‘I remember crying so much after he narrated the script, Sarlaji. The way he described Maya, as a flesh and blood character – a young woman with gaping wounds, who wants to get even with her father.’
I listened patiently as Anupama went on with her memories, telling me of the time she had auditioned, and had subsequently been rejected for the role of Maya, by him.
‘Sarlaji, Amitabhji sat me down and said, “It’s a very demanding role, one that needs emotional starkness and complete surrender. Maya is complex, and, yet supremely childlike…you need to work much harder on your expressions. Learn to give in to the character, completely. Give up on who you are, don’t hold so much back," he told me. I was stung. “Are you saying you don’t trust me as a performer? That you doubt my capability, all of a sudden?” I had interrupted. “Everything I say is not about me. Or my feelings, Anupama,” Amitabhji reprimanded me.
‘I caught his hand, at this point and pressed it against my cheeks. “Is it true, then, about that Parisian actress? Everyone’s talking about her role as Sakuntalam, about this thing you shared…Amitabhji…Sir…was it true? Or was it the effect of the time you spent in Mumbai…I mean the Ballav Salve fiasco…?”’
Known in theatre circles as a loudmouth and trouble-maker, Anupama looked at me sideways, trying to gauge my reaction. I should have known her vested interests in raking up the past. After all, she had been the one to first tell me about Amitabh’s fling with Mrinalini. I pushed open a window, allowing the cool evening air to enter the living room. It had been unused for a while.
Anupama pretended to wipe her eyes again sorrowfully with an embroidered handkerchief, before continuing:
‘Amitabhji lifted my chin, slowly. He said, “Try and get into the skin of the character, Anupama, this is all too superficial, get rid of this dark eye makeup, trying to look old…’”
She turned her face in my direction. ‘I felt so bad, Sarlaji. I shouted: “Why can’t you be plain with me? You are a coward, you know. Shit scared to get involved with an actress, here, in India, in Pune, huh? Especially now that everyone is pretty sure you had something with that French opera star?” I was on the verge of bursting into tears. Amitabhji stood watching me, his hands on his hips. “That is exactly the kind of pent-up anger, Anupama, a seething rage in your body language…why don’t I see it on stage, more often?” he searched my eyes…’
Anupama paused dramatically, perhaps to assess if I was bowled over. Seeing my impassive stare, she went on, gulping down the remaining tea in her cup:
‘Sarlaji, I told your husband: “Everyone knows why you are directing this play. This dark satire that explores the fractured relationship between a father and a daughter…a cycle of abuse and hate…”
‘“What are you talking about, Anupama?” Amitabhji had asked me, frowning menacingly.
‘I laughed. “I’m talking about her: the one and only, Ms. Mrinalini Shirale…. Your wife’s adopted daughter…All the guys in your troupe can’t stop raving about her…”
‘“And what do they say?” Amitabhji had clenched his jaw.'
Anupama cleared her throat, turning to face me, directly; her eyes glowed, with leftover anger:
‘Sarlaji, aap saanp paal rahey they…woh bhi apne chhat ke niche,’ she spoke fast, all attempts at sounding concerned having left her voice. ‘That Mrinalini Shirale was the worst kind of two-faced creature. She destroyed your home, and lured your husband away from you. She repaid your kindness by biting the hand that fed her.’
I looked away, hoping to convey the message that I had had enough. I’d never liked Anupama, in any case. And here she was, playing her old games, as was her second nature.
‘You remember our last meeting?’ she added urgently, whispering thickly, perhaps hoping to convey a fake sense of concern. ‘You had the saddest eyes. Ever since you lost the child…people said you were never the same again... that the randi broke you…something like that…’
I stood up. ‘I’m tired, Anupama, and you better leave, thanks for your visit, but I want to lie down now.’
As I shut the door on Anupama, an old memory rose, of the time she had visited me, once before.
‘How are you, Sarlaji?’ Anupama had barged in all those years ago, much like she had today. Her makeup was tarty; her cleavage generously on display in her small choli.
‘What brings you here, Anupama? I heard you were moving to Mumbai? Heard you are tying the knot, soon? Hope you will not discontinue acting?’ I tried to be civil.
