by Preethi Nair
I went into their room and sat on the bed.
‘Ma, Dad, I have something I want to tell you.’
‘What is it, beta?’ my mother asked.
‘There really is no easy way to do this and I want you to know that I tried, I tried my best to make you happy but …’
Mum put her hand to her heart.
Dad put his teacup down. ‘You’ve given up work, I knew it,’ he interrupted. ‘Please tell me it’s not this, you could have waited until you were married. What if Raj’s family finds out, then what?’ he shouted.
‘It’s not that.’
‘Thank Bhagavan …’
‘It’s …’
‘Oh Bhagavan, don’t tell me she’s not going to pay for the wedding. She was the one who …’
‘I’m not getting married,’ I blurted.
There was a gasp from my mother.
‘April the fool in March,’ my father laughed.
‘No Dad, I’ve told Raj that I can’t marry him.’
‘Hare Ram,’ my mother wailed, clasping both hands to her heart.
‘What do you mean?’ my father screamed. ‘Only two weeks left, you have to. The guests, the Hilton, all organised.’
‘I’m really sorry, I can’t do it.’
‘No choice. I felt the same when I saw your mother but there is no choice and look how happy we are now.’ He grabbed her.
‘I can’t, I know I can’t.’
My mother began blubbering.
‘Kavitha, tell her she won’t find a good boy coming from a good family like that anywhere. Tell her, nobody takes girls who can’t cook and she’s getting old now. Tell her, make her understand nobody will want to look after her.’
My mother was unable to speak.
‘I’m not going through with it.’
‘Why?’ he shouted.
‘Because I don’t love him.’
‘It’s not about the love, it’s about duty.’
‘Then I can’t do my duty.’
‘Please, beta, please think, think what you are doing to us,’ my mother sobbed.
‘Everything I did I tried to do for you, but I’ve realised it will never be enough – and you know why, because what you want for me is not what I want. I’m sorry, I never meant to hurt you, never meant to hurt anyone, but I can’t pretend any more.’
‘Pretend? Nobody is asking you to pretend, just to marry him,’ my dad yelled.
‘Every day I pretend. I paint. Do you know that about me? Every day I get up, put on a suit and go to paint?’
‘Paint? And the love?’
‘There is no law, there hasn’t been for the last three months.’
‘The van,’ he shouted. ‘I knew this. Dickheads struggling and you telling me this? It’s the Jeannie who has put the thoughts into your head.’
‘Nobody has. Did you hear me, Dad? I paint, I’ve given up work so I can paint and when I am painting it’s the only time I’m me. I don’t have to be anyone else but me.’
‘No, no, no,’ my mother cried.
‘And I might as well tell you all of it. There’s someone else.’
At this stage my mum passed out.
‘Jeannie,’ my dad raged.
‘His name is Michael.’
‘Leave, leave my house,’ my father screamed. ‘Take your dirty van and go to wherever your sister has gone.’
I went to pack my things together and they didn’t even try to stop me. My father told my mother to let me go, that I was an even greater disappointment to him than my sister. The problem, he said, was that he had loved us too much and given us too much freedom. Maybe he didn’t love us enough. If he did, he could have let us be ourselves.
Maybe loving us didn’t even enter into the equation. It was all about keeping us clothed and fed and doing his best to do his duty and this was, for him, loving us. Seeing me married off was being a good father. No matter how much I argued that it was important to be happy, he wouldn’t understand. Happiness was a luxury, an expectation, you weren’t supposed to be happy, you were supposed to get on with it and try to make the best of every situation.
‘See, Nina, you talks always about the feelings, if you talks about the feelings who will pay the bills. One day you can be happy, one day you can be sad, the feelings they comes and goes but the routine this never changes.’
That is what they clung to and by doing what they wanted me to do and what was always done I would have made them proud, but by being me … the only way they could handle that was by telling me to go. I understood at that moment what my sister must have felt – a complete and utter disappointment to them.
