The Secrets Between Us

by Thrity Umrigar

  The boy hesitates. “What about the shop? Vishnu is not coming back for another half hour.”

  “I’m here, na?” she yells. “Nothing will happen to your precious shop. I won’t budge until you bring the taxi.”

  The boy looks at her, stunned by her hysteria, and Bhima catches herself—“Don’t worry,” she says more softly. “You will only be gone a few minutes, correct?”

  When she stands at the entrance of the dilapidated Tejpal Mahal, the white-hot fever that has gripped her since the phone call, breaks. As she clutches the piece of paper in her hand, her courage ebbs. She thinks of what her father, or Gopal, or even Amit, would’ve said about her entering such a building. But then, she thinks of what Sunita and Chitra and Maya would require her to do, and feels their encouragement. A man is coming out of the building, and she lurches toward him and asks, “Forgive me. But this is Tejpal Mahal?”

  The man leers at her. “Yes, it is. You looking for a job here? Go talk to Mohan.”

  She flushes at the insult, her right hand buzzing with the urge to slap the leer off this boy’s face. She settles for spitting on the ground. “I’m old enough to be your grandmother. Show some respect.”

  But he is unchastened. “This isn’t a place for grandmothers,” he says before walking away.

  This isn’t a place for grandmothers. The words ring in her ears as she climbs the steps into the building and enters hell.

  She sees clusters of women standing on the balcony, their saris low-slung on their hips. She sees men walking around with their flies unzipped. She hears gales of laughter that sound false in their merriment, hears the notes of desperation and carelessness they hide. But what makes her stomach turn is the smell of the place—hot, fetid, musky. This is no place for an old woman to die. The words enter her mind as a fully formed sentence, and that is how she knows: Parvati isn’t just sick. She is dying. How did she not know this sooner? Her eyes burn with tears and a wild, trapped bird called grief flutters in her chest. She marches down the balcony, stops the first woman she sees. “Where can I find this Mohan? I need to see him straightaway.”

  She is surprised at how young-looking Mohan is and how handsome. The sweet face of Krishna, the dark heart of Ravan, she thinks. “I have come for Parvati,” she says, without preamble, and he looks up, as if surprised by the contempt in her voice. “This way,” he says, leading her.

  Her heart sinks again when she enters the tiny room. Only the high ceilings of the old building and the tiny quarter that she assumes is the bathroom distinguish it from her own hovel. The only furniture in the room is a narrow bed upon which lies a corpse. “Parvati,” Bhima says loudly. “Do you hear me?”

  There is a faint groan.

  “Sister.” Fear makes Bhima shake her harder than she intends. “Wake up.”

  Parvati’s eyes flutter open, and for a long moment they are terrifyingly blank. Bhima knows the old woman is struggling to place her. Then, as she comes to awareness, Parvati gives a weak smile. “Are you really here?”

  “Yes. How are you? What is wrong?” Bhima sniffs suspiciously in the air. Is this daru that she is smelling on Parvati? Mohan seems to have arrived at the same conclusion because he says, “So that’s the problem. The old boodhi is hung over.”

  “Chup re,” Bhima scolds, although the revelation that Parvati drinks has shaken her. Mohan’s eyes harden. “This tamasha has cost me enough. Chalo, get her out of here.”

  Bhima looks at the handsome young man with the soul of the devil who stands beside her. “You must’ve had a mother, na, beta?” she says. “Is this how you would want someone to treat her?”

  “You want to see my mother?” Mohan sneers. “Go to the third floor. She’s the whore with the hashish pipe.” He laughs, but there is something hollow in it.

  “Maaf karo,” Bhima says, not knowing what she is sorry for. “At least help me get Parvati off the bed, beta. And then, if you can fetch me a taxi, I will be grateful.”

  Mohan goes to the door and yells to someone down the hallway to get a taxi. Then he comes back and says impatiently, “Chalo. Get up.” He bends and lifts Parvati up from both shoulders until her feet are dangling on the floor. The woman sits gripping the edge of the bed, her chin touching the grapefruit on her throat. A string of spittle runs down the corner of her mouth. Bhima is gripped by a spasm of fear. Where will she take Parvati in this state? How will she manage? She winces as Mohan grabs her roughly from the armpits and begins walking her to the door, but she is in no position to plead for gentleness. She looks around the room and grabs Parvati’s white cloth bag.

