THOSE PRICEY THAKUR GIRLS

by Anuja Chauhan

  ‘So nice to see you again, Anjini! Yesterday only, when my father-in-law was having a heart attack, I was remembering you and speculating that the word angina – which is a chest pain you get when your heart muscles do not get enough blood – is probably derived from the Sanskrit root anjini. Haha!’

  ‘How naughty of you,’ Anjini murmurs, eyes sparkling beneath demurely downcast lashes. ‘But I know you dashing IPS types – always putting the ladies under cardiac arrest.’

  Much appreciative laughter. Nobody, Dylan notices in amuse-ment, bothers to ask if the man’s father-in-law is alive or dead.

  ‘How many days are you here for?’ asks another admirer.

  Anji turns her body towards him with the air of a hostess proffering plump little cupcakes on a tray. Please have some. Oh please, do have at least one.

  ‘A week at least,’ Anjini replies. ‘My son was bored of Anji-ma’s cuddles – he wanted his nani-nana.’

  A wistful silence greets this utterance – the little circle is clearly imagining being cuddled by Anji-ma.

  ‘Jijaji nahin aaye?’ gulps a thin, stringy man with a bobbing Adam’s apple.

  ‘No,’ she sighs. ‘He has a lot of work.’

  There is a chorus of insincere sympathy from the group.

  The Brigadier clears his throat. ‘Where’s LN?’ he demands gruffly. ‘No kot-piece today?’

  ‘Uncle!’ Anjini sees him and flies gracefully to her feet, her pink chikankari draperies fluttering about, showcasing delicious glimpses of dimpled flesh. She hugs the Brigadier. ‘How nice to see you! How are you?’

  Dylan, watching this effusive display, is positive she doesn’t remember his father’s name.

  ‘Er, he’s Brigadier Shekhawat,’ he puts in.

  Anjini turns to him, her eyes sparkling with mischief. ‘Of course I know who he is!’ she says archly. ‘Do you think I make a habit of hugging men whose names I don’t know?’

  ‘Do you?’ Dylan grins. ‘I won’t tell you my name then.’

  Anjini giggles.

  ‘Okay.’

  It’s one little softly uttered word but she manages to infuse it with a world of intimacy.

  ‘I’m Dylan,’ he tells her hastily. ‘And you’re A for Anjini. Pleased to meet you. I’ll go find uncle.’

  As he strides towards the house, he encounters a sporty-looking young girl rolling a gas cylinder down the driveway and into the annexe of Number 16, a lanky twelve-year-old child trailing in her wake. This is really meet-the-family day for me, Dylan thinks resignedly as he reaches down and grabs the cylinder by the neck.

  ‘Here, lemme get that,’ he says. ‘I’m –’

  ‘Dylllllan.’

  He nods, taken aback. She stands back and looks him over, assessing him with big black eyes. Dylan resists the urge to suck in his stomach and puff out his chest. But he can’t stop himself from swinging the heavy cylinder a little, casually, so she knows how strong he is. ‘Where do you want me to put it?’

  ‘Upstairs.’ She gestures vaguely. Then she gives him an impudent snub-nosed grin. ‘I’m Eshwari. You’re sucking up to me, aren’t you?’

  Whoa, that’s direct. These Thakur sisters clearly don’t mess about.

  ‘Now why would I do that?’ he asks smoothly.

  ‘Because you’re so pretty,’ is Samar’s explanation.

  Dylan looks down at him, impressed. ‘You’ve got a good eye, young Thakur.’

  Samar doesn’t say anything. Nobody knows it yet, but he has plans for Eshwari. She is only five years older than him. It feels like a lot now, but when he’s twenty-one and she’s twenty-six, it won’t mean a thing. He’s almost as tall as her now, and luckily she’s short – and he thinks she’s stopped growing.

  ‘I’m a Singh,’ he clarifies. ‘Samar Vir Singh.’

  Eshwari chuckles. ‘You know why.’

  ‘Yes, I am sucking up to you,’ Dylan confesses. ‘Is it working?’

  ‘I’ll let you know,’ she replies airily. ‘Walk ahead of me.’

  He obeys and Eshwari falls back a little, crossing her arms across her chest and squinting.

  ‘What?’ Samar nudges her. ‘Where are you looking? Is there a stain on his pants, Eshu?’

  ‘Eshu mausi,’ Eshwari whispers in reply. ‘And shhushh!’ And then to Dylan, who has turned around and is looking at her enquiringly, ‘C’mon, you’ve got to take it up that flight of stairs.’

