Koi Good News?

by Zarreen Khan

  Ramit

  I read aloud from Google: ‘If you lie down still, you can feel it. It’s like popcorn popping. It’s like little butterflies fluttering. It could also feel like gas.’

  Asked Mona to lie down, relax and concentrate.

  She’s getting so competitive! She really wants to feel those movements now that Laila’s felt them.

  I asked if she could feel the butterflies when she lay down.

  ‘Ummm … No. It feels like gas,’ she said at last.

  ‘No, no! You’ve got it wrong. It must be the baby,’ I encouraged her.

  ‘Give it a minute and your nose will tell you it was gas!’ she snapped.

  Okay, so it was gas.

  ‘Concentrate,’ I egged her on after a bit. ‘Maybe you’ll feel a little bit of popcorn?’

  She lay quiet for a moment and said softly, ‘Ramit…’

  ‘Yes?’ I said excitedly.

  ‘I feel like having caramel popcorn.’

  Mona

  Today I thought I would faint. I’ve put on one kilo in one week. At this rate, I’ll have added twenty more kilos by the end of this pregnancy. And that’s if I don’t put on 1.5 kilos a week like Mohini has been doing in Amritsar.

  I sulked for a while.

  I’ll just starve myself, no eating out, start exercising, real exercising rather than the stroll in the park…

  So I joined that prenatal yoga class after all, and there I was, wobbling inside while Laila practically glided in like a ballerina.

  ‘Hello, Mona. I’m Jaishree, your instructor. How’re you doing?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ I said, shaking her hand.

  ‘Nearing the end now of the pregnancy?’

  ‘Umm … I’m five months…’

  ‘Oh.’ She was obviously eyeing my weight. ‘Great! Let’s get started!’

  We did all sorts of random exercises and stretching and my muscles began aching. I was questioning whether the poses were safe for pregnant women when she asked us to lie down flat on our backs and relax.

  And that’s when I felt it.

  A kick. A real kick in my abdomen. That wasn’t gas. That was definitely a kick!

  Ramit

  When I got home, Mona ran up to me and placed my hand on her belly.

  ‘There, did you feel that?’ she asked, excitedly.

  ‘Umm … no.’

  She looked disappointed and positioned my hand differently.

  ‘That?’

  ‘No.’

  We waited.

  ‘THERE! That one!’ she said excitedly.

  Couldn’t feel a thing but I plastered on a fake smile and nodded and she happily continued to hold my hand over her stomach, looking delighted.

  She’s really so sweet.

  Mona

  It’s like I’m giving birth to Bruce Lee. That’s the amount of somersaulting and kicking this baby’s been doing since the day I got back from yoga. Or maybe it always had and I had never really acknowledged it till now.

  So exciting!

  Week 21

  The second trimester is often referred to as the golden trimester

  Mona

  So it’s been established by now that Bollywood’s totally off the track as far as the depiction of pregnancy goes.

  But Hollywood movies aren’t any less!

  For starters, pregnant women in India don’t wear heels, I don’t know how it is abroad. Here you have a mother and a mother-in-law who watch you like a hawk if you do anything remotely fashionable. And imagine this comes from my mother, who has no fashion sense whatsoever! Meanwhile Laila Sachdev wears all these wedge heels and boots and…

  Anyway, back to Hollywood.

  Pregnant women in Hollywood have large tummies, but no butts and no saggy boobs. That’s just so wrong! You expand everywhere. Especially the butt. Even Laila Sachdev’s butt is growing. Ramit feigns disinterest when I ask him, and pretends he hasn’t noticed her butt, but I have eyes at the back of my head, you know!

  And then they always show these skinny pregnant women doing yoga! Stretches, surya namaskars and headstands! Let me tell you, prenatal yoga is nothing as glamorous. It’s about deep breathing and holding your tummy and saying ‘Om’. And, okay a little bit of wrist-bending and stretching. And okay, maybe some women can lift their legs in the tiger pose and be all cool like Laila Sachdev and, okay, the teacher claims some can do the headstand with a little practice, but for me, that is not happening.

  Today when I lay down to do the shav aasan – best yoga aasan in the world – I started planning my babymoon.

  Ramit

  Not this babymoon business again!

