Who?”

  “Your intended.”

  “I don’t have an intended.”

  “You know what I mean.”

  Radha Aunty ate in silence for a while and then said, “America.”

  “You met him there?”

  She nodded.

  “Was it love at first sight?”

  She glared at him as if to say it was none of his business.

  “Sorry,” he said, “I am just curious.”

  She didn’t respond. I looked at Radha Aunty. Today, it seemed her moods changed constantly.

  “Do you know why I am curious?”

  Radha Aunty shrugged, her mouth full, as if she had no interest in his curiosity.

  “I think you know why,” he said.

  Radha Aunty gave him a furious look and inclined her head in my direction.

  “I don’t care,” he said. “This is the only chance I have to say it to you.”

  Radha Aunty took a sip from her glass of lime juice and called to the waiter, who was passing by, to bring our bill.

  “Hurry up,” she said to me, “we haven’t got the whole day.”

  “What are you scared of?” he asked.

  Instead of answering him, Radha Aunty suddenly frowned and stared ahead of her.

  “What’s wrong?” Anil asked.

  “Shhh,” she said.

  I stopped eating and my eyes followed her gaze. Then I saw what had stopped her. Mala Aunty and Kanthi Aunty were in the main part of Green Cabin buying some pastries.

  “Who is it?” Anil whispered.

  Radha Aunty held her finger to her lips.

  Now they had paid for their pastries and collected them. But instead of going out through the front door they started to come towards the side exit where our booth was. We watched, in horror, as they approached. They saw us and stopped.