‘Let the wind take its course, Sahil, I am ready to the face the consequences,’ Meera said, and in a moment of sheer anger, stepped on his right foot, digging into it with the two-inch block heel of her shoe with all her might. Sahil yelped and let go of her hand. Meera straightened her kameez and walked off, hoping that was the last time she would have to attack him to protect herself.
Chapter 23
‘I won’t touch it, she has no clothes on!’
‘What do you mean by no clothes, Meera! It is a statue!’
‘Exactly, then why not add some clothes? Would that have been so difficult?’
‘I didn’t know you were such a prude, Meera.’
Veena grabbed the magazine from Meera and took another look at the photo.
‘It’s beautiful, artistic,’ she said.
Not convinced, Meera made a face to let her sister know that she wasn’t impressed. They were poring over an article in the Filmfare magazine that announced the first-ever film industry awards called ‘The Clares,’ named after the famous film critic and editor, Clare Mendonca. The winners would be decided by fans who had been invited to write-in their choices, the article said. There was no award for playback singing, but a Best Music Composer category was mentioned.
‘What a shame. They should have included a singer category. I know you would have won, hands down,’ Veena said and sighed loudly.
‘Oh, come on, didi,’ said Meera, while looking at some contracts Kamal had left for her to read. Kamal, who could not hold down a single job, had matured beyond recognition. Managing his sister’s career was a job he took seriously for the first time in his life, diving head-on to learn the trade inside out. She was grateful for his knowledge and guidance when it came to the business of singing and making money, but he still insisted that she read every contract carefully before signing it.
‘Should I write in for Malik saab,’ Veena wondered aloud.
Meera’s jaw tightened as she tried her best to hide her discomfort. She had never spoken to anybody about Sahil’s assault – she wanted to move on as quickly as possible and focus on her career. Sarhad had launched her into instant stardom, but she’d quickly signed up for projects with other composers, even though Sahil had sought her out several times, partly to mitigate any future accusations.
‘I think I should. He deserves it,’ Veena looked up at Meera, who remained silent.
‘Meera?’
‘Yes,’ said Meera. She turned her face away, hoping she had not given away even a hint of her disgust for the man. ‘You should.’
‘And who is this Gregory Peck?’ Veena inquired, turning the page to a large cut-out of a handsome man with kind eyes.
‘A famous American actor,’ replied Meera, relieved that her sister had moved on.
Gregory Peck had been invited to the awards, and all of Bombay was in a tizzy. Sadly, he couldn’t make it in the end as his flight from Colombo was delayed. Neither could any of Meera’s family members as they had booked tickets to Kashi – a trip they were going on at Kamladevi’s request. So, Meera was left to attend the function alone. The organizers even wanted her to perform at the show.
Years before Subhash Ghai turned the foyer space into a prison for Khalnayak, before Yash Chopra installed stalls selling bangles at the premiere of Chandni or before Dimple Kapadia’s debut film, Bobby, premiered on its screens, the Metro Cinema was where the elite crowd of Bombay would dress up and watch MGM movies. Metro Cinema had been chosen as the venue to host the awards, just like the lane on which it stood, Cinema Galli, was chosen to carve Bombay’s identity as tinsel town. In 1938, a former army barrack that housed Indian and British soldiers was cleared out and an American studio was invited to build a movie hall. Ever since, the pink art deco walls had seduced many. Years later, it was torn down and restored, and torn down again to make space for six screens instead of one.
When Meera entered the Metro, she was more in awe of the Belgian chandelier hanging at the center than the bevy of stars milling around in the lobby while suited ushers navigated the crowd, balancing a dozen drinks on silver trays. Thankfully, she was able slip-in to the backstage before too many people were able to spot her, so that she could prepare for her performance. Not that she needed much of a rehearsal – she could have performed the three-song set from Sarhad in her sleep. An assistant came to inform her about the seat that had been reserved for her in the audience, but she declined. She simply couldn’t bring herself to watch Sahil take the stage if he won. But the thick walls of the green room were not enough to insulate her from her nightmare – she could hear the roar of applause when his name was announced as the winner of the ‘Best Music Composer’ award. Worse still, she could hear Sahil call out her name in his speech.
