by Anil Menon
Bilkis watched the General’s right hand slide slowly from Saya’s back to her waist, stroke the exposed skin gently, masterfully. It infuriated her, but there was nothing to be done about it. Well, maybe something. She stumbled, fell against the General, forcing him to shift to the side. Sorry sir, sorry sir. Oh, how he glared, the haraami, she had known many men like the General in the basti; I’m not afraid of your glare, old man. Keep your lund inside your pants or I’ll rip it off and feed it to you. Sorry sir, sorry sir. The crowds, what to do. Saya wrapped the sari’s pallu around herself, covering her waist.
All around her, people jostled and pushed. She focused on the essentials. It wasn’t like in the movies, the American instructor had warned, where extreme focus was shown by characters moving in slo-mo and a gradual reduction in the volume. In real life, nothing happened to time or the volume. What really happened was that large portions of the scene disappeared. The brain ignored 99.9% of what was happening. It made up shit. But that was nothing to worry about. The trained bodyguard’s brain only wanted to see one thing: the object that didn’t want to be seen. So keep the eyes moving. Keep the eyes moving. Don’t let the eyes rest because otherwise the brain would start to do what it liked to do best: think. Don’t think. There had been many thoughtful animals in the past. Real philosophers, many of them. They could still be found in books, holding forth on selflessness, managing money or raising obedient children. But as science has shown, the thoughtful animals had all gone extinct. Why? Because the thoughtful deer was the cheetah’s funny after-dinner story. The American instructor had mimicked the cheetah’s cigar.
The muhurat shot went off smoothly. The short and easy scene called for Love Ka Logic to ask each of her five husbands if they’d take her shopping. They all had excuses. This is hopeless, shouted Saya. Five husbands and I have to go shopping alone. Why didn’t I just marry the driver?
Cut! Applause. Bilkis shook her head. Five husbands, what nonsense! But nobody seemed to be shocked by the immorality of the concept. The applause only stopped when the General stopped applauding.
‘How well she acts, no?’ Bindu gripped Bilkis’ arm. ‘Was Baby this good an actress even as a child?’
Bindu’s Hindi was a joke. Ditto for her question. Who knew how her bloody Baby had been as a child? Saya’s PA knew full well that she’d never met the actress until a few months ago. It was one thing to indulge your crazy boss when she was around, but when she wasn’t, it was simply mental to continue doing so.
The party, Bilkis discovered after the muhurat, had only been a ruse. The General had wanted to take Saya back to Delhi with him, and Imran Khan’s birthday party had been a convenient excuse to foil his plans. Saya had pleaded past obligations, the General had given in with reluctance. Saya hadn’t intended to go to the party at all. They were both very pleased with themselves about their deception and had no guilt about keeping secrets from the person responsible for their lives.
‘Maybe he’ll be assassinated soon enough, Bilkis,’ whispered Saya in her ear. ‘I pray for it every day.’
And the actress only laughed shrilly when Bilkis, shocked, begged her not to even think such evil sentiments, let alone voice them.
‘There’s been a change of plans,’ she told Vyas in her daily report. ‘The actress was planning to go to the party but decided to stay home. She was tired. The event went well, nothing untoward happened. The General was himself. She will be returning to Delhi on Monday. I am not sure why.’
‘I’m sure there’s some story,’ Vyas had replied, after a brief pause. ‘Thank you Bilkis. Our task is to keep her safe and I couldn’t be happier.’
Saya was happy too. She talked endlessly about how she’d spend the next few days in her beloved Mumbai, just lolling, watching old movies, going shopping, eating bhel at Chowpatti and vada-pav in Sion, having hi-funda late late-night conversations with Mir—Bindu! See if we have his scotch!—in short, simply living life as she had once lived it. Saya wanted rain, an impossibility at this time of the year, and Bilkis wondered if Bindu would be ordered to squat over Mumbai and spray. None of these planned excursions would happen, the actress was too much of a homebody. But it was impossible to be unhappy when she was happy. Bindu, the chameleon in her emotional foliage, shifted moods accordingly, making her mistress shriek in delight with her imitation of the General’s manner of speaking. Walking to her quarters, Bilkis noticed how the house deity’s happiness touched all those who lived in the mansion. Their jai harish and salaam alaikum seemed to have a genuine warmth, the smiles on their faces seemed sincere, their shoulders showed a lightness of being.
