“If they don’t come around, you won’t have any problem finding someone else,” Neelamma Aunty said to Selvi Aunty. She was the first to put her vessel under the open tap. Water rattled against the side of her drum’s fluorescent-yellow sides. Selvi Aunty pressed up against Neelamma Aunty’s back, making sure she’d get to the water next.
“None of us had to deal with any of this nonsense,” Selvi Aunty said. When she saw Neelamma Aunty’s drum was full, she shoved hers under the gushing spout. “Romance, graffiti.”
“Can you imagine what our mothers would have said?” Fatima Aunty said, shaking her head. “Mine would’ve married me off to someone else just to teach me a lesson.”
“Banu, darling, why aren’t you at school?” Neelamma Aunty said.
Our mothers turned and saw Banu running to the truck, bright orange vessel balanced on her head like a basket of rangoli powder. She was already wearing her uniform, backpack, plaits, and semi-shined shoes.
“Give,” Selvi Aunty said. Roughly took the drum from Banu’s hand and shoved it under the pump after her own. “I’ll deliver this to your ajji. You go off to school now.”
“Yes, Aunty,” Banu said. Hitched her bag over her shoulder and ran off. Tripped over a hole in the path and went flying. Caught herself before she landed in a puddle, but not before she splashed mud all over her skirt, her bag, her almost-shined shoes. She looked up at our mothers, eyes widening quicker than the brown stain stretching across her uniform.
“Just go,” Fatima Aunty told her. “You’re in enough trouble for being late. This much won’t do anything.”
Banu nodded, turned, and ran again.
“Watch where you’re going this time!” Neelamma Aunty said. Even though she knew it was useless.
“At least none of us have to get that one married,” Selvi Aunty said, shaking her head.
“That one would be lucky to get a boy like this Kalla fellow,” Neelamma Aunty said.
“Don’t say such things,” Fatima Aunty said, finally sticking her pot under the tap. “That poor girl.”
“At least Kalla would leave her alone at night,” Neelamma Aunty said. Cackled wickedly. “He’ll be busy doing other things.”
“Neelu!” Selvi Aunty said.
Our mothers’ laughter sloshed and gurgled against the sides of the wasted morning.
“We should stop her,” Joy says, staring at the photographer.
“Why? She’s not doing any harm,” Padma says, shrugging.
Rukshana balls her hands into fists. “She’s not even asking permission. It’s like she thinks she can do whatever she wants with us. Like we don’t even exist.”
“Someone’s with her,” Padma says. “Wait a minute. Is that—”
“It is,” Joy says. Sucks her teeth and yells, “Banu! What are you bloody doing?”
Banu hovers around the photographer like a minor goddess, the kind they put in Hindu myths to rearrange a crumbling world into something closer to divine. Takes the photographer’s hand and leads her through the wreckage. Points out the cracked facade of a framed family photograph, the cracked remains of a ceramic pickle jar. Adjusts a piece of tin so the shadows rearrange themselves into another image. A different kind of light.
“She’s going to use her photographs to help us,” Banu tells us. Pulls the photographer gently by the elbow, showing her a new frame. “At least, that’s what I think she said. She talks funny.”
“If she wants to help, then tell her to call the city,” Rukshana says. “Tell her to talk to them in that accent and to call off the demolition.”
“That’s right!” Joy says. When Padma doesn’t say anything, Joy turns to her and says, “Come on. Tell your friend, no?”
Padma doesn’t answer. Just watches Banu drag the photographer through the ruins.
A few nights after the newspapers wrote about Kalla, Padma went to Deepa’s house for dinner. It’s something most of us do at least once a week. Deepa’s father only gets back after he drops off the last of the engineers from the restaurants and bars they fill up after work. Puts up with the drunken directions, the whiskey breath, all in hopes that the alcohol will loosen purse strings, that the engineers will hand over too much money and not ask for change. Neelamma Aunty does the stitching for the whole neighborhood, delivering the clothes after seven o’clock, when the posh people get back from their offices. So Deepa’s kitchen is always full of food and empty of grownups.
The power was gone again. Without the hum of the ceiling fan to thwart them, Bangalore’s night noises crowded into the house, haunted and brash. Crows fought on the rooftops. Bats swooped leathery circles in the sky. Bug-eyed geckos clicked and chirped, their heaving bodies the color of ghosts.
