We that are young

by Preti Taneja

  He takes a whisky from one of the turbaned waiters. Dude has a drop-kick moustache. He knocks it back, takes another, keeps moving. The Sari Army smile at him, so handsome, so polished. Of course they think they know him, they have met each other at such and such’s house – that party – that wedding, of course.

  —Helloji, how are you?

  He nods back at them. Then mixes hysteria with a twist of lime and washes it down with tequila at the long glass bar. Tastes bitter like metal, like blood.

  In the poker room, the dice roll, ones and fives and eights. The chips stack up on the baize tables, models of the half-built Bubu towers Radha has been left to play with. Where is she? Well, she’s been puking all day; she is still in her room. A few of the more experienced Company PRs are working the party in her place, introducing Bollywood to bankers, state and private; property developers to governments, national and regional, letting a select few know what kind of gift might buy them a private audience with Gargi when the time comes.

  Jivan loads a small plate with ladoos. Outside Radha’s suite, her women – one called Sheila, the other, he thinks, Rachel – stand guard at her door. They are dressed in one-shouldered tops and dark leather trousers; their hair has been teased and sprayed into someone’s idea of punk, their faces powdered almost white. Their lips are painted the kind of red that makes whatever it touches look wounded. They say Madam is too sick for him to see her. He hands them the ladoos; they smile and let him pass.

  Now, since when does Radha have such a thing for scented candles? She has to have at least five burning at any given time. She has developed this obsession with lavender: everything has to be purple and smell, Jivan thinks, like a gift shop. He gives a quick salute to a painting of Bubu brought up from Delhi; he is dressed like the Emperor Akbar, leaning on his sword. Bubu doesn’t look down at him but straight out into the private garden, planted with brutal steel sculptures that loom at the windows: alien skeletons, of the industrial modern.

  Radha’s sari for this evening, deep purple, shot through with gold thread, is stiff on its hanger, waiting to be unfurled. Radha’s sandals – gold, delicate – are standing to attention by her dressing table. Where is Radha? Curled in the middle of her four-poster; Jivan has to fight swathes of silk and chiffon to find her. She is wearing jogging pants and his crimson Harvard sweatshirt. She smells too sweet; of Company perfume, and puke.

  —How are you? he says.

  —Jivan. You came.

  He smiles at her; her eyes and skin are glazed. He could take her down to the Egyptian lobby and display her in a cabinet. But this is not gold, it is the sheen of the sick room. He shudders.

  —You have to come down, Rads. You’re missing the party. I need you to come. Look, your lovely sari is waiting for you over there – Sheila is outside waiting to help you.

  —Is Gargi downstairs?

  —I haven’t seen her yet, and I don’t know anyone. I don’t know if Surendra is giving the opening speech or Gargi is. See? I can’t cope without you.

  —Ask Gargi, Radha says. She curls away from him; her hair covers her face.

  —Raddy, don’t be like that.

  She rolls back to face him. Her face is going grey; she is clearly sick, not fronting. She looks almost like a little girl, when he used to make her dens with cushions to hide in. In those soft places, no one could hear her cry.

  —You know what Uppal told me? That you and her – on the way back from Amritsar, that night of Bubu and Ranjit Uncle—

  —Shh, he says. Why are you thinking about that now? No one has seen Uppal for weeks. The guy doesn’t even have the courtesy to show up for work anymore.

  Radha’s hair is sticking to her scalp. Jivan strokes it back with a finger. He tries not to look at her too closely. The room is tiled with lavender and turquoise mosaics, as if she took a pair of scissors to the walls and then ordered some poor slave to piece it all back together.

  —Don’t you think it’s too, too sad? she says. Everyone is leaving us. Sita, Kritik Uncle. Jeet. Bubu, Ranjit Uncle, Uppal. My dad. So sad.

  She sniffs and tries to pull herself onto his lap, up his body, get her arms around his neck. Now he has to hold her. She is so thin in the waist, and so heavy around the breasts, the hips. Much more so than she was in Amritsar. Too many Kashmiri sweets, he thinks. Isn’t it?

  —Radha, he says. How long have you been feeling sick for? What are you taking? Answer me.

