Sugarbread

by Balli Kaur Jaswal

  Bhabi-ji knows that Jini’s mother is disappointed, which is why she does everything to please her. If Jini’s mother told her to run around the house in the rain wearing nothing but a bedsheet and a plastic bag on her head, she’d do it twice. She has told on Jini before—a few weeks ago, she revealed to Mother that Jini had said a Chinese curse word under her breath when she accidentally cut her finger while chopping onions. Her mother was angry that Jini knew any Chinese word, vulgar or otherwise. Other languages were strictly forbidden in the house. “There’s no such thing as ‘Singaporean’. You’re Indian, Malay or Chinese. If you all mix, you will forget your traditions.” Jini had never seen her mother so adamant before, but now that their father was gone, her mother blamed this new country for seducing and weakening him, and eventually chasing him away. Mother gave Bhabi-ji full permission to rub chilli on Jini’s lips if she ever heard her utter a word in another language in the house again.

  As they wash the dishes now, Jini remembers to keep her arms covered because she can feel the rashes returning. The urge to itch has gotten worse since dinner and she wants to scrub her entire body until her skin peels off and a new layer is revealed. If Bhabi-ji sees her marks, she’ll surely use it to cause trouble, to take the attention away from herself so nobody notices her own faults. For once, Jini is grateful for the dim lighting in their kitchen, for the pale moonlight that makes it difficult to distinguish a mark on the skin from a mere shadow. With her sister-in-law, she will always have to dodge in the shadows and depend on tricks of the light.

  • • •

  The first time Jini discovered how fast she could run, she was in school and they were doing a 100-metre sprint during PE. Her teacher was so impressed that he asked her to stay back after school and compete with some of the older boys. One of them was a curly-haired boy who smiled more than he spoke. People sometimes called him Blackie but he just grinned right back at them. He had dark skin and his hair sprang from his head in so many directions that he had to be Tamil. This was what Jini thought, so she was surprised when he spoke to her in Punjabi after school one day.

  “How come you can run so fast?” he asked her.

  “You’re Punjabi?” she asked.

  “Yeah. I don’t look like it?”

  “No,” she said. “Honestly, you don’t. Your hair.”

  He laughed. “Punjabis don’t have curly hair?”

  “Yes…I mean they do. My brother does. But your hair is short. Your parents let you cut your hair?”

  “Yeah. They’re not very religious. And it’s hard to keep this kind of hair long. It gets very messy. So they’ve always cut my hair.”

  Jini shook her head. “My mother would kill me. She would pull me out of school and make me go to the temple every day for the rest of my life.”

  “My parents don’t go to the temple very much. We prefer to pray at home.”

  Who on earth did that? She didn’t speak to him much after that but she saw him around school. He never said hello to her, for which she was grateful, because she didn’t want people teasing them and making up stories. But she saw him in the neighbourhood playing football with the other boys a few times and if their eyes met, he tipped his head slightly and flashed a quick smile in her direction. She was grateful for his discreetness.

  Since her mother found out about her running outside, she can now only run during PE lessons in school. Her teacher, Mr Goh, has urged her to join the track team. “There are races and marathons. I could train you to run really well. You have it in you already.” But every time he brings it up, she refuses. “My parents,” she simply says. He nods and gives her an understanding smile. “I know,” he says. Plenty of Punjabi kids go to this school and they often have to plead to do things differently. Some girls sit out PE classes or wear track pants even on the hottest days because their parents won’t let them wear the required shorts. There are boys who have admitted they have never been swimming because it’s too much trouble to wash their hair afterwards, yet Mr Goh tries to persuade Jini to join the team. “I don’t want you to get into trouble at home,” he says gently. “But maybe your parents just don’t like the idea. When you start doing well, they might be more accepting.”

  “I don’t know,” she says. “I’ll think about it.”