“It’s like a spooky movie,” Padma said, lighting a stub of candle she brought from her house. The flame dripped a waxy puddle into the humid darkness. “Like the scene just before the hero rescues the lady. And then the item number starts.”
Deepa laughed and said, “No heroes coming tonight. This is Heaven, remember?”
“That’s okay,” Padma said. “Janaki Ma’am gave us too, too many math problems anyway.” She tapped the cover of her notebook so Deepa could hear. “No time for romance until after boards.”
Just then, the sky turned blue and red and shrill with sirens. A man-shaped shadow flung itself across the doorway. Cotton collared shirt. Short, short hair. Pants gathered up in a funny way, like they were made for someone with an entirely different set of legs.
Padma shrunk into herself. Deepa grabbed the iron roti pan. Wielded it like a weapon. The sirens grew closer, lights flashed quicker. Footsteps and shouts echoed in the allies.
“Please,” the shadow said.
Padma lunged like a mother tiger, but Deepa grabbed her ankle, pulled her back.
“Banu?” Deepa asked. “Is that you?”
“Yes,” Banu whispered. “It’s me.”
Banu, our Banu, was dressed like a construction worker. Hair coiled under a cotton towel. Faded men’s shirt buttoned over her nightie. Nightie pulled like pajamas between her knees.
Hands covered in blue paint.
Padma broke into a smile. “Kalla?”
Banu nodded. Her cheeks glowed red as AC buses.
“Come,” Padma said, dragging Banu out of the candle’s thin circle of light, “into the shadows where they can’t see you.”
“Quickly,” Deepa hissed. Pulled Banu down to the floor.
“I’ll get the shirt,” Padma whispered. “Get the cloth off her head.”
Padma undid the buttons on Banu’s paint-splattered shirt and threw it in a shadowy corner. Tucked Banu’s nightie around her blue-tinged feet, shoved a plate of half-eaten roti into her hand.
Deepa yanked away the towel. Loosened Banu’s curls, the length and weave of innocence, the texture of unlit skies. Fingered the ends of Banu’s hair and said, “There’s paint.”
The footsteps grew closer, the men’s voices louder. Padma’s eyes swept the room. She pulled a comb from beneath a pile of bedsheets and tugged it through Banu’s curls. Twisted them into an urgent braid.
“Ow,” Banu squealed.
“Quiet,” Deepa said, just as Padma said, “It’s for your own good.”
Outside, men shouted and panted, like they’d smoked too many bidis. Government-issued boots thumped along the dusty path.
“Don’t say anything,” Deepa told Banu. Which she probably didn’t have to do, since Banu never has much to say.
Unless, apparently, she has a bucket of paint and a concrete surface.
The policemen aimed the flashlight into the room, setting the shadows tilting and swaying. Light bounced off the metal pots lined up on the floor, the switch for the fan, the exposed and useless wires.
“Who’s there?” the policeman asked menacingly.
“Namaskara,” Deepa said, smiling. Talked to the wall even though the men were standing in the doorway. “Would you like some dosa, officer?”
�
�It’s roti, darling,” Padma said loudly.
“Oh dear,” Deepa said. “It’s so difficult to be blind.”
Banu giggled until she felt Padma violently tug her braid. Pretended to cough so it sounded less like she was laughing and more like she was being choked.
The man grunted and said, “It’s just a bunch of useless girls.”
“What are you doing alone?” the other officer said. “Don’t your parents know that there’s a dangerous criminal on the loose?”
“Oh!” Deepa said, clutching her chest. “Is there?”
“Yes,” he said. “And he just ran past your house.”
“You’ll find him, though, won’t you, officer?” Padma asked.
“Definitely,” the first officer said. Stuck out his chest like one of the pigeons that eat the stale roti the temple women put out for good luck. “Our job is to protect you.”
“Well, we can’t very well do that here,” the other officer said. Backed out of the house, his shadow dark as a buffalo. “Did you see anyone running?”
“Someone went that way,” Deepa said. “Under the overpass.”
“Yes, yes,” Padma said. “I think I saw blue on his hands.”
