by Sonali Dev
Suddenly a spark shone too strong, too bright, and broke through her trance. Then another. Then another. Blinking, Ria followed the flashes to the rooftop terrace of the neighboring building.
A hooded figure shrouded in black leaned over the concrete wall and reached into the meager space separating the two buildings. A giant bazooka-like contraption projected from his hands and he had it aimed straight at her.
A lens.
The realization slammed into Ria, the force of it turning every cell in her body to lead and locking her in place, as the rapid flashes went off incessantly.
Suddenly they stopped. He moved the camera aside, looked directly at her, and made a bouncing, diving action with one hand.
He was signaling her to jump.
2
The doorbell gave a loud clang. Ria sat up in bed panting, memories thrashing around inside her like rabid things kept locked up too long.
She pulled her knees to her chest, pressing them against the name slamming inside it.
Viky.
Had she screamed it out? Or had it stayed trapped inside? All she knew was that she wanted to hear it again. Wanted to say it again so badly she had to swallow to keep it inside.
The doorbell clanged again.
She dragged herself to the door. Every joint in her body felt like it had come unhinged from being rolled up like a fetus all night. Tai, her day maid, who cleaned and cooked for Ria, stood on the other side of the door, both hands planted squarely on her hips, her face scrunched up with disapproval for being kept waiting. One look at Ria and her glare turned to alarm. Apparently, the Ice Princess mask hadn’t held up to last night’s events.
“Who will believe you are a filum shtarr, babyji?” Tai pulled the door shut behind her and took her street slippers off by the door. “You look like my friend when her husband whacks her twice and her eyes swell into slits this small.” She narrowed her own eyes, simulating her friend’s abuse with her usual matter-of-factness. But the concern in her voice was so heartfelt that Ria attempted a smile to put her at ease before heading off to the bathroom to assess the damage. Tai tucked her sari around herself and followed close on Ria’s heels.
Tai was right. Smudged mascara and kohl painted twin black eyes into Ria’s throbbing head. Leaning over the sink, Ria flicked on the lights that outlined the mirrored wall and studied herself in it. She couldn’t remember the last time she had gone to bed without stripping her face of every last bit of makeup. She turned on the faucet and splashed her face. Time to snap out of all this self-indulgent moping about. The cold sting felt so good she kept splashing until Tai nudged her shoulder and handed her a towel, staring at her the way one stared at a pathetic, hungover drunk.
“You know, babyji, my friend just started doing cleaning for that new girl who lives down there.” She pointed at the bathroom floor. “On the second floor. You know the one who acts in TV sherial?”
A tiny smile nudged at Ria’s heart. She loved the way Tai peppered their native tongue, Marathi, with English words like film star and TV serial, turning all her s’s into sh’s. Ria nodded and started rubbing globs of aloe extract into the soreness around her eyes.
Tai put down the commode cover and lowered herself on it. “Arrey, you should hear the stories my friend tells. Day and night they do party.” Again, she said the word party in English and rolled her eyes one full circle to make sure Ria knew exactly how despicable the partying was. “Bottle everywhere. Even ciga-rette. Shi! And men? All times of the day there are men.”
The smile broke through to Ria’s lips.
Tai went on. “I told my friend, not my babyji. Never. Never a party. Never noise. Never nothing!” She shook her hands to indicate the nothingness of Ria’s life. “And men? Not ever. Not one. And you are a real shtar. Not just some TV shtarlett!” She spat out the word starlet with such disgust that Ria paused in the middle of rubbing circles up and down her cheeks and turned to her. Tai didn’t deserve all this worry.
“Thank you, Tai.” Ria had always used the endearment that meant “big sister” for her. She was much older than Ria, so using her name was out of the question and Ria hated the standard Bai reserved for maids. “When do I have time for parties? And you know there’s no alcohol in the house. It’s just that there was a little problem last night and I didn’t get much sleep.” As understatements went, this one was ridiculously over the top.
