Ramya's Treasure

by Pratap Reddy

  “It’s a lot of stuff for a short story,” Chantal says.

  “It’s meant to be about five thousand words long,” Brenda says.

  “The way it’s shaping up, even fifteen thousand won’t be enough,” John says. “You should expand it into a novella.”

  “You must learn to work faster too, Brenda,” Jeannette says. “In the past six months, you’ve not progressed beyond the opening scene. I’m aware that you faithfully incorporate all the suggestions we make into your story, and it no doubt takes up your time.”

  “I often suffer from writer’s block,” Brenda says, with pain in her voice. “But I’ll see what I can do.”

  The other south Asian lady, named Chantal, is writing a memoir of her early life in India, growing up amidst dozens of relatives and relations. Her husband was a highflying businessman, and they made frequent trips exotic places in the world — Paris, Zurich, Madrid, London, and even Rio de Janeiro. But at long last, they decided, quite perversely, to settle in Canada, a country which is in deep freeze for the better part of the year. Her memoir is all about herself, and how privileged her life was. Everything else, whether people or places, are merely props.

  A surly waiter appears, putting a brake on Chantal’s longwinded narrative. He stands patiently, without enthusiasm, with his pad and pencil at ready. It’s obvious that he knows from experience that these struggling writers place small orders and tip poorly as well.

  The ladies, especially Brenda and Chantal, make a great show of going through the wine list. Eventually Brenda asks for water with a wedge of lime, and Chantal, the self-confessed jet-setter, orders a glass of the plonk known as the house wine. Ramya asks for a cup of coffee, and Jeannette for herbal tea. John orders butternut squash soup. Having to cope with a quartet of women at the table requires nourishment.

  Once the waiter leaves, Chantal resumes, like an unstoppable juggernaut, until the waiter returns a good twenty minutes later with their order. She’s eager to continue after the waiter retires, but Jeannette intervenes. Chantal for one doesn’t suffer from writer’s block.

  Jeannette asks Ramya: “Do you have a short story or something you want to read from?”

  Ramya delves into her handbag and pulls out a sheet of paper. She puts on her glasses, and reads from her poem, “Pink Snow.”

  “You write well,” Jeannette says when Ramya finishes reading. “But Ramya, I hope you don’t mind my saying so, the tree in your poem is most probably a crab-apple tree. Cherry blossoms are white, but crab-apple blossoms are pink.”

  “Thank you,” Ramya says. “As an immigrant one is always learning. But substituting crab-apple for cherry blossom sounds so unpoetical!”

  “I’m not a poet, but do poems always have to be about flowers, trees and birds?” John asks. “I’ve very little patience with all this nature stuff.”

  “This isn’t just a nature poem,” Ramya says. “It’s about sacrifice.”

  “Maybe you should call it Red Snow?” Brenda says. “Red is the colour of sacrifice.”

  “As you can see, we aren’t in the least bit qualified to critique poems,” John says.

  “We once had a poet in our group,” Jeannette says. “She moved to BC last summer.”

  “She had a chapbook published by a small independent press in Toronto,” John says.

  “Each one of us had to buy a copy,” Brenda says, as if still unable to get over the grudge.

  “She sold fifty-two copies of her chapbook in all,” Chantal says. “Quite an achievement, when you think about it.”

  “If you had something in prose, perhaps we could help you,” John says. He’d been looking at her with unwavering gaze all through. When Ramya looks up, his eyes are boring into her.

  “As a matter of fact, I do,” Ramya says, averting her eyes and fishing out a sheaf of papers from her miraculous handbag.

  “Wow, quite a magician, eh?” John says. “I wish we could bring out stories like that. Out of a hat, at the drop of one.”

  Looking at her wrist watch, Jeannette says: “We have fifteen minutes. Would you like to read?”

