From 5:30 onwards, I was seated in our living room. Rhea was in the media room, sipping apple juice and watching the Disney channel. Every now and then, I paced between the living room and the foyer, with my eyes glued to our front porch. At any moment, I expected the maid to arrive. Last night, when I relayed Gowri’s story to Manas, he was incredulous. ‘Other kids put him in? Come on, Vedika, kids don’t do these things. I don’t think you heard right.’ Perhaps Manas was right. Yet her words continued to echo inside my head. Put him inside. There wasn’t any ambivalence in her voice. I waited through the torturous ticks of each minute till dusk started blurring the edges of our hibiscus bushes. But Gowri still hadn’t arrived. I called the guards at the gate. ‘What villa number does Gowri work at?’
The guards fumbled through their registers, then a gruff voice reported that two Gowris worked at Fantasia. When he asked me to clarify which Gowri I was looking for, I described the scar by her lower lip. ‘She’s young,’ I said. ‘In her 30s, maybe?’
‘Oh, villa 76 Gowri. She hasn’t come to work today.’
Villa 76? That was Razia’s villa. If only I’d known earlier. When I called Villa 76, a fatigued Razia confirmed that Gowri hadn’t turned up to work and that her mobile was out of reach. And no, she hadn’t called in sick. Razia seemed a bit annoyed that I was meeting with her maid at all, fearful perhaps that I was poaching her services.
The next day, the guards dispatched the other Gowri to my home. An older woman in her 60s, her teeth streaked by red paan stains, she claimed she didn’t know the younger Gowri. When I called Razia again, she terminated our conversation with a brusque: ‘Listen, I don’t know where she is, and I’m sacking her anyway.’
I called the guards again for her village address. The guards were supposed to document the addresses of all Fantasia staff. But for some reason, they said Gowri’s address was missing. Apparently, a whole page had been ripped off their address register. Why? Wasn’t that odd? They claimed to be flummoxed by the situation, and seemed irked by my pursuit. ‘Why Gowri, Madam? We will send you other maid.’
That evening, when I dropped in at Razia’s to check on Gowri’s story, she was effusive in her apologies. Plying me with apple pie and tea, she said, ‘Was in such a bad mood in the morning. You know how it is, two days your maid doesn’t land up, and she doesn’t call also. People can’t even keep their phones on.’ We were seated on Razia’s sleek black leather sofa, my feet uncertainly poised on her thick blue rug. On her backyard deck, Rhea twirled around inside a wicker basket swing. Across from us, the designer coffee table, its glass top resting precariously on two wooden logs, held a white porcelain vase with orange chrysanthemums. A year ago, I might have rued our own choices, dwelt on how Razia’s luxury furnishings outshone our rustic interiors. But in the past year my perspective had tumbled into another realm. The vivid colours could no longer overtake the dark shades in my life.
‘Did Gowri tell you what happened that evening, Razia?’
‘Which evening?’
‘You know, when my boy...’
‘No, we didn’t talk about it at all.’ Razia, whose bamboo stalk figure was draped in a gossamer kurti, surveyed me with narrowing eyes.
‘But she was the one who tried to rescue Sajan...’
‘It was already too late, Vedika. You can’t blame her.’
‘I’m not blaming her. But she saw him being put inside by other children. It wasn’t an accident.’
‘What do you mean? Danny told me Sajan was slower than the others.’
‘Oh yes, Danny was there, wasn’t he?’ Danny was Razia’s eight-year-old. ‘Can I talk to him?’
‘Vedika, we know this is really hard on you. But it’s also been hard on our children. Many were traumatised after that evening. It’s not easy, as a six or seven-year-old, to confront death in that manner. Damini did a group healing session with them. Just when they’re recovering from post-traumatic stress, we don’t want to rake it up.’ My neighbour was looking at me somewhat warily. Did she think I was crazy?
When we were leaving Razia’s, Danny scampered up the pathway, his foppish hair sweeping across his sweat-streaked face. It was like something had plunged into my insides. For a minute, I stood there, immobilised. I felt like I was encountering Sajan again. ‘Say bye to Vedika Auntie.’ Razia’s crisp tone pre-empted any lingering discussion with her son.
