by Preti Taneja
She will not cry.
—So what? It’s just a letter. Your dad is on my side. I know he is. I’d bet my butt on it, she says.
Bubu has a jackal smile on his face. As if he could just stand here and smoke, and drink and play cards, and watch all of life fall down. He tugs on the ends of Radha’s hair.
—Poor Radha. You know better than anyone that Ranjit will sniff out any chance to protect himself. Looks like your charms wore off, dear wife.
She stands next to Bubu, facing Jivan, the paper limp in her hands. She considers which one she loves – which one she should spend her life with – which one would be a better father – which she makes happy. Is Bubu, she wonders, ever happy?
—Gargi’s on her way, Jivan says, pressing buttons on his mobile.
Bubu pulls out his Camel Golds, his lighter. Gives a smoke to Jivan, who lights it and gives it to Radha. Bubu shrugs. Smirks some more. Gives Jivan another. How Radha hates that smirk.
*
—What I want to know, Jivan, is why you didn’t catch this earlier. Bubu drags on his cigarette, exhales. His smoke hangs, then disperses.
—You’re right. I’ve just been distracted, that’s all I can say. And you?
—Guys, Radha says. Enough.
Neither responds: both of them concentrated on each other. The room; the room is no help, it is nothing but sharp corners and hard angled light – everything fractures and rearranges through smoke – the space in between Bubu and Jivan narrows. Radha says, to separate them,
—There’s only one person who might fix this. Jeet. Where the fuck is Jeet?
Now Bubu leans forwards with his cigarette, the red eye pointing at Jivan’s sweet face.
—Good question, he says. Where is Jeet? Weren’t you supposed to find him, Jivan Singh, son of Ranjit Singh, bastard half-brother of Jeet Singh?
Before Jivan can answer, the main door opens: the sound of Gargi talking to Uppal. Radha sees: Jivan and Bubu straighten themselves and move apart as Gargi comes into the room.
—I’m going back to Delhi right now, says Gargi. I’m going to sack Kishore. All in favour? Put your hand up Jivan, you can be Ranjit’s proxy.
Bubu raises his hand. So does Jivan. Radha can only nod.
—I am working for the good of all of us. I know what I’m doing. So do you three, most of the time. Someone talk to Ranjit. Tell him we will give Sita her half her share if she comes back. Fifteen percent minus the concrete and— (she looks at Radha) —the shawls. Ranjit should give his to you, Jivan, if he is so eager to rid himself of it. Agreed?
Gargi smiles, her eyes light up with it. She is excited. This is what she loves. But in fact, her smile is all for Jivan, and that, Radha thinks – inhaling smoke into her dry mouth, ignoring Gargi’s sideways look – exhaling away from the others – isn’t right.
—Do you think my dad takes you seriously, Gargs? Jivan says. He doesn’t trust any of us. I mean he still talks to me as if he can tell me to stand straight, pull up my socks, or dande padenge. (Jivan beats the air with an imaginary cane.) No. I think it needs more than talk.
He seems so buzzed, and so does Gargi; Radha wonders if they have been somewhere, drinking together.
—Gargi, Jivan says, you told me the night Bapuji left the Farm that this is our time. Don’t we have the ‘the youngest population, the fastest growing democracy’ in the world? Everyone says so. Come on. Don’t you want to grab it all and hold tight for the sake of the – you know, sisterhood?
Now he looks at Bubu, waves his hand to clear the smoke:
—Bubu, you’ve been going on about those hungry middle incomes waiting for your apartments to get built, your malls to open up, your fashion to trade, your hotels to serve them dim sum with dipping sauce at Hakkasan Delhi. This Company doesn’t need old men, still living in the glory days of the 80s and 90s. It’s now, guys. Our time.
Jivan says, Our time. Radha notices, and she notices Gargi’s quick smile. Her sister and her lover, a natural pair. She bites the tip of her tongue. Pulls it between her teeth.
—So what do you think we should do? Bubu says, slowly.
—We should fire Ranjit Uncle, to start, Radha says.
Gargi snorts.
—I could take out his eyes for the trouble he’s causing.
—Madam-Gargi-Directorji. Your wish is my command, Bubu says. Meeting adjourned. Get back to Delhi, Gargi, and fix your side of it. I will take care of Ranjit.