‘A composer dreams,’ he said, ‘but it is up to my artists to make my dream a reality. And I can’t thank them enough. Above all, Meera.’
The crowd cheered.
‘Some of you may not believe me; you may think that I am being humble on this stage. Soon enough, when she performs in a few minutes, you’ll see … hear for yourself. Thank you.’
Meera was up next. She felt nauseous upon being introduced on stage by the monster who had physically assaulted her, and then had the gall to threaten her. Now, he had introduced her with lavish praise, and she felt but a helpless pawn in his grand scheme of things. It took a lot of courage for her not to thank Sahil for his ‘kind’ words. Instead, Meera walked on to the stage and launched into her first song straight away.
Meera had often thought about how unnatural the very construct of playback singing was. She couldn’t fathom how one could stay behind a curtain, lend a voice and instill emotion for a person on screen, and yet the audience would look past this fabrication and choose to believe the story. Over the years, she became used to the concept, but she could never truly like the fact that her voice was used for the screen. She always felt like she was cheating her audience, and would much rather have preferred being in front of them with all her talents and vulnerabilities. At least, she thought, she was connecting with them in a real way. That night, however, she wanted to be behind a curtain. She performed the mukhda of her first song with her eyes closed, in a desperate attempt to shut out the world. Soon enough, being the thorough professional that she was, her anger towards Sahil dissipated and the song took over. She was able to lose herself and focus on the words and emotions that had been written by someone else, yet felt like her own. When she finally opened her eyes, the sight of a rapt audience teleported her to a different time – to that enchanted night many years ago at the Orient Club. She remembered how she spotted Abhimanyu in the crowd, and how the sight of his face had calmed her nerves; how she was able to perform just by singing to him, and nobody else seemed to matter.
Inside the auditorium of the Metro, there was no Abhimanyu to lock eyes with, and in that moment, she recognized the truth – the pain in her heart ever since she had left his hospital room in New York. Had Abhimanyu been in the audience, he would have seen the metamorphosis of the girl he had fallen in the love with. She was no longer a diminutive nervous wreck. Gone was the cheap sharara, its place taken up by exquisite garments and glittering jewelry. It wasn’t the attire that accentuated her presence, though, those trysts in the years since had given her an imperceptible aura that was impossible to miss even from afar. But deep down, nothing much had changed. Had Abhimanyu been in the hall that day, he would have noticed the low thump of longing heartbeats through her slender neck, now adorned with diamonds. She missed him.
Vo jo yaad karte the, aaj ajnabi ho gaye. Yeh shahar, yeh raste, ye gali chhod gaye.
Kyun na du duaein unko, woh meri ‘hasti ka saamaan’ jo ho gaye.
Hasti ka saamaan (reason for existence) was the last song she sang that night. When she sang the first verse, and as the words left her lips, she came to the bittersweet realization that those words, in fact each and every song she had rehearsed and sang and regaled the world with, was an ode to
Abhimanyu. It was a realization that filled her with emptiness. How could she go on without him? How could she sing to the world in the absence of his reassuring gaze? A gaze that felt like an embrace. An embrace so protective that she felt completely naked without it. Overcome with longing, she broke down. Mid-song, her voice cracked and a sob escaped her, and she walked off the stage.
Every member in the audience rose to their feet, each taking away their own meaning from the cry that reverberated in the hall. In her grief, Meera made them relive theirs. It was a quality of hers that might have unconsciously been showcased at the award show, but soon became a constant in her repertoire for years to come. She could sing the same song ten times and bring forth ten different emotions with subtle variations – she would sing in Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, Russian and English, but still speak the language of the heart every time.