Beyond our wooden gates, and to the far left of the palm-lined road that led to those gates, lay an erstwhile village, a remnant of the old Whitefield. While most other patches in those frontier lands had been gobbled up by the gluttonous city, the little warren of unpaved lanes with ramshackle brick and tin homes remained a defiant marker of the past. Most of us skirted the area, the fetid stench of open drains, the discomfiting jostling of buffaloes, chickens and people inside small spaces that housed our domestic and housekeeping staff. But the next evening, with a curious but squeamish Rhea in tow, I veered off our immaculate entryway and headed into the village.
On the way, I ignored Rhea’s pleas: ‘Why are we going there, Mama? It’s so dirty. I don’t want to walk there. Can we go back to the park?’ The odours of soggy garbage, urine-splattered walls and fly-infested turds steamed into our nostrils like a warning: You can’t handle this.
Earlier that morning, I had urged my maid to acquire Gowri’s whereabouts, even dangling a thousand-rupee reward for the address. ‘Left at the barbershop, and then three houses to the right, near the tap,’ she reported, after persistent enquiries inside the maids’ network. The tap, attached to a large plastic tanker, was owned by a landlord in the area. My maid said he commanded steep rents and dictated the water’s whimsical drip. Gowri’s home, when I reached it, was shuttered by a metal rod and a thick, steel lock. While I fiddled with the lock, Rhea said, ‘Clown, clown.’ ‘What?’ I said, trying to peer through a scummy window into the darkness inside. ‘Clown, clown,’ she repeated, her voice insistent, her little fists pounding the door. She was right.
On the wavery tin door, some child had chalked a clown’s face, with a bulbous nose. It didn’t look cheerful at all. Gowri’s neighbour, a waddling middle-aged woman with a child on her hip, stepped out of a narrow door and watched us with unfazed eyes. When I asked about Gowri’s whereabouts, she said she had packed her belongings and left. ‘In the night.’ Apparently, Gowri, a single woman who kept to herself inside the village, had already paid up a quarter’s rent, but vanished without notice. While scurrying back to Fantasia, I was thinking about that chalky clown. Strangely, the shape of its thick mouth echoed the leer on the baby mobile at Raj’s home. What was it about that grin that was starting to haunt me?
That night, at home, Manas tried to dissuade me from snooping around. ‘You’ll step on too many toes if you continue. You know how nice people have been to us.’ He was right. The Fantasia community had bolstered us through the worst days. But so what? That wasn’t reason enough to stop nosing around. ‘Not till I find out what happened that evening. If something’s going on, Rhea might be in danger too.’
‘But that’s my worry, Vedika. I don’t think anything’s going on, but your busybody meddling might endanger her. The two of you trampling around the village sounds crazy.’
‘I don’t agree, Manas. Not knowing can’t be safer. We don’t even know what we’re shielding her from.’
‘Whatever you do, please make sure you keep your investigations completely under wraps. Because, if Raj gets to know what you’re up to, he’ll make it very difficult for us.’
‘But, why? This is our son we’re talking about.’
‘You know how he is, always defensive about Fantasia. Any scandal here, and he’ll be up in arms.’
‘Manas, you’re obsessed with pleasing Raj—don’t we matter to you? Your family?’
‘He’s the only person who believed in my idea, still does. If I lose his support –’
‘Your app this, your app that. What about our happiness?’
‘Working my bu
tt off for you guys.’ He paused and flung his phone on the center table, knocking a glass of water down. ‘I don’t get the slightest --’
As the water dripped on our carpet, something shifted inside me. When had he aged so much? His shoulders stooped with exhaustion, his eyes circled by dark rings. And why was I becoming so uncharacteristically edgy? I deliberately lowered my voice and stroked his face: ‘I know Manas, we’re grateful.’ Truth was, I didn’t want to alienate Raj either. I knew Manas would collapse without his startup, and his implosion could trigger mine. Besides, we needed to stay on at Fantasia, if I was going to discover anything.
Manas sidled up to me on our roomy couch, wrapped his beary arms around my petite frame. ‘Next month, after the Mysuru trip, we won’t speak about this again.’
