Duty and Desire

by Anju Gattani

“So, I’d be dead.”

  “How does Sheetal feel listening to you talk like this?”

  “Thrilled.”

  “What you do affects us all. The family. Friends. The business—”

  “You focus on family and friends,” Rakesh cut her off. “On your share of the will. I’ll focus on the business. Why should my social life affect you now when it’s never affected you before?”

  “Because everyone will see this.” She pointed to the headline damp with grease. “The phone’s bound to ring all day, I tell you. What will I say?”

  Rakesh shrugged. “Just tell them that Rakesh was doing what every man should with his wife. Having fun.”

  “Hai Ishwar! If your father were alive today—”

  “Stop it. I’ve never shaken hands with the PM. Yes, I love hanging out at bars and clubs. That’s who I am. Look at our finances. Our profits are over the roof and my business is better than ever.”

  “Your business?”

  “Yes, my business. Like my wife.” He pointed to Sheetal as if she were a commodity. “With whom I can do whatever I want. Screw whenever—”

  “Such foul language, I tell you. What impression will it have on the girls? Naina. Megha.” Mummyji pointed to the dining room door. “Out now.”

  Both girls rose from their seats and left the room.

  “How dare you speak like that? You didn’t earn any of it. Your father built Dhanraj & Son with his own hands. He created a whole empire. You just walked in, took charge, and now look what you’re doing to the reputation. So selfish you are, I tell you. No interest in keeping relations with Naina’s prospective in-laws. What will the Malhotras think?”

  “Fuck up!”

  “Ae-ee!” Mummyji cupped her mouth.

  “Now, you listen to me. I did everything you wanted. No one to run the business. I took charge. Get Naina married. I networked and found someone for her. That too, just before my own wedding. Get married. I did, for your peace of mind. You got everything you wanted. Everything. Now leave me alone. All of you.”

  “I told you so many times.” Mummyji leaned forward. “But you didn’t listen. That other girl, Rakhi. Or Nupur, I tell you. They were better choices. From better families. Almost as financially strong as we are, but she was your choice.”

  Sheetal’s gut knotted. So, she was here out of convenience? A settlement? Is that why Rakesh chose her over the others? Arvind was right all along. She was a business deal.

  “Sheetal could be so useful in the office, I tell you. I mean, she has nothing to do here all day and—”

  “Her place is in the home. Not my office. If she steps foot in my office, I will not step foot in this house.” Rakesh rose and spun on his heel.

  “You can’t just walk out—”

  Rakesh left the room.

  Mummyji collapsed in an empty chair and stretched her thumb and index finger across her forehead as if to ease a headache.

  Sheetal’s heart was ready to explode. She rose to leave.

  Mummyji jumped to her feet. “I’m so sorry, Sheetal. I…I forgot you were here. And…and… Hai Ishwar! Now you heard everything you shouldn’t have. But it’s not what you think. Give me a chance. I can explain.”

  Sheetal didn’t want to hear any explanations. She left. Wasn’t it enough that their photo was splashed in The Raigun Herald? But to now have her marriage spread out in the open like this? Bile rose in her throat and she swallowed. Her throat burned. She was fed up being treated like a ball of dough that anyone could roll, flatten and toss at will.

  “Sheetal! Sheetal!” Mummyji followed her. “It’s not what you think, I tell you.”

  Sheetal took a left at the upper landing and marched along the north wing. She turned into her bedroom, slammed the door, twisted the lock in place, and pressed her back against the door. Then she sank onto the floor as anger rippled up her chest in waves. She pulled her knees to her chest and scrunched herself into a ball.

  “Listen,” Mummyji pleaded through the door. “Just listen to me.”

  Sheetal took a deep breath and exhaled. She was done listening.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Rev

  Rakesh stormed out of the mansion and a guard in a gray uniform saluted him. Rakesh didn’t bother to nod. He took a sharp left and made for the garage.

  He hadn’t meant to lose his temper at last night’s party, but he couldn’t stand all the hype around Sheetal. How she carried herself so well with such poise, grace and charm. How he was so lucky to have found someone like her.

  Rakesh stopped at the garage entrance and pushed a red button mounted on a wall, causing the door to roll up vertically and reveal a fleecy black sheet that draped a vehicle. How dare the photographer ask him to smile and then gesture to Sheetal! Fuck! Well, he showed them who was boss on the dance floor.

