by Abha Dawesar
“We’re going to teach her English,” I said, looking at Adit.
“That’s nice,” he said almost automatically. There was something patronizing in his tone. I felt like a child reciting my New Year’s resolutions to an adult. I got angry with myself and with him.
The phone rang just then, and I got up to get it. It was India.
“I can hear voices,” she said.
“My classmate Vidur and his dad, Adit, are here.” I felt really grown-up using Adit’s name. I wanted my mom to overhear me calling Adit by his name. I wanted to officialize our friendship.
“Is he nice? You’ve not mentioned Vidur before,” she said.
“Vidur’s great. He’s my best friend,” I said, hoping Vidur was listening.
“Can I talk to your mom?”
“What about?” I asked, feeling suspicious. I wished I’d been able to stop myself from asking.
“I want to thank her for dinner,” India said. She sounded a little irritated.
“I’ll call her,” I said, upset at her irritation. My voice had shrunk.
“Before you go, Anamika,” she said, pausing dramatically.
“Yes?” I asked. I felt she was going to break up with me.
“Will you call me later? I miss you,” she said. I was taken aback by her change of tone. Moreover, she had come for dinner just the previous night.
“I’ll call you when I can speak,” I whispered. There was no way I could leave the house and go away at night with Rani sleeping in my room.
“Tripta wants to talk to you,” I said to my mother.
“Ah!” my mother said, excusing herself. She smiled as she took the phone.
I sat next to Vidur and said in a low voice, as if I didn’t want Adit to hear, “That’s India.”
Vidur nodded knowingly. He liked that I had shared it with him. Adit stared at the curtains on the French windows of our living room, a somewhat blank expression on his face. I was feeling unreasonable and illogical. I had become upset at him for having a wife and for having grown distant. If I wanted to be his friend I needed to be pleasant. I felt immature.
My mother ended her conversation with India. As soon as I heard her say “bye” I had a tremendous urge to shock her. I wasn’t sure she had heard me say Adit’s name the first time.
“Adit,” I said.
“Yes?” he said, looking at me.
My mother, who was walking toward the sofa, stopped for a second. She wasn’t even calling him Mr. So & So or Col. So & So. She was going all out and calling him Colonel Sahib. She looked in his direction to see if he had taken offence at me.
“Have you read any books by Kundera?” I asked.
“No. Have you?” Adit asked as if it were a competition. He seemed to think I was asking him questions to show how much I knew.
“Is that your question to everybody?” my mother said with sudden irritation as she took her seat again. I could tell she was flustered by this new development, these adults I was friendly with and books I talked about. The air in the room had changed. I was upset with India and Adit, and they were both upset with me. My mother getting angry felt like the last straw. I thought of Sheela’s invitation to visit her house this weekend. It felt like the only thing to look forward to.
Rani came back into the living room and sat down on the floor a little distance from us. She placed her cup of tea on the floor next to her.
“I don’t know how she reads that stuff,” my mother said as if apologizing for my tastes.
Adit was still looking listlessly at the curtain.
“What sort of books does he write?” Vidur asked, coming to everyone’s rescue.
“He’s a Czech exile. There are overtones of magical realism in his work,” I said.
Vidur nodded, easily impressed by my words. He was more interested in what I was reading than either my mother or Adit. Adit came back from his drifting, flashed me a fake smile, and said, “Interesting.” His behavior had changed so much from earlier in the afternoon when he had touched his heart. He had become insufferably patronizing. I felt angry. I wanted to cause him a great amount of pain.
“Well, Colonel Sahib, you must have lived all over India in your days in the army. Which place have you enjoyed the most?” my mother asked.
“Ladakh and Kanyakumari. The tips of our country are the most dramatic. I couldn’t go to Ladakh now. My body is too old for the thin air up there.”
“I am sure you keep in good shape, Colonel Sahib,” my mother said. I thought of Adit’s muscular thighs, and the image of the Old Spice model from the TV commercials came to my head. They showed a close-up of his legs as he windsurfed, his quads sinewy and flexing. I drifted.
“She’s a power woman. She works for American Express,” Adit was saying.
“And do you want to join the army like your father or join a bank like your mother?” my mother asked Vidur.
“I want to join the army, ma’am,” Vidur said.
“That’s good, Colonel Sahib. He wants to walk in your footsteps,” my mother said.
“I don’t think it’s good at all,” Adit said sharply.
Alarmed by his reaction, my mother immediately said, “Anamika has no focus.”
“But Aunty, she comes first in class. You shouldn’t worry,” Vidur said in my defense.
My mother looked at me, and then at Vidur, and said, “What about all the competitive exams? She hasn’t been preparing for them.”
“Mom, I want to do physics,” I said.
“What sort of career is there in physics?” my mother said to the room in general.
I stole a glance at Rani. She was looking at all of us as we spoke. Adit took a quick look at her as well. From where we were sitting, the afternoon sun bounced off of her face, making it glow and look dark and shiny at the same time.
“She can do research at the National Center for Science or go to the U.S.,” Adit said.
We were done with our cups of tea. Adit and Vidur got up to leave. My mother shook hands with Adit again and said, “Thanks for helping Anamika with her physics.”
