I think your brother is wrong about your mother. She’s definitely being weird. I thought twin brothers would be different. I had always thought that if Sammy had been my age he would have taken me seriously. But I can’t see Sammy as anything but Sammy. Head Boy, School Sports Captain, going to Princeton, everybody-loves-him, two dimples that trick everyone into not noticing that he’s already balding.
Nusrat thinks it’s really crazy what’s going on in Karachi with all the kidnappings. I mean I do too obviously. But she’s like obsessed. These days as soon as she’s done with the dishes she comes to my room with all these papers that she buys from the raddiwala—English, Hindi, Marathi, Urdu, even Gujurati. And she cuts out all the articles on Karachi. It’s kind of annoying, she covers my room with all the cuttings and keeps going on and on about it in her notebook and ignores all my hints. I tune out and just look at her. I like how she looks when she’s excited about something. Her eyes get super big. Her braid slips from one shoulder to the other until she gets annoyed and pins the whole thing up like a pineapple behind her head. She looks nice in white. Like really nice.
Today I was telling her about how Arjun was nice to me in school and she wasn’t even listening. She said sorry and stuff but I mean whatever. I can’t wait for her to get bored of this stuff.
I asked Arjun again why he can’t be my boyfriend in school. He just hugged me and kissed me and said he loves me. Is that an answer, Tanya? I wish I was clever so I understood without having to ask anyone.
Love,
Tania
PS—Nusrat can’t help it because she has family in Karachi. Like second cousins. Maybe you could send some Karachi newspapers. I think she’d really like that. Then maybe she’d stop being so selfish and listen to my stuff again.
January 11, 1992
Karachi
Dear Tania,
I have enclosed five newspapers for Nusrat. I’ve underlined the relevant articles.
I almost wish I understood you and your ambitions. Wanting your mother’s approval I understand (although I understand very well her ambition for you). I don’t understand your burning ambition to be Arjun’s girlfriend. And how is the girl you had ‘made’? Is she grateful to you? What if she isn’t nice back? You didn’t even know her.
It just seems so exhausting. I always feel so relieved when I’m home from school in my own room with my books and pictures on the walls and my desk the way I left it. Some days I want to come home from the first period of school. I’m not sure I like people.
I’m having some trouble with Ali. He’s really upset with me. He’s never been upset with me before. Part of me thrills to it.
We have exams in school and the only way I can do well in Urdu is to learn everything by heart. Ali wanted me to go to a Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan concert with him. Of course I wanted to, but my father says that one has to make sacrifices for one’s goals and my goal is to get the highest marks in every subject in these exams and you know, Urdu is hard for me.
I told Ali that I couldn’t go because I had to learn all the poems by heart. He didn’t say anything but that evening he came to my house…and you have to promise not to ever say anything about this to anyone…with the Urdu exam paper.
Of course I didn’t. I tore it up and threw it away, in fact. But Ali just didn’t understand why I wouldn’t just look at it. ‘If you know what’s on the paper, then you only have to learn what’s on the paper and then you can come with me to the concert.’ He looked so hurt.
You have to keep this in the strictest confidence because this could destroy his chances of getting into a good college. It could destroy his life. But I’m so distraught about it that I have to tell someone.
Is he a dishonest person and I just didn’t see it? Only cowards cheat after all. Right? But Ali never even lies. Sometimes I wish he would lie and tell me that the phone was busy instead of saying he forgot to call me or worse, that he hadn’t felt like it. He either does really well or really poorly in school. If he cheats, wouldn’t he do well in everything?
I was very angry with him, Tania.
And for the first time since I’ve known him, he got angry back. He said that he was trying to support me in what I love and that I don’t support him in what he loves.
What does he love? A concert? One that he’s not even playing in!
Maybe it is not Ali, maybe it is me. I don’t understand men. I don’t understand my father. I don’t understand my brother. Today my father was home for dinner because a surgery was cancelled (the patient died). He, Navi and I had dinner together, a silent meal. I told him, although he didn’t ask, that my mother was sleeping. He nodded. I said it again in case he hadn’t heard me and he said, ‘I heard you Tanya. Your mother is sleeping.’
How can he not think it is strange that she’s sleeping at nine o’clock at night when her children and husband are sitting down to dinner?
I forced Navi to look at me and I saw that he had registered it, registered all of it. But he turned away from me and talked about muscle atrophy with my father for the rest of the meal. Sometimes I think he doesn’t like to be around me because he doesn’t want to accept reality.
But at least I know that he sees it too. The ever-increasing strangeness of our mother. I almost never see her anymore. She’s hiding. She’s shrinking. She spends all day in bed and at night, when the gardener has gone home, she floats around our garden in a thin nightie, fondling roses and stroking dew from leaves. One morning I found her curled around a baby jacaranda bush. Once I heard her singing lullabies to the jasmine. The lullabies she used to sing to me.
