by Leah Franqui
“What can happen next?” Ram Arjuna asked gleefully.
Rachel smiled and shrugged. She was tired of talking, but she enjoyed his enjoyment. “We’ll find out, I guess,” she said. Ram Arjuna nodded vigorously, as if she had said something deeply profound. She decided she liked him, quite a lot. If she hadn’t disliked Richard so much, she would have made a note to call and thank him.
“You can come tomorrow?”
Rachel thought about it, but really, what did she have to do otherwise? “What time?”
With their next appointment scheduled for the following day at eleven a.m., Rachel left the tiny studio, and was struck by a wave of humidity as she walked toward the street, trying to hail a passing auto-rickshaw. It was five p.m., so she would beat rush hour, at least, and the cook and maid should be gone by the time she got home.
Rachel stretched out her hand, flagging down an empty rickshaw and announcing her destination before sliding onto the seat. She inhaled exhaust from millions of cars as the little vehicle, half car, half motorcycle, sped along the highway. It was open on two of its four sides, and whenever she took a rickshaw on the highway she felt a thrill, like she could fly out of the compartment at any time, her heart racing with the dual excitement and fear of being so vulnerable to the outside world.
As they approached her neighborhood, Rachel could see the sun setting in the distance, dipping into the haze of the horizon. For the first time since she had moved to Mumbai, she felt that she had done something with her time, with her day. She was filled up with the story of Magda, and she, too, wanted to know what happened next. She had something to call Dhruv about, something to share with him, other than a complaint, and she realized in that moment how much she had missed that, how since they had moved she had had so little to say about her days, how they all bled together.
She wished she could go home and cook herself a nice dinner, taking time to unwind and relax through the meditative act. For the first time in months she felt tired for a real reason. Now she wanted to reward herself for that by cooking a meal, in her own space, with no intrusions or interruptions. Well, why not do just that? she asked herself. It was her home, after all. No matter what food the cook had left behind, there was no real reason she couldn’t make her own, was there?
She picked up some cucumbers and lemons from the vegetable seller at the base of her apartment building, smiling at him as she counted out change. To think she had been afraid of him just a month ago, afraid that he would laugh at her mistakes. He was a man trying to make his living. Why would he even care about her? She laughed at herself now, buoyant from her day in Magda’s shoes, feeling affectionate toward the whole universe, even Swati, just a bit. How different the world was when she had a purpose. How much better. Everything was more painful when she was aimless.
She would call Dhruv, and tell him about the soap, and he would laugh with her about Magda and Pytor and they could imagine together what would happen next, thinking up new scenarios for the star-crossed lovers and cruel fates for Nora and Igor and all the other people trying to make poor Magda’s life harder.
But he didn’t pick up.
She texted him, saying she wanted to talk. Out with Papa, came the response. Perhaps this was a good thing? He had been avoiding his father; maybe this was positive. She tried not to be sad. Have fun, she responded.
Perhaps she could talk to her mother-in-law about the job. She loved Indian soap operas, she was always watching them. Perhaps this would interest her.
“Swati?” she called out, and the door to Rachel’s bedroom opened. Swati looked out at her, squinting, bags under her eyes.
“I have a headache,” Swati said reproachfully.
“I’m sorry,” Rachel said, although how would she have known that and why was it her fault? All her goodwill shriveled up and died immediately.
“Food is there,” Swati said. She probably meant it as a goodwill gesture, but it only made Rachel angry.
“I got myself something. To cook.”
“It’s too hot,” Swati said. Rachel turned, rolling her eyes. Did the woman have to control everything? Surely Rachel could determine if it was too hot to cook for her own self.
“I’ll manage,” she said, walking toward the kitchen area.
Rachel threw together a salad, instead of the nice meal she had wanted to cook, because she was too angry now, and although she would rather have died than admit it, it was too hot. The air hung heavy over the city and she felt swallowed up by it.
The crunch of the vegetables was loud in the silent apartment. She tried watching something on her computer, a sitcom, perhaps, something to make her laugh, something to fill the silence, to replace the resentment and disappointment she felt, but all she could think about was Magda, and her love for Pytor, so new, so fresh and intoxicating. She knew that a soap opera was hardly the best thing to compare her relationship to, but oh, the way Pytor had swept Magda up in his arms, holding her like she was something precious. She wanted that. The real version of that. She wanted Dhruv to come home and hold her like he just had to, like she was all he needed. She wanted to be necessary, to be useful, to be vital. She was none of those things here.
Had Dhruv ever felt that way about her? Drunk on her? Rachel had felt that way about him, she thought. She had been so swept up in him, amazed by him, she had wanted to say yes to everything he said and did and wanted. She had been so attracted to his sure, firm sense of the world. The men that Rachel had dated before Dhruv had all been more like her than not. Intellectual, well-bred, living on the nerdy side of upper middle class. She liked dry, alternative men whom she thought she could be comfortable with, whom she could talk to, ones who never really knew what they wanted, men who broke up with her and then asked her later why they had done so. Men who waffled, who dillydallied, who weren’t sure of anything.
