She knew little about his family. He was an only child, descended from what he referred to as ‘poor white trash’. His mother was somewhere in California, following around faith healers. His father was an alcoholic, and long dead.
When he spoke of his parents, his eyes blazed with hatred. When it all became too much, he’d reach for the CD player and turn on the Stones.
She’d been to concerts with him. In Pittsburgh, Toronto, Montreal and Arizona. She’d even met the ‘family’.
The ‘family’ were a bunch of diehard Stones fans: aging, male hippies, with good jobs, fat wallets and no children. One of his ‘brothers’ had seen them 150 times and knew the lyrics better than Jagger. Another guy draped every inch of his body in Stones merchandise. Caps, underwear, t-shirts, tongue-pins, jackets, the lot. And one had even worn ear-plugs to see Elton John to preserve his hearing for when the Stones played the next day.
Before and after concerts, the ‘family’ hung out together. They shared their stories, ate pizza and exchanged warm, drunken hugs. Monisha found herself tagging along for the ride and eventually she began to have fun.
But the ‘family’ only came together when the Stones played. If there was no tour they didn’t see each other for months. Years even. All of them simply evaporated into cyberspace and their relationship was whittled down to a few glum posts on a website.
Her relationship with Michael Wilton followed the same arc. A flurry of texts and visits before a show. Excitement. Pyrotechnics. Then days or weeks of nothing.
Thankfully her work was all consuming. She was starting a new placement in ‘solid tumours’ with different bosses. In the evenings she led the revision group for board exams. But above all this came the demands of the frontline, that bloody battlefield she visited every day: the oncology ward.
However distasteful things were in her private life, Michael Wilton provided a distraction. A temporary escape from the dark world of cancer and the trail of devastation it left behind. And, just like John Davidson had said, without lab work and research, clinical oncology was soul destroying.
On some days she left for home, weeping helplessly. Usually because they’d lost a young mother, a teenager or, even worse, someone who’d just been given the ‘all clear’.
If Michael Wilton showed up, to watch PBS, play a few songs and discuss Chappaquiddick, she’d feel better. And, after some time, the fridge raiding and vinegary gym socks were forgiven and forgotten about.
47
Tina was pregnant. Her once neat strawberry-blonde hair was now red, curly and chemical-free. Her forehead was splotchy from chloasma marks. She paired stretchy slacks with crop tops, belched between sentences and was back on the gluten. But, most astoundingly, her taut, gym-bunny derriere had tripled in size. And she couldn’t give a monkey’s. Neither did Justin. Because Tina was carrying his child.
Monisha yearned for babies too. Lately, when she strolled through the park, her eyes flicked past the fiery birches, and onto the swings and sand pit. A wistful feeling came over her when saw a mother pushing a pram. And, of course, every time she met Tina. Right now, her only hope was to have Michael Wilton’s baby, no matter what he’d said.
In her head, she devised a plan. She’d make a pin-prick in a condom and create the teeniest hole. But then she remembered that he used his own condoms, and he kept them on him at all times.
Plan B was equally duplicitous. She’d get him drunk. They’d have bumping, grinding, condom-splitting sex. Except that it was never that bumpy. Or grindy.
One Saturday afternoon, Michael Wilton had barely made it through the front door when she whipped off her clothes and launched herself onto him with a flying leap.
“Whoa,” he cried, reaching for a condom from his pocket. She kept him going, for almost an hour, until she was red raw and he looked as though he might collapse.
But when it was over he sat up with a jolt. She watched with horror as he performed the same gruesome routine. Yanking off the slippery rubber. Inspecting the ejaculate. Twirling the condom into a knot and taking it to the bathroom himself.
The sound of the flush made her scream. He didn’t notice.
Moments later Michael lay sprawled out on the L-shaped couch, clutching a beer. He seemed mesmerised by the latest offering from PBS: a programme on hidden treasures in the White House.