There is a memory I have of being a child when we had first moved to Karachi. We had gone to my father’s friend’s house, his mentor from college I think. The house was musty and the couple seemed impossibly old. I remember Navi had started crying and my father had looked at him with such annoyance on his face that I knew he had forgotten he had brought us with him. My mother picked us up, one in each arm and that must have been hard because we were at least five years old. She took us out to the garden where it was fresh and cool and she stayed outside in the garden with us the whole time even when my father came outside to call us in to eat. I remember that scene as if it is a picture, the light fading over the champa trees and fat waxy flowers falling all around us as if something had died.
I would try to answer your question about why Arjun doesn’t want to be your boyfriend but why would you want advice from a girl whose family didn’t even notice the big silver cup she won and left by the staircase for everyone to see?
Love,
Tanya
P.S. Besides, Tania, you already know.
January 22, 1992
Bombay
Dear Tanya,
Your letter made me sad man. And then I felt like an asshole for being stressed about something stupid like not being invited to a birthday party.
I’m joking. Of course I’m invited to the party. I’m invited to every party. It’s not even a party if I’m not there. Everyone says that because it’s absolutely true.
Your mom sounds weird. She also sounds sad. Why isn’t your dad noticing?
My dad is really good at noticing things. Actually, he notices things a bit too much. He’s too sensitive. I tell him this all the time when he’s sad after a fight with my mom. I tell him to chill and have a cigarette. It’s a joke because once he caught me smoking and instead of scolding me, he started laughing and then we both laughed and laughed and laughed and I fell over and that made us laugh even more and finally when we stopped laughing he didn’t say anything to me about smoking and instead we both promised not to tell my mother.
Sometimes I have a fantasy about my mother not being there. Maybe going to visit Sammy for a long, long time. And it will be just my dad and me.
Today I did something stupid at school but I don’t care. We have this thing where every week we go do stuff for the poor. It’s really boring and stupid because I always go to the Soup Kitchen with the r
est of my gang because it is run by Laila’s mother. But there’s never anyone there at the Soup Kitchen at the time that we go because that’s a super busy time for beggars. Today—I don’t know what came over me—I went to St. John’s Church instead where they also give food but it’s to street kids. And the kids were actually there.
I mean they were disgusting and dirty and super rude but at least they were there. It was super tiring because we had to serve them food and then give them these tiny bars of soap and make them go take showers and stuff.
When I came back to school, everyone was giving me weird looks and Maya made a face as if I smelled. So I was like, how was Gossip at the Soup Kitchen today? But no one laughed.
At that moment, I didn’t care. I just went and played tennis and beat everyone I was so mad.
But now I’m home and I’m tired and I’ve eaten dinner and it’s 10 pm and no one has called me all evening. That’s like never happened.
But why can’t I go to St. John’s? Why does everyone have to be together all the time? I mean is our group so fragile that if someone does something different then it’s all over?
See this is why I feel like growing up is so dangerous. I never used to think this kind of stuff before. Now I feel like everything is stupid and everyone is stupid. This is the kind of thinking I don’t want to do. It’s dangerous.
My dad once told me that growing up feels like shedding your skin and growing new skin. Well, I like my old skin a lot. It took a lot of hard work to grow it and I don’t want anything else. I’m scared I’m going to become a Communist like my parents used to be. They used to like sing songs on the streets and be against everyone. I don’t want to be like that. It’s hot and sweaty and you can’t look cute doing it.
Besides if you’re against everything then who runs things? Where does the money come from?
Do you sometimes feel like you’re shedding your skin? I think I’m going to pray tonight and ask God if I can keep mine. And maybe see if he can send my mom on a holiday.
Love,
Tania
February 1, 1992
Karachi
Dear Tania,
You won’t believe what just happened. Just as I was going to sit down to write to you, there was a huge crash in the kitchen. When I went to see what it was, I found Bibi pinned to the floor by a huge steel cupboard that had fallen down on her. Chhoti Bibi was standing there, arms folded across her chest, looking mutinous.
I helped Bibi up and she cursed away in Punjabi involving all manners of animals in interesting combinations with Chhoti Bibi’s ancestors and my ancestors even though I had done nothing but try to help her.
As soon as Bibi was free of the cupboard, she sprung up and slapped Chhoti Bibi hard across the face. Once, twice, thrice. Before I could move. Chhoti Bibi just stood there looking straight at Bibi. She didn’t try to defend herself and she didn’t try to stop Bibi. The slaps were hard and her cheek was already swelling up but there were no tears in her eyes. She just stood there blazing at Bibi. It got very quiet.
Then Chhoti Bibi swore and walked out. I was left standing there with Bibi who began to cry. I helped her to her room and made her lie down. I got some balm for her bruises. Her pillow turned wet under her cheek, her wrinkles forming rivulets. I’ve never seen Bibi cry before.
It turns out that there was a marriage proposal from their village for Chhoti Bibi. Of course this is a huge thing because no one ever thought Chhoti Bibi would get married after what she did to the first guy. But Bibi had been sending home a lot of money and finally they had found a family with a boy who is slightly retarded.
I think Bibi genuinely thought Chhoti Bibi would be happy. It’s amazing how little families actually know each other.