  “Where to?” the cabdriver says, and Bhima has no choice but to say, “Gharib Nagar.” But during the cab ride she looks at the dozing woman and is furious at the thought of Maya seeing Parvati drunk. First, two women who love each other like menfolk. And now, a drunk, foul-mouthed business partner with a past. She is a bad grandmother to be bringing Maya in contact with such people.

  The cabdriver parks his taxi illegally to help her half carry, half drag Parvati into the slum. Bhima shuts her ears to the screams and laughter of the slum children, steels herself to the snickers and open stares of her neighbors. When at last they reach her front door, she pays the driver and gives him a tip. “You behave, accha?” she whispers to Parvati, who is thankfully looking a little less drunk. “Don’t scare my Maya.”

  But Maya is not home, Bhima remembers. The girl is away at Chitra’s house for a sitting. She is relieved. She gently lowers Parvati onto her mattress and then immediately starts the stove to make her a cup of tea.

  “Sorry, sorry,” Parvati is mumbling. “I am a bother to you. You should’ve just left me.”

  “I should have.” Bhima doesn’t try to hide her anger. “Next time you drink, you wicked woman, I will leave you in the gutter.”

  “Kya karu, sister?” Parvati says, in a weak, submissive voice Bhima has never heard before. “The pain was unbearable last night. One of the girls took pity on me.”

  Bhima’s heart stops. “The pain?”

  “Yes. From this chikoo fruit growing on my backside. The doctor sahib had warned me. But I didn’t think . . .”

  Bhima turns off the stove abruptly. She walks to the mattress and lowers herself. Without asking for permission, she pulls down Parvati’s sari until she sees it. She gasps loudly, feeling her insides give way. The thing is the size of a child’s fist. And even though there’s no pus or blood or reddened area, it looks hostile. Angry. Evil. Not at all like a sweet chikoo fruit.

  “What did the doctor say?” she asks carefully, wanting to get the information from Parvati before she has fully awakened from her drunken state.

  But like the words to an old song, she knows what Parvati says before she says it: “He said it won’t be too much longer now, sister. And that the pain will be terrible.”

  They take turns staying at home with Parvati. Bhima gets up and goes to work as early as she can. In the afternoon, Maya relieves her. It is not what Bhima wants, having Maya selling produce at the marketplace, where her beauty attracts the unwanted stares of the young men who suddenly decide to walk past Vishnu’s shop twelve times a day. But Maya has time before she begins law college, and Bhima needs someone she can trust at the stall. There are a few terrible days when Maya makes mistakes that cost Bhima money she cannot afford to lose, but Maya is a quick study. People, especially the young men, don’t argue and bargain with her as they did with her grandmother. Bhima has stopped going to Chitra baby’s home in the afternoon. Any other mistress would have let her go on the spot, but Chitra only says, “I’m so sad, Bhima. How can we help you?” and Bhima bows her head, unable to speak.

  Instead, she goes home each afternoon. There is usually only a half hour gap when Parvati is alone, between the time Maya leaves for the market and Bhima leaves the girl in charge and heads home. Afternoons are a good time of the day for Parvati, and she might eat a little piece of bread, dipping it into the tea that Bhima makes as soon as she gets
home.

  “How was business this morning?” Parvati asks as they sip their tea.

  “Good.” Bhima takes a big gulp of tea. “One of the boys came around and asked for Maya. But he called her Eve. Said she sold him an apple yesterday.” She pauses. “This is a joke?”

  Parvati smiles faintly. “It’s from the Bible. The holy book the Christians follow.” She tells Bhima the story, but Bhima is not really listening, aware as she is of how exhausted Parvati looks.

  “You rest now,” she says gently. “Shut your eyes for a while.”

  Parvati nods. “Tomorrow I’m going to the market with you,” she says. “I’m tired of being a weight on your head. I am used to earning my own keep.”

  Bhima places her hand on the woman’s shoulder. “Theek hai,” she says. “That’s fine. Tomorrow you come with me. Accha?”