Monisha threw on her towelling robe and tiptoed in. Eventually she asked herself a painful question. Was this how it was going to be, year upon year? Him lounging about in his underwear slurping beer and she, his faithful food shopper and fridge stocker. Hanging out in hope for the next rock concert.
Like hot stew in a crockpot, the resentment bubbled away inside her. After a few minutes, Monisha marched over to the TV screen and stood in front of it. With her hands on her hips, she blocked his view of the White House.
“Don’t you ever want to settle down, Michael?”
He arched himself round so he could see. She stretched her arms out wide and made it impossible.
“You’re just… never going to have kids?”
Michael Wilton shot up and threw the empty beer can onto the floor. Two droplets of amber liquid fell onto her pristine rug. Then he glared at her, his eyes turning a murky green.
“Here we fucking go! It’s that friend of yours, isn’t it? The one who looks like a beached whale now.”
“At least she’s happy!” said Monisha. “And so is her husband.”
He began laughing, an evil, mocking laugh. Then he spat out his words like viper venom.
“Well, he won’t be when it’s out. Fucking her will be like fucking the Grand Canyon!”
Monisha froze in front of the screen, her eyes welling up. Michael Wilton continued his foul-mouthed rant, with his arms waving and his fingers pointing.
“And they won’t be able to go anywhere when the kid is born. She’ll be one of those fucking psychos with a nanny-cam! They could never go to see the Stones, like we do.”
Monisha let out an exasperated groan.
“The Stones have kids Michael. They’re still having kids!”
“That’s because they earn shitloads of money.”
“You’ve FUNDED them, Michael. You’ve funded their kids. You and Ray and Chuck. The whole crazy, fucked-up lot of you!”
Michael Wilton looked up blankly, dumbstruck by the suggestion. Flummoxed, in spite of his Ivy League degree.
Monisha marched over to the couch and snatched the remote control from his hands. She pointed it at the TV. After a brief silence, her voice echoed from within the fur-lined prison cell. But this time it sounded different: calm, clear and determined. It was the same voice which had told Mrs Kulkarni that she wouldn’t be staying for breakfast, that she was leaving the marriage.
“Well, I’ll be having a child, Michael. With you or without you. And sooner, rather than later.”
Michael Wilton shuddered. His green eyes slowly began fogging up. It was a familiar sound, that death rattle that spelled the end. After all the flapping and whirling, another one would get away. She’d disappear into a murky underworld filled with ludicrous things, like baby showers. And he’d be off to the sports bar again with yet another willing victim.
He rushed to the door, trouser legs only half way up. “GO FUCK UP YOUR LIFE THEN!”
“FINE, I WILL!” screamed Monisha through the open doorway.
She slammed the door and immediately turned to look at the clock on the oven. Her heart was fluttering. She clutched her chest and took in a breath.
Think, think, what time was it now in Mumbai?
The Dases would be at Sitara Road this weekend and afterwards they’d be heading back to Vermont with her parents. A big job lay ahead for the Bastikar family now. The Adam Court house was going up for sale.
Monisha pressed the numbers on a touchphone. She could not do this on Skype, there wer
e too many onlookers. A helper answered.
“Could I speak to Aunty Swati please?”
Amidst the crackling noises she heard a weary “Hello.”
“Aunty Swati, what do you think about me having a baby with a sperm donor? You could be its grandmother… Well, one of the grandmothers!”
The shocked silence came like a kick in the guts. Hours seemed to pass.
“I think that’s a wonderful idea, Monisha! We’ll, er… um… bake that cake together when I get back. Right now, your mom wants a word.”
Oh God! Oh God! Poor Aunty Swati. It must have been all the people hovering round.
“Monisha, are you well?” screeched Leela Bastikar.
“Yep fine.”
Her mother would die when she heard! She could conceal it. Say nothing until she was showing. A grown woman didn’t need permission from her mother to get pregnant. Unless it didn’t work and she had to adopt. Her mother might have to provide a character reference. She’d have to be super nice to her from now on.
“Did you remember to ring the carpenter?” asked Mrs Bastikar.
Damn! She’d forgotten.
