The Unlikely Adventures of the Shergill Sisters

by Balli Kaur Jaswal

  “And all the girls after her,” Hari said, with a wink. He followed Jezmeen back into the building.

  It took a moment for Rajni to understand what his wink meant. “I think he was responsible for getting Jezmeen and the others out of jail that day,” she told Shirina as they walked toward the shopping area. “He probably used his influence to release them—that’s why he was so chilled out about his daughter being there.”

  “Maybe that’s why his daughter continues to get involved in those protests,” Shirina said. “If she gets into trouble with the authorities, her dad can make some calls. It’s probably safer for the other girls without influential fathers to join her.”

  Everything in this country is about who you know, Mum had said to Rajni one day, after hanging up the phone in frustration. She had been finding it impossible to get a lawyer to represent her about Dad’s land without referrals from family members. A woman on her own in a country that was no longer hers, Mum had a hard time getting through to anybody.

  Walking with Shirina toward the arched entrances of the colonial shophouses, Rajni couldn’t stop thinking of Mum. The weary look on her face as she tried another phone number, how hopeful she sounded about getting the land from Thaya-ji. Mum had faith in people. She had faith in her daughters too, otherwise she wouldn’t have sent her back here.

  The urn was still in Rajni’s suitcase. After Shirina returned from the toilet, Rajni said, “We still need to spread Mum’s ashes.”

  “We’re coming back here next year for that, aren’t we?” Shirina asked.

  Rajni shook her head. “No. I mean, yes, we’ll return to India and we’ll make the trek, but I don’t want to go back to London with unfinished business.” It would be too reminiscent of the way Rajni left India last time. Her head hanging in shame, the shadow of betrayal hovering over her. Shortly after she returned home, her sixteenth birthday came and went. Mum didn’t ignore the day out of spite—she really seemed to forget. She had found a cleaning job that would let her take extra shifts—backbreaking work that saw her leaving the house at dawn and coming back late at night, long after Shirina and Jezmeen had fallen asleep at Auntie Roopi’s house. That was when Rajni decided things had to change.

  What Jezmeen said about all bodies of water leading to the same place had some truth. “Doesn’t the Yamuna River run through Delhi at some point?” Rajni wondered aloud. It was a tributary of the Ganges, where ashes were more commonly scattered. In one of Jezmeen’s early emails disputing every item on the itinerary, she had pointed this out.

  “We could ask Tom Hanks,” Shirina said. Rajni took out her phone to call him and saw that he had sent her a message to say that he was parked behind the office tower.

  They found Tom Hanks sitting in the car and watching something on his phone. When he noticed Rajni and Shirina approaching, he beckoned them closer. His eyes were glistening with tears. “It’s my favorite part,” he said. It was that scene from Castaway where Tom Hanks—the actor—was crying over the imaginary friend that he had conjured from an image of a bloody handprint on a volleyball.

  “Yes, I’ve seen it,” Rajni said. “Tom Hanks, we were wondering . . .”

  Tom Hanks held up a finger to silence her. He nodded at the screen. “WILSON!” cried Tom Hanks the actor. “WIIILLLSONNN!” Rajni and Shirina exchanged a look, and Shirina shrugged.

  The scene finished but it looked as if another one was about to load. Rajni caught a glimpse of the sidebar on the phone—Tom Hanks’s Greatest Scenes Playlist still had several more videos in its queue. “Tom Hanks, we need your help,” she said.

  This got his attention. He put the phone down and started to turn on the ignition again.

  “We can’t go anywhere yet,” Rajni said. “We need to wait for our sister. But before you take us to the airport, can you drive us to a river? The Yamuna River goes through Delhi somewhere, doesn’t it?”

  “It does,” Tom Hanks said. “But it might take a while to get there.”

  “Is it far?” Shirina asked.

  “Not far,” Tom Hanks said. “I can show you on my phone. Traffic will be horrendous, though. It will take ages to get to the outer ring of Connaught Place from here, and by then we’ll have to contend with the rush hour.”

  Rajni really didn’t want to be in a panic over getting to the airport on time. “Does the Metro go there?” she asked.

  “Yes. Take the Metro from here to Indraprastha Station and walk about five or ten minutes. You’ll see the river.”