My heart nearly stopped. Vidur and I had forgotten to tell him the excuse we’d used. Vidur cleared his throat loudly. Adit was quick on the uptake and said, “Mrs. Sharma, you’re welcome. She’s a pleasure. Very brilliant girl you’ve got.” Then he stepped closer to me and ran his hand through my hair in what seemed a fatherly gesture, but when his hand reached the back of my head he pinched it at the spot where it always felt tense to me. Only Rani noticed. She would rub my neck there whenever she gave me a massage.
After they were gone I pulled out my books to study.
My mother walked into the room with my almonds and asked casually, “So, how come you called Colonel Sahib by his name?”
I immediately felt defensive. Before I could think of what I was saying I blurted out, “So, how come you shook hands with him instead of saying namaste?”
My mother looked at me quizzically. Then she said, “It’s not that odd to shake hands.”
“You’ve never shaken hands with a man,” I said.
“What are you trying to say?”
“Nothing. Nothing.” I felt a huge dread fill my heart. I could feel I was sinking into an argument that was illogical. It was one thing to feel entirely illogical inside myself, but exposing my lack of rationality by talking this way was another matter.
“What’s wrong with you, Anamika?” my mother asked. She enunciated my name. She only did that when she was about to get angry. I took a deep breath.
“I called him by his name because he told me to. He said ‘sir’ made him feel old.”
My mother dropped the conversation and left the room, muttering, “Adolescence. Everything about you has changed in the past month.”
I was incensed.
xv
Papa
I sought refuge in my physics book over dinner. I read about Einstein’s general and special theories of relativity while putting spoonfuls of rajma chaw
al in my mouth. My mother had to periodically remind me to eat. To concentrate I had to read the same sentences over a few times. At nine I took my dinner plate to the living room and joined my parents to watch the news. A third boy had burnt himself.
“I don’t know what’s wrong with these kids,” my mother said.
“They’re doing it for a cause,” my father said.
“Oh, Rajan! Come on. One doesn’t set oneself on fire because of some parliamentary bill.”
“Some people have strong principles,” my father persisted.
I felt like he was trying to challenge me, accusing me of not having the same staunch moral values as the kids who were burning. I was a brahmin . I thought the reservation policy was wrong. Why wasn’t I protesting? Putting my life on the line? Why wasn’t he for that matter, I wanted to ask.
“Principles my foot,” I said. “They are immature and reckless teenagers. Everyone’s doing it out of some kind of herd instinct. They need to throw out the government, not burn themselves. That’s not rational behavior. It’s self-centered and ridiculous to set yourself on fire.”
“They believe in it. That’s how nonviolence works. That’s how Mahatma Gandhi brought us independence. One harms oneself in protest.”
“Please. That’s a lot of shit,” I said.
“Anamika!” my father shouted, getting up from his seat.
I looked at him without any apology. I said, “What?”
“How dare you talk like that?”
“To call a spade a spade,” I said.
He looked at my mother and said, “What’s wrong with this girl? She’s too big for her boots.”
“Rajan, please sit down. She’s got growing pains.”
Then my mother looked at me and said, “Apologize, Beta .”
“What for?” I said.
“You shouldn’t speak to your father like that.”
“I didn’t say anything about him. I just said his argument was no good.” I did not look in my father’s direction when I spoke.
“Still, that’s no way to speak,” my mother said firmly.
I put more rajma chawal in my mouth so that it was full.
“Say sorry,” my mother persisted.
I looked at my father. He was glowering. It gave me a lot of courage.
“Should I say sorry even when I’m not sorry?” I said in an even voice.
My mother glued her eyes on mine and stared fiercely, trying to convey that she didn’t want me to push this thing. I was sure my father would explode. I relented.
“I’m sorry,” I said halfheartedly.
“No, you’re not,” he said with some bitterness.
I shrugged, not wanting to prolong the torture anymore. Rani must have been watching us from the passageway. She walked into the drawing room and asked my mother for further instructions. I finished the last spoonful of food on my plate and went back to my room.
I sat at my desk. It was so hot that it was difficult to keep my forearms on the desk without its surface getting sticky with my sweat. My fan was utterly ineffective even though it was turned to the highest setting on the dial, whirring away at five. As I deciphered the important things my physics book was telling me, I momentarily forgot about the humidity. The sound of the ceiling fan brought a rhythm to my insides. My emotions slid away from me.
It turned out that even though I was going to grow old and die, I could have a twin who could sit in a satellite moving at the speed of light who would not grow old at the same rate. It suddenly made perfect sense that some moments passed by quickly and others slowly. It also made sense that my brain, which I was sure did travel as fast as light, could go back and forth in time. It could travel at various speeds and make things happen inside its universe in a way that my physical body with all its mass could not. I envied Gandhiji, his fasting and low mass, his ability to eat a few almonds a day and survive. Lightness meant swiftness. It meant longevity, the closest thing to immortality.
I knew there was no practical application of this, but the idea alone was enough to make me want to keep on living; maybe even just to find a way to translate this theoretical physics into a more practical one. Turning into carbon for the sake of some political drama everyone would forget in a few months was entirely out of the question.