Then Dhruv had come along, and he had been so certain of her, so ready to marry, to commit. She had drunk deep from that certainty, it was her elixir of life, but with him gone in Kolkata, it was easy to forget. He was so confident of them, but when he left, he had taken that with him. She found herself wondering, horribly, if her husband even really liked her at all, and cursing herself for being so pathetic. She wished he would call her back, that he would walk out of wherever he was with his father because he wanted to talk to her, because he wanted her. She wished she didn’t need him to validate her all the time. Her relationship was an addict, going through withdrawal from his addictive sense of certainty. Without Dhruv here to assure Rachel that she was happy with him, that this was right for them, she wasn’t sure how long she would last.
She stood up, clearing her plate.
“Rachel?” It was Swati. She looked up; her mother-in-law was back in the doorway of Rachel’s room, the room she had taken from her. “It will be Diwali soon.”
“I know.” She had discussed it with Ram Arjuna; they would record until the holiday and then take a short break, then get back to it.
“Geeta will go to her village for five days,” Swati said mournfully.
“Oh, I see,” Rachel said. Well, that was a bit of a relief, for her at least. She was getting a little sick of being out all day every day and she had only three days of voice-over that week. Swati looked down, then up again, seeming nervous.
“I thought maybe, at that time, you said you wanted to learn some things. Marwari dishes.” Swati said it softly.
Swati was offering to teach her to cook Indian food? It hadn’t gone wonderfully with the dhokla. Was this a trap?
“I thought you didn’t like to cook,” Rachel said.
“I do not. But you do.” Swati held her gaze this time.
Rachel thought about it. She wasn’t sure she wanted to spend more time with Swati. On the other hand, she did want to learn new things; she always did when it came to food. “All right. Tell me what to buy,” Rachel said. Why? Perhaps because she needed someone, anyone, even if it was Swati. Swati nodded, once, and returned to the be
droom. Rachel looked at her back. Swati had tried. She had not apologized for that conversation about Rachel’s drinking in public, but she had tried. Perhaps Rachel should try, too, just as she had thought she wanted to when she came home. Perhaps she could get back some of that bubbling excitement if she tried.
“Do you like television shows?” Rachel asked.
Swati turned around and smiled. “Oh yes.”
And Rachel began to tell her about her day. Swati, it turned out, was the perfect audience, because she was fascinated by Magda’s Moment, even more so than Rachel herself.
“Is Pytor very handsome?” Swati asked. Rachel showed her a photo and was amazed to see her mother-in-law blushing. “Oh, yes.”
“Does it sound like an Indian soap?”
“Soap?”
“What do you call them?” Rachel asked.
“A serial. Oh, I see what you have asked me. No, not too much like an Indian serial. You could not have so much boldness from the girl.”
“Oh, do you mean, like, they sleep together?” Rachel asked. Swati blushed again, deeply, and nodded. Rachel laughed. “I guess it’s a bit racy. But they get married. I mean, it’s not like an American soap, it seemed so tame to me. But it’s all relative, I guess.”
“Here you cannot show kissing even, in the serials. Or at least, you do not. It is not the custom. Because it is for families.”
“Wow. Well, they kiss a lot.”
“Well, they are married,” Swati said, shrugging. “It is like that there.”
Rachel smiled at her tone of authority. How did Swati know? But of course, other places were like that only. It was like she was painting a giant red A over the Western world.
“What do you think will happen next?” Swati asked.
“I don’t know,” Rachel said. But she wasn’t sure if she was talking about the soap opera or her life. “But I admire Magda. She moved to a new place to have a new life, and she is happy to have it, even if it brings her pain.”
“It is easy to be afraid. Everyone stays where they are because they do not know what will happen to them when they go to a new place. But they are still the same. They can do more than they think,” Swati said, her eyes bright.
That night, when Rachel slept, she dreamed of Magda and Pytor, of cooking a beautiful meal, of Dhruv’s running to her and holding her, of not being alone.
When she woke up, though, she was. And yet, her mother-in-law was just outside, in the other room. She still felt a flare of resentment, but underneath it was something else, something tiny and fragile, but she thought it might be comfort, the knowledge that there was someone else out there on the other side of the door. She realized, her heart somehow sinking and rising strangely at the same time, she wasn’t alone at all. They can do more than they think.
Yes, Rachel thought, they can.
Fifteen
Swati woke up the next morning at her usual six a.m., and had completed her morning puja and brewed her tea and made her breakfast all before she got the call from Bunny that would ruin her day.
She had just been sitting down to eat her simple bajra roti, a bread made with millet and eaten with chutney that Geeta had prepared earlier, when she saw Bunny’s face pop up on her phone. The photo she had given her was from Bunny’s fifty-fifth birthday, a day when she had looked especially fine, having dieted for a month before the party to fit back into her wedding choli, which she wore with the sari she had been married in. Girls wore lenghas and all these days, but she and Bunny had not had a choice in what they had worn. She hadn’t liked her own sari, but Bunny had loved hers and was eager to wear it one more time, with the original blouse. She was smiling right at the camera, the wide, loving smile Bunny had had since they were young girls. Swati smiled back and answered the phone.
