Next day, waking early, he went down to the Irani café and made a phone call to Sanjeev Sen. When he said ‘I would like to meet Shalini today’, Sen seemed at a loss, but then said, ‘By evening, yes, it should be possible. Six p.m. at Satkar near Churchgate.’
On his way to the station, Satyajit saw the same people as yesterday rushing to catch the train, but this time bathed and perfumed. The mirrored cupboard shops had not yet opened. The saloon outside the station was open, and Satyajit went in to get a shave. For years now, Satyajit had stopped shaving himself in the bathroom, which had no mirror anyway. He did not need a mirror to finish his bath and comb his hair. Like him, in this city, the million faces rushing alongside him didn’t seem to own mirrors either, as though they were beyond all that.
In this saloon with its wall-to-wall mirrors, a few people were ensconced in the revolving chairs, in various stages of being shaved or having their hair cut. These public mirrors, which included everyone in their reflection, seemed like the friendship between strangers bred in the city. They were all familiar with each other in the saloon, even if they didn’t know each other. And far away, when yet another mirror shattered, Shalini would walk out, followed by a sunbeam, walking from one public mirror to another.
That evening Satyajit reached Churchgate half an hour early and stood on the footpath opposite Satkar. The crowds pouring into the station glistened in the evening light. Satyajit waited until nearly seven p.m. without seeing the Sens, and then went into Satkar and ordered a cup of tea. Just then, he saw Sanjeev Sen struggling through the crowd.
Panting, he sat down opposite Satyajit and drank a glass of water even as he said, ‘Sorry, sorry, I’m late.’
Satyajit called the waiter and asked for two glasses of lime juice.
Immediately, Sen said, ‘Just one will do. I don’t want anything. I’ve come alone…’
It became clear that Shalini had not come, and Satyajit actually felt better.
‘Forgive me, Satyajit babu, I put you to so much trouble. I prayed to God to give me courage to face you. Shalini hasn’t come home since yesterday. Look at her rudeness … disappearing without telling anyone … And me roaming the city like a fool on her behalf … wasting the time of a respectable man like you…’ Speaking with lips that had gone pale, the old man took Satyajit’s hands in his. ‘We haven’t slept all night. We waited all day for her to come back. I waited at home until five o’clock. If she had shown up, I would have slapped her hard and brought her along.’
The juice arrived. Satyajit, not knowing what to say, just said, ‘Please drink.’ When Satyajit was about to pay the bill, Sanjeev Sen shook his head mutely, with the straw still in his mouth. How could he console this failed father, how to fill him with courage … Satyajit simply stared at the restaurant door. It was as though the missed opportunity had made the old man even older.
‘Don’t worry, everything will be all right,’ said Satyajit as he stood up to leave. Both of them walked out in silence. The crowds were still rushing into the station. Those who drank as they ran were throwing their empty Pepsi cans into a huge, round rubbish bin. A posse of street kids would appear any moment and surround the bin. ‘It’s really crowded, come let me help you get on the train,’ offered Satyajit.
‘No, I have some other work nearby … I’ll go later,’ said Sen as he started walking away. Then suddenly he came back and held Satyajit’s hand. ‘You mustn’t refuse … please, don’t refuse … Let me pay for the juice. Otherwise I’ll go mad. Please, please—’ He counted out thirty-six rupees and thrust the money into Satyajit’s shirt pocket. ‘Please forget what happened today. If she comes back … one day, I’ll definitely bring her to meet you. You mustn’t refuse. And you mustn’t tell anyone what happened today…’ As Sen walked towards the subway, Satyajit saw that the windows of all the office buildings around them had turned red as they mirrored the sunset. Outside the cinema house nearby, some men were raising an enormous hoarding with ropes. Satyajit stood watching.