The notion of time being relative was even more liberating than the uncertainty principle. It did not play out on a human scale. It was for the scale of galaxies. But it didn’t matter. Along one relative coordinate I was young. Immature. An adolescent. My fight with my father made no sense. My emotions for Adit even less so. I had all sorts of hormones cruising through my body at top speed that made me act impulsively. I got up from my desk to go apologize to my father.
My chair creaked as it scraped on the stone mosaic floor. The lights went out, and the whirring fan slowed down, then stopped. Everything was dark. No light filtered in from the street outside; there was a blackout in the colony. I shuffled slowly to my bedroom door, groping my way around as my eyes adjusted. The heat and humidity were oppressive now. My armpits were wet.
“Stay there, Anamika, I’ll get a candle,” my mother called from somewhere in the house.
“Babyji,” Rani said.
I hoped no one had heard her. It was like a sigh, a lover’s whisper. I responded with a whine of sorts.
My mom had lit a candle and was walking down the passageway toward my room.
“It’s okay, Mom, I’ll sit in the living room. I can’t really study like this. It’s way too hot.”
She turned around, and we both walked to the living room. The candle was making me even hotter. My cotton shirt was clinging to my skin, and my body felt slimy. We heard the sound of bare feet on the floor. Rani had followed us. I could see the shape of my father in front of the TV where I had left him.
“It’s so hot,” I complained, easing myself onto the couch. Rani grabbed a newspaper from a pile on the coffee table and positioned herself by the couch. She started fanning me.
My father turned toward us for a second. My mother wiped her face with her sari pallu. My eyes had adjusted to the light. I could tell Papa was looking at Rani fanning me, but I could not see the expression on his face. The room felt very still, the rustle of the newspaper in front of my face filling its void.
“You’re lucky. She’s very devoted to you,” he said.
I didn’t know how to respond. Did this mean he knew?
“Yes. She really cares for you. She loves you,” my mother said.
I was afraid they were going to confront me. I was sure Rani and I had been careful and they had not seen anything, but my heart was jumping with fear. The rustle of the newspaper in Rani’s hands grew louder and louder. I wanted her to stop.
“It’s okay, Rani,” I said to her in Hindi. I didn’t want my parents to say anything more to me.
“No, Babyji, you’ll sweat.” It was odd enough that she was fanning me and not my mother, but talking to me that preciously was dangerous. Had she forgotten my parents were there?
“I wish someone were fanning me right now,” my father said.
He didn’t usually speak in a flippant tone like that. He was trying to suggest that my mom fan him. She was tying her hair in a tighter bun to keep it from the back of her neck.
“I wish someone were fanning me right now,” she said.
I laughed, thrilled that she had given it back to him. My father laughed, too. He had been pulling her leg. I loved him.
“Papa, I’m sorry about what I said earlier,” I said. It came out easily.
“It’s okay. I’m sorry, too,” he said.
I had never had such an exchange with my father. My mother had given in to me on many occasions, but an apology from my father was totally new.
The phone rang. It was a loud piercing ring that reverberated through the house. I jumped from the sofa and ran to get it, knocking my shin into something sharp on the way. I hadn’t expected Sheela to confirm so soon that her parents were going to th
e function.
“It’s Adit.” My heart was doing sixty miles an hour now. Faster than my bicycle or my horse, Sugar. I pressed both my hands to the earpiece so that my parents wouldn’t hear. I was silent.
“Is this a good time to talk?” he asked softly.
“No.”
“I just had to call you. It profoundly affected me to meet you today.”
“Really?” I was so happy to hear him that I was no longer angry with him.
“Is someone there?” he demanded.
I strained to see my parents in the dark. Rani was fanning my mother now. I didn’t know what I could say to him without arousing the suspicion of my parents. It was probably easiest to pretend it was Vidur calling about homework.
“Vidur, I don’t know the answer to that sum,” I said.
“Sorry, Anamika, I shouldn’t do this. When is usually a good time to call?”
“The third,” I said.
“I’ll call you at three tomorrow afternoon, okay?”
I put the phone down and walked slowly back to the couch, my knees weak. I needed a cohesive story for my parents. In which order had I said “really” and “yes” and “no”?
“How is Vidur?” my mother asked.
“Fine,” I said. Rani was still fanning my mom. I wondered if she would fan me now instead.
“Fan Babyji,” my mother said to her, as if in answer.
She stepped over to near where I was and started fanning me again.
“You women have it good,” my father said lightly. He was right. I felt smug.
“When we have no electricity, how come the phone still works?” my mother asked.
“The dial tone and electricity are carried on a wire from the central office in DESU, which has its own generator,” I replied.
“Did they teach you that in school?” my father asked.
“No,” I replied.
“What do they teach you in school?” my father asked.
“Wave-particle theory, uncertainty, human biology, probability theory, geologic formations, the structure of molecules.”
“Do you have any questions about anything?” my father asked.
I had a lot of questions. And it occurred to me for the first time to ask my father instead of asking Adit or Mrs. Pillai or India.