Side by Side

by Anita Kushwaha

  Nirav will be home in a couple of hours. She has at least some time to settle in on her own. She peels off her damp things and follows Coal along the short entryway to the kitchen, the daytime chill of the dark hardwood seeping through her thin socks. As she leans against the white waterfall island, she peers around the living space, that feels familiar yet foreign to her, after so many weeks away. But it’s all still there, as she had left it: the paprika-red couch, the large cubby shelves, the wall-mounted flat-screen, the coffee table made of glass and a varnished tree stump.

  She notices a couple of greeting cards on top of the cubby shelves and walks over to read them. The first is an anniversary card sent from Nirav’s parents, congratulating them on their first year of marriage. The second is a Raksha Bandan card for Nirav sent from Maya. The rakhi is still taped inside. Kavita’s fingers fumble around her pocket for Sunil’s rakhi, where it is safe, and makes her wince as she touches it. As she places the card back on the shelf, she wonders why Nirav didn’t ask her to tie the bracelet onto his wrist, as he normally would have, then reasons perhaps he didn’t want to upset her. The lack of sympathy cards is puzzling, though. She might not have read them, then again she might have, but either way, reading the cards wasn’t the point, the point was acknowledgment, a small gesture to make a lonely time less lonesome. It is possible that cards have been sent, and Nirav has placed them aside, for the same reason he failed to mention the rakhi. She will ask him about it later.

  She is about to turn away when her gaze falls upon a wedding picture. Numbly, she reaches for the frame. The moment captured shows her and Sunil standing side by side, his arm slung comfortably around her shoulder, her painted nails peeking brightly out around his waist. She is dressed in a maroon lengha. Sunil is wearing a black Nehru-collared suit with a waistcoat that matches Kavita’s dress. They are staring into the camera, nascent smiles suspended on their faces, as though they aren’t sure when the photographer is going to take the photo. It is her favourite wedding picture of them because it is candid, imperfect, completely unlike the phony glamour shots in every Indian wedding magazine she has ever seen, which of course, is what makes the portrait perfect in her eyes.

  Suddenly she can’t stand to look at the photograph any longer. Its lost beauty burns her eyes as if backlit with fluorescence. She turns away. With blind fingers, she tries to place the frame back in its cubby, then hears it teeter and crash, but doesn’t look at it again, not even to stand it upright, or check the glass for cracks.

  Out on the terrace, the rain has stopped, but each gust of wind carries a lash. She feels her body contract as though retreating to warmer inward places. She makes a cave with her shoulders, lights her cigarette, and exhales slowly. The rattle of her nerves loses a bit of its shake as she shifts her gaze down to the street.

  The sidewalk is tattooed with the umber pigments of decayed leaves. Usual traffic moves to and fro. Kavita watches a woman dressed in a camel trench coat walking a small white dog. The woman stoops over, picks up the dog’s mess, and then they both trot on, somewhere, woman and dog alike seeming very hurried and purposeful in each step they take.

  Just like all the people Kavita saw on the way home as she travelled to the condo. People on foot, people on bikes, people in cars, people on buses. People moving, moving, moving. People with somewhere to go, to be. Taking care of her parents had given her a purpose, but now, back in her own life, she feels aimless. Exhausted yet restless. A scribble in the margins. Watching the people. Wondering how she was ever part of them, and more bleakly, how she will ever be able find her way back.

  As the wind gusts, Kavita gets a prickly feeling that she is being watched. Across the street, a couple of floors up, a man is leaning against his balcony railing, puffing too. When their eyes meet, he takes one more drag, flicks his cigarette butt over the railing, and goes back into his condo. She wonders about him. Why he’s at home, like she is, at this time of day, when productive members of society found themselves in offices and shops and on wheels of some sort. Maybe he is sick. Or playing hooky. Or unemployed; unemployable. Or, she thinks, maybe he has lost somebody, like she has, and needs to withdraw from the forward motion of the world for a while, before surrendering again to its tow. She wants to ask him: Is he like her? But he’s gone. Maybe she will get another chance tomorrow.