  They have been having the same conversation for a week.

  34

  Sometimes, she smells things, foul, putrid smells. Dying things. Then, she knows she’s smelling herself. Other times, she hears things. The flapping of the wings of a fly. The bored sound the stale air makes in the room. The rasp of her own breath. The growl of her stomach, the tick-tock of her heart, the strum of her bones. The swoosh of her blood. Always, always, there are sounds from beyond this closed door—children playing outside, a woman’s scream, a loud curse, the tring-tring of a bicycle bell—and these merge with the sound of her memories, the hot, urgent murmurs of strangers making love to her, the drone of Principal’s voice as she taught her the alphabet, the almost-forgotten sound of her mother’s voice telling her to sweep their little room, the smack of Rajesh’s open palm against her face, which sounded so different from the thud of his fists on her arm or shoulders. Above all, she hears the ticking of the clock, although there is no clock in this room. Still she hears it, relentless, steady, cruel, like the marching of an enemy army that draws closer and closer. Other times, she hears the stretching of trees toward the sky, the blades of grass straining toward the sun, the growing of the bones of children, the turmoil of the soil as the dead toss and turn in it. Or, she hears the incessant breathing of the oceans, the howling of the winds, the swell and shrink of the moon, the acrid burning of the sun that has tormented her for twenty years but whose heat she now craves. Between her own exhaustion and the medicine that Bhima has purchased to diminish her pain, the hours swell and ebb and as she drifts in and out of sleep, there is always the sound of time slipping away.

  Sometimes, a voice pierces through the fog and startles her awake. Today, the voice says, angrily, “Get out.” She has a vision of herself scrambling to her feet, rising from this mattress and hurrying out. But when she tries to do so, all she succeeds in doing is flexing her feet three times before she drifts off to sleep.

  Get out.

  The voice again.

  It is Rahul, Rajesh’s son. Five days after Parvati had watched unblinkingly as her husband’s skull had exploded in the flames of the funeral pyre, five days after she had returned to their apartment and scrubbed every wall and floor to get rid of the smells of Rajesh’s bedridden last years, five days after she had begun wearing her widow’s white and resolved to live out the rest of her days in this quiet, tranquil flat, a free woman at last, not owing anyone anything and not being owned by anybody, five days after she could touch her own skin, her own hair, her own genitals and believe that they belonged to her and no one else, five days after she had settled every claim that the world had made on her, Rahul had appeared at her door. He had been by her side during the last two, terrible days when Rajesh had struggled for breath, and she felt for him the closeness that springs up between those who have kept a deathbed vigil together. The boy had stood beside her as the fire consumed his father’s body, not shedding a tear, but she had not thought to wonder at this. And then, he had disappeared for five days, until he appeared, pale and withdrawn, at her door.

  “Rahul,” she said. “Come in, beta.”

  He walked in, looking around the flat as he did. He allowed her to open a bottle of Duke’s lemonade for him and set down a plate with a few Parle biscuits. Then he withdrew an envelope from his pocket and handed it to her. She took it, suddenly embarrassed. Did Rahul think that she, a new widow, needed his financial help? She did not. Rajesh had a pension and some savings, she knew. She would manage on that amount.

  It was a will. And it said that the flat in which she was living, the very chair that she sat in, the ground below her feet, the walls that were closing in, all belonged to Rahul. That Rajesh had disinherited her completely, that all his earthly possessions, he had bequeathed to his son. That her compensation for her devoted service, of cooking, cleaning, fucking, wiping his butt, spooning food into his mouth, was zero. When she could finally control the burning in her eyes and look up, she said, “I . . . I don’t understand . . .”

  “What you don’t understand? It’s simple. You are illegally occupying my house. And you need to get out.” Rahul’s left eye was twitching, but he did not look away.

  “Rahul. Be reasonable, beta. I’m an old widow. I have no one. Where do I go?”

  He stood up. “That is not my affair. I just want you out of my house immediately. Otherwise I call the police. Understand?”

  Parvati closed her eyes. Maybe Rahul would not be towering over her when she opened them again. But there he was. “I will be out on the streets,” she tried again. “At my age . . .”