“Come on, then,” the officer said. “Let’s go.”
“Be safe,” the other officer said. “If you see anything, call us.”
“Of course, sir,” Padma said.
Outside Deepa’s doorway, the policemen’s heavy footsteps, heavy voices, dissolved into the night. Heaven settled back into the lazy lights of blinking fireflies and three-wheeler headlights, the sleepy sounds of pressure cookers hissing and pots banging.
“I knew it couldn’t be Yousef,” Padma said.
“’A sophistication normally associated with classically trained artists,’” Deepa said, quoting the newspaper. “Of course. It couldn’t be anyone but our Banu.”
“How do you know?” Padma said. “You can’t even see.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Deepa said. “I know our Banu. I know us.”
“Inside the Royale?” Padma asked Banu. “Really?”
Instead of answering, Banu stuffed a roti in her mouth. Maybe because she was hungry, or maybe because, without a can of spray paint in her hand, she didn’t have anything to say.
“If anyone asks,” Deepa said, “Kalla wasn’t here.”
The morning after the police came, Joy sat at her desk and pushed her bangles up and down her wrist. They tossed glassy shadows on the classroom ceiling. Red, purple, green, blue. Anxious tinkling rainbows.
“Stop,” Rukshana said, putting her hand on Joy’s. “You’re going to break one and cut yourself. No one wants to see your blood.”
“What do you know?” Joy said gruffly. Tilted her chin at Rukshana’s bare wrists.
Normally when Joy talked to her like that, Rukshana would’ve given it back. This time, though, she squeezed her friend’s hand.
“You know the police come and take the boys whenever they need a culprit,” Joy said. “Muslims, Dalits. It never matters if they did it or not. It’s all the same to the government.”
“If anyone had been arrested, we would’ve heard about it,” Padma said from across the room. But she didn’t tell Joy she’s wrong. Didn’t sound convinced either.
They sat like that until Vihaan and Yousef walked in, their eyes dark and hollow.
“They didn’t arrest you?” Rukshana asked. Didn’t bother to hide her relief.
Yousef shook his head, too awestruck to pretend. “The police came to my house. Said a boy with blue on his hands ran right by my door. We stayed up all night waiting to see if he’d come back.”
“Really?” Joy leaned forward in her desk, all her anxiety forgotten. “Did you see him?”
“No,” Yousef said. “But they didn’t either. You know the wall behind the water pump? The one right next to the community hall?”
“I saw it,” Rukshana said. She lives on that side of Heaven, near Yousef. “It says ‘Kalla was here.’ It smelled fresh.”
“Like he just did it this morning,” Yousef said, shaking his head. “What a guy!”
“Maybe we can put some mark on our houses so he knows we’ll protect him,” Vihaan said. “Just in case he needs somewhere to hide.”
“Harboring criminals is not legal, Vihaan. I believe you recently learned this term—what is it now? Oh yes. A punishable offense,” Janaki Ma’am said. That woman has X-ray ears—can hear right through school walls. “Which is something you will learn if you go to law school. Which is something you will only do if you pass your boards.”
“Lawyers don’t need math,” Rukshana said.
“Everyone needs math,” Janaki Ma’am said. “Even artists. Now turn to page 17.”
“Did you just call Kalla an artist, ma’am?” Joy asked.
“All I remember saying is to turn to page 17,” Janaki Ma’am said. Circled us like one of the v-tailed kites nesting in the neem tree on the school compound. Paused for a split second next to Banu’s desk.
Banu’s desk. Where Banu opened her textbook, leaving soldier-blue smudges on the edge of the page.
“Honestly, Banu. page 17,” Janaki Ma’am said again, flipping through Banu’s book for her. Banu looked up, startled, as Janaki Ma’am swept past. Just in time to see the headmistress hide her smile.
Janaki Ma’am stood at the chalkboard, her back to us, and said, “This Kalla character may or may not get caught. But you will all pass your exam.”
“They’ll never catch Kalla,” Vihaan said. “He’s too clever.”
“Or he has clever friends,” Padma said.
Banu stuck her spray-paint-blue hands beneath her government-blue skirt.
“Who says it’s a he?” she whispered.
