Marginal Man

by Charu Nivedita

  I had managed to delude myself that love, true love, produced unrivaled contentment. But love is just torment in a convincing pink and red disguise. This hard truth hit me like a hot blast from a furnace. I held back my urge to call Anjali. Why did I have to? (And that wasn’t my ego speaking. I have none when it comes to her.) Oh, how I despised that Venkat – the devil who caused this kerfuffle!

  Finally, at five in the evening, she texted me to ask if we could talk. How stupid of her to be so formal by troubling to ask! But we’d mutually agreed to speak over the phone only after ensuring each other that the coast was clear through text messages. I didn’t answer.

  Rattled by the non-response, she called me. I didn’t answer her calls either. She persisted. I thought I was punishing her, but holding myself back was nothing but an act of self-flagellation. I wondered how I’d feel if Anjali were me and if I were Anjali. I sent her a message enquiring who she was. I also added that I don’t talk to strangers. She explained that an army of relatives had suddenly descended upon her house. “I’ve only just managed to get them out the door. They haven’t even reached the bottom of the staircase yet, and here I am trying to call you.” I couldn’t keep the faux-fences of my anger standing any longer. She tore them down, but not completely.

  “So, we can’t talk if your cousin’s around? Do I become insignificant when they’re around you? From now on, you needn’t trouble to send me a morning greeting. Even if you do, don’t you ever expect me to reply.” I continued to pick her apart for quite some time and finally fell asleep angry at myself for behaving the way I did.

  The next morning, my anger had completely vanished and I was back to normal. In spite of all my resolve to never acknowledge her greetings, it was I who ended up sending her a bonjour. There was no reply. My anger possessed me again. Who the fuck was visiting her today? She would usually slink into the bathroom to chat with me when there were eyes and ears other than her own about her house. When she finally did call me, it was 11. When I heard what she had to say, my anger turned on me. She’d been reading late into the night and had woken up just then. As it was a holiday, she’d switched off the alarm and gone to bed. I wept when I heard her explain in her mesmerizing voice. It was a public place and I’d attracted quite a few stares. I sent her a message that said: “I feel so ashamed. I don’t even have a handkerchief.” She replied: “I’ve never known a man who loved so much my entire life. Are we a dream or are we real?”

  Chapter nine

  1 – Wicked Women

  Nature is always conversing with us, but we never stop or hush ourselves to listen.

  I met Rajan Panicker in Mettupalayam. The man rolled cowry shells. People have been telling fortunes with these shells for centuries. This form of astrology has a history of practice in many parts of the world. Ancient religion Obi of Africa practiced cowry shell astrology. In Kerala, an astrologer rolls 16 cowry shells twice and counts the number of shells facing upwards and downwards, calculates 256 formations and evaluate a man’s life. It is beyond me to grasp how a man can roll a set of cowry shells, analyze the formations and tell you about your past, present and future like he’s lived them with you. Now I reckon that paramapadham, played with cowry shells, is more than just a game. It is a signifier of the fortune of the players. One unlucky formation and the even the man who has climbed the highest ladder can be dragged down by a snake. This is life.

  Perundevi rubbished all these beliefs and practices as mere superstition. Of course, a spiritual woman like her would be inclined to think so. I had recourse to God as I wanted to be safeguarded from the snares of my enemies, my fellow human beings. If astrology is a superstition, then God should be one too. But I am not interested in proving that argument. Anyone else in my wretched place with crazy lying chits and vulturous journalists would have died of a heart attack or thrown himself off the LIC Building. I explained to Perundevi that I was banking on these superstitious beliefs and practices to keep myself alive.

  The forest in which Bhadrakali amman resides is situated at about 5 kilometres from Mettupalayam. The river Bhavani flows near her temple. Close at hand is the lush Nelli mountain. After the customary ablution in the Bhavani, I implored the mother goddess to spare me from the rabid jackals who were hounding me.

  As a child, I’d come across Mettupalayam’s Vanabhadra Kaliamman Temple in the stories of Mahabharata. Later, I encountered the poet Pukazhenthi’s story of Aravalli and Suravalli.