Gargi leaves: Bubu sends Jivan with her. All three concur: the two must be there, to secure head office. They decide to drive through the night. Gargi wants to save energy (even now), Jivan thinks it is less conspicuous than taking the plane.
Radha has to watch them go. Her bones hurt, her eyes hurt, her stomach feels hollow. Bubu gets out his Kashmiri box and cuts her lines for the evening. She wants to see Ranjit Uncle this second now.
—Let’s go find him, she says.
—No, says Bubu, snorting the drug, rubbing his gums, putting on his pants.
Silly pants, he cannot manage, and for a moment hops around the room. Now come Radha’s giggles mixing with the anger in her belly, means the snow is melting into her veins, turning her blood to ice.
—We’ve had our orders from Gargi Ma, he says. He calls out to the doorman,
—Get Ranjit down to the kitchen. A problem I need to speak to him about there.
At least Bubu lets Radha get dressed. Jeans, a loose T-shirt she keeps for après gym. Her handmade kolhapuri on her feet. Her butterfly shawl. He keeps hold of her elbow as they take the lift down. When the doors open the lobby is empty, there is no whisper of greeting from any place or anyone. What time is it? Surely only 10pm. There should be people, and service, and bags, and guests. But no. The floor shiner has started his rounds. Bubu gestures to front desk security, two of the men fall in behind. He drags Radha through the restaurant, still waiting for the ghostly party, where is everyone? There is no answer. Into the kitchen, the spiced air chokes her: the scent is garam massala, onions, raw meat. The fridges and ovens and mixers and mashers, shiny, so shiny. Service is ending (this is Amritsar) but Radha’s mouth starts to water, her nostrils sting. Bubu pulls her into the wash-up, more steel and steam – they pass a potwala, arms in the sink as if chopped off by water and foam; she recoils at his dirty toenails, black skin pricked with wiry hairs, tiny matchstick legs. The man stares at her, a cockroach caught in the light; she wants to crush him but not touch him, she holds her body as tight as she can, this is how a nice girl stops any part of herself coming too near any part of his. Through the kachra room Bubu pulls Radha, piles of onion peel and scraps of fat, pink and white skin; bits of bone mixed with vegetable choppings waiting to be thrown to the Dhimbala basti kids. Is that a rat? Bubu pulls her onwards: outside again, ground level turn, around the curve of the hotel, turn, away from the lights, and turn again, into an alleyway she never knew existed. She slips on the wet floor, dragging something with her on the soles of her chappal. God, she is hungry. Bubu stops. She almost puts a hand out to steady herself against the wall. She puts her shawl over her mouth instead. Lips to butterfly wings.
A narrow passage lit with only a few strip lights. At the far end, a vast tandoor is still belching out heat, the smell of the night’s service: chicken, lamb, all the marinades Bubu loves. It is hot, so hot down here. Radha cannot lean back; the walls are dank, it smells of susu and blood, sharp vinegar, soy piss. She wants someone to lift her up so her feet do not touch the filthy ground.
Ranjit Uncle rounds the corner. He’s wearing a jaunty peach cravat, a beautifully cut black suit. Ranjit Uncle, who she thought loved her better than the whole world. There is that smile on his face, his glee for her discomfort. She forces her body to stay, even though the years have trained her to spring forward, give him a kiss, let her breasts brush his shoulder and her hair tickle his cheeks. Behind him a group of orderlies and potwashers seem to melt out of the walls, and they are blocked: tandoor on one side, workers on the other,
in the back kitchen alley. They stand and look at her. Like city cows dreaming of grass. To be invisible among them she would have to be dirty, naked, dark skinned and poor. The feeling creeps over her. It is not the potwashers. It is Ranjit Uncle.
Radha looks up, tries to see the night sky, she wonders where Gargi and Jivan have got to, if they have passed the state boundary. Tears trickle down the sides of her face, catch in her ears and hair. She straightens her head. She says,
—How could you turn your back like this? You heard how Bapuji spoke to me, Ranjit Uncle.
Ranjit Uncle only wrinkles his nose and licks his lips. He keeps his eyes on Bubu. All of his body seems to shrink. He grips his stick.
—Let’s meet like civilised men, Bubu. What do we need to come down to the bowels for?