‘Kannadi Illada Ooralli’, 1999
INTERVAL
Here, Manjari Sawant, aged twenty, with unremarkable features and skinny limbs, was sitting in front of the stuttering TV set in her neighbour’s house in the narrow old Mahindrakar Chawl near the Naupada ice factory in Thane. There, Nandkishore Jagtap alias Nandu, attendant in Malhar Cinema, who, as the first show drew to an end, stuck the torch under his arm, pulled aside the door curtain with a whirr so that the fight scene’s background score spilled into the lobby, went into the men’s toilet to splash some water on his face and stood there looking at himself in the mirror. That these two were planning to run away together early tomorrow was a fact nestling snugly in the dark, like the secret of a bud that had not yet blossomed.
For the last three years, in this theatre, heroes of different complexions have kept saying to the heroine, ‘Let’s run away somewhere’ four times a day, until the crowded twenty-seventh week. Gazing into the hero’s eyes, smiling coyly, the heroine runs through the fountains and into the upper stalls and disappears. Where does she go, melting into the night, never to be seen again, not even in one’s dreams? In the lights that come up after the ‘happy ending’, the hero’s patched pants and their frayed edges appear to shine. Hurriedly, the hero rushes around turning off the lights for the next show. He shines his torch on tickets, to help those fumbling to find their seats. As the audience floats away into the enchanting world of the film, our hero selects the ceiling fan in the lobby under which he will nap, between the posters, behind the curtains where the theatre owner’s servants will not find him. When he dozes, a million heroines lose their bodies and minds and names in the glistening screen. In the dark, disembodied, they wander into the hero’s dreams – ‘Here I am!’, ‘Am I not here?’ – they mob him, kiss him, stroke him. When the bell shrieks, the hero runs to the door, to let the flood of people out of their world of dreams, to count the ticket stubs, stroking his red comb that peeps out of his pocket. The girl runs into the rain without an umbrella, somehow reaches home to stand in front of her parents and her brother, shivering, saying sorry for returning late.
Three years ago, Nandu had left his home in Vidarbha and come to the magical city of Mumbai, and ever since he started working at the cinema hall, which was a grain in that enormous city, Vidarbha had receded from him. First, Nandu worked with the men who climbed ladders to paste film posters on the walls, marvelling that they held the actresses’s limbs and noses in their hands. Soon he became the ‘battery torch boy’ of Malhar Cinema. The same city which had seemed from the distance of Vidarbha like an unreachable star was now was within his grasp, with all its colourful shackles. It was in the very tickets whose stubs he tore off. As though he controlled the big dream and its billion sorrows, its defeats, its victories and its songs, Nandu walked around outside when the show was going on.
When a thousand people were sitting in the dark, having offered themselves up to the screen, Nandu liked to sit on a sofa outside and smoke a cigarette. When he thought of how the second-run film had many scenes missing from the reels, with the audience not knowing even at the end who the real murderer was, this was also fun. Amidst these pleasures, she had entered, like one more of them, when the afternoon show had ended. She was running in and out of the cinema hall, looking scared.
‘What is it?’ asked Nandu.
‘Purse,’ she said.
Nandu switched on his torch and searched under the seats of the upper stall. ‘Don’t worry, it will be found. Come tomorrow. I’ll keep it for you,’ he said. He looked again before the 6 p.m. show began. And just like in a film, he found it. Standing between the heaps of old posters, he looked through the purse out of curiosity. A few ragged pieces of paper – four rupees in change, two hairpins, rubber bands, a packet of fennel, a pack of bindis and stubs of some old cinema tickets.
The next day she came in the afternoon, along with a small girl. ‘Didn’t I tell you it would be found?’ he said, handing the purse to her.
She shrieked with happiness and hugged her little friend. After that Nandu always noticed her whenever she came to the theatre. Because her friend had called her ‘Manjari’, Nandu had figured out her name. Once he saw her going away because she hadn’t been able to get a ticket. ‘Manjari,’ he called after her, and making her come back, he had managed to bring her a ticket from inside. He was always happy if she came to see a film on the day of its release. He had still not exchanged a word with her, nor had he bothered to find out anything more about her. When his friends said, on seeing her, ‘Here comes your maal,’ he would get very upset that they called her a ‘piece’. She would never come straight to him. She never spoke to him. It was as though it was enough to see each other. Even when he prepared himself in advance, at the moment of speaking to her, he lost heart. Searching for him with her eyes, Manjari would disappear.