She felt less light. It had been a long day and she was wondering whether to pleasure herself and then shower, or do it the other way around, when Gulabi, one of the maids, knocked on the door and timidly announced that Saya-madam had requested the pleasure of her presence for the evening. She called Bindu, explained she was tired, and that she wished to be excused.
‘I’m her assistant, not yours, and you can disappoint her yourself,’ said Bindu briskly, and before Bilkis could say don’t-do-that, the actress was on the line.
Bilkis headed for the shower. As with so many other things, the Swiss had mastered the art of water. The shower from Switzerland washed away the tiredness and with it her previous preference for some quiet. It did seem pointless to spend the evening watching mindless TV when she could spend time with one of the most desired objects in the country.
As she changed into her one good set of clothes, the sky blue salwar kameez that had got Vyas so mischievous at Nizam’s, she was filled with gratitude for all that Heaven had given her, even felt tempted to call Vyas, and let him know she was enjoying life a little, as he must have wanted. He would be proud of her; he was the kind of man to take pleasure in the strangest things, in the most unimportant things. He would be proud of her change of mind.
‘But why?’ she would ask, pretending to be vexed, and he would say: because you aren’t a stick-in-the-mud drone like some women. There was more to life than just work.
Better to call him tomorrow when she had some interesting incidents about the evening to narrate. Perhaps her anecdote would appear in one of his English stories and he would slyly find a way to bring the story to her attention, and when she read it, hauling word upon painful word, she would spot herself in the omniscient cat or in the smooth round bottom of a simple girl or in an unfunny joke about a room where all the furniture was always being rearranged. She was really impatient for the night to begin.
Yes, it would be fun to spend some time in the zenana. There would be good music, good food, lots of laughter, dirty jokes and perhaps Saya could be persuaded not to sing. How could someone who looked like an angel sing like a crow! The actress did like to sing however. Perhaps the hijra would find a way to distract her. Yes, he would be around. An open scandal, that’s what it was. Never mind, welcome to Bollywood, Bilkis meri jaan. As the staff often said to one another, in the fondest of tones, when Saya-madam was having one of her mental fits: ‘Film star after all, some nakhra is only to be expected.’ And for all the hijra’s irritating pretentiousness, his shifty eyes, his creepy inspection, truth was, the poet had a gift for making the actress happy.
‘Tell me something, Mir Alam Mir,’ Saya would perhaps say, ‘tell me something beautiful in that beautiful voice of yourself.’
Mir chose to recite, she remembered, Iqbal’s Bazm-e-Anjum, something about an assembly of stars.
But the occasion wasn’t the celebration Bilkis had anticipated. Later, when she’d finally been released from her obligation to please, she lay in her soft queenly bed and thought over the performance. The food, the wine, the music, the laughter, the craziness, yes, all had been what she’d thought it would be. Future and history were almost the same. Almost. Her presence at the table had been necessary to make the occasion what the actress intended it to be: an atonement. It was a gift wrapped in a memory revealed in a story. Utterly sated by the gravy-rich, meat-cent
ric and rumali roti dinner, mouths tingling, they’d all lolled on cushions, an exhausted pleasure having crowded out all desire. Not the actress however. Saya had eaten little, only sampled nibbles from this plate or that, harangued the cooks as they surely craved, bossed, bullied others to eat, almost manic with some unexplained happiness. She arranged herself in front of Bilkis.
‘How can you even move?’ groaned Bindu, looking as if she were about to give birth.