  And where am I going to find the money for it? I’ve just learnt my insurance doesn’t cover maternity, can you believe that? And she wants a babymoon.

  Mona

  No babymoon it seems. I stormed out of the house on the pretext of my walk.

  I’m sure I can drop all expectations of a baby shower too, in that case. But seriously, who’s going to throw me a baby shower, anyway? The duelling mothers? Or Shania, who’ll sit in a cloud of cigarette smoke chanting Om Shanti Shanti Peace Peace? I’m sure Tina Tej Mushran will throw a posh one for Laila Sachdev with all her posh caterers.

  Was just thinking of Tina when she emerged from a Red SUV.

  ‘Oh lovely! How pregnant you look!’ She gave me a big hug and it cheered me up a bit, though now I’m wondering if it was really a compliment. I mean, I’m still in my fifth month. Or maybe my sixth? I don’t understand how these weeks correspond to months.

  ‘How gorgeous is the dress!’ Shania had made me buy this dress from Cotton Sombre’s.

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘How far along now?’

  ‘I’m twenty-one weeks.’

  ‘Ah! When I was pregnant the first time, I didn’t show till the thirty-sixth week. I remember we’d gone partying and I met this dear college friend of mine, Ashok, the cardiologist in Sunshine Heart Institute? Dear, dear friend of mine, really. His wife and I had done a course in candle-making together. Anyway, we were at this party and dancing and he says, I hope I don’t offend you but you’ve put on a bit of weight since we met last. I told him, Ashok! I’m six and a half kilos up! I’m pregnant!’ She laughs fondly at her memory and I want to throttle her. 6.5 kgs! ‘But during my second and third pregnancy, I showed much earlier. Like I had people making way for me in the elevators, and during Sameer’s time, I put on thirteen kilos! Beat that!’ I didn’t want to tell her I already had.

  Met Mrs Kapoor in the park after that. She looked at my dress rather disapprovingly. I’m sure she was the type who draped her dupatta around herself when she was pregnant so that no one ever got to know.

  ‘Achha, dress pehni hai,’ was all she had to say as little Asha climbed up the monkey bar.

  I made small talk and she gossiped about her sister-in-law in America who had recently had a baby girl who was born at 2.8 kilos. I thought 2.8 was supposed to be good and said so to her. She turned her nose up at me and said Asha was almost four kilos when she was born!

  ‘You have to eat well. Weight loss toh happens only later.’

  I eyed her butt and seriously doubted her philosophy.

  As I walked back some random aunty stopped me, smiling and eyeing my belly. She then actually touched it. Here was a woman I had never seen before in my life and she was happily making physical contact!

  ‘Koi good news?’

  Thank God this time, the answer was yes.

  Week 22

  Naming a baby can be tricky. Making a list will help

  Mona

  My Dad’s side of the family is basically nuts. Possibly that’s the reason I rarely talk about them, or even acknowledge their existence. I believe Shania has gone totally on Dad’s side of the family.

  Anyway, Mom had dutifully broken the news about my pregnancy to Suhani bua about two months ago, and since then, by the clock, every Monday morning at 11 a.m., I’ve received a gloom-and-doom cal
l from her.

  ‘You are now in you twenty-second week, Mona.’ She is my very own personal calendar. I should have simply employed her services during my ovulation time and we could have had this baby years ago!

  ‘This week is very dangerous for you.’ According to Suhani bua, every week is a very dangerous week for me. ‘Your mother has assured me you’re doing nothing strenuous but my friend’s daughter-in-law…’ And then she proceeds to narrate this horror story about of some distant acquaintance. Every single week. Every Monday morning.

  My Dad’s side of the family is basically nuts.

  So to distract myself from this craziness, I’ve decided we need to start working on some baby names. We’re midway through the pregnancy after all.

  Ramit

  I tried reasoning with Mona about getting the grandparents involved in this whole baby-naming business. I was named by my grandmother, so shouldn’t we at least ask Mummy for suggestions? And then quickly added that Mom should suggest too.

  Got late for work because the crazy pregnant lady blamed me for not being interested in the baby and wanting to brush off any responsibility whatsoever. I even suggested Mummy can name the baby if it’s a boy, and Mom if it’s a girl, to be fair.