I went outside to look for Chhoti Bibi but couldn’t find her anywhere. The gardener said she took off by the back exit and my old bicycle is missing. At first I thought it was funny—Chhoti Bibi in her huge salwar biking away angrily on a pink and white bicycle with My Little Pony handlebars. But it has been a few hours now and it is almost dark and she is not home.
I’m sure she’s fine. She’s a smart girl. And she’s been in the city for a few months now. She knows our address. She must know it because she goes to buy groceries in the car with Bibi. She can be flighty sometimes though and I wonder if she paid attention. Knowing her, she was probably so thrilled to be in an air-conditioned car, she hadn’t noticed. And really, it has only been four months. Would I have known Clifton if I had only lived here for a year and that too as a servant? What if she has left Clifton? She has an unknowable number of cousins around the city in neighbourhoods I don’t know, whose names I only read in newspapers when bad things happen.
I’m sure she’s fine.
Love,
Tanya
February 15, 1992
Bombay
Dear Tanya,
Today I got into a fight at school because stupid Aparna said I have no school spirit and I said fuck school and a Prefect was walking by, a total chaap who has never heard of shampoo or deodorants, and he said he was going to give me detention. I mean please. Prefects aren’t allowed to give detention, get a life! I told her that and she said, come with me right now come to the Principal’s office and I said make me and he actually grabbed my hand and tried to pull me but whatever I’m super strong and I burst out laughing and some spit landed on his arm and now he’s saying I spat on purpose. I have to talk to Ms. Kuruvilla tomorrow. Basically, I’m not getting Prefect next year.
I came home and cried to Nusrat. She was so nice about it. I put my head on her lap and she put her arms around me and made those noises that she makes when she feels something a lot. She smelled really nice and her hands on my face were so cool and smooth and soft. How is it that she’s poor and doesn’t smell? I mean I’m not being a bitch, poor people don’t have money to buy deo. If I forget my deo for a day I smell. Nusrat is magic.
I told my mom and she said that it didn’t matter because American colleges don’t care about Prefects.
I want to go to Xavier’s College and study Psychology and then I want to have a big wedding where I’ll wear a tiny choli with a huge red ghaghra with gold all over it and dance on stage and everyone will be looking at me, even the gross fat uncles but no one will be able to say anything because it will be my wedding.
And then Arjun and I will have our own house where I will paint the walls interesting colours and have sex everywhere. Arjun will do damn well in his business and I’ll be the hottest married woman in Bombay and I’ll wear whatever I want all the time and no one would be able to stop me because I’ll be married.
I was mean in school today. Just regular stuff, stuff I’ve always done. But it’s bothering me. I convinced Maya that Sunil has a crush on her and that she should go talk to him. And she did and he got up and walked away. And everyone saw and started laughing. And Maya is no dumb fool you know so she also started laughing and made a big joke out of it.
But she wouldn’t look at me afterwards.
And the fucked up thing is that this would have never bothered me before.
That’s what I’m saying man. I like my skin. I don’t want it to change. I never thought about this shit before and I don’t want to start now.
I guess Chhoti Bibi had to get away for a bit. I can just see her cycling away on your old pink bicycle, wanting to get away from your house, from your stupid lesson plans, from Bibi, from everything. I mean if I didn’t have a boyfriend, if I didn’t have Arjun I would totally want to get away. But I have Arjun and he’s the hottest boy in school and he loves me so I have no reason to want to get away. My life is awesome. I’m happy. I’m like totally happy.
Love,
Tania
5
April 5, 1996
New York, NY
Dear Tania,
Today I saw the first daffodils! Real daffodils growing in the ground, beautifully yellow and pristine and rising above the muddy leftover snow. They reminded
me of gulmohurs in Karachi. Karachi doesn’t have spring but around the time that it was going to be the end of the year and everyone was slacking off in the classroom and the teacher wasn’t really trying, we used to stare out of the window at the gulmohur tree in the basketball court, especially on that magic day when it seemed like it had bloomed overnight. One day just a normal sober tree and the next day a party. I always thought the tree lived through the whole year just to have those flowers.
It is hard to have relationships with trees here. Other than in the park, most of New York’s trees are chained up in fences. There are cherry blossoms by the reservoir though and they, like the gulmohurs of Karachi, come alive suddenly and vividly in spring. All year long, I run round and round the reservoir, imagining every pound I’ve eaten drop cleanly off my body but in spring I don’t even care. In spring, the cherry blossoms triumph and for a few days, all longings are met in paper-thin, pink and white whispers blowing perfume into the air.
You always made sex sound so easy.
I’m angry with you for that. I’m angry with you for a lot of things actually.
For a long time I was angry with you for having sex with Arjun, for letting him do all those things to you. There was something so absolute with you about Arjun. You were just so sure. It set an impossible standard. It still does. Every time I have approached a relationship, I have pictured you in my head, imagined what you would have said. I compare how I feel to how you had felt about Arjun. Your love was singular, full and fecund. Mine sterile and stillborn.
But I don’t feel angry with you about Arjun anymore. I think everyone has to have one obsession in their life. Something that grabs you by the ankle and swings you around the axis of the world until you become a doll, chucked into the universe, whirling, whirling, gone.
Tanya Tania Page 6