  Ramya reads from a short story called “Down Under” that she wrote when she first realized that she couldn’t sell her poems. The story, which needed much polishing, was about a young family from south India living in a basement. The man’s mother visits them to help with the young children. One day she decides to cook a delicacy, which her son liked, made from smelly sundried fish she’d brought from India, tightly wrapped in a polythene bag. The heady but foetid aroma fills their underground flat and then wafts up to the first floor where the owner lives. The suspicious owner, unable to decipher the strange smell correctly, calls 911, thinking there’s a marijuana grow-op thriving in his basement. The irate police and firemen who’ve arrived on the scene aren’t inclined, as her son might’ve been, to appreciate the old lady’s culinary skills.

  “I’ve an issue with the title,” Chantal, the well-travelled one, says. “‘Down Under’ refers to Australia. This story is set entirely in Canada, even though in a basement flat. It will confuse the reader. If I were you, I’d change the title.”

  “I’ll think of another title,” Ramya says.

  Brenda, who had already evinced a keen passion for details, suggests: “Why don’t you include the recipe for the fish curry? It’ll add to the authenticity of the story.”

  Though Ramya is at a loss to know who’d be interested in making the offensive dish, she’s in no mood to argue, and so she says: “That’s a good idea.”

  “The scene and conversation with the police doesn’t ring true,” John says. “I don’t think policemen in Canada speak like that.”

  Ramya sighs. Being a prissy, law-abiding soul, she couldn’t even begin to guess how Toronto police would behave and speak. While she’s seen them zipping up and down the streets in their cruisers, she hasn’t so much as received a traffic ticket in her life.

  “The story is very interesting,” Jeannette says. “If you have a bunch of such stuff maybe you could get them published as a collection.”

  “But collections are very difficult to sell to publishers, Jeannette,” John says. “And to have individual stories published, literary magazines take months to decide. Even if the story is published, very rarely do you receive any payment.”

  “Max two copies of the periodical,” Chantal says. “Sometimes I wonder why I want to be a writer at all.”

  “Vanity,” Brenda says with a sigh, “like the rest of us.”

  “If you’re serious about being published, I suggest you write a novel,” John says.

  Then they all leave, collecting their coats from the stand. Outside on the sidewalk, John says: “Hope to see you next month.” The tip of his tongue sneaks out and wetly caresses his lower lip. The restaurant was overheated and dry. “Maybe, the next time you’ll pull out a novel out of your handbag.”

  “Your vanity case,” Brenda says.

  “So that’s that,” Ramya says to herself as she’s driving back home.

  Her spirits have plummeted to their nadir. The literary outing, far from accomplishing the goal of showing her how to proceed with her literary ambitions, has only revealed more pitfalls. All she learned was that she didn’t have the required talent to write saleable poetry — and there was no ready market for her short fiction.

  The evening was such a waste of time and effort. Whatever John said about her talents in his mock-serious way, unfortunately, legerdemain wasn’t one of them. There was no way she could materialize a novel out of thin air!

  Maybe she was better off filling in those EI forms. She must use her creativity to come up with some credible excuse for the delay. Something the labour department functionary will fall for. Pogey seems more lucrative than poetry.

  She returns home exhausted and depressed. She switches on the lights one by one in her dark unwelcoming home, hoping they’ll ward off her depression. But the dolefully quiet rooms with all their redundant furniture only deepen her
loneliness.

  In the evening the following day Ramya drives to Mrs. Rao’s house to pay her condolences in person. She was careful to call earlier in the day and make an appointment. The Raos have little patience with the typical Indian way of doing things; they think it’s too slapdash.

  The evening is gloomy and cold. There’s a mild fog stroking the city with its wet fingers. As she nears the Rao residence, the fog seems to grow thicker, maybe because of all the tall old trees in the posh area. The Raos had moved to an upscale neighbourhood, rubbing shoulders with well-heeled neighbours consisting of doctors, business tycoons, drug dealers, and illicit pot growers.

  The house has a slate grey façade with black doors and windows, and turret-like projections on the roof. It looks back at her with a baleful gaze, and on that wintry evening, with a low grey sky and the dark denuded trees, the fashionably built house might be mistaken for a vampire’s lair.

