Half Torn Hearts

by Novoneel Chakraborty

  Later that evening, when Nirmaan’s mother told him that she had met an injured Raisa with another girl in the RBI campus, he abandoned his dinner midway and rushed to her flat.

  ‘With whom did you fight?’ was his first question upon entering her room. It was only when he switched on the light that he noticed Afsana sitting on the bed with her back against the wall. Raisa had run straight to her and Afsana had taken her to a doctor first before bringing her home.

  Raisa was on a chair by the window.

  ‘Switch off the light, Nirmaan,’ she said.

  He complied, repeating his query.

  ‘Affu’s cousin,’ Raisa replied.

  ‘That guy who said you’re beautiful?’

  Raisa muttered a soft yes.

  ‘Why?’ he asked.

  ‘He was trying to be smart.’

  ‘Is he in our school?’

  ‘He is in Bhawanipore college,’ Afsana chose to reply.

  Nirmaan ignored her, staying focused on Raisa and said, ‘Then where did you meet him?’

  ‘Outside school. He said he would drop her home on his bike but took her to Nicco Park where he tried to smooch her,’ Afsana replied.

  Nirmaan stood quiet, seething with anger.

  ‘Why the hell did you get on his bike? Are you mad?’ he hissed.

  ‘I thought—’ Raisa started, but didn’t say anything more. Realizing that she didn’t want to talk, Nirmaan threw an accusing glance at Afsana and stormed out.

  Silence crept back in.

  ‘You know, Affu,’ Raisa said in a soft, confessional tone, ‘my father has raped my mother. And beaten her up as well. I have seen it with my own eyes. She always surrendered like a slave. I don’t want to be a slave. I had promised myself long ago that if any man ever touched me, I would beat him to a pulp. This touching thing—’ she trailed off and tried again, ‘ . . . until Rick tried to smooch me, I felt good being with him but the moment—’

  Afsana was quiet, absorbing every word.

  ‘I don’t think I’ll ever be able to have sex with anyone. The thought of physical intimacy stifles me, threatens me, breaks me and in a way alienates me from myself. When Rick held me by my shoulder, I thought he would rape me. I thought he would make me his slave and . . . Affu, is sex really important?’

  ‘I don’t know. I think love is important and sex is necessary. But we often confuse ourselves by thinking what is important is necessary and what is necessary is important.’

  ‘That’s deep, Affu,’ Raisa went over to Afsana and put her arms around her.

  ‘Why? Don’t you like deep stuff?’ Afsana caressed Raisa’s forehead.

  ‘I do. I think deep too when I’m sad.’

  ‘I think deep when I have nothing else to think about.’

  ‘So, do you mean no boy will ever be mine if I don’t have sex with him?’ Raisa asked.

  ‘At some point you’ll have to. Everyone does.’

  ‘Aren’t you afraid of sex, Affu? Isn’t it such an “ugh thing”? Just imagine a boy sticking something inside you. Yuck! Why can’t we stick something inside them instead?’

  ‘From what I’ve seen in my family, I’m more scared of love.’

  The two girls sat in silence in the darkness of the room. Then Afsana suddenly said, ‘Stay away from Rick. He’s a B-hole.’

  ‘I will. Such an A-hole he is. Wait a second, B-hole?’

  ‘Bum hole.’

  ‘Oh! It’s the same as A-hole.’

  ‘Yeah. A-hole is his good name and B-hole is his nick name.’

  ‘I think he should also have a third name: C-hole!’

  Afsana looked at her enquiringly. Raisa’s amused face answered her. She gave a hard peck on her soul-sister’s cheek.

  VOICE NOTE 17

  The half-yearly exams for Class X were over. Raisa, yet again, managed to barely scrape through in all the subjects. Afsana had slightly more than average marks while Nirmaan successfully topped the entire batch.

  Raisa went to his flat one evening to copy Nirmaan’s history notes. She saw him talking to someone on the landline phone in his room. He raised two fingers, implying that he would need two more minutes. Raisa didn’t mind. She extracted his history notebook from his school bag and began copying the notes. The two minutes stretched to half an hour and then to a full hour. Raisa wouldn’t have noticed the time had she not heard Nirmaan giggling and trying to crack lame jokes on the phone, which sounded very unlike him. As soon as he was done, the hangover of the phone conversation was evident in the form of a faint smile on his face.