“Why not? We reminded you!”
Why not? Because the wards were full of cancer. Because Tina was having a baby. And, because when she’d wanted one, Michael Wilton had just upped and left.
48
Twenty-three Adam Court was going up for sale. Its only tenants, a newly arrived Indian family, had long gone. Swanker was using it as a crash pad until his transfer to Chicago. And he hadn’t exactly kept it tidy; because, he said, it was more like a time capsule than a house. It badly needed renovating. The yard was littered with fallen trees from last year’s storms. The garage was stuffed with boxes of their childhood things. The avocado bathroom suite had to go. And the ground floor was crying out for a kitchen-diner.
When the Bastikars had pitched the place as an ‘attractive project’, the realtors weren’t interested. If the work wasn’t done, the house wouldn’t sell.
Aunt Romila helped stir things up by suggesting to her sister that a few months in the States to supervise the renovation would ‘do everyone a world of good’. Uncle Shyam and Uncle Rohit rarely visited Sitara Road now; they were getting tired of their non-resident relatives incessantly moaning about Mumbai.
Consequently, Leela and Amit Bastikar found themselves in the uncomfortable position of having to travel back to Vermont, in the lead up to winter, to spend time and money on a house that they would never live in, destroying countless precious memories in the process. But it had to be done. Without the money, how could they ever downsize into a flat? Or more importantly, afford Swanker’s wedding.
One Sunday morning, a few days after they arrived, Mrs Bastikar asked the Dases over to help strip wallpaper. Outside, thick rain clouds were gathering; the drizzle was due anytime soon. The Dases came early, but after breakfast and coffee, progress was slow.
Swanker was busy making trips to the dump. Professor Bastikar had to be driven to the drug store when he hurt his shoulder. Ultimately, Mrs Bastikar, Monisha and Aunty Swati were left holding the sponges. They started in the master bedroom, two scraping, one steaming.
The room was dusty and dated, the queen-sized bed adorned with a chintz cover and crocheted cushions. There was a single picture on the wall that the tenants hadn’t taken down: a family photograph of Amit Bastikar in a suit, carrying four-year-old Swanker on one hip. Mrs Bastikar stood next to him in burnt orange silk, with her arm wrapped around Monisha, who wore a pink, puffy dress and a bow in her hair.
Aunty Swati stood on the foot stool and ran the scraper along the wall opposite the photograph. Half an hour in, she’d worked up a sweat.
“How’s Michael Wilton?” she suddenly asked. “It must have been a year now at least.”
Monisha tried to block out the image of him running out through the front door while still putting on his jeans. She rolled the steamer up and down with heavier strokes.
“He didn’t want marriage… or kids.”
Leela Bastikar dropped her wet sponge and picked up a scraper, all the while she stared incredulously at Monisha.
“Why waste time with someone like that when there are thousands of guys who do?”
Monisha sighed and shook her head. A square of vintage, floral wallpaper curled and flopped into her hands. Neatly and simply, unlike anything else in her life.
“There are thousands of guys who don’t want kids, Mom, and thousands who want them, have them and leave them. The rest are a minority.”
Aunty Swati interrupted. “What’s the point of getting married, just to be controlled by someone else? If I were her age, I’d be dating lots of men.” She paused, then raised her voice above the harsh scraping noises. “These days you can even have a child on your own.”
Monisha felt a rush of butterflies swirling round her stomach. This was it. Aunty Swati was doing as promised; she was baking the cake.
Leela Bastikar shrieked. “Hai Ram! What are you talking about, Swati? What sort of ideas are you planting in her head?”
Suddenly Swati Das was livid. Her eyes swelled with rage, until they were almost ready to pop out of their sockets. Thirty years of childlessness had prepared her for this moment. A lifetime spent attending christenings, birthdays, sacred thread ceremonies and graduations. With nothing to show of her own.
She flung the scraper onto the floor and met her friend’s gaze.
“YOU WOULDN’T HAVE A CLUE WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT LEELA, BECAUSE YOU HAVEN’T FACED WHAT I’VE FACED!”