Maybe that’s what happens when you are forced to move continents and come to a foreign place; you become incredibly practical and don’t get attached to anything again, not even your children.
I drove to Gina’s house and rang the bell. It was seven o’clock in the morning. Nobody answered so I kept on ringing.
‘Go away, there’s nobody in,’ she shouted from her window.
‘Gina, it’s me. Will you let me in?’
‘Bloody hell, Nina. What time is it?’ She opened the door, half-asleep. ‘Jesus, what’s happened?’
‘I’ve told my parents everything and they’ve thrown me out. Can’t find Michael anywhere, Mangetti didn’t show and I’ve crushed Raj …’
‘Slow down, slow down. Come in.’ She took my bags and led me to the kitchen.
‘Your mum and dad have thrown you out and you’ve left that pretentious guy?’
‘How am I going to manage? And Michael, he knows about Raj and he didn’t give me a chance to explain. It’s all gone wrong. I’ve hurt people, I’ve got no money, no job, no family, nowhere to go,’ I put my head in my hands and sobbed. ‘It was all just one crazy idea … mad … mad.’
‘Don’t worry, sweetheart, I know it’s not much but you’ve got me. If you don’t mind sleeping on the sofa you can stay here until you get yourself sorted. Let’s make you something to eat and you can tell me properly.’
‘I can’t eat. You know he just told me to go. They both did, and when I went to speak to them they just closed the door and asked for my keys back. My mum was crying hysterically. What have I done to them? All for what? For nothing.’
‘They’ll come round, you’ll see. The first thing you gotta do is have a good sleep, you can’t think straight like this. Then have a shower, get dressed, and go find Michael.’
She made up the sofa, made me some tea, and sat down and listened to me ramble until I exhausted myself and fell asleep.
It was five o’clock in the afternoon when I resurfaced. My dad would be arriving home from work, my mum would be in the kitchen making rotis. Sleep didn’t make things feel any better. I got ready and made my way to Artusion. Michael wasn’t there. Emanuel Hikatari came down from his office to thank me for the successful coverage Foruki had received. I enquired after Michael but he told me that Michael had already left for New York.
No, he couldn’t have gone, not without giving me an opportunity to explain, not like that.
‘But I need to speak to him, about the exhibition,’ I added, trying not to sound desperate.
‘The gallery manager, who I believe you met yesterday, will be taking over the day-to-day running; so if he can be of help?’
‘It was really Michael I needed to speak to.’
Emanuel gave me the numbers for Artusion in New York and said that he would tell Michael that I needed to speak to him.
As I stepped out of Artusion my phone rang.
‘Michael?’
‘No.’ It was Raj’s mother. ‘It’s true, you don’t want my son?’ She was incredibly calm considering she had six hundred and fifty guests and no wedding.
‘I’m so sorry, Auntie, I never meant for any of this to happen.’
‘Tell me, why?’
I wanted to be as honest as I could with her. ‘I don’t love him.’
‘When does love come into it? Just marry him; th
ese things will come later.’
‘I didn’t mean for this to happen.’
‘Then how else has it happened? You can change it.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘There is nothing I can say to make you change your mind?’
‘No.’
She turned on me. ‘I knew from the first time I set eyes on you that you were cheap. Look what kind of family you come from. One could hardly expect better.’
‘It’s got nothing to do with Mum and Dad. Don’t take this out on them.’
‘They raised you,’ she shouted. ‘What can one expect these people to raise? You cheating housie.’ It was inappropriate to tell her that the word she was looking for was hussy so I let her vent.
‘Who is this Michael? You’re leaving my son for him? Don’t think I won’t make you and your family suffer for this.’
And then the words flew out: ‘Maybe if you didn’t spend half your life trying to control your son’s life he would be happier, and maybe, just maybe, the others wouldn’t have left.’
‘What?’ she screamed. ‘I’ll make sure you won’t be able to set foot anywhere without people knowing how cheap you are, and I promise you, I will make you pay for this.’