I hadn’t permitted Manas to travel out with other male relatives, to sprinkle our son’s ashes in the Cauvery river. I wanted to be present, while his remains diffused into rushing waters. But I hadn’t been ready to undertake the trip, not for a long while. We had finally settled, after many to-and-fro calls between Manas and his uncle, on an auspicious date in the coming month. But Gowri’s news changed everything. I walked into our small Puja room, set into an alcove below the stairs, where the sealed copper pot, surrounded by incense sticks, bore a belligerent gleam. I ran my fingers over its cold metallic surface. I couldn’t radiate a mother’s warmth into him anymore, but at least I could absorb his chills.
‘I won’t do it, Manas. Not next month. Not till I find out what happened.’
Manas pursed his lips. ‘Fine, let’s never do it. But you deal with Mama.’ Then he picked up his phone again and said: ‘Remember, if Raj hears of you digging around this place, you’ll jeopardise my business.’
TEN
DESPITE THAT AWKWARD MEETING with Razia, I wasn’t willing to give up. Surely the trauma of the other kids could be healed, unlike the incomparable vacuum in my life? Besides, what if those kids did it again? To other kids? Or to my daughter? What had they done exactly? Were all involved or just a few? I needed to question them in stealth mode, without their parents hovering around. In the absence of anyone who might snitch to Raj.
So when Kalpana whatsapped our group, asking if anyone could baby-sit her boys for an evening, I volunteered at once. Honestly, it wasn’t just my detective’s mission that inspired the offer. Till that recent fogginess, Sajan had been the perkier child, his rustling presence stirring around the house like a shifting breeze. Since Topsy’s death, Rhea had turned moodier, occasionally cheerful, but often somber. I tried reading books, playing games, baking treats but she rarely giggled like she used to. To dispel the silence in our home, we’d have welcomed any friend’s kids over.
I planned a special dinner that day: pizza, cupcakes with colourful sprinkles, and ice-cream. I promised Kalpana’s boys that they could whip the eggs and stir the pizza sauce at our place. Their own mother rarely permitted their mucking about her cherrywood kitchen.
On our babysitting date, Manas arrived home earlier than usual, with a new Scrabble board. While I was busy in the kitchen, boiling water in a hot pot, he rearranged our living room, moving the couches against the wall to clear a space for family games. Later that night, while tomatoes were simmering on the stove, I heard loud noises. I stopped by our living room, riveted by my husband. Manas, who armed with a large dictionary, was insisting that ‘DAK’ was a three letter word that deserved the triple word score that came with it. With Rhea astride on his shoulders, he yelled from the couch, ‘a system of mail delivery or passenger transport’. Akshay, the older boy, giggled, and Gaurav, the younger boy, pummelled him with cushions. Manas playfully pummelled him back, his hair all disheveled, as intent on winning as they were.
With most adults, Manas was reserved, reluctant to engage in long conversations. But in the company of children, something broke loose, a pent-up energy that lit up his face. Watching him then, I realised how acute his grief was, and wondered too at how well he hid it. A devilish glint in his eyes, he was a child again, pirouetting across the room and wrestling with the kids the way he used to earlier. And maybe it was the way his hair was all tousled up or the expression he wore, but he suddenly looked as attractive, as filled with hidden depths and mysteries as at our long-ago bookstore encounter. Rhea too was more animated than she had been for months.
After the kids had recklessly messed up our kitchen, licked the cake dough off the mixing bowl and paddled around in our master bedroom jacuzzi for ‘the most fun bath ever’, we tucked them into bed and kissed them good night. My husband and I paused at the threshold, watching their faces framed by the blue night light. For a few minutes I held on to the illusion that it wasn’t Gaurav there, but Sajan, our boy returned to his rightful place. That night, we made love with an intensity we hadn’t experienced since the tragedy.
With my head nestled on Manas’ shoulder, I dreamt of Kanthabhai again. Mira, the fat boy, and I were moulding clay dolls. Under her gentle, caressing gaze, we felt secure. Then why wasn’t she around when we needed her? Because that evening, when the Evil slithered in, where was Kanthabhai? We were alone, the three of us, when shadows scuttled across the garden, when something sinister hurtled towards us. I twisted about, grappling with my husband’s night shirt as if I were fending off an assault. Manas gently tapped my shoulder, and when I shut my eyes again, Kanthabhai crooned me back to sleep.