‘Bilkis,’ the actress began. Perhaps she’d begun some other way. No matter. ‘Bilkis, nothing between us can ever be the same, until I acknowledge the great tragedy that’s become this dark wretched wall between us. We were best friends as children, that is to say, until yesterday, and yesterday I was convinced tomorrow would have no power over us. You know how it is in childhood. Everything is going to last forever. No, don’t speak poor, proud Bilkis. Let me say what I have to say. For your birthday, you got a foreign doll. An American doll, beautiful I suppose, in the American fashion. You were so proud of it, I could not stand it. I suppose I could have endured it—I hope I am not without generosity of spirit—if it were not for the fact you kept remarking how the doll was a spitting image of me. A scarecrow doll bought from some cheap store in Walmart! Walmart! A plastic creature made by the Chinese for the lowest possible cost. But you were oblivious. You made a tin-can house, do you remember? You kissed and coddled and poked and prodded the doll all morning. You even called it Shahzadi Nafiza. Shahzadi! A plastic princess when the original stood before you in the flesh! I couldn’t bear it. I admit it freely. I was on fire with jealousy. Then you were called away for some treat, you never could resist food, even then, and I saw my chance. I put the doll in its miserable tin-can hovel out in the noon sun. It was ruined. And later I wept when I remembered the pain on your face. I have been eaten alive by the memory ever since. You knew. Of course you knew it was I.’
‘Horrible!’ gasped Bindu. ‘I don’t know what to say.’
Saya cast her a poisoned look, then recomposed her face to one of atonement. ‘Bilkis, I cannot undo what I did. But I have been punished. When one betrays who or what one loves, there is no trusting oneself ever again. Bilkis, look at me, I have been punished. And ever since you were returned to me, I have been searching for a way to make you trust me again. Bilkis, here—’ The actress held out a large rectangular carton with a plastic slipcase. ‘From America, your Shahzadi Nafiza.’
Bilkis took the carton. Such a familiar weight. It was indeed Shahzadi Nafisa. It was her memory made flesh. But how could the actress have known? She felt light-headed and then a stab of fear that she would faint. But no, she was only floating, hovering in the air a few feet above the intimate tableau of Bilkis, Bindu, Saya and Mir Alam Mir. The actress, sitting on her heels, bare arms clasped in filmi delight, as if in prayer. Bindu lolling against the cushions, a jealous expression on her face. The hijra, smiling, pleased, humming something to himself.
She stared at the doll. So it was all true, it had to be, that Jehan was Saya and she was Saya’s Bilkis. What she remembered about Jehan was also a memory about Saya. No, it couldn’t be, she felt nothing at all for the actress. How could that be? If Saya was her Jehan, why hadn’t she recognized the living fact earlier? Why wasn’t she recognizing it now? She simply did not know what was up and what was down anymore.
‘You must not think the Shahzadi is a duplicate,’ said Saya. ‘I would never gift you a duplicate. Nor is it like me, a reincarnation. But you, me, and the Shahzadi—’
‘And me,’ said Bindu with a little laugh, ‘don’t forget me.’
‘We are now made whole. The story of what I did to Shahzadi is now complete. It is ours and ours alone. That is the nature of stories and their creators. Is that not so, Mir?’
‘You would be surprised,’ he said dryly. ‘Have I told you how Muhammad Hussain Azad passed off his verses as Zauq’s?’
‘You may have.’ Saya sat back on her haunches, looking vexed. ‘Do you wish to tell it again? Very well. Why would such a famous scholar cheat?’
‘The why always demands a story.’ He gestured with his hands. It said: get up, get up. ‘But this is an auspicious occasion. Embrace your friend.’
‘Yes!’ cried Saya.
Bilkis felt the arms cradle her neck, the lavender lips breathe softly against her hair, the pearly white teeth lightly nip her ear. Remember, Bilkis urged her body. Why can’t you remember! Past and present, what had happened and what was happening, it was all mixed up. It was a muddle and nothing mattered. But coincidences happened for a reason. What the actress said had to be true. She returned her friend’s embrace, feeling rather than observing Saya’s tears on her cheeks. Not Saya, she thought. Jehan. From now and forever: Jehan.
‘Now,’ Saya sat back, her expression as full of delight and mischief as a six-year-old, ‘who is ready for some barfi?’
18
(TANAZ IS BROWSING IN THE BAHRISONS BOOKSTORE IN KHAN Market. Her face is puffy and the small furrows between her eyes have deepened, but she looks peaceful.)