  ‘So how’d I do last night?’ Dylan asks as he hauls the cylinder up the narrow steps. ‘Did I feature in your girlie bedtime conversation at all?’

  ‘Not really.’ Eshwari grins amiably. ‘We were too busy discussing if Anji didi would look like Kenny G if she got her hair permed.’

  ‘Ah,’ Dylan replies ironically. ‘That puts me in my place.’

  Eshwari smiles at him, turns around and goes back downstairs. Dylan puts down the gas cylinder for a moment and looks at Samar, who is watching him intently.

  ‘I like her hair as it is,’ Samar says.

  Dylan nods, panting just a little. The cylinder’s heavy.

  ‘How many more flights of stairs?’ he asks.

  ‘Just one more,’ Samar replies. ‘You’re lucky. In the main house there are three – the toppest one is where the Pushkarni fell from when she died.’

  ‘Who?’ Dylan asks, confused.

  Samar sits down on the steps. ‘The Pushkarni. My grandmother. Or rather,’ he clarifies conscientiously, ‘my step-grandmother. She went to the terrace to pick up the clothes from the washing line because it was storming, but then the storm became so strong that the lights went out. The terrace became dark, so she just stood there and started screaming, Pushkar… Pushkar...’

  ‘Who’s Pushkar?’ Dylan struggles to stay with the plot.

  ‘Her husband. And then she heard footsteps behind her and she relaxed… and then he said (here Samar assumes a horrid, giggly sort of voice), Here I am! And she was so relieved, she said, Pushkar! And then he grabbed her shoulders and said (Samar’s voice goes all high and giggly again), You only said push kar – and he pushed her right off the roof!’

  Dylan’s jaw drops. ‘That is a horrible story!’

  Samar grins. ‘Isn’t it? I think it may even be true.’ He hesitates, then lowers his voice. ‘But I’m not sure about all the other things Chachiji says. I think she could be imagining all that. Do you believe in ghosts?’

  They have reached the top of the stairs. Dylan puts down the cylinder and stares at the lanky lad seriously.

  ‘No,’ he says with finality. ‘There’s no such things as ghosts.’

  Samar looks philosophical.

  ‘Thought so,’ he says laconically. ‘Namaste, Chachiji.’

  Dylan looks up to see a bulldoggy lady sitting in the semi-darkness, staring blankly out of the window.

  ‘Hello, ma’am,’ he says courteously.

  ‘Hello, hello,’ she replies, her chins wobbling. ‘You are Steesh, no?’

  ‘I’m Dylan. Nice to meet you.’

  Then he turns to Samar. ‘Any more stuff to be brought up? Four-poster beds? Suits of armour? Dead bodies?’

  Samar shakes his head seriously. ‘Gulgul bhaisaab did all that.’

  ‘I wish I could offer you some tea,’ Chachiji frets. ‘But there is no milk…’ Her jowls start to quiver. ‘No cheeni… no leaves…’

  ‘It’s okay, ma’am,’ Dylan assures her hastily. ‘I’ll be downstairs, all right?’

  Running down the narrow stairs, he encounters Debjani hurrying up, hugging a stack of lurid green-and-yellow striped curtains. He places his palms along both walls, blocking her path, leaning down and smiling at her, his dark eyes warm.

  ‘Hey,’ he whispers.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ She stops, startled.

  But Dylan doesn’t reply. He just stares at her, staggered by the impact this sudden, delayed sighting of her is having on him. She glows, he thinks helplessly. Her hair is loosely twisted into a wet fragrant rope along one should
er, trailing water droplets onto her white cotton kurti. He wants to reach out and touch it.

  ‘Ingratiating myself with your family,’ he says finally, lightly. ‘For reasons I am not yet ready to divulge. How pretty you look. You’d look even prettier if you didn’t,’ he reaches out and touches her chin gently, ‘insist on painting that fake dot on your chin every day. That…’ he purses his lips and shakes a finger reprovingly, ‘is actually kinda cheesy.’

  Debjani gasps in outrage and pushes at him with her armload of curtains. He buckles over, laughing, but then, as she stumbles too, he straightens up and steadies them both, gripping her upper arms. Her breath catches. Her eyes lock into his, twin pools of Pears darkening.

  ‘God curse you, A.N. Thakur!’ Chachiji wails from upstairs. ‘Bringing me to live in this wretched servants’ quarter! I wish I were dead!’

  Dylan’s eyes widen comically. Debjani gives an involuntary snort and pulls away.

  ‘Don’t make fun,’ she says. ‘My aunt’s suffered quite a sadma today.’

