Fern Road

by Angshu Dasgupta

  He goes back down the stairs, not knowing what he should do. There’s a bank of fuse boxes and power meters beneath the staircase, but staring at them is not going to help him diagnose the problem. Feeling woefully inadequate, he heads to the caretaker’s quarters at the back of the compound.

  ‘A man from the electric company was here,’ Kedar-dada says apologetically. ‘He said that your bill hasn’t been paid for six months. I told him there must be a mistake, and that I would tell Sengupta-babu to get in touch with him, but he wouldn’t listen.’

  At first Orko can’t believe that his father could forget to pay the bill for six consecutive months. On the first Sunday of every month, Nandan sits at their dining table with his diary, writing out cheques for their monthly bills and enclosing cash in envelopes for the milkman and the paperboy. Orko tries to recall the last time he saw his father at this monthly ritual, but he can’t.

  For the first time in his life, Orko is worried about his father. There was a time when Nandan would say that eating out frequently was terrible for one’s health. Now, more often than not, they have dinner at a dingy little Chinese restaurant near the bus terminus. Sometimes Nandan doesn’t even feel like walking the five minutes that it takes them to get there. He sends Orko to a grimy roadside stall for chicken curry and roti. Sometimes Nandan doesn’t come home for dinner, and Orko eats toast and eggs, saving the takeout money for himself.

  Back in the flat, Orko lights a candle. He lets a few drops of wax fall onto the surface of an old saucer. He presses the bottom of the candle into the puddle of wax, waiting for it to cool. The flat looks eerily different in candlelight. The walls seem to recede, making the living room appear much larger than it is. He sets a cushion against an armrest and lies on the sofa. On the ceiling, the fan casts a shadow that looks like an alien spacecraft. The cushions on the sofa look brown, although he knows that they’re green. The refrigerator, sky-blue, is now an indeterminate colour. On the refrigerator is the familiar photo frame, but his mother’s image is lost in the shadows.

  When Brishti showed him Joshua’s photo, Orko was reminded of his mother glancing sideways at him from the top of the refrigerator. On his way back from Brishti’s, he surmised that this was because they were both beautiful, and because neither of them would ever be old and infirm. Now he realises that they have another thing in common: the manner of their deaths was shrouded in secrecy. No one ever talked about his mother’s passing; when he asked questions, he was always told that his mother’s heart had stopped beating. This frustrated him, because ultimately everybody died because their hearts stopped beating. Finally, an answer begins to emerge from the shadows of the years. It begins to seem very likely that his mother, like Joshua, had taken her own life.

  Eleven

  After the incident by the guava tree, Orko stopped going to the schoolyard by himself, and he avoided going to the bathrooms on their floor, lest he run into Kaushik. For the first few days, he became angry and resentful when he thought about the situation. Weeks passed, then months, and now it seems as though this is how things always were. He is always vigilant, and he doesn’t indulge in frivolities such as walks in the schoolyard with his classmates. In the morning, he waits outside the gates until he hears the bell for assembly. He falls in line at the last moment, and he stays close to Brishti and Nilanjana when they make their way to their classroom. He spends the break indoors, with Brishti. After school, he usually goes to Brishti’s house and has lunch with her.

  It begins to rain just as Orko and Brishti leave school. It’s just a few drops in the beginning, so they keep going, but it’s pouring by the time they’ve walked half the way to Brishti’s house. Orko breaks into a run. Brishti keeps her composure for a while, walking briskly, holding her bag up to cover her head. Then she too begins to run. By the time they reach her house, they’re both drenched. They giggle as Brishti fires off a volley of buzzes on the doorbell.

  ‘Oh my! Look at the two of you,’ Komola-mashi exclaims. ‘Are you crazy? Couldn’t you have stopped for shelter? You’re going to fall ill!’

  Orko is glad to be indoors. He is drenched to the bone. He’s worried that his books are soaking wet, as is the change of clothes he’s carrying in his schoolbag. For a moment he considers going back home. There’s a thunderclap, deafeningly loud.

  ‘Wait here,’ Komola-mashi says. ‘I’ll bring you some towels.’