Heroes changed their clothes, changed their horses. Songs came easily to them. The heroines opened their arms wide and ran up the mountain to embrace the heroes. They vowed to be with them in life and death and happiness and sorrow. Manjari woke up at night to collect water for her family when the taps flowed briefly. Nandu waited for a new day. The street was full of film posters soaking in the never-ending drizzle. In the narrow houses, coal stoves burned. Sometimes Manjari’s mother would open the cupboard, and stand looking at all her worldly possessions.
A few steel vessels gleam inside the cupboard. Two sets of new clothes amidst mothballs. The cupboard fears the weddings of the future. If it’s kept open too long, her father gets irritated. Aayi weeps. Once again the cupboard is locked. The old Diwali sky lantern nestles on top of it.
If someone invited them to a wedding, they would go early in the morning and leave only after dinner. If they were invited only for the evening meal, they would skip lunch so as to be all the more hungry for dinner. The hands that tried to stroke her as she passed were the hands on which she tied rakhis at Rakshabandhan. Her brother, who had yelled at his wife just ten minutes ago was now mounting her, panting in the dark. Bound by all these circumstances, Manjari’s breath seemed to loosen when she saw the freshness of the gleam in Nandu’s eyes.
Nandu comes out of his den of film posters. His feet take him near Mahindrakar Chawl where he lingers until afternoon. Perhaps she will come into the street to post a letter, to stand in the ration queue or to take the neighbour’s child to school. Once in a while their eyes meet. At other times, Nandu returns to the theatre for the matinee show. Beyond this mutual exchange of glances, neither of them knows anything more.
Once a film ran into its jubilee week. All the theatre staff got new clothes. The film stars came. Manjari of Mahindrakar Chawl got a special pass that day. Placing some burning coals in a plate, she ironed her blouse, and made sure, by sprinkling water on it, that her string of jasmine flowers stayed fresh. Half an hour before the show, they met hurriedly between the parked cars. He was to open Gold Spot bottles for the actresses. She, on the other hand, wanted to look her fill. In that brief meeting, did their fingers touch? Was there a shy laugh, wonder, a sweaty brow? He ran into the theatre. She went to seat E-28. They met again in the interval. He was standing with a huge cup of ice cream. She kept waiting for the stars who were now to come on stage. He called her thrice. Then she came up to him. The handsome young man sitting next to her, was he walking with her? No, he was going in another direction. She snatched the ice cream from him.
‘How about you?’
‘No, you have it,’ he said.
Looking at the beauties going past, she began to eat the ice cream. He waited to see if she would give him a spoonful. But she didn’t.
‘You can give me a spoon if you wish,’ he said softly. Either she did not hear him or she forgot to respond in the flurry of China silks – she emptied the ice cream cup. ‘Shall I get another one?’ he asked.
Looking away, she said, ‘Yes.’
He ran to buy another cup. This time she might give him a spoonful – he waited. Just then people started rushing back to their seats. So as not miss the heroines, she said she would eat her ice cream inside. Feeling strangely hurt, he went to the side of the stage, where the theatre manager was shouting at everyone. Nandu stayed outside the cinema hall until the show was over. Later in the rushing flood of people, he did not see her. He didn’t search for her either.
The next day it rained. The drops dashed themselves against the window panes. There was a Malayalam film for the matinee and he went inside to see it even though he didn’t understand a word. The film was filled with plump women who aroused him. In the evening, he went near Mahindrakar Chawl in the rain, still lost in the film. She appeared. He felt a strange release. It was as though the moment anticipating the meeting or the moment right after was filled with a pleasure that the actual meeting did not have. ‘Come tomorrow,’ he said. He returned to the theatre. Both of them began to weave their dreams again.
She will say ‘this’, and then I will say ‘that’. In reply, she will say ‘that’.