  ‘Okay.’

  His voice is very deep. Debjani realizes she’s feeling nervous, which is stupid .

  ‘Hey, guess what,’ she says. ‘They called from DD. I get to read again this Friday. So it wasn’t such a disaster, after all.’

  ‘That’s great,’ he replies, still holding her.

  Silence.

  Then, ‘Go down to the garden,’ she tells him. ‘The table’s all set up and your dad is waiting.’

  ‘Aren’t you coming?’ he asks, not letting her go. ‘I mean, your sister’s nice and all, but she doesn’t say hukum – the soul of Balkishen Bau may take offence.’

  ‘There’s no running water in this hovel,’ Chachiji moans from upstairs. ‘How will I even wash?’

  ‘Go downstairs, Dylan,’ Debjani, too shy to meet his eyes, firmly orders the collar of his shirt. Looking down at her lashes curled against her cheeks, he realizes, with a surge of happiness that is clearly disproportionate, that this is the first time she has said his name out loud. His arms tighten about her, curtains and everything.

  ‘Say that again.’

  ‘What? Go downstairs?’

  He shakes his head. ‘My name.’

  Colour floods her cheeks.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because,’ he says simply. His eyes slide down to her mouth. ‘Say it.’

  She looks away. Warning bells, straight out of the climactic temple scene in a Hindi movie, are ringing madly inside her head. But she ignores them. After all, it’s just a name. What’s the big deal about getting her lips to shape two simple syllables?

  ‘Say it.’

  This is ridiculous.

  ‘Dylan.’ She says it with her cheeks mortifyingly red but her head erect. As his eyes rise to meet hers again, his gaze warm and quickening, she adds, ‘Singh Shekhawat. See? Was that supposed to be some kind of test? I can say behenchod too. And maadarchod. And She Sells, Sea Shells. Shall I?’

  ‘You were right,’ he says, his lips twisting wryly. ‘You really don’t know how to flirt.’

  ‘Now go downstairs.’

  ‘I’m going,’ he replies, still holding her fast.

  ‘Um…’ Debjani talks to his shirt again. ‘You’re still here.’

  ‘Yeah... What shampoo is that?’

  She starts to say that it’s Halo – because, excuse me, what other shampoo is available in this country – but before she can, he lowers his dark head and kisses her, very softly, on the place where her wet cotton kurti falls away to reveal the delicate skin at her collarbone.

  Debjani freezes.

  Dylan pulls back.

  His eyes are closed. As she notices, numbly, how long and thick his lashes are, he opens them and looks at her. His eyes are curiously alight.

  ‘You can’t just… kiss me like that,’ she manages to say.

  ‘No?’ he asks, his gaze now on her mouth. ‘Why, exactly?’

  ‘Because…’ She falters, hardly knowing what she’s saying. ‘Because it’s wron –’ She stops short. ‘Because I don’t want you to!’

  ‘Really?’ He is murmuring into her ear now, his arms sliding down to wrap themselves smoothly around her slim body. ‘Are you sure? Besides, it was such a little kiss. Too little to count, surely? Maybe you imagined it.’

  Her eyes widen in outrage. ‘I did not.’

  She spits this out so vehemently that he releases her, raising his hands and moving backwards, leaving her path free.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he says, consternation in his voice.

  ‘It’s okay,’ she returns, her cheeks flaming.

  The curtains have fallen from her grasp. As she bends down to pick them up, he bends too.

  ‘Lemme carry those,’ he offers. ‘They’re heavy.’

  ‘Oh, please,’ Dabbu flares up. ‘I haven’t exactly gone weak in the knees, you know.’

  ‘But you dropped the curtains,’ he points out, totally straight-faced. ‘Surely that’s something.’

  ‘Oh, get out of my way,’ Debjani says, confused, red-cheeked and totally fed up.

  ‘Okay, okay,’ Dylan returns peaceably. She can feel him piling the last of the curtains into her arms. ‘I’m going.’ His voice comes closer, becomes a whisper, becomes cockier – she can tell he’s smiling. ‘I’ll save you some Maggi.’

  His footsteps sound lightly down the stairs, and then Dabbu sinks down on the steps, her heart thumping wildly. Chachiji appears on the landing.

  ‘Curtains?’ She sniffs morosely. ‘Of course. Shut me in. Block me out. Seeing my face in her window like a gaand ka tukda will give your mother a bellyache, I know.’

  ‘Dabbu, tell me all about you and that delish son of Shekhawat uncle. Now!’