Ria grabbed a tissue and wiped around her eyes. The naked, violated feeling that had made her hands shake when she tugged the drapes shut after running in from the balcony last night spread through her in an unbearable throb. She eased the pressure of her fingers. Some desperate paparazzo wasn’t worth gouging out her skin for. Especially not just before a shoot.
A frown creased Tai’s forehead. But Ria didn’t respond to her silent question. Tai’s curiosity would be satisfied soon enough. The pictures were going to be all over the media. Ten years of keeping her private life off the media’s radar, and she had potentially blown it all in one fell swoop.
She turned back to the mirror, her spine so straight it made her feel ten feet tall and lifted her away from the problem. Blowing it wasn’t an option. After spending ten years guarding her private life with everything she had, she wasn’t going to let one stupid impulsive moment ruin it all. Silence was the only defense against the press. It was the best antidote to scandal. And Ria Parkar did silence better than anyone else.
Tai shook her head, giving up on a response, and straightened the stack of the MindBender magazines Ria special-ordered from England and solved obsessively. “Come on, babyji, I’ve worked for you for five years, you don’t think I know you are as straight as an arrow?” She pulled her arms apart and shot out an imaginary arrow. “Look at you. Who else has a face like that? Those almond eyes the color of honey.” She widened her own eyes. “That skin like churned cream!” She rubbed her own cheeks with both hands, jangling her glass bangles. “What is the use, babyji? I ask you, what is the use? You don’t eat, don’t sleep, don’t have any friends. That family of yours visits you every few years like some strangers. When I was twenty-eight like you I had five children. Five!” She held up five work-worn fingers and pride flashed in her eyes at the mention of her children.
Ria crushed the blackened tissue into a wad and swallowed the sharp edged lump that stuck in her throat like a mangled ball of nails.
You will have to find someone else to have crazy children with. It will not be my Vikram.
Even today, ten years later, the memory of his mother’s words was as fresh as a bleeding wound. It cut her off at her knees and in the space of an instant turned her into the helpless girl she’d been.
“Babyji?”
Ria found her fist pressed against her belly—a womb she would never allow to fill. This curse of hers would go no further than her. She pulled her hand away and tossed the tissue in the trash. Enough. If the idea of going home was going to undo all the distance she had traveled, she really had to think of a way to get out of it.
She forced her mind back to Tai’s concerned face.
“But I have you, Tai, don’t I? You take such good care of me.” She conjured up her best smile, making her dimples dance, her eyes twinkle, shamelessly wielding her weapons with the skill of a hardened warrior.
Tai’s worry dissipated. She touched the wooden door to ward away evil spirits. “With a smile like that, no wonder that Kunal Kapoor was willing to kill himself for you in Jeena Tere Liye,” she said, the smile back on her face, her eyes at once bashful and shining with mischief.
“Thank heavens he didn’t,” Ria teased her. “How would I ever live it down if I hurt your favorite heartthrob?”
“Ish!” Tai giggled into her sari like a little girl, blushing furiously. “Such a jokester you are, Babyji! Those stupid press-walas should see you like this.” She picked up the laundry basket. “When was the last time you ate?”
Her tone reminded Ria so much of Uma Atya that for one moment the intensity
of her need to go home squeezed the breath from her lungs.
“How about you make me a chapati?” she said, ignoring the pang. “And give me some yogurt with it. And don’t you dare sneak ghee on my chapati. I have to be at a shoot in two hours.”
Tai snorted and switched on the water heater so Ria would have hot water in the shower. “Who eats a chapati and yogurt for breakfast when they could eat just about anything they wanted? It’s nonsensical, that’s what it is,” she mumbled under her breath as she left the bathroom. And it almost turned the smile on Ria’s face real.