  Rajni and Shirina looked at each other. “You sure this is how you want to do this?” Shirina asked.

  Rajni nodded.

  Jezmeen walked out of the building, her heart pounding, to find Rajni holding the canister of Mum’s ashes. “How did it go?” Rajni asked.

  “I’ll tell you later,” Jezmeen said, keeping her eyes trained on the urn. “What are you doing with that?”

  “We’re thinking of scattering Mum’s ashes on the Yamuna River, which leads to the Ganges. Turns out it’s not far from here, and we can get back in time for Tom Hanks to take us to the airport. Indraprastha Station is only a few stops away.”

  Take you to the airport, Jezmeen thought. She couldn’t bring herself to say it, though. In the last hour, an opportunity to star in a television series had been presented to her with one small catch: she had to stay in India. At first, Jezmeen had thought the choice was easy. Of course! she’d said. But Hari told her to think about it, and then the doubt crept in. This meant leaving London behind, which she had been so glad to do last week when she was leaving for a temporary trip, but there were so many different things to consider now. She had suspended her frustrations with India because she knew she was just visiting; would she survive here on her own?

  Luckily, she didn’t have to say anything yet. Rajni and Shirina were too busy trying to find the Metro station according to Tom Hanks’s directions. Rajni clutched the canister to her chest as a surge of commuters went against their direction at the station’s entrance. They paid for their tickets and made their way to the platform. The smooth tiled floors and air-conditioning muted out the noise from the city above.

  “I wonder what Mum would say if she knew this was how we were doing this,” Shirina said, holding a protective hand over her belly as they jostled with other passengers through the doors of the women’s section. A seat was quickly cleared for Shirina, who thanked the woman and sat down. Rajni and Jezmeen stood next to her.

  “Mum’s letter contained a lot of reminders for us to bond with each other and look after each other. I think she’d be happy enough to know we were doing this together,” Rajni said. The train jerked suddenly, the force knocking Rajni into Jezmeen, who reached out instinctively to grab the canister. Rajni stabilized and hugged the urn to her chest with one hand. With the other, she held on to a pole.

  “Or she’d say, ‘I should have chosen a burial,’ ” Jezmeen said. Rajni and Shirina started laughing.

  “So tell us what happened with Hari,” Shirina said. “Is he going to follow up, or was it just a meeting to say hello?”

  Jezmeen waved the question away. “One thing at a time,” she said, nodding at the canister. “I’ll tell you guys after we’re done.”

  There was a muffled announcement and then the train pulled into the station. Jezmeen couldn’t help remembering that day at the protest, all the women pouring out of the station and into the white sunlight. They brimmed with energy and anger. Jezmeen had felt as if she was part of an exciting movement, and the injustice of being catcalled and harassed was so fresh from that walk from the hotel to the station. “Your sister told me you couldn’t stay out of trouble,” Hari had said in his office earlier, with a grin. He was joking, but Jezmeen’s stomach knotted at the thought.

  The noise of the street greeted them as soon as they emerged from the station. The river was visible in the distance, but they had to walk in single file along the wobbling stones of a pavement to a traffic junction. A bus teeming with peopl
e thundered past, trailing a long black puff of exhaust. Jezmeen wasn’t sure if the sheen of being in India had worn off, or if she was just thinking about it more because of the dilemma she was in, but she missed London. She missed it even more knowing that she might not go back for a while.

  The river was clogged at the banks with rubbish. Empty plastic bottles and scraps of wood bobbed along the water. Poking between the debris were weeds, clumped and blackened with oil. This was all to be expected, but when Jezmeen saw the look of uncertainty on Rajni’s face, she wondered if they had come here for nothing.

  “We don’t have to do this now,” Shirina reminded Rajni. “There’s always time to come back.”

  “You’ll have a baby then,” Rajni said. “Anil and Davina will have one too, and I’ll be busy helping them. I don’t have much time off except during school holidays. Life will get in the way and we’ll keep putting it off.”

  Jezmeen looked around. “If we walk a bit further, we can find a better spot,” she said. She had no idea if this was right, but Rajni and Shirina took her advice. They walked in silence along the edges of the river, which curved away from the road. There was a row of boarded stalls on the embankment. The people in the shops looked curiously at them as they walked past.