  Rakesh grabbed the car cover, balled the sheet and tossed it aside. A gift from the in-laws. He slipped behind the Diablo’s steering wheel, switched on the ignition, and eased the vehicle out of the garage.

  Two pairs of black wrought iron gates and two security posts, five hundred meters apart, marked the entrance and exit to the Dhanraj mansion. But when Rakesh test drove a vehicle, they served as test points. Three years ago, the Ferrari, a graduation gift from his father, had made it through in three seconds flat.

  Rakesh revved the accelerator and the V12 engine roared, but he restrained the vehicle.

  A security guard in the left guard post glanced at him and pounded a button. The gates quivered and began to slowly swing apart. The guard’s job depended on Rakesh passing through the gates without a scratch on the car’s chassis.

  Adrenaline tingled through Rakesh’s veins. He wriggled his toes in the leather Bally shoes and pressed the accelerator. He watched the arrow on the tachometer…nine thousand…nine thousand, five hundred…six hundred. He shifted gear and shot like an arrow. Wind rushed through his hair as he zoomed around the semi-circular driveway. He was flying. Free! The gate’s black bars loomed closer, widening in slow motion: Five feet to go. Four feet. Three feet. The gate whizzed past on the right, missing the chassis by a hair’s breadth. His manhood hardened. A glance in the rearview mirror showed the guard flop down in relief. Rakesh cocked his head back and laughed. Sweet!

  He sped down Barotta Hill as sunlight dappled through the overhanging canopy. At the four-way intersection, a policeman dressed in an olive-green uniform with a belly the size of a watermelon stood on a podium two feet high. He blew a whistle for Rakesh to stop as pedestrians started across the road.

  Fuck! Rakesh braked and gritted his teeth. Didn’t that officer know who he was? That he was supposed to hold back the pedestrians and let him through? Rakesh reached over to the glove compartment, flicked it open and groped inside for a packet of Marlboros he had tossed in yesterday morning. Something sharp pricked his thumb. He slid his hand right and pulled out Sheetal’s proposal photograph. Was this a reminder from the in-laws that she was the reason he owned a Diablo?

  The long, smooth curves of Sheetal’s figure-eight body shimmered behind the orange translucent pleats. Her belly button winked like a hidden eye, and there was no denying the smooth, sharp curves of her lips or the almond-shaped eyes. He let go, and the photograph fell onto his lap. She was nothing more than a fixture with limited time warranty. Once she realized it was impossible to live with him, she'd leave him alone. Though he'd warned her not to file for a divorce, she might still go ahead. However, because she would initiate the separation, he’d owe her nothing.

  He needed her to keep the charade going until Naina’s wedding; otherwise, the Malhotras would think there was something wrong with the Dhanrajs and with Naina and break-off the engagement. Then he’d be stuck with Naina for God knew how long.

  Rakesh groped in the glove compartment for the Marlboros. He pulled out the familiar red and white packet, a golden lighter, and tapped out a cigarette. He was about to light the cigarette’s ti
p when his attention fell on Sheetal’s photograph. Her orange sari glowed like a fucking sunset. Surely, he could put the photograph to good use.

  The policeman whistled a signal for Rakesh to advance. With a foot on the brake, Rakesh revved the engine and basked in the roar. He was not one to take orders from anyone.

  “Eh! Hurry! You’re holding everyone up.”

  He flicked the lighter and held the photo’s bottom right corner to the flame. The flame danced along the Kodak’s edge, and Rakesh released the brake, rolled ahead and stopped at the podium.

  “Watch it!” The policeman almost toppled off the podium but regained his balance. “Don’t meddle with the law or you and your shiny black—”

  Rakesh thrust the burning photograph into the policeman’s hand and sped off, glancing in the rearview mirror.

  The policeman blew furiously on his fingers as the burning photograph drifted to the ground. He stamped out the fire, yanked a notebook from his pocket and looked ahead, no doubt, to note the Lamborghini’s license plate.

  Rakesh cocked his head back and laughed, imagining the man’s reaction when he saw A-5-5-H-O-L-E.