A bone-chilling silence swept the room. Seconds turned swiftly into minutes. Swati Das sat herself down on the foot stool. Her oversized, paint-stained shirt hung limply round her toned legs. Her unlined face and the odd strand of grey in her jet-black hair glimmered under the ceiling lights. At fifty-four, she found herself wandering adrift, in a middle-aged wasteland. A strange time in a woman’s life.
Like three o’clock, too late for lunch, but far too early for tea or dinner.
Stone-faced, she recounted the lurid details of her picture-perfect marriage. It was Saurav’s fault they were childless, all because of his ‘failing testicles’. They’d visited fertility clinics, but he’d backed out of using donor sperm. And, when she desperately wanted to adopt, he wasn’t interested. He would never have left his practice to go scouting round orphanages in India. And he knew darn well the authorities wouldn’t let her do it alone.
Throughout the years, Swati Das had suffered in silence. He had his ‘medicine’, she had her dead-end bank job. On weekends she doled out the invites. Played charming hostess and dutiful wife. Everybody loved the Dases, especially Saurav, so handsome and witty! The couple’s closeness was enviable; they finished each other’s sentences.
Twice she’d taken an overdose. Saurav pumped her stomach himself, so it never got out.
She was resigned to her fate; her mother had said. Paying a hefty price for her attractive, adoring husband, and inextricably bound to him for seven lives.
Leela Bastikar wiped her eyes. Then she shuffled over to her friend, and extended one arm, ready to place it round her shoulders. But Swati Das shook her head vehemently and resisted.
“If I were Monisha’s age, Leela, I would have left long ago. And if I couldn’t find a man, I’d get a sperm donor.”
Leela Bastikar raised her eyebrows. Eventually, she managed a hesitant nod. Monisha put aside the stepladder and placed herself between the two women. Her stomach began churning. She took in a breath, sharp and quick.
“Mom… I want a baby. I’m almost thirty-six now. My eggs are running out. If I wait for the right man, it may never happen.”
She paused, in anticipation of her mother’s reply. When none came Monisha took in another breath, deeper this time.
“So, I’m going to try with a sperm donor, and if it doesn’t
work, I’ll adopt. Either way I’ll be a mom and Aunty Swati can be a grandmother too.”
Leela Bastikar froze, then clutched her chest. She could not bring herself to look at her daughter, nor her best friend. Instead, she stared down at the floor, where the vintage, floral wallpaper, with its purple pansies and blood-red roses, lay in tatters round her feet. Out of the blue, a flood of memories came bursting through.
Thirty-five years ago, she’d held her new baby daughter. Curled one finger round her tiny toes. She hadn’t known whether she was having a boy or a girl. They’d bought this wallpaper on their way home from the hospital. Then Amit read somewhere that nurseries should be soothing places and not too bright. So, they’d kept it for their own room.
Three years later, her beloved baby boy arrived and with him the congratulatory telegram from her overjoyed parents; Swanker was their first grandson.
Leela Bastikar lifted her head. Her eye caught the photograph on the wall, taken when the kids were four and seven. Oh, those sacred days! Of balloons and bubble baths. Cut knees and falling teeth. Endless trips between swimming pools and skating rinks.
And to think that whenever Saurav Das announced he was taking his wife on a luxury cruise, she’d actually felt jealous! When all along it was Swati who’d missed out on the most incredible journey.
Mrs Bastikar placed her arms round Monisha and Swati. Weeping and blubbering, she clasped them both tightly.
“I’ve been blessed. So blessed! Who am I to stop you, Monisha? And how could I stop our beloved Swati from becoming a grandmother?”
Monisha raised her eyes to the heavens and murmured a ‘thank you’. For a few moments the women sat with their arms linked together. Leela Bastikar and Swati reminisced about their first time in the States. How their itchy wool coats slung over their chiffon saris did little to block out the teeth-chattering cold. And how miserable they’d felt, relegated to an ice box like Vermont, when many of their friends had made it to LA.
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