The next morning, I woke up earlier than Manas. The dregs of last night’s dream still clung to me, and I tried to shake off the terror as I soaped my face. Gaurav was already awake, watching TV in the family room. His behaviour always seemed to have rougher edges than his brother’s. He was constantly fidgety, shifting in his seat or twiddling his fingers. His curly lashes, the only redeeming feature on his churlish face, seemed wasted on his morose eyes.
‘What are you watching?’ I asked, sinking into the couch beside him.
Instead of responding, he turned it off and sighed. ‘I hate cartoons. They’re so kiddish.’
‘Really? Then what do you like?’ Again, there was no response, just a snide curling of his lips. I decided to try the direct approach. ‘Gaurav, do you remember what happened that evening, you know when my son Sajan...’ He looked at me with widening eyes.
‘What do you mean, Auntie?’
‘How did he fall into that room? Was it just an accident?’
‘Bijoy did it.’ he said, turning to face the TV again.
‘Bijoy? Who’s Bijoy.’
‘Arcadia Bijoy.’
‘He lives in Arcadia? What villa number?’
‘I don’t know, Auntie.’
Just then, Akshay burst into the room. Akshay was famous inside Fantasia for his dimpled grin. His lips, drawn widely apart, exposed a neat row of pearly-white teeth, burnishing his good boy image. His tone when he spoke to adults was always polite, his expressions well-mannered.
‘Gaurav, did you brush your teeth?’ he asked. ‘Mama said you have to brush before breakfast.’ Akshay sounded stern when he said it, almost as if he were warning Gaurav to stop talking.
While Gaurav shut himself in the toilet, I quickly turned to Akshay. ‘Akshay, I was asking Gaurav about that evening. He said it wasn’t an accident?’
‘Auntie, he fell down,’ the boy said, quickly. ‘He didn’t run when the smoke...’
‘But he said Bijoy—’
‘Bijoy pushed him. Then he fell down.’
‘Who else was playing with you’ll that evening? Besides you, Gaurav and Bijoy?’
‘Danny, Joel, Suhel.’
‘Did anyone try to help him?’
‘We had to run away Auntie, or the room would have caught fire.’
While I laid out donuts for their breakfast, I wondered if Akshay’s response had been too pat, almost rehearsed. Had he been coached by someone?
Later that morning, I was disgruntled by Kalpana’s curtness when she picked them up. Perhaps her kids’ responses to her turning up promptly at 8 a.m. incited her
ungracious behaviour. They were playing ping-pong on our dining table and biting into sugary donuts, when she arrived. ‘Ma, why did you come?’ Gaurav said, as soon his mother stepped into our dining. ‘I don’t want to come home.’ The older boy echoed his brother’s words. ‘Go away Ma, we’ll come later.’ I was gratified. For the first time in so many months, I was bubbling with optimism about the future. Even Rhea had broken into mirthful laughter in their presence.
But Kalpana’s face turned beet red. ‘Don’t be silly, we can’t bother Auntie any longer. See you, Vedika,’ she said, whisking them violently off our breakfast ledge. She stopped at the door and added a rather grudging, ‘Oh, by the way, thanks.’
That afternoon, I was surprised by Kalpana’s call. I hadn’t expected to hear from her that soon.
‘What did you ask the kids this morning?’ she asked.
‘Nothing much, just some questions about that evening...’
‘Questions? Vedika, they’re both traumatised right now, you don’t understand.’
‘Really? They seemed fine here?’
‘They wouldn’t display their feelings at a stranger’s home.’
‘It was my son, Kalpana, I need to know—’
‘I should have known you had an ulterior motive.’ Perhaps, she was right. Yet, I felt an angry gush of tears welling up. I was glad Kalpana couldn’t see me then.
‘If you had lost your child..,’ I said, holding my voice taut to keep it from quivering, the way my hand was.
‘It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have sent them there.’
For a few minutes after we hung up, I sat there and just cried. She had some nerve, ticking me off like a truant child when I had done her a favour, when I had gone out of my way to care for her children. That whole weekend, her words continued to whirl inside my head in dizzying circles. I could hardly take in our neighbourhood anymore, the vision from our backyard, the beautiful facades across our living room on the west side. All I could think of were other things I should have said, of sharper retorts, of the frostiness I planned to assume in the future. Of how the truth and my relentless pursuit of it would be a revenge of sorts.
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