  ‘What’s up with you? Why are you smiling to yourself?’ Raisa asked.

  ‘Am I? Shit, sorry,’ Nirmaan said and sat beside her.

  ‘Who was it?’ she asked.

  ‘A newcomer. I was updating her about the stuff that she has missed in class till now.’

  Her? You were updating her about what she missed in class by telling her stupid jokes, Raisa completed it in her mind.

  The next day Raisa went to Nirmaan’s class during recess to share her lunch—pani pitha, which was his favourite too—but she didn’t find him there.

  ‘Where’s Nirmaan?’ she asked one of his classmates.

  ‘I saw him go out with Sakshi.’

  ‘Sakshi who?’

  ‘The newcomer.’

  Afsana approached her from behind.

  ‘Hey, waiting for Nirmaan?’ she asked.

  ‘He’s not here.’

  ‘Absent?’ Afsana casually helped herself to the pani pitha in Raisa’s lunchbox.

  ‘No. He’s out with Sakshi.’

  Afsana stopped chewing and looked at Raisa. Before she could say anything, Raisa was gone. She followed her out. In the distance, they could see Nirmaan and Sakshi walking together in the parking area, chatting and smiling.

  ‘What?’ Afsana joined a dejected-looking Raisa.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she replied, but Afsana knew what was wrong.

  ‘Listen, Rice,’ she said, ‘Nirmaan isn’t your property. He’s a friend, not your boyfriend. Let him roam around with whomever he likes and let us enjoy these pithas.’

  ‘I know he is not my property, but . . . ’

  Raisa reluctantly averted her eyes and walked away in the opposite direction with Afsana.

  The following weekend when Raisa met Nirmaan while he was playing cricket with the others, she couldn’t help but laugh. For the first time he had shaved off his thin line of moustache and the peach fuzz on his chin.

  ‘You look like a girl!’ she exclaimed.

  ‘Shut up!’ Nirmaan bristled.

  ‘But why did you have to shave?’

  ‘Sakshi thought I would look better if I shaved.’

  Raisa checked her laughter.

  ‘Moreover, everyone but you think I look better now,’ he retorted.

  ‘You look like a fool,’ Raisa snapped and marched off leaving a bewildered Nirmaan behind.

  Sakshi started riding in the same school bus as Nirmaan and Raisa. Although Raisa could effortlessly excuse herself and barge in between them, she didn’t want to.

  A few evenings later, Raisa went to Nirmaan seeking his help to complete her science project. He was again busy on the phone. His tuition time came and went, but he stayed glued to the phone, smiling all the while. The I-am-not-myself-any-more tinge in his smile told Raisa it had to be Sakshi at the other end.

  It wasn’t jealousy or any kind of insecurity that gripped her. She sensed a new indifference in Nirmaan’s attitude towards her with his increasing proximity to Sakshi. What hurt her was that when Nirmaan was the first person to whom she had confided about Rick, why couldn’t he have told her about Sakshi without her having to nudge him to it? Raisa eventually discussed it with Afsana.

  ‘She wastes his time all the time and he doesn’t seem to mind it at all.’

  They were sitting together on the last bench in their Hindi language class, chatting softly while one of the students was reading out a passage
from the book aloud.

  ‘If he doesn’t mind it, why the hell do you care?’ Afsana retorted.

  ‘Can best friends be substituted, Affu?’

  ‘No,’ Afsana replied.

  ‘Can there be more than one best friend?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then, wasn’t I ever his best friend? Was it all fake?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Stop being monosyllabic, Affu!’ Raisa hissed in her ears.

  ‘Aap dono,’ the Hindi teacher said, ‘bahar.’

  Afsana and Raisa happily obliged and went to stand outside the class.

  ‘What do you want me to tell you?’ Afsana asked, irritated by Raisa’s obsession with Nirmaan’s behavioural changes.

  ‘I’m okay if he’s with Sakshi, but his indifference is killing me. You know, for the last two months he has talked to me only when I approached him. This is simply not done!’