  Her neighbour’s terrace door unlocks with a click. Kavita buries her cigarette in the terracotta pot at her feet, the one that holds the twig-like remains of some forgotten annual. As her neighbour’s door slides open, before she gets caught up in the polite lies of chitchat, she slips back inside.

  Coal is curled up on the couch, twitching in dreams. She sits beside him, pulls out the library books from her bag, and selects A Widow’s Story. As she considers the title, she realizes that there’s no common name for what she is now—her new bereft identity—or possibly there is, but if so, she has never come across it. In the world, there are widows and widowers. One need only say “I am a widow” and somehow people understand with sympathetic hmms and ahhs. There is an understanding of the loss of one’s “better half” “right hand” “life partner” “soul mate” but what about the loss of a soul brother? There is widowhood. There is an understanding of that lonely journey. Even divorcées have a label to communicate the challenges of their life state, despite the failure of their relationships.

  What about the sibling bereft? What about her and Sunil’s twenty-five year relationship, that should have been seventy-five years, eighty-five years? What about the promise of living together for most of their lives, side by side? Hasn’t she lost a life partner too? Is her loss somehow lesser, her pain less devastating, because she is not a parent, a wife? What is her “—hood” or “—dom?”

  I am brotherless, she thinks, the quiet pronouncement heavy and unmoving as a boulder as it sits at the centre of her mind. Can there be a lonelier state? Brotherless. Another way of saying she is cleaved. She is alone. She is like Yami crying a river of tears at the loss of Yama. But there is no common empathy, no common language, for her grief path, that endless black tunnel. It exists inside her, in perhaps the only place where it matters, or is seen.

  Pinned by the boulder, Kavita sits, staring off into mid-space. Sometime later, Coal crosses her lap, padding her gently out of her stupor. Her dazed eyes follow his movements as he leaps off the couch and makes his way over to his food bowl. As he crunches satisfyingly on kibble, she remembers with the groan of her own stomach, Nirav will be home soon.

  As she rinses romaine lettuce and chops red peppers, her stomach’s earlier groan builds to a growl. She pours a glass of water into its hungry mouth, then flicks on the television to drown out its futile begging.

  The evening news is on. She briefly considers changing the channel, to avoid anything triggering, but feels out of touch, so keeps it on for the sake of curiosity. She continues chopping the red pepper, semi-aware of the newscast in the background. The chopping is nearly done when she hears the top story. Hears the news anchor say the word suicide and feels her insides spasm as if speared. Letting go of the knife, she lifts her startled gaze to the screen.

  A teenager has ended his life. He is the son of a local politician. He was loved by his friends and teachers. He was on the yearbook committee. Played trumpet in the school orchestra. Talked of studying animation after graduating next year. In the yearbook photo they show of him his hair is green, his braces shine, and his acne looks a rosy nuisance. The face of someone with so much life ahead of him, most of his whole life, and in this respect, not unlike Sunil.

  Kavita springs for the remote control. Changes the channel. Flicks back. Changes the channel. Flicks back. Changes the channel.

  She feels at war with the contrary push of needing to know how this could have happened to such a bright, young person, and the pull of wanting to remain ignorant. Her emotional side tells her: Look away, protect yourself. Her thinking side says: Look.
/>   She flicks back to the newscast. The anchor explains that the boy’s family have decided to share their story to help educate the public about teen mental health. A pre-recorded clip begins to play. Kavita can’t pull her eyes away from the local politician, the boy’s mother, as she stands at the podium and reads a statement from a piece of paper that quivers in her hands. Her husband stands by her side, his head bowed, his eyes pinned to the floor, his mouth a firm line. One of his hands remains pressed securely against the politician’s lower back as if holding her upright.