  She had not known what fury was until she looked into his face. “Then go back where you came from before you decided to pollute this family. Go back to live among your own kind.”

  She flinched. Still, she put out an appeasing hand. “Beta. Show some mercy. I left that life behind me long ago.”

  He spat on the floor. “Well, that life never left you.”

  She was out of the apartment two days later, still reeling from the shock of the revelation that Rajesh had turned the apartment and pension over to Rahul during his trip to Pune decades ago. That this was the condition of Rahul allowing his father to remain in his life. And when Parvati went to the bank, she was told that Rahul had withdrawn every last paisa. Years ago, she herself had insisted that Rajesh add his son’s name on their joint account. She stood outside the bank and laughed mirthlessly at the irony.

  There was one person who could have reversed this reversal of fortune—Principal. A few slaps and threats from her goondas, a night spent in the police station on trumped-up charges, and Rahul would have begged her to take possession of the flat. This, she knew. And Principal would have done this for her, readily. But Parvati knew that she could never seek help from the one person who could help. She had left behind that life, forever. Instead, she had trudged to Praful. And Malik. The two boys, both sons of whores, had managed to have a semblance of a childhood because of her kindness toward them. And with their help she had knitted together a threadbare life for herself all these years. Until the God she refused to acknowledge had brought an angel called Bhima into her life.

  “Parvati,” Bhima yells, shaking her by the shoulders. “Wake up. You are having a bad sapana.”

  The older woman opens her eyes, sees Bhima, and blinks as she tries to fight off her hallucinations. “Bhima.” Her smile is unexpectedly bright. “You save me.”

  She sees Bhima looking at her cautiously. “I’m okay,” she struggles to reassure her. “I . . .” But it is all gone, the dream, like a thief slipping behind a wooden partition. Her mouth feels swollen, as if she has mothballs in it. “I must . . .” What must she do? Something urgent. Something she must tell. What? Who is looking at her with such frightened eyes? Is it her mother? “Ma,” she cries. “Help me, Ma.”

  “Parvati,” Bhima yells. “You are very sick. You hold on, sister. I am coming right back. I bring the doctor for you.”

  Don’t leave me, she wants to say, but Principal leaves her anyway. They are at the train station and her father is standing still, like a stake planted in the ground. Why didn’t the rain
s come? If only the rains had come. Saala badmash, she curses the rain. May your children’s children suffer. Is she itching? Where is she itching? Or is it paining? What’s paining? “Who is there?” she says loudly. “Kaun hai? Khabardar. Don’t you dare enter.”

  The doctor sahib talks mostly to Chitra. “She’s getting the wrong pain medicine,” he says. “Too strong. It’s making her hallucinate. We can try controlling the pain with something different.”

  “And if it doesn’t help?”

  He shrugs. “We can always go back to this.” He turns to Bhima, speaks to her in a low, respectful voice. “I want you to be prepared,” he says. “It will not be very long now. But I can try and make it so that she is more alert. Without suffering too much pain, of course.”

  “There’s nothing more to be done?” Chitra asks.

  “I spoke to the doctor at the government hospital. He says she would not even hear of chemo.” He hesitates. “How old is she? In her seventies? You have to ask yourself, we prolong her life to what end?”

  Hunched in a corner, almost tucked into herself, Maya lets out a sob, and Bhima looks at her sharply, placing a warning finger on her lip. The doctor looks at Bhima again. “As her sister, you have to decide. If you want aggressive treatment, I can shift her to the hospital.”

  Bhima opens her mouth to correct him, then stops. Let him think that Parvati is her sister. She realizes they are all looking at her for a decision, and she is paralyzed. But then she thinks of the miserable government hospital and an image comes to her: Parvati is a bright yellow kite with a cut string, stranded on earth. When she belongs to the sky. “I don’t care how long she lives,” she replies. “I just want her to go with honor.” And as soon as the words escape her mouth, she knows she has made the right decision.

  The doctor nods. “Good. Let’s try a dose of this tonight. And someone can call my clinic tomorrow and let me know if she’s a little less sleepy and confused.” He stoops a bit as he touches Bhima’s shoulder. “Don’t worry. I will be able to control the pain.”