“Hello—”
“What on earth can you be thinking? Lost your mind or what?” Bunny’s voice screeched so loud Swati had to hold the phone away from her ear.
“Bunny, what are you saying?”
“Of all the foolish, immoral, wicked things to do—”
“Who did—”
“How could you possible leave your husband?” Bunny shrieked. Her voice could have broken glass. It certainly broke Swati’s heart.
“I can explain,” Swati said softly.
“Then do it,” Bunny spat out witheringly. “I had to hear this from my presswala. Did you know that? He saw that nothing was coming from you for days and days and then your son came to town and asked for things to be pressed, so he picked things up and asked your maid when madam was coming back and you know what she said? Madam isn’t coming back. I would tell you to slap her for saying such things but you aren’t there. And she’s right, isn’t she? Of course, your son is in Kolkata but he hasn’t so much as called on me once, and I’m not surprised, with a mother like you, that his manners are so horrible!”
“My son has wonderful manners!” Swati broke in. She could live through Bunny’s ranting herself, breathless and full of bile as it was, but she wouldn’t listen to her insulting Dhruv.
“I knew that this trip wasn’t planned. I forgot to tell you. When have you forgotten to tell me anything? I suppose you forgot to tell me you were leaving your husband, too. Your poor husband, who has taken care of you all of your life! Vinod is a good man! He doesn’t drink much, doesn’t smoke much, what has he done wrong? That you would leave him? What can you be thinking? And at your age!”
“What about my age?”
“It’s indecent!”
“I wanted to be happy, Bunny. Can’t you understand that?”
“How could leaving your husband make you anything but ashamed? What are you now? What do you have? What is there to be happy about for you now?” Bunny really did sound confused. Swati didn’t understand her, not one bit. It was like she was talking to a stranger.
Bunny had always been the romantic one, the one who talked about loving her husband, loving this, loving that. She used the word so much that it lost all meaning. And now she was telling Swati she had been wrong, wrong in trying to be happy, in leaving a man she didn’t love?
Remember what she said about her own son, Swati thought. If she didn’t approve of his wife leaving him when he was unfaithful, of course she wouldn’t understand what I did. Vinod did nothing to me. That was the very point. But she was so disappointed, despite herself. She had really hoped, with all her being, that Bunny would understand when she told her. Did I really? Then why didn’t I tell her? Swati shook her head, trying to clear her own conflicting thoughts.
“I knew that I did not love Vinod, and I—I didn’t have to stay with him, anymore. Dhruv is there. I wanted something for myself. I wanted to, to know myself.” Swati stumbled, unsure how to explain, unsure what she really did want, herself. She didn’t have the words to describe her needs. That was part of why she had left, really, because she didn’t even know what she might want, only that it would not be found in the life she was living.
“What nonsense are you saying! Such things are all right for younger people, for other people.”
“Why not me?” Swati said, a sob catching in her throat. “Why don’t I get that?”
“You are selfish,” Bunny hissed. “Do you think you are the first person to want something for yourself? That is a selfish way to live. If everyone went around wanting things for themselves, only doing things for themselves, what would happen? We would be like the West, with all their problems, divorce divorce, cheating cheating—”
“Is that what happened to Arjun? He became too Western?” Swati asked, her voice sharp as a knife. There was silence on the other end of the phone. She had gone too far. But so had Bunny.
“How dare you say that to me? How could you be so shameless?” Bunny asked, pained wonder in her tone.
“I have made my choice. You have no right to tell me how to live my own life.”
“What do you think your choice will lead to? Young women in our community will see this, think what you are do
ing is what they should do, too. They have one fight, they leave their husbands. Their husbands do one bad thing, weighed against the balance of every good thing, and they will leave their husbands! That is not marriage. You will become an example to them, they will be doing wrong because of you. How can you live with that?”
“Your son did wrong all on his own, Bunny. He didn’t have my example and he did that. So what does that say?”
“You are a wicked woman!”
“Well, then it’s good you don’t have to see me again, isn’t it? Goodbye.” And Swati hung up the phone.
Bunny rang again, and again. Swati watched the photo of her, smiling, jump up on her screen as she cried into her tea. The real Bunny would never smile like that at her ever again.
By the time Rachel had emerged from her room at nine a.m., Swati had calmed herself again, on the outside. But inside, her heart was in pieces. Leaving Vinod, it seemed, was not so simple. She had known ending her marriage would mean saying goodbye to so many other things, as well. But she had never thought Bunny would be one of them. Bunny, sunny, romantic, impractical Bunny; that she should be the one who judged Swati, who shamed her, felt beyond Swati’s comprehension.
Vinod had not told her. Well, that was not so surprising, she supposed. Not talking about it meant not having to answer questions about it, she could understand that. But had he not said something because he had hoped it might not be true? He still called her, still sent her demands and sermons, but fewer of them. What would he do now that the news was spreading? For it would spread, Swati was sure of that, especially given the way she had just spoken to Bunny. She had talked to her like she was the enemy, and Bunny would treat her like that from now on.