God, I’ve been yawning all morning. I’m exhausted. Physically and emotionally. I’ve should’ve slept late, but a whole free Sunday is such a luxury and I really really needed to get out of the house. Once I’m done here, I’m going to get a cappuccino and an obese muffin and then read pati-dev’s letter in peace. It’s such a beautiful day. Perfect for a lazy Sunday. Who knows when I’ll get another? Next two weeks are crazy busy.
This is a cool bookstore. I used to come here all the time. These days bookstores make me feel so guilty. They just remind me everyone else is reading and I’m not. I just can’t find the time. Still, I’m going to catch up one of these days. I’m going to take a nice long vacation, sit on a beach, sip my Mai-Tai and read till I pee ink.
I had this friend, she used to be a total bookworm, and then she just stopped reading novels. She told me: I’m tired of imagining things second-hand. Ninety-nine percent of the time the author hasn’t had the experience. So I’m imagining what I haven’t experienced as imagined by some fake-chand who hasn’t experienced it either. She wanted the real thing. Like, don’t read about buying a house in Tuscany—go live there for a while. Or, don’t read about bondage, try it out. So my friend has an affair, gets AIDS, loses custody of her children and commits suicide. When I tell this to Vyas, he says: she could have just read Madam Bovary. (Laughs.) I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh. (Laughs.) Okay, I’m going to be struck by lightning any minute now.
(Tanaz gets a call, answers it. She sounds exasperated.)
That was Shabari. She doesn’t know how to compile an install. All she needs to do is to exec one Ant makefile! That’s okay, we all have stuff to learn but she just can’t ask directly. She wanted Rajiv’s home phone number.
Why do you want Rajiv’s home phone number? Because I don’t have his cell.
Why do you want Rajiv’s home phone number? Because I have a question.
Why do you want Rajiv’s home phone number? Because I have a doubt and I’ve been trying to crack it then my son had called and he had—
Why do you want Rajiv’s home phone number? Because I’m getting compilation errors about missing Maven files in the Vayuputra codebase.
Ah. The error dump should tell you where Ant expects the files to be. Anyway, his number is on the intranet. Project contact page. Excel spreadsheet. The one we all use every day.
Part of the problem is that her English is just okay and it’s no use telling her RTFM because she has a hard time understanding the manuals. She’s good at taking orders and following them to the T, but if the job requires initiative, she freaks. Shabari doesn’t know how to ask; it’s like she always expects to be rejected. Too cunning for her own good.
Just a sec, let me make sure Rajiv gives Shabari the help she needs. Sometimes they just ignore her.
(Tanaz heads to a corner of the store, makes the call, then returns. She browses in the business section, sampling one volume after another.)
&nbs
p; I wish I had someone to ask for help. All these books are totally interesting. Pati-dev doesn’t read business books. He says they are bent on proving he knows nothing about money. That is true. He has the Econ degree but I handle our finances. On the other hand, I have the B.A. English degree but he’s the bookworm. Go figure.
I used to gift him novels for his birthday, but stopped because he’s read everything! What the hell do you give a guy who’s read Lichtenberg?
I’d never even heard of Lichtenberg until this morning. We were having breakfast and on the news there was this report that the Lokshakti was sponsoring an inter-faith religious conference. Somehow we got talking about his great pal Bilkis. I asked him whether she was a hard core Muslim and he said Bilkis wasn’t, but he was pretty sure she’d find her faith again and that’s when she could become dangerous. Bilkis understood words had many meanings but newfound faith could make people forget many things they’d once understood.
It made me uncomfortable to hear him say these things. Not the words so much, but his tone. I’ve heard this tone a lot among my Parsi friends and relatives. She’s a close friend of his. I pretend to be jealous but I like that they’re close friends. Pati-dev needs friends. Actually, I was planning to invite her home, once we’d released the Vayuputra distribution. But here he is, talking about Bilkis as if she were a case number or a pet or somebody else’s friend.
Pati-dev must have seen my freaked expression because he smiled and said he’d been making a general point. He wasn’t talking about Bilkis per se. It wasn’t even his idea. He was just quoting this German philosopher called Lichtenberg. This guy claimed there was a difference between people who had always believed in an ideal and people who’d lost their belief, then regained it. God, patriotism, a leader, a lover, whatever.