  They wait as instructed, dripping pools of water on the shiny mosaic floor. Orko shrugs off his schoolbag and undoes the clasps. His change of clothes is damp. The ink on the labels of his notebooks has begun to run.

  ‘It’s all wet,’ he says in despair. ‘I had better head home. Is there a raincoat or an umbrella that I can borrow?’

  ‘Don’t be an idiot,’ Brishti retorts. ‘You’ll catch your death of cold. Your books will be pulp by the time you get home.’

  Komola-mashi rushes in with an armload of towels. Brishti takes one and wipes herself down vigorously. Orko gingerly pats himself dry.

  ‘Dry your hair,’ Komola-mashi says to him, before turning to Brishti. ‘Why don’t you give him some of your father’s clothes?’

  Brishti grabs him by the arm. ‘Let’s go,’ she says. ‘I think I can lend you a T-shirt and a pair of trousers.’

  ‘You should both have a hot shower,’ Komola-mashi calls after them. ‘I’ve switched on the water heaters in the bathrooms upstairs.’

  They make their way to the staircase.

  ‘Take your shoes off – you’re tracking mud all over the floor,’ Komola-mashi complains. The floor is covered in muddy boot prints.

  Orko is ashamed. He would never be so careless in his own home. If his shoes were muddy, he would take them off before he walked through the front door.

  As he follows Brishti up the stairway, Orko has an uncanny sense of having done exactly this before. It’s not quite deja vu, but it’s close. He has a shadowy memory of being ten years old and drenched to the bone, following Urmi up the stairs to her flat.

  ‘I’ll bring you some clothes,’ Brishti says when they’re at the top of the stairs.

  It seems strange to Orko that although he has been to Brishti’s more than a hundred times now, he is yet to meet her father. The only other friend that he has visited so many times is Urmi, and her parents are like a second family to him. Even now, he sometimes goes to their flat just to say hello to them. Brishti’s father, on the other hand, is an enigma. She has shown him a picture, taken many years ago. She speaks of her mother often, but never of her father. Sometimes it seems to him that Brishti doesn’t want him to meet her father. He felt that way a few times early on in their friendship, but he had dismissed the feeling as a figment of his imagination. It was only about a month ago that he began to believe it.

  It was a Saturday. They had been assigned a lot of homework that week, and Orko hadn’t being paying attention during their economics lessons. He rang Brishti to ask her if he could come over after lunch. He had been to Brishti’s house only a couple of times that week, so he thought that she would welcome the idea.

  ‘Why don’t we compare notes on Monday,’ she said, under her breath. Usually, their phone conversations lasted at least a few minutes, but that morning she hung up promptly. Orko pictured her glancing furtively over her shoulder as they exchanged the rushed sentences.

  Just the other day, they had been listening to music, and had lost track of time. When Komola-mashi brought them tea and samosas, it was dark outside.

  ‘Look at the time!’ Brishti exclaimed. ‘Why didn’t you tell me it was past six?’

  As they sipped their tea, Brishti began to seem increasingly anxious. She ate her samosas in uncharacteristically large bites. When Orko took his time, she glared at him admonishingly. She closed Orko’s notebooks and stacked up all his belongings in a neat pile. In the end, she looked like she might begin to cry. Orko left his samosa half-eaten. He packed his belongings and left as soon as he could. He wondered, then, if she was ashamed of b
eing friends with him.

  ‘Here,’ says Brishti, handing him a set of clothes bundled in a blue towel. ‘I think they’ll fit you. Use my bathroom – I’ll use the other one.’ She motions towards her father’s room.

  In the bathroom, Orko struggles to extricate himself from his sodden clothes. They seem to have shrunk around his body. His skin feels cold and clammy. He turns on the tap and steps under the shower. The water is cold at first, then lukewarm, and finally scalding hot. He fiddles with the taps on the shower column until the temperature is just right. Orko rarely uses a shower. Nandan had once told him that showering for five minutes wasted twenty buckets of water. At home he bathes with a bucket and a mug, never using more than two buckets of water.