Even today, ten years after her first time, being in front of the camera felt like being stripped naked and held down against her will. Ria let the gush of relief wash over her as she stepped away from the blazing set lights. The forced synch-sound silence dissolved into the din of pack-up that erupted around her. Her mind turned back on and slid back into her body just as it switched back into itself. Years of practice made it easy to use the rituals of pack-up to reorient herself. She relaxed and adjusted her sari so it didn’t show quite so much cleavage.
“Excellent shot, Riaji!” Shabaz Khan, her hero in the film, followed her as she walked away from the set and beamed at her with all his newcomer enthusiasm. “Thank you so much for all your help.”
Ria nodded politely. Five minutes ago he’d been holding her as though she was his life’s blood and it was a huge relief that he was able to drop the character just as quickly as she did.
“You too, Shabaz.” She should have asked him to dispense with formality and call her just Ria. But she liked the distance the ji tacked on to her name provided. This was his first film. Between his small-town upbringing and his eagerness to please, she doubted he would have called her just Ria even if she asked him to. Truth was, his newcomer reticence made her own social ineptness in the industry seem less awkward. It was one of the reasons she always agreed to act with new heroes when none of the other established heroines were willing to take that chance.
She hated the usual hugging and kissing in the industry and her greatest horror was one of those sets where everyone acted like it was one big party with the pranks and the spontaneous get-togethers. Fortunately, her reclusive reputation preceded her and all she got for hiding away in her room was a few sniggers and some name calling behind her back.
She returned Shabaz’s smile and was about to walk away when he took a step too close and reached for her hand. “The film is done now and we don’t have to pretend anymore,” he said, his smile turning suddenly heavy lidded and far more bold than she’d ever seen it.
Ria stepped back, so startled that for one second she forgot how to hide it.
His mouth tightened along with his grip. “Oh come on, you don’t really think I buy the “benevolent senior actor” bit, do you? It’s not like I haven’t heard what they say about you.”
In a rush of cold, hard fury Ria’s composure returned. With all the calm befitting an Ice Princess she looked around the set. Everyone appeared to be absorbed in packing up, and there wasn’t a journo in sight. Good. Without a single word she turned her glare on his hand, which was still gripping her wrist, until he dropped it. He stepped back, both hands raised as though it was her reaction that was completely irrational and not what he’d just said.
She regained her polite smile and gave him a second to return it before walking away. And when he mumbled the words “frigid bitch” behind her, she blocked them out just as she blocked out the sting of his fingers on her wrist.
“Funtastic shot, Riaji.” The lanky unit boy caught up with her as she made her way to the dressing room. He held an umbrella over her head to keep the harsh sun off her face and handed her a bottle of water, smiling at her with such sincerity, the useless anger that had flared inside her calmed.
She took a long sip. “Thank you, Rameshji.” She presented another rendition of the signature Ria Parkar smile.
His eyes lost focus, his mouth fell open in a besotted “O,” and Ria quickly dialed it back.
“You’ll kill someone with that smile someday.” How her agent knew the exact wrong thing to say in any given situation, she would never know. He strode up to her in his all-black ensemble. Quintessential DJ in all his intimidating glory. The boy cowered.
Ria frowned at DJ. He ignored her and snapped his fingers, signaling for the boy to leave. “We need to talk.”
She turned to Ramesh again. “Did you get Choti’s board results?”
He brightened. Brotherly pride turned him larger, older than he was. “She got eighty percent, Riaji!”
This time Ria didn’t have to make herself smile. She patted his head. “Excellent! I told you she would do well. Remember what I said about marriage? Wait until she finishes college, okay?”
He nodded shyly before running off.
“You can barely remember your costar’s names and you know everything about the unit hand’s family?” DJ said as though it were somehow an accusation.
“You needed something?” Ria turned and headed for the cottage that served as her dressing room in the sprawling studio complex. She had steadily refused to buy a trailer. Too many bad memories.