I cut her off. It was probably the wrong thing to do but when was I ever good at doing anything right?
Gina wasn’t home when I got back. I called home. My dad picked it up and as soon as I spoke he put the phone down. I called once more and he did the same. I waited by the phone for a few hours and tried again. My mother answered and I could hear my dad shouting in the background, ‘If that is the unemployed fooler, tell her if she says there has been some mistake and that she will marry Raj she can come back.’
‘You’ll marry him?’
‘No, Ma, but listen to me, please.’
She hung up.
I left a message for Michael. ‘Michael, it’s me. I never thought it was possible to fall in love with someone just like that. There, I’ve said it. I’m not marrying Raj. I had my reasons. Can I explain? Please, just pick up your phone and hear me out.’
He didn’t call back.
It was dark; I went to the studio and stared at the blank canvas. The only thing that reflected back at me was emptiness and the bits that hurt. Taking out the blue and black paint, I mixed them together in a tin pot and then dipped my hand in it. An explosion of bluish black paint was thrown on the canvas and I swirled it around with my fingertips. Nobody cared if I returned home with dirty fingernails, nobody cared if I had paint smeared across my face or in my hair. After I’d finished I sat desperately trying to find some light in the painting but there wasn’t any. No spaces between the movement that I could paint white. I stared hard.
‘I know you’re still there, Ki. I haven’t come this far to believe you not to be but I’ve made such a mess of things. A really big, awful mess. I should have told him, I know I should have, but I never found the right time. I didn’t even want to begin to think it was love because that kind of love hurts. It’s safer not to really love someone, Ki, because they go, don’t they?
‘And Mum and Dad, I held on to them because I didn’t want them not to love me any more, so I tried, I really did. I don’t know what to do now.’
I lay curled up on the floor, crying. Paint was sprawled everywhere, across my face, hair and clothes. I must have fallen asleep there because I was woken by the studio door being pulled open.
‘Hell, Nina, it’s not that bad. It isn’t, look, look what they’ve written about you.’ Gina crouched down beside me and read from the paper she was holding.
‘“The enigma of Foruki. Foruki manages to capture the sense of obscurity to light on so many different levels as to be beyond simple explanation.” Another one here, look. “This is a collection that must be seen to appreciate the conceptual diversity and the bold use of colour …”
‘Nina, are you listening? What do you think?’
‘I don’t care any more.’
‘I know, but Imogene Bailey has also given the exhibition a brilliant review. She doesn’t write anything good about anyone, so it doesn’t matter if Mangetti didn’t turn up; all these paintings are going to sell.’
‘It doesn’t matter any more. Just lies; all of it.’
‘You can’t give up, not now. Come on, Nina.’
‘What am I supposed to do? Michael’s gone. He’s not coming back. I have no family, no home, and a whole load of pictures done by someone who doesn’t even exist.’
‘Keep believing, maybe? Believe that it will all work out? That’s what you say, isn’t it?’
‘I can’t see the light between the spaces,’ I cried. ‘The only place I have been able to see it is on the canvas. Even when it hasn’t been there.’
‘We’ll paint some, look,’ she said, picking up the white tube. ‘Let’s pretend it’s there and paint. Come on, Nina, get up and start again. We can do this.’
She oozed the entire tube of white into a tin and mixed it with water and dipped her hand in, and then held it out to me so she could help me up. The paint dripped from our hands onto the floor.
‘You ready?’ she asked.
Together, we pressed our palms onto the canvas and covered every part of it with our white prints, and after we had finished Gina washed my hands for me with soap and water.
‘Tomorrow we’ll paint flowers there. Come on, Nina, let’s get you home.’
It had been incredibly hard going back to school after my accident: everything hurt, my sister had gone, she didn’t drop me off or pick me up any more, there was no one or nothing to be proud of. The other children at school, perhaps sensing my self-pity, stayed away and didn’t play with me. I watched from the sidelines feeling inadequate and alienated, completely unaware that someone was watching. Ki took me from the sidelines to the centre of every game, she saw something in me that was baffling even to myself. That is what Gina did too; she made me want to leave all the questions behind and start all over again, even though every part of me hurt.