  As he dries himself, Orko notices the clothes that Brishti has given him. He recognises the pastel blue trousers and the white cotton shirt – they’re Brishti’s. She was right. They do fit him perfectly, except that the trousers are just a little shorter than he would have liked. The shirt buttons are on the wrong side, and the collar is narrow and curved. The floral print looks like it has been pencilled in. The trousers are of a light material, softer than any he has worn. When he sees himself in the mirror, he is startled; this is the least ugly he has felt in a very long time. He uses his fingers to comb his hair.

  When Orko comes out of the bathroom, Brishti is back after her shower. She smiles at him. She looks like she’s about to say something, but she doesn’t.

  ‘What?’ Orko demands. He’s almost certain it’s going to be a jibe about the clothes.

  ‘Nothing,’ says Brishti.

  ‘No, you were about to say something,’ Orko insists.

  ‘Just that you’re looking pretty,’ says Brishti, with a twinkle in her eye.

  Orko has been called pretty before – in the boys’ bathrooms at school, in the changing rooms at the swimming club, on the football field – and it has always been a taunt, usually followed by a pinch on his buttocks or a punch to his stomach. This time, though, it’s different. Brishti is still smiling, and Orko can’t detect even the faintest whiff of derision in her expression.

  ‘Lunch?’ she asks, and heads out without waiting for Orko to respond.

  Downstairs, Komola-mashi is ready for them. ‘You two look like twins,’ she says. ‘Sit down. The food’s getting cold.’ It’s true; they really do look like twins, dressed in slacks and shirts, their wet hair slicked back, their earlobes bare.

  The rice is piping hot, the chicken curry delicious. They eat quietly, ravenously. Halfway through the meal, Orko begins to feel a little bit anxious.

  ‘Do you have an iron?’ he asks Brishti.

  ‘What do you want with an iron?’ Brishti asks, surprised.

  ‘I have to dry my clothes. I can’t possibly go home in these,’ he says, regretting the words the moment they escape his lips. What if Brishti thought he didn’t like her clothes?

  ‘Don’t worry. I won’t miss them,’ Brishti says as she gets up from the table.

  They wash their hands and head back upstairs to Brishti’s room.

  ‘I know you won’t miss them,’ Orko says. ‘It’s just that…’

  Brishti cuts him off. ‘You’re looking nice,’ she says. ‘Really.’

  Orko hesitates. ‘People are going to stare,’ he says.

  ‘Stare back at them,’ Brishti says. ‘That’s the first thing I learned after I moved here. People stare at me all the time, as if I’m a monkey in a zoo. The only thing to do is stare right back.’

  They sit on the lower berth of the bunk bed, side by side. Orko wishes he didn’t have to go home today. Brishti’s room is cosy and warm. Outside, the rain beats against the windowpanes and on umbrellas turned inside out by the wind.

  ‘I don’t think we can do our homework now,’ Orko says. ‘My books are all wet.’

  ‘So are mine,’ says Brishti. ‘Scrabble?’

  ‘Sure,’ says Orko.

  After they’ve played a few turns, the board resembles an incomplete crossword puzzle. Orko shuffles the tiles around on the bench, sure that he can use all seven tiles for his next turn, if only he can find an opening.

  ‘Do you like The Sound of Music?’ Brishti asks.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ he says. ‘I watched it with my mother. That was the first time I went to the cinema.’

  ‘Wait till you hear this, then,’ she says, and walks over to the shelves by the stereo. She stands on her toes and picks out a record, without really looking. She raises the lid of the turntable. She fishes the shiny black disc out of its well-worn jacket and places it on the platter. ‘It’s one of my favourites,’ she says. ‘The record actually belongs to my mother,’ she adds, closing the lid softly.

  There’s a faint crackling, followed by a few bars of piano. Then a wind instrument plays the first few notes of ‘My Favourite Things’.

  Brishti potters about, emptying her schoolbag and laying out its damp contents on the floor. Orko wishes she would stop.

  ‘Do you like it?’ Brishti asks when the song is over.

  ‘It’s amazing,’ Orko says.

  ‘Do you think this music would exist if all anyone could do was to sing the song the way it was written, words and all?’ Brishti asks.

  The record plays on, and Orko is a little embarrassed because he can’t recognise the instrument. The songs are long, and they don’t seem to have any discernible structure. It’s almost as if the musicians are just playing like children in a playground, and the music is an accident.