  Chapter Eighteen

  North and South

  Sheetal headed downstairs the next morning, noticed something sparkle on the Bradford Browns, and quickened her gait. At a ten-feet distance, she just made out Naina’s figure on the sofa, almost as if Naina were an extra pillow.

  Naina’s pasty brown complexion matched the sofa’s fabric, and her raisin-eyes were pressed into her face like buttons dotting the center-point of each Bradford cushion. Not only was she the black sheep here, her complexion was darker than Rakesh and Megha’s and she was rude and barbaric compared to them. Naina held a hand up to the chandelier, and her engagement ring sparkled in the light. “Eh na, where you going?” She wiggled her fingers as Sheetal stepped onto the landing.

  “Nearby.”

  “Can I come?” Naina stood.

  Sheetal lengthened her stride. The last thing she needed was Naina meddling in her business instead of minding her own. “Next time, perhaps.” She hurried out the door.

  ***

  Three hours later, Sheetal slid into the rear seat of a white Mercedes as the chauffeur loaded bags containing tubes of oil paints, knives, turpentine and other art supplies into the vehicle’s boot.

  Soon, he drove through northern Raigun, a poor section of the city Sheetal hardly ever visited. His route would cross Nariyal Ka Rasta, where Sheetal grew up, which fell halfway between north and south Raigun.

  “The highway is always jammed at this hour, Choti Sahiba,” the chauffeur said. “It may take us forever.”

  Sheetal didn’t mind. No one waited for her at home. “That’s fine.”

  The Mercedes wove in and out of traffic, jerking every time an auto rickshaw squeezed between it and the vehicle ahead or a policeman signaled to stop even though the traffic light was green. Pedestrians sidled between bumpers to cross the road while vehicles honked furiously for them to get out of the way.

  The left pavement swarmed with shoppers, beggars and vendors. Hawkers yelled out their wares as the November sun beat down on their mobile carts stacked with pots, pans, Tupperware, stainless steel cookware, mops, brooms and household bric-a-brac. Smoke from open-air food stalls coated everything in a film of oil. Smog puffed from vehicles’ tail pipes, and grayish liquid spilled from open gutters onto the streets. Amid the dirt and chaos, a coconut seller plucked a coconut from a garland of many, tethered to a rusted pole by frayed brown rope. He hacked away at the coconut, poked a hole in the top, popped in a straw and handed it to a man in queue.

  The Mercedes inched forward and the carts eventually gave way to colorful tarpaulin sheets spread across the concrete. Sheetal lowered her window for some fresh air but the odor of sweat and stale grease drifted in.

  “Two for five!” a hawker yelled the price of fruits for sale.

  “Diwali bargains! Three for five,” another hawker competed in a shouting frenzy as the Festival of Lights, Diwali, approached. He rearranged slices of papayas, pineapples and watermelons while fanning away swarms of flies attracted by the nearby carcasses of fish, eels and other sea creatures that glistened on blocks of ice, their blood melting with the ice to form a reddish liquid that dripped into open gutters.

  Nausea welled up Sheeetal’s throat and she turned away. She was going to be sick.

  The traffic light changed from red to green and the driver eased forward before a woman in her late twenties, dressed in a dark blue kurta and white leggings, her hands loaded with bags, crossed in front of their vehicle. Groceries fell from a bag. She raised an elbow, the chauffeur slammed the brakes, and Sheetal rocked forward.

  The woman grabbed bunches of carrots and radishes from the pavement, stuffed them back in, then hurried across the street.

  “Sorry, Choti Sahiba,” the chauffeur apologized. “These people think they own the roads. Don’t obey traffic lights, rules or anything.”

  “It’s okay.” Sheetal watched the woman hop onto the right pavement and stagger as she maneuvered on the broken heel of her sandal. She looked back at Sheetal and her sunburnt skin cracked as she frowned.

  Is that what she could have become had she married Arvind?

  A chill shuddered up Sheetal’s spine and she looked away.

  Just then, tiny fingers caked in grime and dust crept up the window. Children in tattered and ripped clothing with overgrown, matted hair, swarmed outside her vehicle. Gray saliva dribbled from their mouths, yellow mucus trickled from their noses, and blood-crusted, open wounds on their arms and faces oozed a mustard-colored serum.

  “Bhook lagi hai. Kooch de na.” Children as young as two begged for food while stray dogs barked and snarled at the pavement’s edge.