  Nellurupattinam in southern Andhra Pradesh was ruled by seven sisters, all unconquerable magicians and sorceresses. Aravalli, Suravalli and Veeravalli were the oldest sisters and anyone who opposed this all-powerful trio was either gored on the battlefield or cast into a dungeon.

  Having vanquished several kings, the sisters set their sights on the Pandavas whom they wished to enslave. They sent a cockerel to them with a message that beckoned them to the land of the women. “You can all have a good life there. All you have to do is chant Aravalli’s name and beg for food.”

  “I will not return until I have destroyed that woman!” Bhima declared.

  Yudhishthira tried to deter Bhima by warning him of the dangers of miring himself in a web of dark magic, but Bhima was firmly resolved to go, unafraid of losing his life or his limbs.

  It turned out that he was no match for the Aravalli sisters. They defeated him with the dark arts. It was not a straight fight at all.

  He did not know who he was having a sex chat with. The newspapers seemed to know more than he did.

  Bhima was imprisoned but he managed to escape and went running to Yudhishthira.

  Aravalli wrote a letter to Bhima. It said, “You lost the war to three women and we even took you prisoner. You even escaped from prison like a thief. Do you think you’re in any fit state to deserve a kingdom?”

  On reading the letter, Yudhishthira was enraged. He summoned his brother Sahadeva who was an expert astrologer.

  “I want to raze Nellurupattinam to the ground and destroy the Aravalli sisters completely,” said the former. “I want you to read the stars and tell me what lies in store for us all.”

  Sahadeva said they’d be better off consulting their nephew, Allimuthu, on the subject of their futures. Allimuthu prayed to Vanabhadra Kali.

  This incident unfolded in days of yore when Mettupalayam did not exist. It was to this very same goddess that I – a so-called postmodern writer – came running, seeking succor and boons. And what was the boon, you ask? To defeat a couple of twenty-first century hardcore feminist sisters who made a living hell out of my life with their threats. I do not know whether the boon will be granted or not. We shall know my plight – and that of the feminazis – by the time I finish this novel.

  I – sorry – Allimuthu accepted the sacred ash and sword that Vanabhadra Kali gave him and made his way to the Aravalli sisters’ palace, successfully countering the dark magic and sorcery they’d used to thwart him. He was only too clever for all the tests the sisters put him through.

  What tests? They stole his password and cooked up a steamy sex chat that was one part real and nine parts bullshit. As Allimuthu fancied women, they lured him again and again and again and again and again into sex chatrooms and phone sex. These were the tests they’d created to destroy him.

  As we already know, I am a fool. Unlike Allimuthu, I didn’t go to Vanabhadra Kali before the war began; I went to her only when I’d almost lost everything.

  It came to me as a rude shock when some of my readers who held my writings in acclaim ventured to ask me whether “it” was true. Whether what was true? There was a man and there was a woman, both of whom started sexting each other. I told you that much, so why come around asking if it’s true?

  The Aravalli sisters ask pardon from Allimuthu. They also promise him the hand of one of their daughters, Palvarisai.

  Allimuthu was in no hurry to accept the offer.

  “You a
re all sorceresses,” he said. “The apple can’t have fallen far from the tree.”

  “Our daughter was raised in a dungeon,” they replied. “She is yet to set eyes on a man.”

  On his way back to the kingdom with Palvarisai, Allimuthu misplaced Vanabhadra Kali’s sacred ash. He is overcome by thirst during the journey and he faints. Palvarisai immediately squeezed a lemon and fed the juice to Allimuthu. The juice from the lemon, given to her by her mother, kills Allimuthu instead of reviving him. Palvarisai knew nothing of the poisoned lemon.

  When news of Allimuthu’s death reached the Pandavas, they declared war with the Aravalli sisters.

  In the meanwhile, a saddened Arjuna went all the way up to heaven and retrieved Allimuthu’s soul from Indra. He kept it in a box, returned with it to earth, and restored it to Allimuthu’s body. Allimuthu was back from the dead.