‘I should’ve called first, na? But, but I just thought…it’s my duty to tell you…everything. Right from the start, before I left Pune,’ she had declared, dramatically narrowing her eyes.
‘So, things between Amitabh and you soured after he didn’t select you as the lead actress for his new play, Maya? You’re not the first one to make these allegations about him, you must know that, Anupama…’ I had remarked, matter-of-factly.
‘I know, but this is not about us,’ she had snapped.
‘Then don’t waste my time, dear. I have a dance class waiting. Besides, I have to take Mrinalini to the doctor later,’ I called out for Meena-tai.
Anupama clicked her tongue. ‘This is in fact about her; your Mrinalini, the one you now think of as your daughter,’ she had retorted sardonically. ‘Yes, you heard right, Sarlaji, this is about Mrinalini – the girl who calls you “Aiyee”.’
‘What makes you think I should react to every rumour you report? Why do I have to listen to your crazed drivel, Anupama?’ I had replied angrily.
‘Because, this time, you have no choice, Sarlaji, you are just as powerless as I am, as we all are!’ She had stared back into my eyes. ‘Look, I just want to be a friend to you…a well-wisher; only a woman can understand another woman’s heart,’ she had tried reaching out.
‘I have no friends, Anupama,’ I cut her short, ‘I have lived this way since I moved out of my father’s house. Also, Mrinalini is my child. I took her in, not Amitabh. So, I would appreciate it if you leave her out of these petty politics and mindless allegations. She’s a talented young girl and, will, I know, make her own place under the sun. And, as for Amitabh, he’s a man many admire. To confuse admiration with attraction would be dangerous…for you…so get out of my house. I don’t need you and your poisonous mind to taint everything that is pure. Get out now!” I had lost my temper.
Later, of course, I had witnessed the truth with my own eyes.
I had caught Mrinalini in Amitabh’s room.
His head rested on her bosom. She rocked back and forth. Their eyes were closed.
The room too was shadow infested.
I shuddered at the memory of that dark night. The way our lives had been altered irrevocably. Anupama had known something I couldn’t fathom, even when it was happening under my nose. I flopped down on the cane two-seater, feeling drained. The cushion was still warm from her presence. Wiping the sides of my neck, I flipped open to the page I had been reading. Hoping to find some solace in Amitabh’s words.
Hoping to understand why he had done what he had done. Hoping for answers as to why he had wronged me, again?
Why did he always have to destroy the people I loved?
First Rakesh, then my baby girl, and then, Mrinalini.
The girl I had taken in and nurtured, and started to care about.
MAYA SHIRALE
Goodbyes are gruelling. Goodbyes are greedy. Goodbyes are gullible. Goodbyes are guilty. Goodbyes are greeting cards. Goodbyes are girly. Goodbyes are ghosts. Goodbyes are gruesome. Goodbyes are gimmicky. Goodbyes are gritty. Goodbyes are guesswork.
Goodbyes don’t mean a thing.
Except…goodbye…’
The lines blurred in front of my eyes. I felt completely hollow these days, so empty inside that though Amitabh’s memoirs made me cry, it was a relief to feel something; anything that wasn’t anger and hysteria and frustration. Since the day the news first came…
My cell-phone had been vibrating incessant
ly. I had been ignoring it all morning. I groped under the icy sheets. Avi was gone too. His boxers lay by the edge of the bed.
I put the phone on loudspeaker. It was the journalist, Razia Siddiqui.
‘I’ve got a new job.’
‘Accha, toh?’
‘I wanted to meet you once Maya, we could go to your favourite spot…?’
‘I had something else planned, Razia, a prior engagement, I’m sorry... ’
‘But…’
‘I’ve got to hang up now…someone’s on the other line…’ I fabricated.
‘Please, Maya, at least let me text you what it’s about, then you decide.’ She messaged me saying she was trying to put together a longer and more indepth article on Amitabh Kulasheshtra as the more she read and heard about him, the more he fascinated her. His professional triumphs and his personal failures. Trying to understand his flawed genius. His creativity and his conflicts. His convictions and his contradictions.