  She says they don’t want their son’s life, or death, to be in vain, which is why they have chosen to come forward, in the hopes of saving another child, another family, from the incredible pain and loss her family is experiencing now. Her voice quavers as she admits to not knowing about the bullying her son went through leading up to his death. Nor did she realize the toll it took on his mental health. She noticed recent a change in his mood, but like any mother of a teenage son, thought it must have been just another phase of adolescence. She was wrong.

  If the stigma surrounding mental health didn’t exist, their son might have been more open with them about his struggles. They have started a foundation in his name to collect donations for youth treatment programs at The Royal and encourage others to contribute if they can. She finishes by saying thank you for the messages of support they have received. They ask for prayers, for their son most of all. They thank the public for respecting their need for privacy at this difficult time.

  The newscast flips to the next story. Kavita shuts off the television. The story rouses her turbulent grief, that storm beneath her skin. She feels it spinning and building. Crying to cut to the surface. Crying to be heard.

  She has things in common with the politician’s family, but their situations aren’t the same. The politician’s husband held her back the whole time she spoke, so she knew he was there, she wasn’t alone. They were in pieces, yet unified. But crisis has fractured Kavita’s family. The politician’s family shared their story. But her family can’t even talk to each other about what happened to Sunil. The politician’s family want their son’s life and death to mean something, to make a difference, to change things for the better. She wants the same thing for Sunil. Of course she does.

  But how? She has no public persona. She has no platform. Lately, it doesn’t even feel like she has much of a family anymore. She isn’t important. She isn’t a somebody. She is just a girl who loved her brother, and lost him, in the most inconceivable way. Why would anyone listen to her? Why would anyone care?

  How can she change the world when she can barely stand the one she carries inside?

  Heaviness pulls at her. She fills her lungs deeply in an effort to resist the drag. Still, it pulls. She knows what’s about to happen next.

  You’re failing him again, Anchor tells her.

  The weight settles upon her, heavier and heavier.

  That’s what you do, says Gloom. Isn’t it?

  Kavita remains there, at the centre of the living room, suspended in a stunned pause, as if locked inside a dark spell.

  The metal twist of the front door unlocking shatters the iron shell encased around her. Kavita blinks back into the room and quickly sweeps away her tears. Sweeps away Anchor and Blaze and Gloom, for now, knowing they will be waiting to show themselves the moment she is alone again.

  She shuffles back to the cutting board, picks up her knife in her nervous hand and continues chopping the red pepper. She forces her lips into what she hopes is a convincing smile.

  “Hello-oh?” Nirav calls from the entryway.

  “Hi,” she calls back. Her voice sounds breathy and high, not her own.

  He emerges from the hallway with Coal in one hand and a bottle of white wine in the other.

  “Hello, love!” He is wearing a pair of black trousers, a blue dress shirt, and grey paisley tie. “I’m so pleased you’re back.” He kisses her warmly on the cheek. Coal wriggles from his grasp and pads off. “Look what I’ve got? Thought we could toast your homecoming with a bit of the ol’ vino. What do you say?”

  “Great.” She forces a deeper grin. Then grabs the cutting board and slides the peppers into the saucepan on the stove, any excuse to turn away and hide for a moment. She hasn’t swallowed a drop of alcohol since Sunil’s disappearance. The small, still voice inside her continues to warn against the path of forgetting, but it is getting fainter and fainter all the time, taped over by the voices that strengthen in its place.

  “It’s Pinot Grigio—your favourite.” He fetches a couple of stemless glasses, gives the cap a twist and pours. “Here you are, darling.” As he holds out her glass, he glances at the Band-Aid on her palm, but doesn’t ask about it.

  “Generous pour,” she says, as she takes hold of the glass.

  “I reckon we’ve got loads to celebrate, don’t you?”

  She orders herself to smile again. It is what a normal person would do. A normal person would have reason to be happy right now. It doesn’t matter that it isn’t true. That is the part no one needs to know but her. They toast and she swallows an ample mouthful. She had forgotten how good it tastes, forgetting.