  ‘Rice, people transform, their preferences alter and priorities change. Get used to it. Not every friend remains with us forever. Forever is only a bestselling concept in books and movies. Apply it to life and it will flounder.’

  The words affected Raisa deeply. If Affu was right, then what would she do without Nirmaan? Is that all life was about? Things change just like that and we are all left to suffer?

  ‘Affu, will you too forget me one day?’

  Afsana looked at her and with a serious face, said, ‘I only talked about friends. Not about soul-sisters.’

  Raisa managed a smile and they shared a high-five.

  Without Nirmaan, I won’t be able to live; but without Affu, I won’t exist, Raisa thought.

  Raisa took Afsana’s words seriously and decided that instead of feeling frustrated because someone’s preferences had changed, it would be better for her to change her priorities as well. And she did leave Nirmaan alone.

  A few months later, on her way home from the vegetable market with her mother, she saw Nirmaan sitting alone on one of the benches in the RBI quarters.

  ‘Ma, you go ahead, I’ll be home a little later,’ Raisa told her mother and headed towards Nirmaan.

  He noticed her but didn’t react when she sat down beside him. They looked at each other and she could tell that he had been crying.

  ‘Will you tell me what happened or are you waiting for a film director to say “action”?’

  ‘My marks dropped in the unit tests. I came second.’

  ‘Oh no! Are the results out? I thought that would be next week.’

  ‘The results aren’t out officially, but our class teacher told me that this time I’ve stood second. This is the first time after so many years that I have come second.’

  ‘God, Uncle is going to be harsh, won’t he?’

  ‘“Harsh” is a mild word. He’s away on an official trip and will call tonight after dinner. I’m fairly sure he’ll disown me and tell me to get out of the house.’

  ‘Chill. You still have a week more to face him. Tell him about it when the results are officially out. And don’t forget to have a fever or stomach ache or headache or whatever you can conjure up two days prior to that. It would be best if you tell him you have brain cancer. I have seen in the movies that people turn real sympathetic towards brain cancer patients. In any case, if Uncle tells you to get lost, come over to my place. I’ll call Affu as well.’

  Nirmaan looked at Raisa and a smile spread on his face.

  ‘I missed you, Raisa,’ he said.

  ‘Hmm,’ Raisa said doubtfully. Then she asked, ‘By the way who came first?’

  Nirmaan didn’t reply.

  ‘Do I need to use a loudspeaker?’

  ‘Sakshi,’ Nirmaan blurted out.

  For a split second, Raisa felt immense joy surging through her, as if Sakshi were her own daughter and she, Raisa, was proud of her.

  ‘What are you saying?’ she exclaimed.

  ‘She would complete her lessons and then call me to waste my time.’

  ‘But I thought she was your best friend,’ Raisa’s words held a whiff of sarcasm, which Nirmaan couldn’t sniff.

  ‘Best friend?’ Nirmaan gave her an incredulous look.

  ‘Yes, best friend. In fact, I thought you two were an item as well. Best friend turned lovers, you know,’ she sneered.

  ‘I’m sorry, Raisa,’ Nirmaan finally smelled the sarcasm.

  ‘Affu said your indifference towards me was normal. And I thought our friendship was over. That it was time for me as well to change my best friend. You and Affu are my heart and soul, if you don’t know this already.’

  Nirmaan knelt down before her and said, ‘I don’t know what happened to me in the last few months. It was as if I were under a spell. I’m really sorry, Raisa. I know you must be hurt.’

  ‘Hurt? You have no idea, Nirmaan!’ she turned her face away.

  ‘Tell you what, the next time you see me doing anything like this, or any other stupid stuff, just slap me hard, okay? It’ll drive some sense into me.’

  Raisa turned and instantly slapped him hard. He cupped his cheek in sheer disbelief.

  ‘Just checking. Do you want it this hard, or harder?’

  VOICE NOTE 18

  ‘What’s this?’ Raisa freaked out at the sight of the slashes on Afsana’s wrist.

  They were meeting after a good one month post their Durga Puja vacation during which Afsana’s family had compelled the recalcitrant girl to accompany them on a pilgrimage to all the holy places in north India.

  Raisa was perched on the teacher’s desk and Afsana was sitting on the teacher’s chair. It was a free period.