Ranjit Uncle’s face is like a dog’s, denied its bone. Radha knows this look too: did he not teach it to her? Did she not use it, time after time, to get whatever she wanted from Gargi, from Bapuji? My little Firebrand, Ranjit Uncle calls her. And now, here they are. Yes, she thinks, now you’ll see. She wants to press against him like she did when she was a girl, the smell of aniseed cologne, the scratch of his beard, his tongue in her mouth, his hands, his stick, his fingers, his tickly beard. His beard. Now she wants to rip the hairs out of his chin. See what you have done, she will say. And send the torn parts to Sita.
—Ranjit ko pakado, says Bubu.
The security men step forward, they grab Ranjit Uncle, he struggles but Bubu slaps him. Radha stuffs her shawl into her mouth; she wants to scream, but cannot.
—Tie him up, says Bubu.
He pulls his own tie loose. Don’t use that, it’s Armani, Radha thinks. He signals for the security guards to do the same. They push Ranjit around so he is facing the workers, his fingers wriggle at Radha – five or ten fingers – seem to grow towards her, to want to touch, in her – she watches Bubu fumble. God, so incompetent. She pushes him out the way and snatches the ties; she begins to bind Ranjit Uncle’s wrists; Bubu knows nothing about real knots. Radha does, though, for didn’t Ranjit Uncle teach her himself how to bind Jivan the chiru? And didn’t he impress upon her how important it is to beat but not kill? The bonds are fast: he struggles and tries to twist, almost he wants to bite at her, though he is stronger than he looks, of course so is she, from boxing and yoga and abs and bends and spreading her legs above her head and working her core and all she does to keep her figure, to not become a fatty, or get sick, or old, to make sure the walls and the doors and the floors and the bars and the mirrors and the doormen and the public and Bubu and Ranjit have something pretty to feast their eyes on – she binds Ranjit more tightly; she turns him to face her; he cracks his head on the wall. The shock on his face delights her. He tries to get free. Then realises he cannot. Radha’s arms are loose, her hands reach out: she takes the beard she used to stroke and pulls as hard as she can.
—Radha! he cries out, her Ranjit Uncle.
A puddle begins to form around his feet. His susu runs down the alley, mingling with what is already there. Grease, dark mud. His stick drops, he falls on his knees.
—Bravo! Bubu claps.
Behind Ranjit Uncle the onion peelers and whatever else they are swarm up against the two security guards. The alleyway is so narrow, so lucky to be so thin. Arms loom towards Radha, over Ranjit Uncle’s head – someone’s fingers almost grasp her. Bubu pulls her behind him. The security push the servants back towards the alley’s neck. This is all Ranjit Uncle’s fault. How could he let this happen? When she was little, he promised to love her always, and protect her; he said he would keep all her secrets and pat her and pet her and gift her and treat her. Now, no longer. She pushes back past Bubu, she shouts in his face, barely aware of what she’s saying: Pissing in the gully, talking to Sita, lying, cheating Ranjit Uncle. You promised you would look after me and this is what you meant? The hurt is sharper than the vinegar smell around her, it takes her body back to those hot afternoons, thirteen-years-old and dizzy with champagne; missing Jivan, riding in the Bentley, home from tea with Ranjit Uncle, head in his laps, taken to Nizamuddin for naps to get sober – he would stay with her, stroking her, stroking her, one hand on his stick, one to five fingers in her. Waking up with blood on the sheets. Ranjit Uncle’s chin drips crimson onto white: such a bright, hurt red under the strip lights. Dead flies caught in them; still bodies above their heads. The blood is beautiful, it makes her own eyes hurt, her skin, her insides; she wants to pull again, see that red come out. Have you told Sita she can come take all? Have you?
Ranjit Uncle swallows. Radha wipes her palms on his cheeks. A shock to feel Jivan’s bone structure, Jivan’s flesh, hard under her hands, now turned to stale papad that no one will eat.
—Sita wanted me to help her reconcile – she wanted the lie of the land – I gave her the truth that is all.
His old play-time voice. His our-keeping-secrets voice. Now Radha hears it differently: cowardice, cunning. Fear.
—Don’t lie to me, Ranjit Uncle, please sach batao. Who am I? she shouts in his face.
She starts to weep. She can feel Bubu behind her, pushing her out of the way. She holds up her arm.
—Stop.
The softness in her voice raises Ranjit Uncle’s head. There is blood all over his lips like a liquid lipstick. He is crying. His nose is running, into the blood.
—Radha, he whispers. He sounds so serious and so hurt.