  ‘Don’t you sometimes wish that you were like everybody else?’ Brishti asks, just as the record comes to an end.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Orko retorts, trying to appear less anxious than he feels.

  Brishti doesn’t seem to have heard him. She fidgets with the tassels of the bedcover.

  ‘I’m here because I’m not like everybody else,’ she says. ‘If I was, I would be home, in Montreal, and I could see my mother whenever I wanted. I don’t even have friends here.’

  Orko feels a twinge of sadness, because he thinks of Brishti as his closest friend now. ‘Do you have many friends back home?’ he asks.

  ‘Not many,’ Brishti says. ‘But I do have a few people that I’m really close to.’ She retrieves a diary from the top shelf of the record cabinet. She flips through its pages and brings out a photograph. It’s a polaroid. Orko’s uncle has a polaroid camera, and Orko had been wonderstruck to see his own likeness printed out on the little square just minutes after his uncle pressed the shutter. Brishti is in this photograph. She’s standing behind a girl with long golden hair. Orko remembers seeing her in the picture with Joshua, on the basketball court. In this picture Brishti has her arms around her.

  ‘That’s Janice,’ she says.

  ‘She looks like Tinúviel,’ says Orko.

  Brishti laughs out loud. ‘You had better not say that to her face,’ she says. ‘She hates The Lord of the Rings.’

  Orko doesn’t have photographs of any of his friends. But then, the only real friend he’s had lives within shouting distance of his home. He can’t fathom how Brishti must feel about being so far away from her mother, and from her friends. It seems really cruel of her father to have moved her to Calcutta.

  ‘You must be really close to her,’ he says.

  ‘She’s the reason I’m here,’ says Brishti.

  Orko is intrigued. ‘I don’t understand,’ he says.

  Brishti looks at the photograph for a long time, then replaces it between the pages of her diary. ‘I tell my mother everything,’ she says.

  ‘Yeah, I used to do that too,’ he says.

  ‘Did you ever regret it?’ Brishti asks.

  Orko remembers that time by the swimming pool, when he told his mother that he hated being a boy. He remembers her heart beating against his as she held him. That is his last tactile memory of her, because it was shortly afterwards that she disappeared.

  ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘There are a few things that I shouldn’t have told
her.’

  ‘My mother knows everything about me,’ Brishti says. ‘I just wish she hadn’t told my father.’

  It is immediately clear to Orko that he has been confided in, but it takes him a while to fully comprehend the essence of what he has been told. He struggles to respond. ‘You mean…Janice…’

  Brishti smiles. ‘My mother asked me if I had a boyfriend,’ she says. ‘And I said I did, but my boyfriend was a girl.’

  ‘And then?’ Orko asks, his thoughts in disarray, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle scattered on the floor.

  ‘She said I was too young to have boyfriends, or girlfriends for that matter…but she also said that Janice seemed like a sweet girl.’

  ‘And your father?’ Orko asks.

  ‘He went ballistic,’ says Brishti.

  She doesn’t elaborate on the shenanigans that followed, but Orko can’t imagine that the process of moving halfway across the world could have come about without conflict or confrontation. He begins to understand why Brishti doesn’t want him to meet her father.

  ‘Well,’ he says, pausing to choose his words. ‘If I was a girl, I too would probably have a boyfriend who was a girl.’

  ‘But you’re a boy,’ says Brishti. ‘And maybe you’ll have a boyfriend, when you’re older.’

  Brishti is obviously alluding to the conversation with Paromita and Nilanjana. Orko isn’t sure that he would like to have a boyfriend. He can’t dismiss the idea entirely, but he doesn’t want to give Brishti the wrong impression. ‘Having a crush isn’t quite the same as having a boyfriend,’ he says. ‘Boys are stupid. If I had a boyfriend, it would take us five minutes to run out of conversation.’

  Brishti doesn’t respond to this. Orko glances at her, but she’s fidgeting with the tassels again, a faraway look in her eyes. ‘I’ve always wished I was a girl,’ he says absent-mindedly. He’s surprised by the way the words sound, because this is the first time he has said them out aloud.

  ‘Why do you wish that you were a girl?’ she asks.

  Orko has asked himself this question many times, and he never has been able arrive at a satisfactory answer.