Sadly, Sahil misinterpreted the language. He misconstrued Meera’s crying as having something to do with him. He was already enraged when she refused to thank him in public, but her walking off stage halfway through the song was an insult he couldn’t take lying down. Sahil could see the adulation he received just moments ago come crashing down. There was no doubt in his mind that Meera was very close to publicly accusing him for what he had done to her.
To this day, no one knows whether the act of poisoning her was premeditated or if Sahil had done it in a fit of rage. No one knows what enraged him more – Meera turning down his advances or his fear of being outed as a molester. He must have done it in a fit of rage, people would argue later, he couldn’t have just been carrying around poison now, could he? But like everything about Sahil, there was more than what met the eye.
Sahil used to boast that the watch he wore – one that showed the same time forever, 10.23 a.m. – was an original Seikosha Kamikaze that he had picked from a dead Japanese soldier’s wrist on the streets of Calcutta. He would proudly declare that he never fixed the watch because he wanted it to always remind him of the terrible phase he had been through in Calcutta. The truth, however, was that the watch just couldn’t be fixed – he had taken it apart many times. It had dawned on Sahil that the dead Japanese man on the street was not a soldier, and that he must have been a spy. The watch was irreparable because its gears were jammed by a small plastic casing, barely a millimetre long, that had disrupted the intricate mechanism from within – one that had no business being in the gear system, and yet was essential, as it carried a small amount of cyanide. Just in case things didn’t go according to plan. Sahil reckoned the spy must have been shot in the head before he could reach his wrist. He decided to keep it untouched. Till that evening, when he realized a two-bit singer could ruin his life. With his hard-earned life of honour and privilege flashing before his eyes, he followed Meera through the hall, enraged by her smile as she was being complimented by fans and industry stalwarts. He couldn’t stand her being the toast of the night, surrounded by an adoring crowd. Noticing that she wasn’t having anything to drink, he stormed into the makeshift kitchen and unloaded the cyanide from his watch into a mocktail lying around with one swift sleight of hand, and then signalled to a suited waiter. After slipping him a few hundred rupee notes, he charmingly asked him to pass the drink to Meera as a compliment. The waiter dutifully snaked his way to Meera and offered her the drink with a courteous bow while looking back to Sahil. To his surprise, the composer had vanished. A few awkward moments passed as the waiter apologetically looked for Sahil. It was Meera who broke the awkwardness by gracefully accepting the drink in order to put the waiter out of his misery.
*
For Meera, the ordeal lasted rather briefly. A dull headache while talking to a producer while sipping on a mocktail escalated to convulsions in a matter of seconds. An usher walking by was able to break her fall. A few alert men rushed through a confused crowd to attend to her, but it would be a few minutes before a doctor arrived at the scene. Cyanide might not be as potent a poison as the spy movies make it out to be – death does not come in seconds, but it’s a mischievous element. As Meera’s unconscious body lay on the grounds of the Metro Cinema, the cyanide worked to block her cells from using oxygen. She had no recollection of being carried to a nearby army hospital, where the doctors who observed the symptoms consistent with cyanide poisoning, administered her antidote with admittedly low hopes of a full recovery. The only saving grace was that she had consumed a relatively low amount. As she fought death, the after-party at the Metro moved to the Wellington Gymkhana Club. Gregory Peck could finally make it, just in time.
But the news about the singer being poisoned at an award show spread quickly, first within the film circles, then Bombay, then India and beyond. Penaru was in the city and heard about it first. He visited the hospital to make sure it was indeed Meera. Once he was certain that it was not one of those tabloid rumours, he sent word out to Abhimanyu. His swift action allowed Abhimanyu to land in Bombay before Meera’s Kashi-bound family had even heard about what had happened. The prince felt like he had finally awakened from his drunken stupor.
