Song of the Cuckoo Bird

by Amulya Malladi

  When Renuka slapped Chetana again, Charvi moved into action.

  “Stop it,” she said with as much dignity as she could, and pulled Chetana away from Renuka.

  “How dare you?” Chetana yelled at Renuka as tears streamed down her face. “I can do what I want to do. You’re not my mother.” Chetana’s body shook with the shock of being slapped by a veritable stranger.

  “What’s the matter?” Charvi asked, though she could guess. This was about the lipstick Chetana had painted on her lips, probably in hopes of enticing Mark. Chetana had never told where she got the lipstick, but still . . . How could a little red paint cause so much commotion? Charvi thought.

  “She wears lipstick like that whore mother of hers,” Renuka said. Her face was constricted with anger and her thin body was shaking under her white sari. Her back was slightly bent and Charvi noticed the bitterness in her stance.

  “She can wear whatever she wants to wear,” Charvi informed Renuka, and decided to ask Subhadra to explain the rules of Tella Meda to the old widow. “If you ever, and I mean ever, strike anyone again under my roof, you will have to leave Tella Meda.”

  “You don’t teach right from wrong and she’ll end up like her mother, selling her body for five rupees on the street corner,” Renuka cried out. “I care about what happens to them when they grow up. You . . . you are too busy shaking your ass around that white man.”

  Charvi had to wait five seconds before she could pull a calm façade over the anger that was quickly claiming her. “Chetana, ask Subhadra to come here,” Charvi instructed in a controlled voice.

  Once Chetana left to get Subhadra, Charvi told Renuka regally, “You are not the voice of morality in my house. You are not to assume that role. If I feel something is amiss, I will deal with it. If you feel something is wrong, you can tell me about it and I will decide if it is worthy of attention. What I do is not your business and it is not for you to judge. What Chetana does or Kokila does is their own business. In Tella Meda we mind our own business. You will not strike anyone, child or adult, in this house. This is a Gandhian house; we don’t permit any violence.”

  Subhadra came running out of the kitchen, leaving Chetana with Kokila for consoling. “What? What happened?”

  “Nothing,” Renuka said before Charvi could speak. “This woman does not care if that little girl walks around with red paint on her lips like a slut. Well then, why should I care? Let their lives go down the drain. I won’t be responsible, you will.”

  Charvi smiled at the woman’s foolishness. “We all make our own destiny and no one is responsible for another’s decisions and their lives. Subhadra, please explain to Renuka the rules of living in Tella Meda. If she doesn’t follow them, she must leave by the end of the week.”

  Chetana’s affection for Charvi turned into devotion after the scene with Renuka.

  “I don’t like that Renuka,” Kokila said. “She actually told me that I was worse than a widow because my husband left me.”

  “You left your husband,” Chetana said with a smirk. “And you must have enjoyed telling her that.”

  Kokila’s mouth curved into a smile. “Yes, very much, and then you should have heard her. She went on and on and on about bad morals and how God will strike me down for my sins. If she doesn’t like Tella Meda she should go and stay with her children.”

  Chetana lowered her voice to a whisper because they were sitting in the courtyard. Subhadra was hanging wet clothes on the clotheslines and Narayan Garu was reading aloud from a book to Ramanandam Sastri.

  “I heard that her children don’t want her. She has nowhere to go,” Chetana told Kokila. “And Subhadra told me that the woman only has some pension coming, that’s all.”

  Kokila nodded. She wasn’t surprised. Why would someone with money and kind relatives live in Tella Meda? Everyone in the house lived there because they had nowhere else to go, no one else to take them. Except her, of course; she had rejected her husband and his house to stay at Tella Meda. She didn’t dare regret that decision even though sometimes she wondered why she had stayed, especially since Vidura was gone.

  “Oh and that old hag said something about Charvi getting very friendly with that white photographer,” Chetana whispered.

  “Maybe something is going on between them,” Kokila suggested, and Chetana immediately shook her head.

  “No, that simply can’t be true. Charvi is . . . she’s a goddess, Kokila, and she doesn’t have passions like we do. She is a higher person and she’s godly,” Chetana said. Kokila made a face. Usually, Chetana was happy to talk about Charvi but since Charvi had stood up for her against Renuka, Chetana was feeling especially loyal toward her.

  “She’s still human and humans have emotions. She certainly spends enough time with that white man. And so what if she finds him attractive?” Kokila said.

  Chetana shook her head vigorously. “We find him attractive because we are lower beings; she doesn’t. Her interest in him is purely religious.”

  “Right,” Kokila muttered sarcastically. “Religion is why she goes on long walks with him and sits next to him during meals. Religion is why she smiles as soon as he says something in English.”

  “You’re just like Renuka, you know, always criticizing Charvi,” Chetana admonished.

  That evening Renuka didn’t follow Mark and Charvi on their walk on the beach. Charvi was tempted to tell Mark about Renuka and what happened in the house that afternoon but it felt too domestic. And then she realized that she had no one to talk to about the small things in life, about seeing a bird fly or a young man sneak a kiss from a girl behind the big boulder on the beach. She had no one to gossip with. She was supposed to be above the usual chitchat anyway. She had to talk about lofty subjects, important matters.

  “Do you ever wish for the world to stop?” Mark asked Charvi.

  “What a strange thing to wish for,” Charvi replied thoughtfully.

  “I mean, do you ever wish that you could stop your life and then change course?”

  “You mean like changing buses during a long journey?”

  “Yes, exactly,” Mark said, pleased that she understood.

  Charvi shook her head. “It’s not a matter of wishing. I couldn’t even if I wanted it.”

  Mark shook his head. “What if you could? Would you want to?”

  Charvi thought about his question and then shrugged. “It’s pointless to speculate over something that can never happen. I believe it’s a waste of time. Would you want to change your life?”

  Mark nodded. “Sometimes I wish I had a wife and children, a house in the suburbs like some of my friends. Other times I wish I had done more with my life professionally than I have. I wish I were more successful.”

  “But that is living with regrets,” Charvi said. “Regrets are a good way of drying up the energy within.”

  “Yes, yes, you are right,” Mark said.

  “I don’t know much about your profession but the photos you have taken of Tella Meda leave me . . . speechless. You make my house look more beautiful than it ever has looked through my naked eyes,” Charvi said. “The photos I have seen are a testament to your art and your craft.”

  Mark laughed softly. “But those photos were easy to take. Your house is full of energy. There are vibes all around it and it feels alive. I have never been this compelled to take so many pictures of an inanimate object, a house, before,” Mark said. “You were right when you said in your letter that it has a soul. Your house has a soul. I wonder if the walls move at night and whisper to each other.”

  “It has a soul but it is not haunted,” Charvi said, laughing at the image of the walls whispering to each other.

  But when she went back into her room, she thought she could hear the walls talk. They were warning her, cautioning her against falling in love.

  Did she really swing her ass around Mark? Charvi wondered about Renuka’s accusation. She had walked close to him today, his arm had brushed against hers and his roughness had care
ssed her softness. There had been a sensation akin to death and birth. Charvi had almost turned to face him and let him read all the pent-up affection and love inside her. She had so much to give, so much to offer, yet she felt her hands were tied. She had duties, Tella Meda, the people who came every Sunday for advice, help, and prayer. She couldn’t turn her back on everyone. Could she?

  As it always was, Sunday was a busy day. Devotees and those seeking help, salvation, more money, children, better children, male children—everyone with a need who believed in Charvi came to Tella Meda. They were all seated in the large temple room. Charvi played the veena as she sang bhajans and Renuka (still angry with Charvi and everyone else at Tella Meda) reluctantly played the harmonium. Narayan Garu was not very good at the tabla but still accompanied Charvi on it. The devotees chanted after Charvi as she sang in praise of Lord Venkateshwara Swami and Tella Meda was alight with the glow of devotion.

  Before lunch, the devotees stood in line and touched Charvi’s feet as they asked for her blessing. She hugged each one and touched their foreheads with her hand. Devotees would discuss among themselves how the hug purified them and how her hand on their forehead brought immense peace.

  Subhadra rallied Chetana and Kokila, along with some of the regular attendees such as Dr. Vishnu Mohan’s wife, Saraswati, to prepare and serve lunch to all the devotees. During lean times, Subhadra just cut up the fruit the devotees brought along as offerings for Charvi. She served it with tea. But this week the white photojournalist had already paid for his stay and the money would go a long way in keeping mouths fed at Tella Meda for a few months.

  The Sunday meal was simple: bhindi curry, sambhar with sweet potatoes, spinach pappu, mango and tomato pickle, and curds. Kokila and Chetana laid out banana leaves all around the knee-high dining table in the verandah. Once the thirty people were seated, they first put salt on each green banana leaf. Chetana came with a bucket of bhindi curry and put some on each banana leaf with a large steel spatula. Kokila followed with the rice and Subhadra with the sambhar. The spinach pappu came next, along with the mango and tomato pickle.

  Another steel bucket of rice was emptied onto the banana leaves while people ate, talked, and shared their problems. The only member of the ashram not there was Ramanandam Sastri, who had stopped coming out of his room for meals after Vidura ran away. The regular visitors asked after his health and sent a prayer to God for Vidura’s safe return.

  “I’m hungry,” Chetana declared when Subhadra handed her a bucket of curds, the last course of the meal.

  “We eat after they have finished.”

  “But I’m hungry now,” Chetana said peevishly.

  Subhadra ignored her and gave Kokila a plate stacked with sliced mangoes. It was monsoon time; mangoes were not in season and the ones on the plate were a weak shade of yellow. “Here, you take this.”

  “Chetana, go,” Subhadra ordered, and Chetana walked out of the kitchen onto the verandah.

  “Why do we have to do this?” Chetana demanded as she forcefully dumped lumps of fresh yogurt on piles of rice settled on banana leaves next to remnants of pickle, sambhar, and bhindi curry.

  “Just let’s finish serving so that we can eat,” Kokila said as she put one slice of mango on each banana leaf.

  “Next she’ll say that we have to make coffee for everyone and then we can eat,” Chetana complained. “I’m telling you, I’m going to get married soon and get out of here. Then I can eat when I’m hungry, not wait for everyone to finish.”

  “And who’s going to marry you?” Kokila asked as she placed a slice of mango on the last banana leaf.

  “I’ll find someone,” Chetana said, and her silver anklets hummed as she went back into the kitchen.

  Mark sat next to Charvi at the table and was pleasantly surprised by how many people showed up every Sunday. They all brought money, fruit, pieces of cloth, or vegetables from their garden, anything that they thought they could offer the goddess. Charvi took everything without drama and Mark wondered how she felt about accepting what he thought was charity in the name of God.

  He had been in India long enough and had seen enough of it to understand the intricacies of life in India, where poverty—real poverty, where people went hungry—was only a step away. You just had to walk out of your nice or not-so-nice home and you would step into large puddles of penury and destitution. Beggars on the streets, young children who were filthy and skinny—it was a world apart from what poverty meant to him in America.

  And yet, despite the struggle to make ends meet, he had seen that woman in the kitchen at Tella Meda put out a feast every Sunday so that every devotee would be fed. And it was probably because of their generosity that many homeless, hungry people came to their doorstep and were accepted as equals, seated next to the goddess at the table if there was enough room, or at rows of banana leaves placed in the courtyard in front of thin coconut straw mats.

  He didn’t know what to make of Charvi. On one hand he felt that she was cheating these good people out of money and gifts, and on the other he saw her as a benevolent soul who gave food and shelter to the hungry and the homeless.

  Charvi accepted everyone, whether they were able to pay their way or not. No matter how he analyzed the situation, he couldn’t figure the woman out. He couldn’t understand how she, who was quite intelligent, could allow people to believe she was a goddess.

  After lunch Mark helped Subhadra and Kokila with the dishes. Feigning a headache, Chetana had gone into the room she shared with Kokila to rest and avoid doing any more work for the wretched devotees of Charvi. Poor Chetana, Kokila thought, amused. She would be so upset that she didn’t get a chance to wash dishes with the white man.

  “No, no,” Kokila said when the man didn’t properly scrub the big pot used for making rice. “This like. This, you do,” she tried to explain in her broken English.

  She showed him how to get to the corners of the pot with the piece of coconut straw used for cleaning the dishes.

  “Thanks,” Mark said, and continued to clean.

  “Everyone will be very scandalized that a man is cleaning the utensils,” Subhadra told him. “But I think that since men eat, they should also clean.”

  “I agree,” Mark said. “My father always did the dishes at home, my mom always cooked.”

  Kokila looked expectantly at Subhadra to translate what had just been said, and the older woman complied. Kokila was impressed. She didn’t know any men who knew what to do in a kitchen besides eat.

  Later, Chetana was livid that she had missed talking to Mark.

  “Did he say anything about me? What did he say?” she grilled Kokila.

  “He just washed the pots and that’s it,” Kokila said wearily. “Anyway, he’s leaving in two more days.”

  “If I could speak in English, I’d have snared him,” Chetana said saucily. “I’d make him marry me and take me away.”

  “Why do you want to leave Tella Meda so badly?”

  “Why do you want to stay?”

  Kokila shrugged. She had wanted to stay because of Vidura, but also because this was the only real home she’d ever had. Now when Chetana talked about marriage and a husband and leaving, she was still reluctant to leave. Where would she go? Why would she go?

  “I want a rich husband, someone who will buy me everything I want, and take me to fancy places on holiday. Like Lavanya. She goes all over the world in big airplanes,” Chetana said with dreams in her eyes. “And even this white man, he has been everywhere. Subhadra said she saw pictures he took in Africa. Do you know where Africa is?”

  “Hmm,” Kokila said, though she wasn’t really sure.

  “They have big wild animals there and only black people. You know why they are black?”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s very hot there. It isn’t too hot here, that’s why we are brown. In Africa it’s very, very hot and they are all burned black,” Chetana informed Kokila. “And it’s very cold in America, that’s why they
are all white.”

  “So, is Subhadra looking for a boy for you?” Kokila asked, changing the topic.

  Chetana shook her head. “No one is looking; I’m looking for my own husband. And I think . . . no, I’m not telling you anything yet. When the time is right, I’ll tell you.”

  Kokila couldn’t bear not knowing what Chetana had been about to tell her and nagged her to reveal her secret. She didn’t succeed, though, and finally gave up.

  He had promised that he wouldn’t take any photos of her, but as she stood under the moon on the terrace Mark felt helpless and grabbed his camera. He was on the beach looking up at the house and she was standing up on the terrace, looking ethereal, like a fairy princess, dressed in white, her hair loose and flowing around her shoulders and the full moon lighting her.

  He usually didn’t take pictures of people who explicitly told him not to, but here he decided to make an exception.

  The next evening, his last, when they went for a walk on the beach, Charvi was quiet and somber.

  “I will miss you,” she admitted to him, and waited, hoped, wished for him to say something. She wanted him to take her away from Tella Meda, this life. She suddenly wanted to see Africa with him, the big elephants and the tall giraffes. She wanted to see New York City and she wanted to see his home in a place called Kansas. She wanted the impossible because even though he was attracted to her, she knew he would never stake a claim and she couldn’t let him. But what if he did? What if that magic happened?

  “I will miss you as well,” Mark said. “I saw your house under the light of the full moon last night and it was studded with diamonds.”

  “I’m glad that you had this opportunity,” Charvi said. “Will you come back?”

  Mark shrugged. “I’ll try. I’ll try my best.”

  The way he said it made it obvious to Charvi that he wouldn’t be back. This was an interesting vacation but not one he’d care to repeat. The world was full of places he hadn’t yet seen that he would visit instead.

  “I hope you will come back,” Charvi said softly, her voice not the voice of a goddess but that of a young woman trying to tell her first love that her heart was available.