  Sheetal’s skin crawled and she inched away from the window.

  The chauffeur turned and smacked the children’s hands with a folded newspaper, forcing them to retreat like snakes into their holes as the window rolled up. “Scoundrels! All of you. Only know how to beg. Precisely why you’re on the streets.”

  The children, undeterred, banged on the windows with their tiny fists, demanding food and money.

  The Mercedes shot forward and the children flaked off like mites shaken off a pashmina shawl. Sheetal snuggled both hands beneath her thighs and sank back against the plush fabric.

  Shop windows displaying mannequins in expensive saris, salwar kameezes and western wear now lined both sides of the road. Bakeries, cafes and fast food chains dotted street corners, their red, pink and green awnings offering shoppers respite from the Raigun sun. Overweight Memsahibs walked pampered pooches on designer leashes. A woman in her mid-twenties busily instructed a chauffeur to load shopping bags into a car’s boot as people, armed with their own purchases, hurried in and out of stores, almost knocking the woman over. Sheetal sat up, content to be on familiar turf and relieved to be close to home. This was her Raigun, where filth and poverty didn’t exist.

  ***

  The following noon, Sheetal took her place opposite Mummyji at the dining table and spread a napkin on her lap, reminding herself the law around here was this mother-in-law and asking for a favor could lead to unfavorable results. “I’d like to begin painting. Can I please have an empty room? Somewhere on the south wing, perhaps?” No bedrooms were occupied on the south and west wings. However, the west wing was only exposed to direct sunlight in the afternoons. The south wing, on the other hand, overlooked the front lawn and received sunlight throughout the day. Janvi placed a serving dish on the table as Sheetal continued, “Rakesh likes the curtains drawn, so there’s not enough light in my bedroom to paint by.”

  “Oh…well…I don’t know what to say. I mean, this is such a surprise, I tell you.” She fanned the air. “I talked to your mother yesterday, I tell you. And you can go to your parents’ place on the first of December for two weeks. It’s all sorted out.”

  Two weeks? Sh
eetal leaned forward. “Mama said I could go for a month.”

  “A month? What, and leave all your responsibilities behind? Too long, I tell you. Far too long for a bride. Two weeks is all you will get.”

  Sheetal was about to argue, but realized that gave her just three more weeks here and then no coming back. Her heart was ready to burst in relief, but she suppressed the excitement. “I’ll start tidying a room on the south wing. Perhaps even find some old furniture I can use while the servants are cleaning up for Diwali and—”

  “No need to, I tell you.” Mummyji shook her head. “We can always buy new furniture and—”

  “I’ll manage with what we have.” Sheetal helped herself to a curry.

  ***

  That afternoon, Sheetal swiveled a key in a resistant lock on a south wing door as Janvi waited patiently. Finally, the lock clicked and she opened the door. The odor of stale air and mothballs greeted her. The windows on the opposite wall were cloudy with dust.

  Sheetal flipped a light switch but no light came on. Janvi offered her a torch, but Sheetal gestured for her to put it away. Sheetal navigated through ghost-like furniture draped with bedsheets, Janvi close behind. “What’s in here?”

  “Don’t know. No one open this room before. At least, not while I here.”

  Dust carpeted the marble floor, and cobwebs draped light fixtures and ceiling fans.

  For two days, Janvi and Sheetal yanked sheets off furniture and dusted old lamps, vases, huge glass bowls and crystal chandeliers. On the third day, they pushed aside furniture and found a closet that contained sealed cardboard boxes. Sheetal peeled off the brown tape, opened the flaps and pulled out a layer of crumpled newspaper.

  Janvi removed a child’s cricket bat, helmet, knee padding, a box of cricket balls, and examined a loose ball that lay in a corner of the box. The ball’s cover cracked and flaked. “So old, Choti Sahiba.” She dropped the ball into the box. “Why Memsahib not throw away?”

  Had this box belonged to Rakesh? She tried to imagine Rakesh playing a team sport and failed. He shot orders and instilled fear to get a job done. She grabbed a pair of scissors, slit the tape on another box, pulled apart the flaps and lifted out a photo frame. . The box held more. She used the end of her dupatta to wipe the glass. A whirl of dust caused her to sneeze. Janvi offered her a rag.