  Thus, Anjini on the terrace, flinging herself down on the mattress between her two younger sisters and casting her arms around Debjani’s neck.

  ‘There’s nothing to tell.’ Debjani’s cheeks are fiery red. She has just spent a harrowing evening not looking at Dylan across the kot-piece table.

  ‘Oh, but he stared at you all evening. I know, because I stared at him all evening. And he didn’t even notice me. Even when I yanked the neck of my dress as far down as it would go. Should’ve worn a kurta, actually. Then I could’ve popped open a couple of buttons. Anyway, he’s got it bad for you.’

  ‘I cannot believe,’ Debjani says primly, ‘that you’re talking like this when you’re thirty years old.’

  ‘I’m thirty – not dead,’ Anji replies candidly. ‘Or in the convent like you. Sister Dabbu. The nun who has no fun – ooh, he’s Christian, isn’t he? That’s kind of…’ her voice grows deep and purring, ‘kinky.’

  ‘No, it isn’t!’ Dabbu, totally appalled at how she let Dylan kiss her after meeting him barely six times, bursts out. ‘Anji didi, you really talk such rubbish. Eshu, say something.’

  ‘He’s got an awesome butt,’ says Eshwari unhelpfully. ‘I fully checked it out. And I know he likes you. I accused him of currying favour with me and he admitted it.’

  ‘What!’ Debjani’s toes curl in squirmy horror. Oh god, so Dylan knows she’s been having girlish little chats about him with her sisters! No wonder he was so cocky when he met her on the stairs. She hates cocky men – although she has to admit he hadn’t looked so cocky afterwards, during the kot-piece session. He had looked shaken, even confused. And he had played very badly. The Judge, who had drawn him as a partner, harangued him all evening. Wow, kissing her was so awful it had totally put him off his game.

  ‘What did you tell him, Eshu?’

  ‘Oh, how does it matter.’ Anji comes quickly to Eshu’s defence. ‘You like him, don’t you?’

  ‘I don’t,’ Debjani insists. ‘He just took me by surprise, that’s all –’ She stops abruptly.

  ‘How?’ Anji pricks up her ears. ‘What did little Dillu do? He looks like a total harami. That kind always falls for a Vestal Virgin. Did he corner you against a wall and smoulder at you, Dabbu? Is your supta vastha officiall
y over now?’

  ‘Mind your own business!’ Debjani, goaded beyond endurance, finally lashes out. ‘I don’t ask you what you’re doing here, or why Antu bhaiyya never phones you, do I?’

  Eshwari gasps.

  Anji goes very still.

  ‘I’m sorry, Anji didi.’ Debjani’s voice is a wretched whisper.

  ‘It’s okay.’ Anji has gone rather pale. ‘You’re right. I should respect your privacy. Like you do mine.’

  ‘Anji didi…’ It is Eshwari who speaks now.

  ‘You girls sleep,’ Anji says. ‘I have to check on Samar anyway. Goodnight.’

  There is a shocked silence on the terrace after she leaves.

  ‘You’ll get chhaalas in your mouth,’ Eshwari says with certainty. ‘Big, painful blisters. Talking like such a kutiya. Why did you have to twig her about Antu bhaiyya?’

  Dabbu shakes her head, stricken. ‘I don’t know where that came from. It was horrible of me. I’m just… really stressed today. Should I go downstairs and grovel?’

  Eshwari shakes her head. ‘No point. She’s in martyr mode now. Which basically means we’re screwed. The only thing worse than a bubbly Anji didi is a hurt and dignified Anji didi. Thanks a lot, Dubz.’

  Hey there, Georgy girl…

  ‘Wake up, Georgy girl.’ Eshu, back from her early morning run, chucks her sneakers across the terrace with such force that Debjani sits up, blinking. ‘She’s been singing that like a maniac for the last hour. Samar had to hear it as he chugged down his Bournvita, and as he sat on the pot. It’s being sung in your honour, you know.’

  ‘When did you last wash those socks?’ Debjani wrinkles up her nose.

  ‘Did you hear what I said?’

  ‘Yes.’ Dabbu burrows under the sheets again. ‘I’m not deaf. She wants to tart me up for the newscast… Just kill me now.’

  The enthusiastic warbling continues relentlessly from below stairs.

  ‘Just go down and get it over with,’ Eshwari prods her. ‘You totally owe it to her after last night. And she knows it.’

  Dabbu straightens up with a groan, pushes her feet into her chappals and makes her way down the stairs warily. Anji is sitting in the verandah, sharpening her nail file with the happy air of an executioner readying his blade for a ritual slaughter.