10
Half-Wild
“padma? padma, where are you?”
“Amma?” Padma springs up from where she’s sitting with the rest of us, crouched in front of steaming plates of biryani.
“Where is everyone?” Gita Aunty asks. “Why isn’t anyone home?”
“We’re all out here, Amma,” Padma says. “There’s been some trouble.”
“Trouble?” Gita Aunty says. Rubs her eyes with the back of her hand. “What trouble?”
“First, eat,” Padma says. “Then I’ll tell you.”
Our mothers are brassy and cheerful, larger than life. Fill up space with their bodies, their orders. Their noise. Padma’s mother, though? She doesn’t take up any space at all. Floats through Heaven like a silhouette. An outline of someone who once was, a charcoal pencil sketch smudged around the edges.
Padma’s mother is nothing like our mothers. But Padma says she used to be.
“Did you feed the crows?” Gita Aunty asks. “They’ll be hungry.”
“I will, Amma. Right now it’s dinnertime, okay?” Padma says. Steers Gita Aunty around the bulldozers, away from the line of engineers loading up the bus. Settles her mother on the ground, pours water over her hands to wash off the dirt. The way our teachers did when we were in preschool. Before we knew how to take care of ourselves.
Banu scurries over with a plate of biryani and a water bottle. Hands them to Padma, who hands them to her mother.
“Eat, Amma,” Padma says. “You need your strength.”
Beneath the glow of the rising moon, streetlamps flicker and headlights glimmer, fireflies twinkle and cell phones gleam. The foreign lady’s camera flashes, illuminating Padma stroking her mother’s back, Banu curling her shoeless toes. Gita Aunty hunching over her meal, next to the space where Banu’s ajji would be if she wasn’t too sick to eat.
Heaven may be striped with all kinds of light tonight. But it’s the line between the mothered and the unmothered that always glows the brightest.
After she gives birth to Padma’s youngest brother, Gita Aunty can’t stop crying. She cries when she hangs the laundry on the clothesline strung between the roofs of Heaven’s houses. When she pours the dosa for breakfast, packs the rice for tiffi
n. Even cries when she sees Padma, even though Padma is the only one who makes her happy.
“Why’s your amma so sad?” Rukshana asks.
“She misses the village,” Padma tells us.
“What’s there to miss in the village?” Joy asks. The way she says it, you can tell she doesn’t want an answer.
“The colors,” Padma says. “Especially the blues and greens.”
“There’s blue here. Green too,” Joy says, pointing to the blue-and-white city bus rumbling by, the peeling green paint on the Dumpsters they installed behind the school.
“Those aren’t the greens and blues she misses,” Padma says. “She misses other colors. Not those.”
“What nonsense,” Rukshana says. “Green is green and blue is blue.”
Padma shakes her head and says, “There’s sky blue, river blue. Peacock-neck blue and God-skin blue. Even sky blue is so many blues. There’s a sky blue that smells like rain. There’s one that smells like drought. Green is like that too. Rice-paddy green, bitter-gourd green, parrot-tail green. You don’t know about them because in Bangalore, you don’t have them. Those are the colors my mother misses.”
Padma’s eyes are full of fear. But they’re full of something else too. Something the rest of us wish we had. A memory of air that isn’t salty with petrol and construction dust. Of roads lit by stars instead of the headlights of two-wheelers. Of river mud and thunderstorms and beetle wings we’ll never feel against our toes, our cheeks. The palms of our hands.
There is city smart and there is country smart. One day, Padma will be both. But we will only ever be one.
Still, Rukshana says, “All that jungly stuff is well and good, but it won’t get you anywhere here.”
“That jungly stuff is exactly what she misses,” Padma says. Like she hasn’t heard right. Or like she’s heard right, but she’s answering wrong. “She misses the birds.”
Before we met Padma, we always took the short way home. Through narrow gallis where skinny-shouldered men push wooden carts full of guavas, cucumbers, chili, and salt. Where village women hack open tender coconuts with machetes, sunlight bouncing off of the jewels in their twice-pierced noses. Where city women crouch on straw mats heaped with vegetables, herbs, and fruits, calling out, “Carrots! Bananas! Cilantro! Beans!”
A People's History of Heaven Page 12