  A female relative, whom Ramya doesn’t recognize, opens the door. She gives an uncertain smile, and conducts Ramya wordlessly to the living room. The house is uncomfortably cold and unnaturally quiet — as though everything in the house, people, furniture and appliances, are observing silence in honour of the late Mrs. Rao.

  Mr. Rao is seated on a winged chair. He’s idly holding a walking stick which ends in four prongs at its base. He’s staring at the floor, as if he’s trying to find meaning in the pattern on the hardwood. His face has become a tissue of wrinkles; there are wayward strands of hair protruding from his ears and nostrils.

  “I’m sorry to hear about Subbu-Auntie,” Ramya says like a parakeet with limited vocabulary.

  Mr. Rao’s answer sounds something like ‘mmmff’. He continues to stare at the ground.

  “I hope she didn’t suffer before she passed away.”

  “What suffering? She had a nice life right till the last few days. Anyway, she died in her sleep.”

  “That’s comforting to hear.”

  “How’s Prakash these days? Don’t hear from him at all.”

  “He’s moved to Alberta.”

  “Why haven’t you gone with him?”

  “We’re separated.” To her, her words sound as if she’s talking about a pair of Siamese twins who’ve been surgically parted.

  “So are Subbu and I now.” Mr. Rao had another take on separation.

  “In a different way, I guess.”

  The old man looks up and says: “You’re damn well right.”

  Why do most men turn uncaring and crotchety when they grow old? Even her father was no exception. It was only in his later years that he revealed an acerbic side of his tongue, bidding goodbye to his reputation as a modernday Buddha.

  Interacting with the Indian community always makes Ramya feel depressed. It’s been so ever since they first arrived over a decade before. She detected an undercurrent of envy, and jealousy, or even contempt sometimes, when one would’ve expected sympathy and kindliness towards new immigrants. With one or two exceptions, the only real help she’s received was from people of other races.

  After she separated from Prakash, things became more acute. Men try to take advantage, and women are needlessly judgemental. The pettiness of character, which may have gone unnoticed in her native land, when transplanted to Canada, seems all the more magnified.

  Ramya’s feeling of isolation is complete.

  12

  The Stain on the Mattress

  THE MANAGALSUTRAM, a special wedding necklace made of twenty-two carat gold, is the most expensive object in her box. Also, perhaps, the least valuable. A thin rope-like chain with a disc-like pendant. Traditionally, it’s a symbol of wifehood; the chain that a groom places around the bride’s neck to proclaim his ownership.

  The chain reminds her of her failed marriage, the wasted years. Nearly two decades of living together, and nothing to show at the end of it. Even while it lasted there were few shared delights, few shared triumphs. There was neither companionship nor commonality of interest. Over the years they became complete strangers living under the same roof, sharing the same mattress. Just roomies — and not very cordial ones at that.

  It’s not only Ramya who’s paid a heavy price for the misadventure. Daddy had parted with a big sum as dowry and picked up the enormous bill for all the wedding expenses, as was the custom. In the bargain, he’d bought himself a lemon of a son-in-law. Mercifully, he never came to know of that, at least not from Ramya. It’s possible he’d suspected that all wasn’t hunky-dory between his daughter and son-in-law; word has a way of getting around.

  Like many fathers in India, Daddy searched high and low for a perfect match for his daughter, the apple of his eye. He was very well off, so he was in the position to call the shots.

  As for Ramya, she was a prize catch in the marriage market — born into a rich family, educated, and even talented. It meant Daddy had to be vigilant, and filter out unsuitable suitors, separate grain from chaff. Unfortunately, he wasn’t a very canny person. A trusting soul, he habitually accepted things at face value.

  In those days any male who entered an arranged marriage preferred a full-time homemaker for a spouse. Housewifery was a demanding job. The country being beset with shortages of every kind offered a great opportunity to show off one’s talent for economy and efficiency. If a wife could moonlight, and earn some money as a teacher or an office assistant, so much the better. A welcome bonus, no doubt, but not a dealmaker. The jobs earmarked for women were humble dead-end jobs, but yielding a small steady income to supplement the family earnings. This was considered a good thing as it wouldn’t eclipse the husband’s status and salary. A man liked to be the primary breadwinner and the maker of all decisions. The unquestioned king of his castle.