  While Nirav showers and changes, she finishes making dinner. Tosses the salad. Plates the pasta and sauce. Mixes together some olive oil and balsamic vinegar in a finger bowl for dipping their bread. A feast compared to how she has been eating, or rather not eating, recently. Her stomach awakens. This time she drowns its complaints with another swig of Pinot.

  Their evening progresses like any other, as though she hasn’t spent weeks away. They eat dinner while seated across from each other at the island, balancing on ebony wooden stools. She picks at a small portion, pushing food around her plate more often than bringing her fork to her mouth. Nirav talks about a new project at work, but she can barely follow. They drink the rest of the wine. She likes how dull it makes her feel, less alert, less hyperaware. Another glass or two and she might even fall sleep before three a.m. without having to watch Buffy.

  After supper, they move to the couch for tea and a couple of hours of television. Nirav wants to hold her in his arms. Wine makes him amorous. She loathes being touched but leans into his embrace regardless. It is what a normal person would do. A normal person would want to be close to their partner after spending weeks apart.

  Before bed, she takes a scalding shower. Cries about the boy from the news, and Sunil, and her failures while the water burns tiny rivers over her skin. She welcomes the burn. She knows she deserves the burn. She knows she deserves worse.

  Now, as she lies in bed at a chaste distance from Nirav, she has an urge to place a pillow between them, although hopes she won’t have to. If the wine has done its job, he will be more sleepy than amorous.

  The shallowness of his breath tells her that he is still awake, but it won’t be much longer. She envies this about him, the way he sleeps like a child unfettered by worry. She wishes she could breathe in this magic like a lavender-filled pillow and drift away. She can’t remember the last time she dipped effortlessly into sleep, nor the last time she closed her eyes without fearing the screech of her nightmares, nor the last time she was able to fall asleep without her laptop open, which is the only thing that seems to drown out her horrors, and stop them from shrieking in the night.

  Nirav’s lascivious grip around her waist jerks her away from her thoughts. She stiffens from crown to toe. A woman knows when she is being touched with expectation.

  Pressing his weight against her, he kisses along her jutting collarbone and the taut muscle that bulges from her neck.

  “I missed you,” he whispers.

  “I’m sorry,” she says, turning her head to one side. “I can’t right now.”

  Ignoring her, he continues to kiss his way up her cheek, across her eyes, down her other cheek, landing at last on her lips. He probes her mouth with his urgent tongue. />
  The thinking side of her says: A good wife pays attention to her husband’s needs. A good wife puts her husband’s needs before her own. A good wife compromises.

  The feeling side of her shrinks away from his needy touch.

  With effort, she frees herself from his deep kiss. “I don’t feel well, I’m sorry.”

  He nuzzles her ear. “It might make you feel better.”

  Her body is too rigid to even flinch. “Nirav, I can’t,” she tells him, pleadingly.

  He stops. “All right,” he sighs, making no effort to mask his disappointment, as he rolls onto his side, his back like a barricade beside her, cold as moonlit stone.

  Too rattled to move, she stares into the black nothingness in front of her, and breathes shallow breaths.

  Anchor pulls her into the mattress.

  You should feel lucky he still wants you, it says.

  Yes, it seems that Anchor is right again. She wonders how long it will be before Nirav leaves her or has an affair. Maybe that would be for the best. Maybe he would be better off without her, happier with someone undamaged. He is young, he can start over, in a way that she knows she will never be able to. It isn’t right to keep him from finding the happy life she knows she can’t offer him anymore.

  She blinks at the darkness and listens to the mute sound of late autumn, which is nothing more than the lifeless breath of a cold wind. Through the thin walls of their bedroom, she hears the muffled voices of the couple next door. A spirited laugh pops and fizzles. She envies her neighbour’s pillow talk.

  Soon, Nirav’s breathing is deep and steady, as he navigates in dreams a plane of consciousness away from her. She pushes aside the comforter, climbs out of bed, and pads to the doorway, where she pauses to look over her shoulder, and admire his tranquil body.