  “Here,” Rajni said, nodding to an area where the water was clear. All of the rubbish had floated and collected together on the other side—there was a small sanctuary. Jezmeen felt the sun prickling her skin. The sky was a blur of pale yellow, like parched grass. It wasn’t Lokpal Lake, but there was beauty in searching for a space like this for Mum too. Shirina clasped her hand.

  Rajni twisted open the lid from the canister and hesitated. “Shall we take it in turns?” Jezmeen and Shirina nodded, so Rajni lowered herself slowly to a squat and began to tip the ashes into the water. They sprinkled out and peppered the surface. “You’re home now, Mum. Rest well.” Rajni stretched her arm and shook the canister again, spilling more ashes.

  “Your turn,” she said to Shirina, wiping the tears from her eyes.

  Shirina stayed standing. She held on to Jezmeen’s hand and took the canister from Rajni with her other hand. She whispered, “Thank you, Mum. Thank you for bringing us together. Thank you for our lives.” After she shook some of the ashes out, she waited and watched them floating on the water’s surface.

  Tears blurred Jezmeen’s vision. A part of her wanted to run away from all of this. It was too difficult to put an end to Mum like this. She felt that familiar choking, that need to turn back time. “Go on, Jezmeen,” Rajni said gently. “You can do this.” Jezmeen shook her head, refusing the canister from Shirina.

  Rajni and Shirina waited for her. They stood quietly on the banks of the river, looking out at the horizon, lost in their thoughts. Jezmeen gathered up the strength to say good-bye to Mum. She didn’t have anything to say aloud, like her sisters did. She felt as if she had too many things to say, that there were so many conversations she wanted to have with Mum in place of all the arguments they had over trivial things. You have to take more responsibility. This was why Jezmeen was so afraid to stay in India. What if trouble found her again and she didn’t have anybody to bail her out?

  The clouds shifted, letting in a shard of sunlight that made Rajni and Shirina blink and look away. Jezmeen closed her eyes. Light danced in the darkness and then materialized into familiar shapes. She saw Mum sitting up in her hospital bed, nodding a greeting as Jezmeen walked in. It was just like that day when Jezmeen visited her on the way back from the audition, except Jezmeen had different news now. I have an opportunity, she said. It could be amazing. Mum listened, her expression unchanging. In the fantasy, Jezmeen heard herself telling Mum that she had worked very hard for a long time, and it was time she had a break. I need you to have a little faith in me, she said.

  When Jezmeen opened her eyes, the sunlight was defining every ripple in the water. She shielded her eyes and held out her other hand for the canister. Shirina placed it in her grasp. Jezmeen clutched it fiercely to her chest, remembering how strange it felt to hold Mum’s limp, bony hands. Unlike her sisters, Jezmeen had no parting words for Mum. What she resolved to do then was more powerful than anything she could say.

  She turned the canister over and emptied it into the water. The ashes drew together to make a floating shadow on the surface before the water shifted and they broke apart.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  My daughters, the completion of this journey should bring you peace. I’m sure traveling together was not easy, but perhaps this trip to India has taught you something that you couldn’t have learned in England. I cannot command you to spend any more time together, or to cherish each other’s presence in your lives. I can only leave you with hope that the lessons of this journey will continue after you return home.

  Good-byes had to be quick at the entrance of Delhi airport. Passengers poured from every direction toward the sliding doors, their trolleys piled high with wobbling luggage. A tour bus pulled up on the curb and began a deafening series of honks to clear the cars parked ahead. Jezmeen and Shirina were locked in a tight embrace. Tears spilled down Shirina’s cheeks and darkened Jezmeen’s blue cotton peasant top.

  “You take care of yourself,” Rajni said briskly, when it was her turn to part with Jezmeen. She was almost tempted to give Jezmeen a pat on the back and dive into the crowd of passengers to avoid any more wrenching emotion. Instead she gave Jezmeen a quick hug. She could feel her eyes welling up, so she turned her attention to her suitcase and said, “Right, off we go.” She sensed rather than saw Jezmeen wandering off into the crowd. Shirina waited and waved, and caught up with Rajni as she entered the airport.