  Ramya never let on that she hoped to be an author, and prayed that Daddy would do the same. Writing was considered a rather kinky pursuit — suitors would probably be more in awe than be enamoured of it. Hobbies like embroidery, tailoring, and fabric painting however were understandable, and there was a practical moneysaving side to those.

  Sometimes, during a conversation with a prospective groom, Daddy would let slip that Ramya wrote poems and articles in the local newspaper.

  “Really? Has she been published in Eenadu or Andhra Bhoomi?” the suitor, or his father or his uncle, would ask — suddenly wary.

  “No. Her work has appeared in the Deccan Chronicle and the Hindu.”

  “Oh. So she writes in English?” There would be puzzlement and sometimes suspicion in the tone. Was Ramya too good a match for them?

  That’s how even Daddy, a trusting, guileless man, learned to soft-pedal on Ramya’s writing abilities.

  The proposal for Prakash had come from a marriage broker. “The boy” seemed to have everything: education, an excellent job, well settled siblings, and parents who were of independent means. He seemed a bit on the older side, but nowadays didn’t men tend to marry late?

  Daddy was both delighted and relieved to settle the obviously suitable match, and did it with alacrity.

  With too much alacrity, perhaps. He should’ve delved deeper into Prakash’s antecedents. People did a more thorough job of checking the background of a candidate when hiring for an entry-level position. The shadow of failure in Atom Auntie’s case must have hung over Daddy. His daughter was growing up to be more and more like his sister. He didn’t want Ramya to remain single — with nothing but books as companions.

  The wedding was conducted with great fanfare. There were lots of lights, noise and smoke to mark the occasion. After returning from Srinagar in Kashmir where they spent their honeymoon, Ramya and Prakash left for Bengaluru. Prakash had a good job with a Swedish engineering company and lived in a posh well-appointed flat. That he had a drinking problem and was prone to violence came out in bits and pieces, and by then they were already a year and a half into their marriage. Ramya blamed it on fate and continued with her life. She would do anything to spare her father pain and disappointment in the evening of his life.

 
In all the years she spent with Prakash, she had to call the police only once. The police came a couple of hours later and heard her out with patient resignation, while Prakash sat penitently silent on a sofa. The police counselled her, despite her bruised face, to learn to live with her husband in amity. They gave a kid-gloved warning to Prakash before they left. In the eyes of the police, wifebeating was a normal pastime for a man. Like betting on racehorses or throwing darts in a pub.

  A few months down the road Ramya and Prakash met a marriage counsellor at a cocktail party — some of these counsellors were real high-flyers. Her name was Payal Singh, a wellspring of unbounded optimism, and with her help they tried to reconstruct their life. The first thing that struck one, upon beholding Payal, was her self-confidence. Being a glib talker, she gave the impression that she was extremely knowledgeable.

  “Nothing is impossible,” Payal said. “If you set your mind to it, you can achieve anything.”

  Payal lived in Delhi, but flew around the country as she had well-heeled clients in all the major cities. After a few consultations, she recommended Prakash join a substance abuse therapy group, and advised Ramya to take fertility treatment.

  “In some parts of the world, people may think my methods old-fashioned. But in India things are different. There’s nothing like children to hold a marriage together.”

  Prakash decided to give abuse therapy a try, and Ramya encouraged him. Prakash said: “I doubt it’ll help.” Then added, with a chuckle: “But what the heck!”

  After a couple of trial sessions, he signed up and stuck it out — to Ramya’s utter amazement.

  “That Payal,” Ramya thought, “she can really work wonders.” For once, husband and wife were united in their admiration of something, or rather someone. Payal succeeded in bringing the mutually antagonistic Ramya and Prakash together on the same plank, even if fleetingly.