The following day, like children, we went into the studio together. There wasn’t really space for the both of us but Gina made it feel like ten people could fit in. We painted what we wanted to see and not what was there – huge, colourful flowers absorbing sunny optimistic colours, eliminating any signs of shadows.
Despite the fact that I had virtually no money left and was supposed to hand the studio back to Gina, she said I could share it with her for as long as I needed to. After we painted, she went to the flat and I went for a long walk in Green Park to try and sort out my thoughts. This had begun because all I ever wanted to do was paint, and that was what I decided I was going to continue to do. I would work part-time like Gina did. If even a few paintings sold from Foruki’s exhibition, I would have enough money to rent my own studio and flat. I sat on the bench making plans. For the first time I could see myself being my own person, completely self-sufficient.
The phone rang while I was sitting writing notes on the bench. There was a fuzzy background noise. It sounded long-distance.
‘Michael, is that you?’
‘Tastudi Mangetti here.’
‘Oh, hello,’ I replied disappointed. It was ironic; if he had called me a week ago I would have been jumping up and down, but now, impressing him was the thing that mattered to me least.
‘Nina? Nina Savani?’
‘Yes it’s me. How can I help you?’
‘I saw Foruki’s work. I prefer to see work in the starkness of an empty room. That is when you see if it holds its own. What can I say? Interesting? Original? The use of colour is impressive.’
‘Right.’ When had he gone to see it? He wasn’t there at the exhibition.
His tone suggested that he expected me to be more enthusiastic. ‘Right?’ he repeated.
‘I mean, yes, I know – so how can I help you?’ I asked, trying to focus.
‘Foruki is good, very good. That was you I heard on the radio, wasn’t it? I agreed with what you said abo
ut art now being more about the artist and moving even further away from the subject matter.’
‘You did?’
‘Yes. This is what I like about Foruki’s work, his focus on the subject matter. I was told he didn’t even turn up to the opening.’
‘That’s right, he didn’t. He’s media shy.’
‘There is something that I would like to discuss with him and it is of a delicate nature. When can we set up a meeting?’
What did he want to talk to him about? Did he want to buy a painting? If he did I could rent my own studio but I couldn’t produce Foruki, no more lying. ‘Could you give me an indication as to what it is about?’ I asked calmly.
‘The Turner Prize. I want him to be entered in for it but I’d like to discuss a few things with him first.’
I nearly fell off the bench. The Turner Prize? He was having a joke. Foruki and the bloody Turner Prize? Hold it together, Nina, say it’s not possible – you can’t pull that off, you’re not lying any more. ‘Mr Mangetti, I have to let you know now it may not be possible to convince him to meet with you.’ I didn’t want to lie, even if he was handing me the crown jewels on a plate.
‘I’m sure you’re skilful enough to persuade anyone, Ms Savani, and it would be to our mutual benefit. One more thing, why are all those paintings earmarked? You said you would give me first option. Are you saying that those paintings have been sold and that the buddha is still not for sale? Surely you can persuade Foruki to sell it to me?’
I felt overwhelmed. He could buy all the paintings if he wanted but not the buddha.
‘That particular one is not for sale.’
‘Surely you of all people could manage something? Persuade him to meet with me and I will make sure it is worth your while.’
I needed to end the conversation, I needed time to assimilate what he was saying.
‘Mr Mangetti, I will call you back once I have had an opportunity to speak to Foruki.’
‘I look forward to hearing back from you soon,’ he replied.
What was going on? It was complete madness, Foruki being entered for the Turner Prize. No, I couldn’t go that far; it was ridiculous. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Mangetti hadn’t even turned up to the opening night. How could he want Foruki to be entered for the Turner? It wasn’t making sense.