  After checking in and putting their bags through the scanners, Rajni and Shirina were to give their father’s name for the last time at Customs. The immigration officer scrutinized Rajni’s passport photograph and gave her a hard, unblinking stare. It hadn’t been that long since the photo had been taken, but Rajni was conscious of how different she probably looked. With each passing year, her cheeks sank a little bit more and her laugh lines deepened.

  “Look here, please,” the officer said. Rajni didn’t realize that her eyes were wandering. At the next counter, Shirina was having a conversation with the immigration officials. It was probably because of the last-minute change in her ticket.

  But Rajni still worried. She had not stopped worrying since they found Shirina in that clinic, even though she was working hard to stay upbeat for Shirina’s sake. In the car on the way here, Rajni asked Shirina, “What’s the first thing you want to do when we get back to London?” Shirina shrugged. “Come on, tell me,” Rajni urged. “We’ll go wherever you want. Maybe that new Ottolenghi restaurant? I haven’t tried it either, but I heard it’s gotten rave reviews. Or a West End show? Did any good musicals come out while you were in Melbourne?” Rajni realized that she was selling the tourists’ version of London to a person who had lived there all her life, but she wasn’t sure if Shirina thought of it as home anymore.

  Last night, while her sisters were watching a movie in the hotel suite, Rajni had called Kabir. They hadn’t spoken since that late-night conversation early on in the trip, and their conversation now was careful, with pauses that Rajni knew could only be filled when they saw each other in person again. After telling Kabir about Shirina, and deciding together that Shirina should stay with them for a while, she asked after Anil. “He’s well,” Kabir said. “He and Davina have started flat-hunting.”

  Rajni had felt the twinge in her gut, but accepted that it would always be there. This was her son after all, and he was starting adulthood far earlier than she’d wanted. She was allowed to grieve while also supporting him. She took in a deep breath and said, “I’d like to meet her. Maybe we can have her over for dinner when I come back?”

  “That would be really nice,” Kabir had said. Rajni could feel his relief over the phone. Her next phone call was to Nikhil, the private investigator. She thanked him for his services and to
ld him to close the investigation. After assuring him she didn’t want a refund, she hung up and deleted his number from her phone.

  Now Shirina was nodding at something the official was telling her. Her gaze flickered at Rajni, and she nodded again. There was a sign on the wall that instructed passengers not to wait in this area, but nobody had shooed Rajni away yet. All sorts of travelers trailed past Rajni, lumbering under the weight of backpacks and dragging suitcases which bulged with excesses from their journey. Rajni realized she hadn’t bought a single thing in India to take home. The contents of her bags were the same as when she left London, but so much had changed. She had a new relationship with her sisters—that and a throbbing pain in her ankle.

  Rajni had been worried too when Jezmeen announced to them that she had decided to stay in India. Rajni knew staying in India was the best thing for Jezmeen’s career, and she couldn’t wait to see her sister succeed, but she also wished they were returning to London together. She remembered taking Jezmeen and Shirina to the shops when they were little girls. She’d link arms with her sisters, one on each side. Sometimes, if Rajni picked up her pace, Jezmeen would stumble and ask her to slow down. Rajni would smile, and say, “I forgot your little feet.” The comment made Jezmeen take long, quick strides, an imitation of a fairy-tale giant. When Mum first told them to take this pilgrimage, Rajni had had a mental image of racing against her sisters across India, out of sync and gasping for breath. Rajni wished that Mum could see what the journey had done for them. She imagined Mum waiting for them at Heathrow, expecting three bickering women who couldn’t wait to get away from each other, but instead finding her daughters chatting amicably, making plans to see each other again soon.

  Rajni’s phone buzzed in her bag. As she pulled it out, a border officer marched toward her, wagging a finger. Rajni dropped the phone back in her bag and cast a glance over her shoulder. Shirina was holding up the stub from what looked like her Melbourne-to-Delhi boarding pass. The security officer waved Rajni along. She walked as far as she could while still keeping Shirina within her sight. Outside a duty-free lounge, Rajni picked up her phone. It was a message from Jezmeen: