Now the room looks darker and Nil feels lonely, lonely as never before, and so he grabs the edge of the sheets and slips it off the mattress and, careful not to disturb Jiya, wraps it around his neck and holds it together with both hands. Nil opens his mouth wide to utter a silent cry but not a tear streams down his face, and so Nil tries to strangle himself in silence: an idea so pathetic that it’s hilarious. Again, Nil laughs.
“Cut it,” hisses Jiya without looking at him. Nil loosens his grip on the sheet.
He lies where he is, bathed in cold sweat. He listens to the sound of the AC. He observes the moon hanging over the railing of the balcony.
When Jiya’s breath gets regular, Nil gets up, opens the doors and lights a Benson on the terrace. Smoking calms him right away. From the top floor of the Taj, his gaze is lost in the urban vastness below him. Nil plays with the cap of his twenty-three thousand rupees Dupont lighter. He blows the smoke towards the city.
Below him, Ayodhya stretches out of sight in the pitch of the night, right to where the blackness of the sky merges with the blackness of what lies underneath. In the night, the lights of the city spread like wildfire in every direction and Nil follows their glow with his gaze until the streetlights in the outlying districts lose intensity and disappear in the shadows beyond. In the heart of the glittering metropolis, caught between the colonial district to the south, the financial district to the east, the New Territories to the north and the Old City to the west, the Pit emerges from a haze: a patch blacker than black, bleak and shameful in the middle of Ayodhya. The Pit ranks first in the world’s largest slums.
The very thought of it makes Nil shiver. He can’t bear the sight of it any longer. He takes a drag of his cigarette and looks away and thinks about sneaking back in and taking a couple more of Jiya’s pills.
“I’m just a pussy, don’t you think?” goes Nil, still looking at the city.
“A little dramatic, maybe,” says the Crooked Woman, “as usual.”
“At my best.” Nil chuckles, his voice thick with smoke. With every drag, the tremor of his hands subsides.
She leans on the railing beside him. “The milk cup, especially, that was a slip.”
“I know, right?” says Nil, a rush of laughter on his face. “Mum certainly wouldn’t approve.”
“It’s still on the floor, under the bed, for the record,” says the Crooked Woman, and her voice is far away and it sounds like that of someone who has just finished a long run.
“A pretty cup, though,” says Nil.
“Yes, I admit. It must belong to her grandmother or something.”
“Now you’re making me feel guilty.”
“Who, me?” The Crooked Woman laughs, but from her throat only a gasp rises and her arms, bent behind her, give a tug.
Nil doesn’t mind: he observes the smoke trickling over his lips and beyond the railing like an open hand reaching out into the darkness.
“So,” Nil goes after a while. “I’m married.”
“How does it feel?” she asks.
“Lonely,” he says, and throws his cigarette and turns to her but there is no one. He turns back to the city and says, “Maybe I should have respected the tradition.”
“And shared the milk?” asks the Crooked Woman.
“After all, it was such a beautiful cup...”
“It was not the only thing you should have shared.”
“You know I can’t,” says Nil, shaking his head.
“From how you say it, it seems like it’s my fault.”
“No,” Nil is quick to say. “No, you know that.”
“I know.”
He can almost hear the inflection of a smile in her words and turns to the balcony door to make sure.
“Your arms seem worse off than usual tonight,” he says.
“It was a busy day for both of us.”
Nil hesitates, his eyes mischievous. “From how you say it, it seems like it’s my fault.”
The silence is palpable. Then they both burst out laughing, and Nil turns to the room to make sure that Jiya is still asleep. He sees the Crooked Woman’s twisted arms reflected in the glass door and realizes that talking to her made his hands stop shaking. He gives her an affectionate smile.
“How did it feel?” she asks, once her laugh has subsided.
“Cocaine? As if I were worth a million dollars.”
“You are worth a million dollars.”
“I mean myself,” goes Nil pointing at his chest, “not Dad.” And after a pause, “It felt as, if I were to throw myself from here now, I’d just fly and land in a better place.”
“Don’t you dare climbing on that railing.”
Nil chuckles. “I’m not joking... but then again I wouldn’t have the balls to do it.” Nil observes the city lights. “Not now.”
The Crooked Woman waits for him to speak on.
“It felt like the best friend I ever had, the coke.” He adds, “Not that Ferang isn’t, it just... made me feel better, like discovering a more positive part of myself. Like I’m really a good person, you know?”
“You are, Nil. You’re the best person I’ve ever met.”
But Nil is lost in the pursuit of that memory. “I felt like I had an answer to everything.” He scratches his left cheek.
“And Mel saw something in you, is that it?”
Nil says nothing
“Of course,” she says, and her labored voice turns bitter. “Of course she saw something.”
“What?” he asks.
“Me, Nil.” Her twisted arms jerk and her tone is flat and her image is reflected in the glass like a burn on the film of reality.
“She didn’t see you,” he says, but his words sound unconvinced.
“Maybe not,” she allows, “but she knows.” A pause. And then, with a hint of wonder coloring her voice, the Crooked Woman adds, “But you don’t care.”
“You know,” Nil says, his eyes following an invisible track in the distance. “I don’t even want to fuck her. It would be enough to sit close to her, angry even, our eyes turned, puffing into silence for the rest of eternity.”
“Should I be jealous?”
They laugh and Nil turns to her, but again in front of him is only the night.
“I should go,” he says.
“You should,” she answers, a note of disappointment in her voice.
Nil walks three steps toward the doors and stops as if seized with an afterthought. Again, he says nothing.
“I will always be there for you, Nil,” goes the Crooked Woman.
Something in her voice both comforts him and makes his blood freeze. “Thanks,” he says to the reflection, but the only reflection on the glass now is his own.
Silent, he slides back into the room and looks for the remote control of the air conditioner to reduce the blow of ice-cool air, but he can’t find it and so he slips under the covers and, removing only his sherwani, he imagines an invisible line between him and Jiya that nothing and no one in world can force him to cross and that helps him to relax until he feels calm enough to close his eyes. Somewhere in his mind, Mel sings.
***
At dawn, Nil wakes up with a parched mouth and lies there a few minutes waiting for something to happen, but all he hears is the hum of the air conditioner and the unpleasant feeling of his clothes still damp and cold against his skin. Jiya breathes gently across the imaginary line between them.
Coke is indeed a nice little thing, he thinks, and with this thought he sneaks out of bed and goes to the bathroom, where he looks at himself in the mirror and, rubbing and rinsing his wasted face, decides that he looks like shit.
He turns to the hot tub considering taking a bath but decides against it, fearing that the sound of running water would wake up Jiya. Also, he is wearing a Rohit Bal outfit worth two hundred fifty thousand rupees, and Mel for sure likes it, so why change? Instead he pumps some Cartier Pasha édition Noire on his armpits and wrists and he’s good to go.
Leaving the b
athroom, Nil finds Jiya sitting on the edge of the bed, checking Instagram with one hand and swallowing two Valium tablets without water with the other, and he considers asking her for one but the idea of talking to her scares him and anyway she closes the pill box without offering him any, and then she goes to the bathroom and Nil moves aside to let her pass and stands still, listening to the water gurgling in the pipes as his wife gets ready.
The glass he dropped last night eyes him with an accusing look from under the bed. Collecting it, Nil wonders what to do: throw it from the goddamn balcony; give it to Jiya with an apology; or put it back under the bed and let a lower caste janitor find it and turn it into some sacred relic of his or her family. Instead, Nil opens the refrigerator and he pours himself some Bollinger filling the glass to the brim and drinks it in one gulp. There is not that big a difference from any other champagne, he thinks, but chases the unsophisticated thought away and pours another glass for Jiya, and raising the cup to the closed bathroom door in a silent toast, drinks that, too.
Jiya gets out of the bathroom wrapped in a Cavalli robe, already wearing bra and underwear, and Nil watches her getting dressed from the opposite corner of the room. She collects her clothes from the floor and throws them in bulk in her Louis Vuitton suitcase and then she’s in front of the mirror putting on a veil of makeup and a substantial layer of Fair and Lovely.
Nil wonders if he could ask her some of her whitening cream, but his mouth is still dry and he can’t speak, and when Jiya gets up to leave, Nil gallantly holds open the door, but realizing that it should instead help with her suitcase, he cracks a smile and grabs the handle of her Louis Vuitton, and she lets him do it. Once in the elevator, she kisses him on the cheek and everything seems okay.
In the hall, Mel and Ferang are already waiting and Mel wears a georgette silk overdress by Tarun Tahiliani, and Nil smiles, eager to let her know they didn’t fuck and, perhaps understanding, Mel’s eyes light up with pleasure, and then Nil is sucked away by the crowd of relatives and relatives of relatives and friends of the latter, and then, next to the large sliding doors, Nil meets Dad.
“I’m proud of you, beta.”
Nil feels the warmth spreading inside his limbs. “Thanks, Dad.”
“This will strengthen the company in the coming decades. Together, we will guide this country towards a full development, and one day, looking out the window you will say that you have helped to create a better world.”
“I know, Dad—I will, Dad.”
“Jiya is a good girl, her blood is good. She will take care of you.” Dad beats his chest. “But what am I saying? You know better than me, you wanted to marry her since you were four.”
“And now I have done it.”
“Yes, beta. But now focus on your studies, get a degree... have a little fun, and then, when she gets back from London, you will occupy your rightful place at Worlds United, next to your wife.”
“Sure, Dad.” Nil hesitates. “There is this work that I am doing with Mel and Ferang—I mean, it’s more of an investigation, and we are putting all the possible effort and I think we could get something interesting out of it... in the field of journalism, I mean. Who knows, maybe we could make a few heads turn the right way.”
“Does it have anything to do with your degree?”
“No, it’s about—”
“I think you should focus on your studies mostly.”
“Dad, it matters to me.”
“I know, beta,” says Dad with a smile. “If it’s important to you, it is to me. I’m sure you’ll do a great job.”
Nil looks at his feet. “Sometimes I am not sure that construction is my field.”
“Construction? Is this what you believe we do?” Dad rests a hand on his shoulder. “We don’t build houses, we shape the future. Ours is not just a company for profit, it’s an empire aiming at tomorrow.”
Silence.
“Go now, and hug your mother. She’s been down in the dumps since her interview with Vogue got postponed.”
Dad pulls Nil into a hug, but Nil can’t hug him back and would like nothing more than to move away and take refuge in the depths of himself, but finally he raises his arms and rests his forehead between the neck and the shoulder of his father. He can smell his scent. It doesn’t feel familiar.
“I love you, beta,” says Dad. “You did the right thing.”
***
“I’m so proud,” Mom cries, two hours later, when Nil reaches her through the crowd of photographers. Mom, wearing a two hundred thousand rupees Sabyasachi Mukherjee dress, takes her leave from a journalist showing a Times badge around his neck.
Without losing her smile, Mom whispers in his ear, “Whatever the incident of three years ago, it was not you, and I’ve always known that. I always knew it was just a phase and that it would pass. And I was right, my darling. I’m so proud of you and I love you.”
“Me too, Mom.”
Mom hugs him, posing for the photographers. The Whole, a mixture of hatred, and despair, and affection, too, gurgles deep inside of Nil, and although he loves his mother, he repels the physical contact, and for this he hates himself.
“Study well and let us hear from you every day while we’re in Delhi,” she says. “And say goodbye to Jiya properly.”
At the name of his wife, Nil feels his guts squirm and it is not a pleasant feeling and it comes with all the loaded memories of last night.
“And Vogue?” he asks.
Mom, her mouth reduced to a slit, shakes her head with indifference. “Ah, Vogue is too mainstream. But I think L’Officiel is interested in a photo shoot.”