  He pushes her away.

  —You aren’t leaving are you? She reaches for him; her pupils are tiny black pinpricks.

  —Get up. Wash yourself. I’ll check in with Gargi for a doctor. I’ll bring you some food.

  —Feed me like a baby, she says.

  She pulls her knees up to her chest, locking them to her belly. She rocks from side to side, smiling at him through sleep-crusted eyes. Her face is smudged pink all over, as if she has used too much blush. It should be grotesque but there is something about the way she is curled on the lavender sheets: she is still a pretty Radha.

  —Sure, I’ll feed you, whatever you want, he says. I might be an hour.

  —Would you feed Gargi? she asks.

  —Stop it Radha, or I’ll just leave.

  Now she rolls onto her stomach, her face in the pillow. Her sweatpants are filthy.

  —Do you love her? she says, muffled.

  —Of course.

  He moves himself off the bed; it’s like swimming through lavender sludge.

  Radha kneels up, wiping her hair off her face again, and again, even when she does not need to.

  —Would you have sex with her? Do you think about it? I can’t believe you’d find her sexy – as if she even knows what the word means.

  —Enough, he says. It’s insulting. She’s your Didi, or did you forget?

  She flops back into the bed, a dark-skinned Rapunzel with burned black hair. She starts to hum to herself; she says:

  —Did you know that in the first trimester, pregnant women like anything pink if they are going to have a girl, anything blue for a boy?

  —What did you say?

  —Nothing.

  She lies there, grinning at him.

  —I have to go, he says. I’ll see you later.

  He forces himself to bend, brush his lips over her forehead. She tastes like a pillar of salt.

  Back downstairs he loops around, Radha’s words in his head. He checks his phone: no message from Punj. He looks for Gargi in the Napurthala Room, where gift-wrapped girls and festooned matrons are comparing notes on each other’s children. She is not in the English pub that Radha insisted on; it’s full of Bubu 2.0s, all in black tie, smoking cigars, drinking whisky sours. In the Orchid Room, where plants on polished walnut tables droop purple, white and yellow labia over their own reflections, Jivan eavesdrops on couples talking about everything but sex. He asks a waiter, a doorman, a security guy where Gargi is. Have they seen her? No? Have they met her tonight? Every one of them nods – she cares about me, they seem to be saying, she cares about my uniform and whether it fits. She knows I have a sick daughter, she sent Diwali clothes to my wife.

  No – that’s her way of protecting her investments, Jivan wants to tell them. Gargi only cares about work. She doesn’t love you, or your family, and she doesn’t love your children. How could she? She doesn’t have it in her.

  In the Modernist’s Room – painted stark white, with a band of dark colour around its walls – Jivan pauses. He stands under spotlights, turning through the pages of hardback art books arranged on one of the tables. He does not recognise the artists’ names. Husain. Reddy. Sher-Gil. Gargi – on that drive from Amritsar to Delhi, the night that his dad was blinded and Bubu died. Radha won’t talk about what happened. Still. Jivan was with Gargi in the back of the SUV; Uppal was in the front (where is he, really?). None of them aware of the chaos they left behind. Poor old Bubu must have croaked somewhere around the time they crossed the state line out of Punjab.

  They did not know. They were
still shocked at Ranjit’s betrayal. He remembers that Gargi cried in the car, about Sita. She said she felt every day was forcing her to steel. He listened until she stopped, and said,

  —Sorry.

  They had a car picnic of beers and spiced fruit salad, eaten from a tiffin box. There were chicken kebabs and minted yoghurt dip – he remembers this because they laughed about getting it on their fingers and licking it off. When they finished the beer, they drank French red wine shared straight from the bottle. Parts of the country he never wanted to know flashed by in the dark. Gargi cried again; she said Sita had always been self-centred – that maybe it was a generational thing. She said Sita had a death wish, that if she came back, she would ruin their lives for good. And if she didn’t?

  Gargi fell asleep, her sandals kicked off, her feet pushing against Jivan’s leg. Her heels were surprisingly dry – the skin cracked, as if she walked around barefoot in the dirt all day. She woke up around dawn, surprised by her phone’s cheerful buzz.