  The next day, she borrows a pair of shorts and a T-shirt from a Chinese classmate. She’ll have to figure out how to wash it at home without anybody noticing, but there are more important things on her mind now. Her legs are covered in scabs. They range from wide circles to long red lines where she must have scratched her skin in her sleep. She decides to run out onto the field and pretend the scabs don’t exist. She uses them as motivation to run faster—if she slows down, people will get a chance to see her dirty skin. If she moves quickly enough to become a blur, nobody will see her. This is another reason she loves running—she can be invisible.

  On the track, Mr Goh shouts words of encouragement and soon the passers-by are slowing down to watch. Jini speeds up so they don’t recognise her. She knows her mother will find out eventually because there isn’t a Punjabi person who can keep a secret in their neighbourhood, but for now, all she wants to do is run. She thinks about Sarjit in his silence, how he barely speaks to her now that his wife dominates everything. She runs it off. Her father in India, enjoying his life, while she is only a faded speck in his memory. She runs faster. Her mother’s anger, her sister-in-law’s bitterness, the staleness it all brings into their wilting house. She can feel herself breaking her own record speed and when she finally slows down, it is like she is walking on air above everything and everybody else.

  “I’m impressed,” Mr Goh tells her. He pats her on the back and tells her to come back the next day.

  Jini washes the borrowed clothes under the tap in the back of the school building. The brittle stubble of grass pricks at her feet as she squats and scrubs the dirt out with her knuckles. Then she rubs water on her arms and legs, willing the scabs to disappear.

  As she leaves the school gates, she has to think of a lie to tell her sister-in-law when she gets home. She was asked to stay back for extra lessons. There was an accident on the road and she had to walk home by a longer route. A sudden car honk interrupts her thoughts. She turns around to see the same white car she saw the last time she ran outside. With her hand shielding her eyes from the midday sun, she strains to see who is inside. A window rolls down, and it is Pra-ji.

  “Sat sri akal, Jini,” he calls out. She walks over to the car, eyeing the glistening paint. It’s very grand. “Sat sri akal,” she says, clasping her hands together in respect.

  “How are you? Just returning from school?”

  “Yes. I had extra lessons.”

  Pra-ji gives her a thin smile. “I see. Want me to drive you home? I’m going to the temple.”

  She climbs into his car. It smells fresh and new, like damp earth after a long monsoon. He doesn’t say much on the short trip back to her house but when they are approaching, he asks her when her birthday is.

  “Already passed. 15 May.”

  “May. I see. And you are sixteen?”

  She blushes. People think she is older because of her height and her body, which is clearly developing now. Her breasts are becoming more obvious, even under this pleated pinafore.

  “Fourteen,” she says.

  “Your O-Level exams are in two years! What do you plan on doing after that?”

  Jini shrugs. “I’ll have to work, I guess.”

  Pra-ji nods slowly, and there is a long silence in the car. She realises that they are outside her house now. She thanks him and runs inside, preparing a lie in her mind.

  • • •

  Jini is only allowed to leave the house nowadays if she’s running errands for her mother or her sister-in-law. She used to dread going to Shop Uncle’s provision shop down the street but now she goes eagerly, happy to be outside. Her mother always tells her to come back quickly. “No talking and playing outside,” she says. Bhabi-j
i echoes Jini’s mother’s words if she’s not around. Today, Jini has been asked to buy a bag of sugar. They’ve run out and they’re having Pra-ji over for tea.

  In the shop, the shelves are lined with different brands of sugar. Shop Uncle is pounding away furiously at a calculator and scribbling in a blue ledger. “Girl, what you want? Hurry up. Don’t stand there.”

  “I need sugar,” she says.

  “Sugar. There—got so many bags.”

  “The cheapest one,” she says, scanning the row. The prices are not written on the bags.

  Shop Uncle’s scowl softens. “How much you have?” he asks.

  Jini hesitates but Shop Uncle looks sincere. He pushes aside his ledger. “How much?” he asks. She unfurls her fingers to reveal the coins she’s been clutching. Once Shop Uncle sees her money, he’ll say there’s nothing for her here. Cheap Indian, she remembers him calling her, and her face burns.