Later, as dusk filters through the large windows of the Taj, Nil manages to get through the mass of suck-ups with their pathetic questions and scroungers with their oily smiles, and finds Jiya surrounded by a swarm of camera flashes, and together they withdraw into a corner of an adjoining room furnished in colonial style and, sitting on exquisite and high backed chairs, she puts her hand in his and they pose as the ever happy couple, and it is all the perfect gift for the photographers whose lenses peer from the other room.
“So,” he starts, looking at her hand, “leaving already?”
“So it seems. My flight is tomorrow morning.”
“Heathrow or Gatwick?”
“Heathrow,” she says, “it’s more convenient—because of the subway.”
Nil tries not to show the embarrassment that thinking of her taking the subway gives him, and Jiya looks into his eyes for a moment before bursting out laughing.
“I’m joking,” she says. “It’s Heathrow because it’s closer to my apartment, and the driver knows the way.”
Nil feels his hands covered in a film of sweat.
“I’m sorry I can’t stay longer.” Her hand, soft and almost white, seems to stay dry no matter what.
“Never mind,” says Nil, perhaps with a little too much emphasis.
Jiya falls silent and turns away. He looks around the room and notes that the carpets smell like cinnamon and lemon.
“I’m sorry about last night,” he says.
“No,” she says, “don’t mention it. I care about you, Nil, you know I do.” Her voice sounds both distant and earnest and, as she says this, she seems more interested in the fine curtains and the gleaming candelabra and the well-lit chandelier scattered around the room.
Nil breathes in and would like to take his hands away from hers and he almost does, but he senses the vultures with their shutters still looming behind them.
“Excited?” he asks when the silence between them becomes deafening.
“About graduating, about the internship or about our marriage?” She laughs, pushing her hair behind her ear. “Of course I am, every engineering student would give a lung to work at General Motors. Plus, I got this without Dad’s help.”
Nil nods and his eyes wander to the lion-shaped feet of the pink-covered ottoman beside his feet.
“What about you?” Jiya asks, breaking the silence again.
“I—” Nil starts and he would like to tell her everything about the investigation and the accident and Ferang and yes, about Mel, too, but out of the thousands of words buzzing in his skull not one seems to be appropriate, and he find himself still thinking of an answer when Jiya’s hand moves to his knee.
“See you when I get back, then,” she says.
“Yes.” Nil looks at his own hands and feels cold. “I’ll come see you when you graduate.”
“Don’t worry. Think about finishing your work here. I know you are doing something that matters.”
Jiya glances at the photographers who, hungry for juice, are leaning over from the adjoining room.
“I’m going to kiss you on the cheek now,” she says, leaning toward him and resting her lips not far from the corner of his mouth.
***
The sun has faded by the time Nil finishes off the formalities with the guests. He got rid of his batchmates and professors and leaves the Taj with Mel and Ferang. In Nil’s Mercedes—a white E300 with a golden band running along the sides—he uncorks a bottle of Krug and drinks to their friendship, and Mel looks fresh and her mere presence is enough for Nil to feel invigorated after the tedium of the day.
They sit immersed in comfortable silence and Ferang, rolling over the cup in his hands, says, “Incredible, the cost of this bottle alone could send six of my kids to school.”
Nobody acknowledges him.
The trip through the tangle of the city traffic is slow and Mel reads about half of The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares and Ferang scribbles zealously on a leatherette-bound notebook and Nil listens to Polly by Nirvana forty times over on loop, craning his neck from time to time to steal glances of Mel’s bright hair and upturned nose.
“I didn’t see Careena at the wedding,” says Ferang, closing the notebook and placing it in his lap.
“Yeah,” Mel says. She doesn’t look up from her read. “Maybe because she’s in rehab?”
“Again?” goes Nil.
“Apparently they found her passed out in the University elevator.”
Nil pauses the music. “Again?”
“Crack,” Mel and Ferang say in unison.
Objects in the Mirror Page 3