  —Aw, sod off, she said. Then she looked at Jivan’s face, and laughed. Only Amritsar. Probably to see if we reached.

  If she had answered the phone they would have learned that Ranjit had gone blind and gone missing, that Bubu was dead, that Radha was locked in her suite making the kind of noises an animal might as it dies. Instead Gargi reached forward to the passenger seat and shook Uppal awake. They pulled over, they got out of the car, to stretch and drink coffee with petit fours: high tea on the highway. A few cars passed and beeped; otherwise it was just the tarmac, pasted flat to the earth, desert stretching out either side. Leading towards a sunrise the exact same pink, he thought, as the five-dollar bill in the Monopoly game.

  —Jivan, Gargi had said. Do you want to get married one day?

  Sure, why not? This is what he had thought. If you lose your husband and change your mind about having kids.

  She looked at her wedding ring. He remembers this because her family signet ring was nested on top.

  —Just got to find the right girl, he said.

  Gargi smiled, full wattage.

  —Should I start looking in the Sunday classifieds? Telling the Aunties I know a suitable boy? Foreign return, Harvard MBA, good salary, seeks fair-skinned beauty from good business or Brahmin family, appreciation of Abercrombie and a taste for single malt. Sound right?

  Trucks roared past, whipping grit into their eyes. He told her he didn’t have so many demands. The sun was racing into the sky, glaring red as if trying to warn them to get back into the car, keep on! Towards the city and its watchful crowds. He told her he wanted something more simple: he just wanted to be happy.

  Gargi teased him. She said the girl would have to be quite pretty – but not too much – she wouldn’t choose one from skinnybitchland. She seemed to enjoy the look on his face when she said that. Then she twisted her hands, then picked up a petit four and placed it back down again. Her nails were painted a bright pink colour. He thought about Radha, slippery and firm in the afternoons when she sucked him. Her hair so long, Sometimes he wants to wind it round her neck and pull it tight.

  Gargi had said, without looking at him,

  —Do I seem happy to you?

  The day was firming its claim. He took a piss, then got back into the car with her. They had to slow to make way for a parade of cows – lean in the ribs but with big, low bellies. Unseeing as they clopped past, tails swishing, assholes dark and stained. The boy riding them had a homemade whip and bare feet; he balanced on the back of a cow, a circus performer to the long grass waving at the side of the road. He asked Gargi if she was lonely and she told him no, that she loved being at the helm of the Company. Yes, she had said, I love it.

  — Just, since you’ve been in Amritsar, I’ve had so much on my mind. Work, accounts, how to be good. You make me think.

  —What? he asked, and looked out of the window. A hand-painted sign flashed by – Free-way Toll Coming Soon.

  —Jivan, she said.

  The city was rising all around them in squats and slums and drunken towers. They passed wedding grounds being assembled; Taj Mahal facades and the dessert behind.

  —Jivan, she had said again. She stroked her palm down his face.

  He looked at the lines in her face, around her eyes. He wanted to sink into her belly and feast on her softness and power. Could he really do this? Looking into her face he imagined: divorce from Surendra, remarriage. Could he actually become head of the Company? And have Gargi, who anticipates everything he’s ever needed, as his wife? Mother to two (or maybe three?) pure Indian children who would grow up to inherit so much? Two would be enough. A boy and a girl. Jivan Junior. Jivanka.

  —You know, he said. You’d be a great mom.

  She looked at him and shook her head.

  —No. Then: You know I’ve never experienced a really good fuck?

  He, who never shows surprise, wanted to raise his fist and stop her mouth.

  They left the freeway, heading down the dirt tracks towards the maze. Their hands separated as the car bumped over the potholes. They turned into the Farmhouse drive and Gargi sat up straight. Just like that, Jivan’s bright vision faded. She looked older. Despite the air conditioning in the car, she was sweating.

  It was late August, or was it early September? All the flowers had been replaced with grass and there were no peacocks to greet them. Surendra’s Mercedes was parked like a full stop in front of the farmhouse. Before Jivan could say anything else, Uppal was jumping out to open Gargi’s door.