  The Pandavas fiercely attacked Aravallipattinam which later became known as Nellurupattinam. They emerged victorious as they’d sought Vanabhadra Kali’s blessings before the war. They imprisoned six of the Aravalli sisters. The seventh escaped to Kerala where she became Kambalathu Bhagavati.

  2 – Warning: Thou Shalt Not Masturbate on a Pilgrimage

  One fine day, on a whim, I decided to make a pilgrimage to the Ayyappa temple in Sabarimala, and began to practice the rituals and observe the austerities the pilgrimage prescribes. My friends openly howled and laughed at my decision. “I know of all your antics, but this one takes the cake!” Kokkarakko opined. “This is your biggest sham yet!”

  I’ve often toyed with the idea of going on a pilgrimage to the shrine of the bachelor god Ayyappa in the past, but the thought of complete abstinence from sensory pleasures for forty-eight whole days in preparation for the trek of faith deterred me. I was convinced I lacked the will to do it. Moreover, I have accustomed myself to comfort. I can’t walk barefoot at home for a day, let alone going about shoeless for seven weeks. Perhaps not being able to afford passable footwear till I was eighteen had something to do with it. Going barefooted was only one of the austerities to Ayyappa the devotees had to observe. That aside, they had to perform puja twice a day after a cold-water bath – one before dawn and one after sunset. I couldn’t even begin to contemplate this enforced but voluntary forty-eight-day celibacy. I could probably survive without sex, but without masturbation? The hell I couldn’t!

  When Kokkarakko told me about the calamitous aftermath of breaking the rules, I was panic-stricken. Kokkarakko had been making the pilgrimage for four consecutive years. In the fifth year, he was overcome by an urge to shag himself. He walked up the mountain, praying to Ayyappa for forgiveness. He took the forty-eight mile route through the forest. Born into a Vaishnavite family, Kokkarakko was blessed with a well-chiseled physique and was cast-iron. A trek he’d completed with consummate ease on four occasions was not even close to good in the fifth year. No matter how carefully he climbed, he slipped and fell several times, sustaining bloody injuries. When he finally managed to reach the sanctum sanctorum in one piece, prepared for the highest point of his penance – the darshan of Lord Ayyappa – one of the Namboodri priests was shielding his view of the idol. His pleas to the priest to move aside were in vain as his shouts did not travel in the din. With thousands of devotees in waiting, the darshan time was barely a few seconds. Kokkarakko’s time was up. He was tossed out by the wildly advancing throng.

  He spent the night sleeping on the temple floor and recounting his misfortune to a security guard who was stationed there. What came over the guard we do not know, but he whisked Kokkarakko into the sanctum sanctorum for his darshan.

  After his bitter experience the fifth time around, Kokkarakko decided to never undertake the pilgrimage again.

  “People like you and I can never stay true to the vows prescribed by Ayyappa. Forget it, buddy,” he said, smirking. It was difficult not to agree with him, but I felt that things had sufficiently fallen into place then to make the pilgrimage. After I’d met Anjali, I had eyes for no other woman. “Even Anjali will never believe this,” my friends taunted. When I asked Anjali to introduce me to one of her female friends who was a Lara Fabian fan, she jabbed my forehead with her index finger like it was the mouth of a pistol and said, “I’m fucking warning you.” However hard I tried, I just could not make her understand (or maybe she just pretends not to understand) that I would have no one but her.

  She once accompanied me to a news conference in Chennai. Usually, when I’m in her company, she oozes sexy passion and her body does all the talking. Fortunately, she was able to put all her sexiness and lust on a leash at the media event. I had to compliment her on her supreme acting skills and her self-control.

  “You’re in the news – again. Why should I create a new scandal? Besides, most of the journalists in attendance were women. If I didn’t keep a poker face, they could have told I was undressing you and fucking you in my head. We wouldn’t want their imaginations running wild, so there wasn’t so much as a twinkle of the eye or the twitch of a lip when I looked at you. It was tough, I’ll admit, but not impossible,” she said.