  But Shop Uncle doesn’t say anything. He steps away from the counter and returns with a bag of sugar and a plastic bag. He tears the top of the sugar bag and pours it into the plastic bag, pausing every now and then to weigh it in his hands and glance at Jini’s coins. “This is enough,” he concludes, taking some coins from Jini and leaving the rest in her palm.

  She opens her mouth to thank him but he waves her away. “You want to come back and buy things like that also can,” he says. “Next time you bring your own bag.” Jini nods.

  Storm clouds are beginning to form in the sky and a sharp flash of lightning in the distance of the kampong sends children scattering through the streets, shouting, “Electric! Electric!” The sky is ash-coloured. Raindrops tap her face, gently at first, then they begin to hit harder, like small bullets. She runs back to the house without looking where she’s going and slams right into Pra-ji, who is standing at the gate.

  “Sat sri akal,” she says quickly by way of apology. He greets her back and steers her into the house. In the dining room, Bilu is sitting on the floor and refuses to make eye contact with anybody. His face is wet with tears.

  “He tried to follow you again,” Bhabi-ji says accusingly. “I had to hold him back by his T-shirt and it ripped in the back. He’s getting too strong.”

  “Too strong?” Jini asks her. She doesn’t like the way Bhabi-ji says things like that. She always seems to be implying that Bilu is too much to handle, that they should send him away. She notices Pra-ji looking at her curiously.

  “Come and help me in the kitchen with the tea,” Bhabi-ji says.

  “Actually, I want to talk to Jini,” Pra-ji says. “You don’t mind?”

  Bhabi-ji looks at Jini suspiciously and says, “No, not at all.” She disappears into the kitchen but bangs the pots and pans loudly to show her discontent.

  “Mother’s working in Bukit Timah today. She might be stuck somewhere now because of the rain,” Jini tells Pra-ji. He doesn’t seem to be listening.

  “How are you, Jini?” he asks her after a moment’s silence.

  “Good,” she says, forcing a wide smile onto her face.

  “You’re doing well in school?”

  It hurts her to admit it. Her marks are decent and she is the fastest runner. You can do anything, Mr Goh told her the other day. She decided against telling him that he was wrong.

  “I’m okay in school,” she says modestly, playing with her thumbs.

  “You’re a fast runner,” he tells her. She separates her hands and looks down guiltily.

  “You saw me?” she asks. “Please—”

  Pra-ji laughs. “Don’t worry, Jini. I didn’t come here to get you into trouble. I know that your mother doesn’t approve.”

  Jini feels like she might die of embarrassment. Pra-ji has seen her in her running shorts! “She doesn’t know,” Jini says, her voice barely louder than a whisper.

  Pra-ji raises an eyebrow. “So you’ve been disobeying her?”

  Jini nods. From head to toe, she is flushed with shame. Her skin is burning.

  “I just really like to run,” she tells him quietly. “It makes me feel better.”

  “Things have been very difficult for you,” Pra-ji says with a nod. “I understand.”

  “I know it’s wrong to lie to my mother,” Jini says. “But please don’t tell her?”

  Bilu makes a guttural groaning sound that startles them both. Jini pulls him up from the floor and makes him sit on the chair, but he just slides back down and crawls around under the table.

  “I won’t tell,” Pra-ji repeats, keeping one eye on Bilu under the table, who is running his finger in slow circles over the floor. “I do want you to know, however, that God punishes us for disrespecting our parents. I was worried about you the other day when I saw you after school, so I pleaded with Guru-ji to be merciful. And He revealed something rather disturbing about you.” His gaze shifts from her eyes to her arms. Jini feels her heart stop for a moment and her throat gets tighter. But Pra-ji does not look angry, only concerned. “Let me see,” he says.

  Reluctantly, Jini rolls back her sleeves and shows Pra-ji the redness on her skin. “It’s on my legs too,” she says. She fears she might start crying, and when Bhabi-ji comes out with the tea, she’ll demand to know what’s going on.