  Personally think Mona’s worried about her own Mom’s creativity. She hates her name. But I’m pretty all right by my Mummy’s. I mean, she named me Ramit, not Amit. Which is good, right?

  Mona

  Letting the Deols name my child? No thanks! It’s bad enough he’ll have to carry their last name. I mean, nothing wrong with it but the Sunny Deol, Bobby Deol jokes just never end!

  And who is Ramit trying to fool, talking about his family’s creativity? Mummy’s told me about the whole naming fiasco and this is how it goes.

  His father’s brothers are called Ramesh, Dinesh, Monish, Sudesh.

  Then Ramesh married Somesh.

  And they had Swaroop, Abhiroop, Dhoop.

  Yes, Dhoop. Like agarbatti. The poor man keeps such a low profile, possibly because of his name.

  And when the panditji had picked the letter R for Ramit, Dadi immediately suggested Roop to match Swaroop, Abhiroop and Dhoop; Mummy decided not to let her mother-in-law have the upper hand, and named him Ramit instead. So I will not let my mother-in-law have the upper hand either.

  My own mother and father on the other hand, I can picture them cooing over my crib and saying:

  ‘So Colonel, what should we name her?’

  ‘Ah, Madhu, anything you want. Mona-Shona type will do. Who cares?’

  I could be wrong, of course. Because Dad wasn’t a colonel when I was born. He was a major. The rest of the conversation though, I will bet you it was exactly that.

  Ramit

  ‘Here’s my list,’ I told Mona, ready to impress her with how much I cared about our child!

  Varun aka Vicky.

  Aivaan aka Avi.

  Chiragh aka Chiru.

  Romair aka Romeo (cute, no?)

  Tushar aka Tushy.

  Purab aka Purab. Because if we call Purab Pur, it would sound like a fart, haha.

  ‘Pur would be a fart but Tushy would mean nothing?’ she snapped.

  ‘Well…’

  ‘And Aivaan? What does that even mean?’ she threw her hands up in exasperation.

  ‘It means … something. I don’t know. We can look it up.’

  ‘Let me tell you what it means. It means Haivaan. Haivaan! The Devil! Monster!’ she exploded, looking a bit like one herself.

  Then she went on: ‘And why do each of those options have nicknames? Why can’t you not be a Deol for a change? And why doesn’t your list have any girl names?’

  ‘Because … Well, what’s on your list!’ I didn’t want to tell her I was still sure it was a penis in the scan and not an umbilical cord. The doctor hadn’t fooled me.

  She rolled her eyes dramatically, pretending to be disappointed in me as she picked up her list.

  ‘Sameer, Aarav, Advay, Nishant, Rudraksh, Rahul…’

  ‘And for a girl?’ I interrupted.

  ‘And if it’s a girl, Avni.’

  I waited for her to continue but she looked at her piece of paper nonchalantly.

  ‘You fraud! You have only one girl name too,’ I accused her.

  She turned her nose up at me. ‘I’m sorry! I didn’t need options because Avni is such a beautiful name.’

  ‘And what does Avni mean?’

  ‘It means … light.’

  I whipped out my phone and Googled. ‘It means earth,’ I informed her.

  ‘Maybe you’re just looking at the wrong website,’ Mona said dismissively, still not meeting my eye.

  So I Googled ‘Avni + light’.

  ‘I can’t find a single website listing that meaning.’

  ‘Ramit, will you stop being so competitive and just decide if it works or not.’

  ‘I’m the one being competitive?’

  Mona

  It continued for a good hour.

  Our shortlist is Alina for a girl. And Kabir for a boy.

  Yes, I know neither of the names was on anyone’s shortlist earlier.

  Ramit

  Mummy has flipped over us having picked names without consulting panditji. Her exact words: ‘… without consulting me – err – panditji.’

  Just because Dadi had forced her to consult the pandit.

  I told her we’re the parents and we don’t believe in pandits, and how she knows I’m almost an atheist to which she shushed me and said I needed to lower my voice lest Dadi or Bade Papa or anyone else hear me, and I reminded her I’m in freaking Delhi and she’s in freaking Amritsar, to which she shouted at me for using words like ‘freaking’ in front of my mother.