—I have known you and your sisters since before you were born. I have seen you fight and play. I have watched you take on life’s challenges. I watched you become a wife to this idiot, and tried to guide you. But I cannot stand to see you and Gargi take everything from your father. His titles, his houses, the eyes in his head? You cannot imagine and you don’t care.
Ranjit stops. Splutters with his own blood.
Radha takes her white shawl, she tries to wipe his cheeks. Ranjit Uncle turns his head from her.
—You are not the Radha I tutored and loved. Even if some pagal kutta had barked outside in that storm you would have let him in. God will show us what happens to delinquents like you, who make such great men into slaves.
—God will show you nothing, says Bubu.
He pushes Radha out of the way; she sprawls in the alleyway then gets on her knees. She touches cold stone, dark matter, the scent of earth and filth. The orderlies shout out – that sound, what is that sound? Crack, as the snapping of a cane. Thump, as a body falls down. She looks up. Bubu is standing over Ranjit Uncle, the splintered cane in his hand. He raises his arm; he pushes the end into Ranjit Uncle’s eye, he twists the stick and turns it.
Blood spurts all over Bubu, all over Radha. She screams, and beneath it, hears a deeper note: Ranjit Uncle. A sound so like Jivan, in the bed, under her – and all she can see around her is red; all she can feel is the slip of flesh between flesh. Wet like the night in the dipping pool, heat as he sucked on her breasts one by one, one by one, so fast. One, the other, one, the other. It fizzes in her mouth and then she says the words that will change her story forever – says them in a haze of red, the sentence from which she will never be free, no, never, never, no—
—The other one too, the other one too! Don’t leave him lopsided, take the other one too!
Bubu takes her hand, he wrenches her shoulder, but she cannot get free. His palm on hers, the stick in her hand. He raises their arms: Bleed little chiru, but do not die. They give a sharp twist. Seconds. Slow, a breath, or two. It is done.
—Ayeee, ayeee! The servants break past the security, Radha sees them stumbling towards her.
—Bus karo! One, no more than a child, barefoot and slipping on the blood, tries to climb Bubu’s body, get the stick out of his hand. Ayeee, ayeee! Bubu shakes him off; he falls on the floor. Smack: his little head. Radha tries to kick him; Bubu kneels over him – then someone – a guard – hits Bubu on the temple with a tandoor brick: he thuds to the ground, he lies still.
The guard hits again. Radha cannot get close
enough to make him stop. She is covered in blood. This is her youth: she is meant to be in Switzerland or Paris or London; she can feel the cool of the fresh snow, the blinding white of the Alps. It is so far from the piss in the alley, from the blood, from the stick now flailing in the guard’s hands, trying to school her husband. The tandoor’s mouth, a dark hole: It is our time. Now, Radha, now!
She scrabbles towards the guard; finds his knife in his belt. He does not see her. She pulls it out, she stabs the man in his side.
—Don’t touch your betters you disgusting Jhimba!
She has to pull the knife out. It is harder than putting it in. Meat on the bone, torn with teeth. It takes all her strength, then the man collapses.
Around her: men. Stop. Eyes wide. At her feet, Bubu gapes, staring. He grabs at her. There is so much blood. The whole right side of his head is mashed. She wants to leave him in the alley. Three bodies and a half. Ranjit, Bubu, the security man. The whimpering child.
A groan comes from the red wash.
—Jivan, where are you?
Ranjit or Radha? No one there could tell.
She heaves Bubu out of the alleyway. The orderlies huddle around Ranjit Uncle, some melt back against the walls. Some help. They lie Bubu down amongst the five-kilo bags of Company flour. He is bloodless, it seems. As if stunned only, not dead. As if dead only, and about to wake. When the car comes she climbs in also, holding his hand. She does not cry. When they get to the hospital she does not go in. She will not be seen in this backwater, covered in blood. She is folded in hospital blankets; she is returned to the hotel. Through the back gate. Up in the lift, the goldfish gapes and flickers, the light strobes her stained clothes. In her suite, she begins to sob, so hard, choking: someone, she does not care who it is, slaps her. Then pats her and wraps her up again, and puts her to bed, her cherry room, with something milky to drink. How red and bright are the fruits on the vine. She closes her eyes. No, keep them open. A silence descends: so complete it is as if Sita has come home and filled every corner of the whole deep world with her nothing.