DJ fell in step next to her, but didn’t answer. Ria could hear the cogs in his brain turning. DJ was never at a loss for words. Everything about DJ was out in the open, and what wasn’t was barely contained. He was one of those small men who cast a large shadow. Everything about him, except for his height, was huge. Huge hair, huge mannerisms, huge ambition. And amazingly, for someone most women had to look down at, he also had a huge reputation that suggested he wasn’t called Big DJ for nothing.
As they approached the cottage, a uniformed security guard who had been smoking under a tree ran up and unlocked the door for them. Ria thanked him, but instead of his usual cheery greeting, he gave Ria a formal smile and DJ a stiff salute and stepped away quickly.
“How is it they only smile at you, never at me?” DJ asked, one of his spectacular frowns darkening his face.
“Maybe because I don’t glower at them and scare them half to death.”
“Yeah, you save your glowering for your costars and the press.” DJ signaled the guard to bring them chai, his dark mood perfectly in synch with his black muscle shirt, black jeans, and chunky black elevator shoes. The only speck of color on him was the scarlet prayer thread on his wrist and the scarlet tilak etched across his forehead.
He was probably coming from one of the many poojas—the prayer ceremonies he attended almost every day as part of his job. Religious rites to invoke favors and give thanks were standard fare in the film industry. Success was elusive—no one knew what brought it on or how to keep it from slipping away. So divine intervention was universally accepted as the only explanation and everyone rushed about to lay claim to whatever divinity they could intercept. They changed the spellings of their names and rebuilt their homes to follow feng shui and vastu shastra to open up their energy centers and let in light and peace and the one thing that made all that light and peace worth having—money.
Ria settled into the leather sofa and slipped off her silver heels before placing them neatly in their box and stretched her feet under the heavy zardozi border of her sari. Must be nice to be able to believe that destinies could be reversed by something as simple as prayer.
DJ noticed her looking at his wrist thread. “The Kapoor satya narayan,” he said, doing a quick thing with his fingers, touching his head, then his heart, and the restless set of his shoulders relaxed for a few seconds.
Ria nodded and arched one eyebrow at the oversized manila envelope he pulled out of his shoulder bag.
He handed her the chai and biscuits the security guard brought in. “Eat first.” He tapped the envelope with a finger. “These aren’t going to help your appetite.”
She took a sip of the chai and put the biscuits on the coffee table. “I thought you liked it when I didn’t eat. What happened to ‘There’s no such thing as too thin’?” She reached for the envelope.
He moved it out of reach. “Babes, if you get any thinner, we’ll have the eating disorder police to deal with on top of everything else. Fat bunch of frustrated journos and their fucking sour grapes. Talk about destructive Western influence.” He lowered himself onto the arm of the sofa.
“On top of everything else? I thought I was your easiest client.” She wasn’t much of an actor, but she knew what the audience wanted and she gave it to them, always looking her best, working hard at her dances, and following the director’s directions to a T. Having learned to separate from herself at such a young age had its advantages. Even the critics followed along, calling her nuanced and ethereal if the film clicked, and robotic and plastic if it tanked. She was also his most scandal-free client. He’d never had to clean up a single mess for her. DJ had absolutely nothing to complain about.
Usually, he would’ve responded with a cocky comment. But his frown didn’t budge. He held up the envelope when she reached for it again and opened and shut his mouth a few times in a ridiculously un-DJ-like gesture, before his words finally tumbled out. “My guess is you haven’t posed semi-topless while trying to kill yourself. So this has to be some bastard who got lucky and caught you doing something incredibly stupid.”
The milky chai curdled in Ria’s throat. The paparazzo had worked faster than she’d expected. But why had he sent the pictures to DJ? She swallowed and snatched the envelope from his hand. It opened, spilling pictures on the tightly stretched black leather of the sofa.
There were four of them. All sepia-toned with the hue of night. All surreal.
Her hands were spread-eagled. Hair billowed in a tangle around her face. Her bare toes clutched the edge of the concrete, and her body leaned forward like it was about to go flying to its death. He had even managed to capture a hollow maniacal gleam in her kohl-smudged eyes.