I decided to meet her.
I guess I owed him that much.
Or, maybe I needed to feel closer to Amitabh; for I felt so far apart now.
Razia was waiting at the exact same spot where I had last met her in Chowpatty. She had probably been waiting for a while, but I didn’t care. The sky was overcast with pregnant rain clouds. The sea, unusually tempestuous. It was also high tide.
I asked Alam to park at some distance from Razia and then asked him to tell her to come inside the car. It wasn’t dark yet. And I was reluctant to be spotted.
I turned off my cell.
Razia slid into the seat next to me: ‘Thanks for texting and coming down, Maya, and answering my call earlier.’
‘Only because you said you were working on a piece about Kulasheshtra. For Amitabh’s upcoming death anniversary…’
Razia turned on her recorder: ‘Maya, I am here to ask you what transpired that night between you and Amitabh Kulasheshtra, when his wife supposedly walked in on you both, in the dark, in the bedroom of their Pune house…as she later told leading Marathi newspaper, Samna, almost a year and a half later. Alleging you ruined their marriage. Claiming you betrayed her, most of all. A woman you even called...’
‘Aiyee…I called her Aiyee, as in mother. The thing is, I loved her, more than even my own mother, perhaps, Razia. The way she looked after me…It was because of her, that I got to meet Amitabh, to become Maya…his Maya…’
‘I assume you are referring to the sensational play, Maya, here…Kulasheshtra’s first work, after Paris…and…Marie…?’
‘Amitabh caught me sneaking around in his room a few months after his return from Paris. I’d been living in their home for almost a year by then. Aiyee had taken me in when I’d taken up position outside their gates, after running away from mine. Aiyee and he slept on separate floors. In my desperate eagerness to catch his eye, I’d often sneak inside, look through his things. It was on one of those days that I happened to discover the script of a play he was supposedly working on, almost accidentally, really, and it blew my mind. It was as if he had written my story. When he caught me, the first thing I blurted out was: “How do you know how a child who has been molested feels? A girl raped by her own father, almost every night? Did, did she tell you? The character in your new play…?’ It was the first time I actually stood in his presence – a man whom I had obsessed over for so long.’
‘Wasn’t he upset you had looked through his script? Kulasheshtra was known to be famously private, especially about his writing?’
‘He was. But I was so immersed in the script that I immediately said: “I know this is wrong, a big mistake, even coming here, to your home. But, please will you answer me. How did you know all this about my life, the entire thing? Did Aiyee mention something?” Amitabh looked at me quizzically as I continued: “You know, that…that my father touched me, every night, almost…till I ran away from home…decided it was enough.’
‘What happened next, Maya?’
‘Amitabh listened to me without saying a word. I went on: “Aiyee told me about your daughter. She said ever since her death…you’ve changed…you won’t talk about it, she claims…it’s, it’s exactly the way I feel, too, you know, about everything…I can’t talk about it,” I wiped my face, adding edgily, “Maya…was your little daughter’s name, na?…Is that’s why you’ve named your lead character after her? This is a new play, right?”
‘“Sarlu told you that? Even that?” Amitabh finally raised his voice.
‘“No, no…Aiyee hardly mentions your work. She only talks occasionally about Maya. She’s so lonely, Aiyee…’
‘Was their marriage over, by then? Did you take advantage of the void in…’
‘It was Amitabh’s decision to cast me as the lead in Maya. He was looking for a fresh face, and perhaps my personal history also influenced him. The day before the play opened, I spent the entire night with Amitabh in the Pune house, in his room, rehearsing my lines. The last scene, in particular, I broke down: “I’m scared my father will come and watch this play. And…and see me. I’ve, I’ve managed to hide here. Even now, after all this time, I can’t sleep without feeling his breath on my shoulder. The way he’d casually brush his hardness against my buttocks. Before he grabbed my breasts. Tearing at my t-shirt. Pulling off my panties. I, I have tried so hard…to forget…”
‘“Take a pull on this,” Amitabh had passed me a half-smoked bidi.
‘“I don’t like hiding things, from Aiyee,” I pushed his hand away.