He will hold my hand and thrust his lips forward, and I’ll close my eyes and bend my head a little.
She turns over on her side as the rain beat down on the chawl. In the theatre, he changes his clothes.
The posters talk:
‘Why don’t you buy a red T-shirt?’
‘Yesterday I’d bought you a rose, but it faded…’
‘You always eat in a restaurant – what fun it must be.’
‘When you watch a nice TV programme in your neighbour’s house, do you think of me?’
‘Why do you wear those torn pants?’
‘Wait and see. I’ll start my own business.’
Nandu was bored with the routine at the theatre. Apart from life in Vidarbha or life at the Malhar, there must be so many other ways of living. He should leave this theatre with its re-runs and repeat shows. But how and where, and why? Eating daily from roadside carts, placing his clothes under his mattress to press them, and being caught by the collar by those black market ticket thugs – Nandu wondered what he should do. Silently, Manjari gave him the inspiration to leave.
And similarly, Manjari, who kept patching her old clothes, and waited so eagerly for her father to bring home some mutton once a year, also began to think. She floated, drunk on thoughts of Nandu, hoping that through him she would get far more than this – sweeping, washing vessels, Sunlight bar soap, kerosene … In the warmth of her solitude, she saw a way out of this. But once in a while, neither could remember the other’s face and would panic.
‘Let’s run away.’
Who said this first, they could not remember. But it was said.
‘As soon as possible.’
This too was said. While the words were being uttered, their resolve strengthened, and from that moment a new spirit filled them both.
The next morning, she was to meet him at Jambali Naka. And then they would go from there. Where? That they could decide tomorrow. And until that morning dawned there was the long night ahead. For Manjari, the night felt like the doorway to a new life. For Nandu, the night filled his limbs with renewed strength. Manjari put her only two good sets of clothes and a sari into her cloth bag and hung it by the hook over the mori. When she slipped out in the morning on the pretext of fetching milk, she would take the bag with her. Nandu made a heroic attempt to get back the ten rupees he had loaned the boy at the soda stall. His salary, received yesterday, was safe. Three hundred was enough to go away with. Then he would work in new businesses, work towards his own. The last show was now going on. Stills in the glassed cupboards were staring out at the empty verandah. Nandu thought of the impossible possibilities awaiting him, and chafes. At her neighbour’s place, Manjari remembered that she won’t be there tomorrow, and watched all the programmes on TV before going home.
At midnight, the show ended and the theatre emptied out. Nandu took his torch out and searched under the seats. Like the waiting night, the darkened theatre frightened him. He lay down in his corner.
> At three a.m., Manjari wakes up, goes to ease herself at the mori, looks at the clock, and goes back to sleep. Nandu wakes at five a.m., has a bath, puts all his belongings into his bag, and leaves the theatre. At the same time, Manjari leaves her house with her bag. Both of them wonder at the number of people out at that hour. Nandu reaches Jambali Naka early. He watches the vegetable trucks emptying themselves out at the market opposite. He looks at the people nodding sleepily in the milk booth queue. Manjari comes slowly towards him, as though limping. Looking around a little fearfully, Nandu smiles at her and says, ‘Let’s have some tea.’
They walked along the main road by the big lake. There were already a number of young people rowing little boats. As the cool breeze blew from the river, Manjari and Nandu, as though confounded by the infinite possibilities afforded by their freedom, walked fast, almost running. He stopped near a roadside tea stall.
‘I’m hungry. I want to eat something too,’ she said stubbornly. So they walked towards the restaurant near the station. They sat down at a table on the empty upper floor. Before the waiter could come to them, Nandu tried to pull Manjari towards him with his right arm, as though for courage. He couldn’t do it right, and something poked him, her chain or an earring, he couldn’t tell. They took forty minutes to finish their vada sambar, upma, masala dosa and tea. As they ate, he kept looking at her. For some reason, her teeth looked very prominent. For one instant, he felt they had been sitting there for years, eating. ‘Eat quickly,’ he said.
No Presents Please Page 2