  Mona

  Mom suggested Laila for girl.

  I’m not speaking to her again.

  Week 23

  You could be feeling a little off-balance, both physically and emotionally

  Mona

  Waddling around, packing my XXL-sized clothes. Mom is livid I’m off to Amritsar again and not coming to Doon. She says Dad is missing me, but I seriously doubt he even looks up from his canvas to know I don’t live in Dehradun any more.

  I asked Mom to come with us to Amritsar but she got even more upset.

  Then calmed down finally and asked if I wanted anything from Doon. What? Is she coming now? Is it her turn to babysit me?

  ‘I used to have that gorgeous beige stole, remember, I wore so often to college? Get it with you.’

  ‘Arre, I’m not coming right now. I can send it next week with Laila, if you like. She is coming, na.’

  Sorry? How does she know Laila is going to Dehradun? And why is Laila going to Dehradun?

  ‘Oh, she and Shania have been in touch. I’m so glad for her, Mona. Shania has finally broken off the yogi phase. Laila has got her interested in fashion designing and she spends a lot of her time in her room now. She’s doing some course online. Being quite serious about it. And she was a decent artist in school. Maybe she’ll do well. I’m so glad Laila’s guiding her. She’s like the older sister Shania never had.’

  ‘Excuse me!’

  ‘Oh, you know what I mean,’ Mom said hurriedly. ‘You’re more friends than sisters, hehe.’

  I told Mom if nothing she would herself benefit from Shania’s fashion designing course. Then slammed the phone on her just as she slammed the phone on me.

  Ramit

  Mona’s mother called to tell me that Mona’s pregnancy hormones are acting up. As if I didn’t know.

  Mona

  Am so glad we’re going to Amritsar instead of Doon. At least people appreciate me here.

  I was whisked from the station (wasn’t allowed to fly because that would mean pressure, etc., according to Mummy) and planted on the sofa that I swear sank under my weight. I could feel the other side lift slightly off the ground.

  Skinny Ramit sat on the chair opposite and buried himself in his phone as the relatives engulfed me with their
questions.

  Puking Mohini came in and we bumped our baby bumps and exchanged some morbid tales on acidity for a while, till she left to puke and I was allowed some rest.

  Ramit

  Mummy asked me why Mona was walking funny. I told her Mona had a stitch in her bum. Mummy was horrified and asked me when this surgery had happened. Told her a muscle pull is common during pregnancy as the uterus adds too much weight on the rest of the body.

  I don’t know why Mummy insists on asking me questions and then doesn’t like me sounding knowledeable about anything. She huffed away saying she had been perfectly balanced and also had worked all nine months during her pregnancy, much to Dadi’s dismay.

  Mummy always takes great pride in telling us stories where she’s put down her mother-in-law. Yet hates being put down as the mother-in-law.

  Mona

  Daisy chachi hounds me about Suttu’s well-being. Asks me how often I see her, how she was looking the last time I saw her, and generally whines about her daughter being in Delhi while she’s stuck in this terrible Amritsar. Then asks me to find Suttu a boy, given that she’s nineteen already and will be finishing her fashion designing course next year. I want to tell her I have another wannabe fashion designer to take care of first, but don’t say anything, then dutifully let her stuff my face with whatever laddu she thinks is best for me and the baby.

  Mummy comes in shortly and sits down with the calendar to do some ‘planning’. Thank God that word has a different meaning now.

  Ramit

  Mummy wants to decide on dates for the mundan and naam karan ceremony – dates for shaving and naming the baby. I tell her we’ll be having neither of those because we don’t believe in any of it.

  She launches into a lecture on how disappointed she is in me and keeps looking at Mona for encouragement but Mona refuses to raise her eyes from the bowl of fruit someone’s put in her lap.

  Mona

  Eventually Mummy returned to our room tearfully, holding a knitted jumpsuit for the baby and saying she had wanted to weave in the name before giving it to us, but now that there would be no naming ceremony, she sniffed … but Ramit kept staring at his phone.

  Then…

  Then she handed me another hand-knitted sweater and said, ‘This is for your friend Laila’s baby. It’s so nice that you’re going through your pregnancies together.’