  “This is worse than I imagined,” Pra-ji says. “Do you know what this is?”

  “No,” Jini says although she can already guess.

  “This is how God punishes you for lying and having dirty thoughts. Do you know what dirty thoughts are, Jini?”

  She has to think about this. The anger she felt at her father in the beginning has now subsided but when she thinks about him now, it becomes real and fresh again. The image of her father lying dead somewhere is the dirtiest thought she has ever had. She nods reluctantly, shame burning her face.

  Pra-ji closes his eyes and presses down her head with his hand, the way God is always poised to do in the portrait that is hanging on their living room wall. She sees Him there so often that she barely notices Him and lately, with all of her horrid thoughts and lies, she’s been ignoring him completely. “You must change or your skin will worsen. For every filthy thought you have, God will give you filthy skin. Do you know my maid, Rani? Do you know what she did?”

  Jini nods. She has seen the girl at the temple a few times. She walks with a limp and she avoids everybody’s eyes. There have been lots of stories about Rani. Her parents disowned her after they found out she had plans to run away with her Malay boyfriend. She boldly told them she would convert to Islam and marry him to get away from them. They beat her and kicked her out of their house. Pra-ji had tried to intervene, but they wanted nothing to do with her, so he took her in as his servant.

  “She used to be able to walk just fine. Then shortly after she was sent to live with me, she complained that something was wrong with her foot. Something mysterious—she had pains in her legs and her left foot went limp after a while. She wanted to see a doctor but I asked her, ‘What’s the point?’ This was God’s doing, I was sure of it. I spoke to her and I found out she was still in touch with the Malay boy. While running errands at the shops, she made short trips to his home. I scolded her and told her it was obvious that God was punishing her. He wanted her to stop sneaking around. God is doing the same thing to you, Jini. He uses illness and deformities to teach us lessons.”

  Jini looks down at Bilu. Surely, this can’t be entirely true. What did Bilu do to deserve being like this? Pra-ji seems to read the doubt in her eyes.

  “If you want, you can go see a doctor. He’ll give you medicine and make everything go away for a while. But God will present himself in other ways. You have to change.”

  It never occurred to her to see a doctor. When she has a cold, she doesn’t even tell her mother because she knows the response. “What am I supposed to do?” It is what any mother in their neighbourhood would say. Going to the doctor for a cold would be a frivolous expense, money that could be spent on food or electric bills. Once, when she was very little, she coughed so hard she thought
her lungs were going to explode. Her mother had given her hot tea and rubbed her chest with mint oil until she fell asleep. These are the only remedies they possess at home. The other remedy, a less expensive one, is faith.

  Bhabi-ji comes out with a tray of teacups and pakoras that she has deep-fried. Jini wonders where she got the pakora mix from, because the last time she was in the kitchen, the cabinets were bare. She looks out the window. Her mother is probably stuck in somebody’s house now, praying for the rain to stop. She hates to keep anybody—particularly Pra-ji—waiting.

  That night, while Jini is sitting in bed, she makes herself stop thinking about her father. She rehearses a speech for Mr Goh to let him know that she cannot run any more because she has to listen to her mother. She even vows to be more helpful to her sister-in-law, to stop complaining about kitchen work, to pay less attention in school and accept her fate. In a few years she will be working and she will be married off. Then God will be pleased with her again for doing all of the right things.

  • • •

  Her mother has the afternoon off and she’s using it to rest at home before going to the temple in the evening. Bhabi-ji is outside in the yard hanging clothes to dry. The glaring sunlight makes the edges of everything sharper. Jini can hardly stand to look outside without shielding her eyes first. She wishes for the comfort of rain and cool air. Moods change and soften with the weather. The stray dogs outside stop their loud barking and lie in the tangled shadows of the trees. Neighbourhood gossip becomes less vicious. She can hear her sister-in-law exchanging secrets with the neighbours now.