  ‘I tried killing myself last night,’ Afsana said matter-of-factly.

  ‘Killing? Please tell me this is a joke?’ Raisa pleaded, tentatively stroking the livid marks on Afsana’s wrist.

  ‘It’s not a joke. A boy and his family had come to see me yesterday.’

  ‘What do you mean “see you”?’

  ‘My parents have fixed my marriage.’

  ‘Marriage?’ Raisa hopped off the desk and gaped at Afsana in amazement. ‘What rubbish are you saying?’

  ‘I was a little surprised when Mom asked me to wear conventional Indian clothes and bring tea for the guests. Then the boy’s folks started asking me weird questions. Actually, you know the boy is a man. He is twenty-seven.’

  ‘Twenty-seven? And you are only sixteen!’

  ‘I know. It’s my dad’s colleague’s son. They want us to get engaged now and marry as soon as I turn eighteen.’

  ‘You can’t get married like that, Affu.’

  ‘Exactly. Hence, just as I was about to kill myself, I wondered why the hell should I waste my life only because my parents want to get me married. I’ve decided that I won’t go home again after school today. I’ve brought a few clothes and some other essentials with me.’

  ‘But where will you go if not home?’

  ‘I don’t know. Any suggestions?’

  The girls brainstormed the whole day until school was over. In the end, Raisa said, ‘Do you remember you once opened the old rusty padlock of the chemistry lab?’

  ‘Yes, with a hairpin.’

  ‘Can you still jimmy a lock?’

  ‘Anytime,’ Afsana quipped.

  The sparkle in Raisa’s eyes clearly indicated that she had hit upon the very solution.

  An hour later the two were on the mezzanine floor between the top floor and the terrace of Raisa’s block in the RBI quarters. The low-ceiling floor had two locked rooms on either side of the stairs, with thick pipes from the terrace going into one of them.

  ‘What’s in there?’ Afsana indicated to the second locked room.

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t think I’ve ever seen it open in the three years that I’ve lived here.’

  It took Afsana little more than two minutes to unlock the thick metal lock to reveal a dusty, cobwebbed little room. The tiny window was broken and had an empty bird’s nest on the outer ledge.

  In the next hour, Raisa managed to smugg
le out some candles, a box of matches, a broom, a bedsheet and a pillow from her apartment without arousing her mother’s suspicions. Raisa swept the attic room clean, after which they set up the room together.

  ‘Damn! I wish I could live here with you,’ Raisa said, wiping the sweat off her brow.

  ‘I can’t thank you enough, Rice,’ Afsana hugged her.

  ‘The next time your parents try to get you married, just give me a little more time.’

  They burst out laughing.

  That night, Raisa finished her dinner hurriedly and when her mother went into the kitchen, she stealthily packed two chapattis and a little sabzi in a piece of newspaper. She told her mother that she was off to Nirmaan’s place for some schoolwork and went directly to Afsana. She knocked thrice—their code—and Afsana opened the door. The room gleamed delightfully in the candlelight.

  ‘This is so adventurous. Why didn’t your parents fix your marriage before?’ Raisa moaned, sitting down beside Afsana as the latter wolfed down the food.

  The next day, Raisa skipped school feigning a stomach ache and spent the entire day with Afsana in the small room, playing ludo, snakes-and-ladders, chatting and smoking.

  ‘Do you know, Rice, I want to study science,’ Afsana confided.

  ‘Science? Not arts or commerce?’

  ‘With arts or commerce, I won’t be allowed to leave the city. If I study science, I can do engineering in some other city and never return.’

  ‘Never?’ Raisa sounded disturbed.

  ‘Naturally we’ll go together, stupid,’ Afsana said.

  A smile lit up Raisa’s face.

  ‘In that case, I too will opt for science,’ she replied, knowing perfectly well that she had never scored even average marks in science subjects or for that matter in any other subject.

  ‘But all that will be possible only if my parents report to the police that I’m missing.’

  ‘They should, right? Otherwise I could adopt you.’

  The girls giggled.

  ‘I’m counting on it,’ Afsana grinned. ‘As soon as they file a police report, I’ll emerge from my hiding and threaten to elope if they don’t allow me to study science.’