  For the first time in my life, I didn’t feel like an infidel. In the Indian context, fidelity is synonymous with monogamy. An ekapatnivrata is a man who is committed under oath to one woman alone. A man’s fidelity was not more important than a woman’s chastity. Sangam literature is replete with paeans to chastity, describing the conduct of a chaste woman in these terms: when the man of the house returns from the abode of his mistress upon hearing that his wife has given birth, the chaste wife of impeccable upbringing lets on no displeasure whatsoever and welcomes her lord and master with the pleasantest demeanor.

  I detest the word vrata as it suggests that formal and external oaths and vows tie a man and a woman to each other. In my case, nothing external tied me to Anjali; it was all a matter of the union of minds, hearts and souls.

  3 – Affairs: Both Real and Imaginary

  My friend Vettukkili has a wife and three girlfriends and is always on the lookout for more. Most of his time and energy is spent on expanding his harem. I envied him once. He never found the woman who would end his quest. He prowls around like an eternally hungry beast. I can only pity him now. Why, even Kokkarakko sails in the same boat as Vettukkili! By Kokkarakko’s own admission, his wife gives him no reason to complain. Yet, he has four lovers – Manju, Andrea, Abinaya and Ranjani – all of whom he met through Facebook.

  Manju, 21, is a college student. She was going steady with her boyfriend whom she had plans to marry. The boyfriend was a thorn in her flesh, an overtly possessive chap who wanted to micromanage Manju’s life. He wanted to control who she met, what she ate, the girth of her smile when she greeted other men, how high the waistband of her jeans should be – stuff like that. They hadn’t even kissed once in their two-year relationship.

  Kokkarakko had known her for three months.

  “Screwed her yet?” I queried.

  “Willy-nilly.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  This requires some explanation. In Tamil Nadu, there are no safe houses where consenting adults can have sex. Even five-star hotel rooms are not free from police raids. But Kokkarakko is a smart bastard who can thread an elephant through a needle.

  There’s a government-run tourist resort near Mahabalipuram. Government-owned hotels offer many advantages. One, not many people know they exist; two, the police would never enter a state-run establishment. This resort, located on the seafront and complete with a swimming pool, was frequented by bureaucrats who were keen on cutting shady deals over drinks. Kokkarakko zeroed in on it.

  Expressing a desire so early in the piece, to get into her churidar, carries the risk of a girl as young as Manju wanting to eject out of the conversation. Subtlety and patience are vital in such an operation. ‘The city is too hot and noisy. Let’s head to a tranquil spot. I know of one by the sea,’ suggested Kokkar
ako masking malice. Kokkarakko booked a room at the resort, picked up the girl and drove there. They spent time talking in a leaf-carpeted corner of the beach. Manju, like most women, wanted to get her feet wet. She stood on the shore and enjoyed the feel of the sun-warmed waves lapping at her ankles. When all the seaside fun was over and her salwar-kameez had been soaked into transparency, under the pretext of having a fresh water wash, Kokkarakko ushered her into the pre-booked room. There were two doors to the suite, one over looking the pool and other the sea. He kept both open while Manju was in the washroom. The conversation continued. After a while Manju locked both the doors because the cool air of the air conditioner was going waste.

  Kokkarakko showed me a picture of Manju. Describing my friend’s girlfriend here would be inappropriate and detrimental for a multitude of reasons which I do not care to enumerate. Suffice it to say that she was a dusky beauty like the women in the great epics.

  “Did you fuck her?” I asked.

  “No, no, I didn’t,” he said. “She’d have a poor opinion of me if I did.”

  “You brainless asshole.”

  Do you know why these women refuse to have sex before marriage? It is because he would think that she was chaste and that he had chosen the right girl. Otherwise, the marriage might not even take place. And men’s dicks start growing moralizing consciences during periods of inevitable marital fiction. “Weren’t you the one who had no compunctions about bedding a man before marriage?” the husband retorts. How well he occupies that dubious piece of real estate called the moral high ground!

  Now coming back to Kokkarakko, while he never did manage to unhook Manju’s bra or slide down her panties, he did flaunt his tonsil hockey and sleight of hand skills. But Manju was still unspoiled. The slightest touch goose-pimpled her skin and had her gasping. “Oh my sweet fucking goodness,” was Kokkarakko’s response to her reaction.