  —Welcome home, Gargi Madam, Uppal said.

  Jivan stayed in the car, in the debris of their journey. He watched Gargi go inside. He thought about calling Bubu, but didn’t. After five minutes or so, Gargi came back out. She opened the door and said she was sorry, Surendra was having some kind of fit.

  —You better not come in. Go to Ranjit’s bungalow. Freshen up, then meet me in the office downtown. Call Bubu in a couple of hours, tell him to keep an eye on Radha, please? Not too many wild parties. We just don’t know what’s coming up.

  —Will you be OK?

  —Of course, she said.

  She looked back at the farmhouse.

  —I just have to go and press Surendra’s feet for a while. Listen to his latest attempt at writing for The Speaking Tree. But Jivan – she said (and this is the moment he cannot let go of) – You know whatever you want, I’ll do my best to give you.

  She started towards him. They were face to face, the car window in between. His vision flared again. The idea that Surendra never existed, that he could marry Gargi and the Company and the Farm – and the mines and the cement and the cars and parts and all the hotels. All that land – which means so much money, for him, for his children, for theirs down the ages.

  He went to the bungalow. He washed and ate. He went to the Delhi office – but she didn’t come. Nor did she text him – not even one coy little smile. Then, Uppal himself came to the bungalow, to tell him what Bubu had done. That Radha had been widowed – his father was missing – he had to go back to Amritsar.

  Since then Gargi has been in Delhi, he has been in the North. Four weeks working with Punj in Amritsar and Srinagar, all towards this night. They walked the city. They made recruits and began a watch. Jivan knew when Sita had arrived – with Kritik, of all people, and Devraj. He did not share this information with Gargi, or Surendra or Radha. Instead he took it slowly; he wanted to get to know her. He sat in a coffee house near her safe house, drinking bitter cups of black, waiting for her to come out alone. He watched her go on endless boat-rides, wondering what she was planning. Would she want to continue the campaign? For her, he thought, it would not be about boycotting the Company – she would probably want to take her place in it, with all of Ranjit’s shares. She might want to break the whole thing into pieces and offer the parts to the People. In the badly recorded films he has watched of her she stands in wood panelled rooms in England, going on and on about changing the lives of the bottom rung. The pieces were in plac
e, she said, the public marches were only the beginning. So many others wanted a new way forward. They believed they had a duty to speak up. And such causes! The environment, labour laws, child marriage. There was even a debate where she told the floor that the prohibited practice of dowry still led to women being sold as slaves across India. Sure, he wanted to say to the screen, Satyamev Jayate. He watched her as she talked. The things she said, the people she wanted to help, whom she felt she really could make a difference to – it made him nostalgic again, for Iris and the old American life.

  What would happen if Sita never came back? He did not tell them their sister, their father were here.

  Tonight, he wanted to talk to Gargi. He was going to tell her his dreams. But Radha – so thin around the waist – so thick in the hips – and now sick…

  He stares at the walls of the Modernist room, the dark band of colour. It is actually a mural – a rusted, earth coloured background. Over there, a yellow horse rears behind a faceless woman. Her angular body is wrapped in white bandages around the breasts and she cradles a long-necked, fat-bottomed instrument. Her black hair streams behind her and over there, in a corner, the blanched ribs of a cow are etched on the canvas. In the centre, a Mother Theresa headdress, white, with blue stripes floats with no face. And there – a yellow skinned baby holds out its arms to the void.

  ii

  —Gargi Madam, here, please, look this way!

  The camera flashes. Gargi poses on the stairs and feels the glitter and chatter, the wine and music, a column of gold under her feet. People have come here. People have been seduced here. By Gargi Ma. This new skill was learned as the panic began for her, late at night. As the Company went into a freefall, a kind of spin she once thought only happened in movies, where the plane is going down, nose first and begins to roll, beating the clouds like a ceiling fan does the air. Sweet words, eye-fluttering persuasion. Transferable skills. She used to do this only to flatter Bapuji; now these attitudes wait in her office each morning, to help her through the day. They work. The panic recedes, the evidence is everywhere around her. She is the seductress and each of her guests is in love.