He had thought about seeing Meera again a million times, dreaming about different circumstances. Perhaps they would bump into each other on the street. Or at a party. Maybe he would find it in him to reach out to her and request a meeting. Or she might come to Ranakpour to see him, even to chide him one last time. They could meet at the Orient Club, or at Lucky’s in Bandra. He once hallucinated about them going on a horse ride again into the woods of Jharer. Never in those million possibilities and scenarios he had ever imagined that he would see her looking like a pale ghost, lying on a hospital bed. Even in his daze, it took him less than a minute to comprehend and decide what had to be done next. Experts were consulted, and the Apte family was informed and convinced that even if she was out of the woods, the treatment could have a lasting impact on her core functions, and that she needed to be in better hands for a full recovery. Meera’s lifeless body was soon on an airplane on a familiar journey – the prince and the songstress were in New York again, albeit in reversed roles.
Chapter 24
Same city, different circumstances. In the summer of 1954, as New York simmered and sizzled, Meera was suffering in a rarified air-conditioned hospital room. The worst began after the worst was over. As she came out of her medically induced coma, splitting headaches took over. Every breath was laborious, punctuated by frequent seizures. The cyanide was out of her bloodstream, but had left behind a trail of wreckage. Her lungs and heart were working on a fraction of their full capacity. Just like Meera before him, Abhimanyu learned about numerous medical terms and the regiment of patient care. He did all of it with monk-like discipline, even as he battled with his own alcohol withdrawal symptoms. The ex-lovers, a shadow of their former selves, picked up the pieces and dragged their feet on the road to recovery, one pill at a time.
As Meera finally regained her health, she was surprised to see the prince at her bedside. They didn’t converse for over two days; not a word was spoken – Meera, from the sheer lack of energy, and Abhimanyu, because he was completely at loss for words.
Their first few interactions were strictly of medical nature. ‘Take two of these,’ he would say, handing her a glass of water with pills of different colours and shapes. Meera would ask for more blankets when she felt the chills. Later, Abhimanyu began relaying messages from her family to her, informing her that Veena would soon be on her way to visit her. When she was finally able to talk again, she spoke with her mother over phone, who told her about how Abhimanyu had saved her. Back in Bombay, the wagging tongues about something being amiss between the composer and her singer had now taken a firm hold. The hushed tones had reached a fever pitch in the gossip columns. There were speculations regarding what could have transpired between Meera and Sahil that made her snub him on numerous occasions, which was perhaps what led to the mercurial Sahil taking revenge. The investigation by the media and the police came to a swift end when Sahil Malik confessed to his crime in the face of mounting circumstanti
al evidence. Abhimanyu tried his best to keep the news from Meera, but couldn’t hold back.
‘I have something to say to you, Meera, about this incident.’
‘Was it Sahil Malik?’ she asked without missing a beat. Taken aback, Abhimanyu tried to placate her.
‘He’s in custody.’
Meera’s face remained emotionless.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ Abhimanyu said softly, not wanting to push her against her wish.
‘Do you?’
‘No,’ said Abhimanyu. They never broached the subject after that.
The night prior to Veena’s arrival, Meera thanked Abhimanyu for all he had done.
‘I didn’t get a chance to ask … how have you been?’
Even in her weakened state, she couldn’t miss the drastic change in his physical appearance. The strong jawline had become a little less pronounced and now carried a grey stubble. Without the rigours of cricket, he had lost his golden tan and looked pale. His injured eye looked hollower than she remembered. Overall, he had lost the invincible air of his youth, but somehow still managed to look regal.
‘I am very well, thank you.’
‘Looks like you don’t want to talk much now,’ she said.
‘Listen,’ he said, leaning in towards her, ‘Veena will be here tomorrow, and soon, maybe in a week’s time, you’ll be discharged. This might sound inappropriate, especially since it’s coming from me, but I request you to stay back here. Let Veena see you and go back. I need … a few days with you.’
The Prince and the Nightingale Page 16