‘“Hiding is what you’ve been doing all your life, by your own admission,” he took a lengthy drag.
‘There was an awkward silence. The room was stinking of tobacco.
‘“As a performer, tap into that primal fear and use it to your advantage. Fear is what keeps us alive. The fear of being found out, of being judged, of being unloved. It’s why we try so hard, constantly, to be this other person, to wear a mask; to keep love out. Perhaps, abandonment and abandoning, are the same thing…in the end,” Amitabh placed his hand protectively over mine.’
‘There was obviously an attraction, Maya. I mean, the guru-shishya paradigm slowly polarizing into more of a man-woman thing? Was it the same as what transpired between Marie and him, in Paris? Was Sarla punishing you for someone else..?’
‘As per tradition, Pune was where we staged the final show. Maya was Amitabh’s most awaited production after the international success of La Legende de Sakuntalam,…it was a massive success, the play, lauded for openly tackling sexual abuse in modern Indian homes. A topic a conservative society like ours shuddered to confront. Maya catapulted me into a theatre sensation overnight; critics lauded my no-holds-barred performance, blown away by the emotional starkness of the character; at how sexual abuse was used as a metaphor for a regressive society, and how unsafe the girl-child was in a sexually closeted culture. The play was essentially a monologue that used a lot of shadow play, and it had Amitabh enact a brief role, the first time he acted in his own creation, essaying the role of my father, the one whom I murder in the last act. It was our only scene together on stage. I had never spoken to anyone about my own father, before Amitabh, before this play.
‘On the night, after our final performance I was completely overwhelmed. I hadn’t bothered to remove my make-up. Amitabh had consumed a lot of alcohol. Most of the men in the troupe were sloshed as well. We’d also organized an impromptu party, it wasn’t really planned, or anything. After we reached home, I guided Amitabh up to his room, helping him to change out of his kurta. Aiyee was sleeping downstairs in her part of the house. She never attended any of his plays. “It will bring bad luck, if I come…” she used to say, a little darkly I thought, each time I pleaded with her to come and see me perform. I always felt she was being unnecessarily superstitious.
‘“Turn off the lights after you,” Amitabh had commanded, as soon as I was done.
‘I did as I was told. “Thank you…for giving me a chance of a lifetime…” I said tremulously, as our shoulders br
ushed.
‘“You could have performed much better, you know,’ Amitabh removed a bidi from behind his ear, flopping down on the bed.
‘“I’m sorry, if I didn’t live up to your expectations…’ I said, turning back and sitting down on the floor by his bed.
‘“Mrinalini,’ Amitabh propped up my chin, ‘you’ve got to bury your father. You can’t get away with not killing him, in your mind, each time.”
‘I covered my face with both my hands, “I feel so dead inside…soulless…the little girl who shivered every time she heard a door being opened, lights being turned off…who bore the brunt of a stale marriage, a paralyzed mother and a father who couldn’t retain a single job…paying the price…” I swallowed my tears.
‘“We’re all dead, inside. It’s why we love this stage so much…it’s the only place we get to be completely alive. Tell our own stories, pretending to be someone else. Live a different life than the one you ran away from, the one that still haunts you daily. It’s exactly why you failed today…you just couldn’t be her, the woman who wanted to stab her father, desperately…the pervert who abused her every night. The hatred…I didn’t see it fully in your eyes…that vengeful wrath…you should have been consumed with…”
I couldn’t look into his eyes. “But…it was not in the script, either. I was meant to drop the blade and walk away at the end,” I feebly tried defending myself, wiping my eyes.
‘Amitabh stubbed out his bidi. “Then what are you doing, here?” he grabbed my shoulders, all of a sudden.
‘“I was scared you may slip and fall down the stairs…you, you were drunk…” my heart raced.
‘“I’ve been walking alone up those stairs, every single night of my life, Maya…I will not fall,” Amitabh tugged at my shirt.
‘I was wearing a chiffon blouse. The top button popped open.
‘“Don’t,” Amitabh held back my hands, stopping me from fixing my buttons.
‘“Why? This is all so wrong…Aiyee could wake up, any minute…she, she will…” I couldn’t control my tears.
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