After all, he had stopped RR’s most ambitious film. He had got him out of work, temporarily, at least. PK alias Kris Lokapalli had called him and kindled RR’s Hollywood dream. He had given the bastard a few sleepless nights. He could turn around, buy a ticket to San Jose and report to work on Monday. No one would be the wiser. No major losses, his dad’s soul partially appeased, if one knew the nutritional requirements of souls.
Wasn’t that enough?
‘Never had it as a kid, da. My son is to blame,’ PK said.
‘Naannaa!’ came another disembodied voice, nipping the blame game in the bud.
‘We should just get a replacement, saar,’ said Selva. ‘We’ve come this far. Everything’s ready. We just need someone to play Kris.’
‘Yeah, who?’ said Abie. ‘Maybe Rajinikanth could be roped in.’
Selva thought for a bit.
‘Won’t do, saar,’ he said. ‘He’d never be able to do an American accent.’
‘Maybe it is time to call it quits,’ said Abie.
‘What do you mean, quits?’ said Sumi. ‘Give it up now after all the trouble Ray’s been through?’
‘Have some,’ said Shravani, PK’s wife, placing a plate of jantikalu big enough to feed a drama troupe on the table. ‘Will help you think.’
Selva helped himself to a large piece and did a dead-on imitation of a mini granite crusher. Abie made eyes at Sumi not to eat any. When she ignored him, he mouthed the words ‘chickenpox’ to her. She looked at him, nodded and took a bite.
Ray picked up a jantika and examined the crisp, intertwining wires of rice flour. It looked like a hundred infinity signs had been hastily shoved into one another.
‘Maybe it’s not a bad idea, Sumi,’ said Ray. ‘Maybe now’s the time to cut my losses. If you look at it, PK agreeing to do this ridiculous thing is because PK is, you know, PK. I’ve had a good run.’
‘It isn’t like PK’s the only “actor” you know, you know,’ said Sumi.
‘Who else, yaar?’ said Ray.
‘I mean, at a pinch, Abie could do it, right?’ she said.
Ray and Selva laughed out loud. Abie produced the same expression he had had when he had gone to a party and realized the food was entirely vegetarian.
‘I don’t know which I find more offensive,’ he said, ‘that my wife thinks I have it in me to be a conman or that this … gentleman, Selva, whom I’ve met not more than a minute ago, thinks I’m funny.’
‘You can do it, da,’ said PK. The chickenpox had obviously done nothing to diminish his voice-throwing ability. ‘Remember, you played something in Julius Caesar in school. Who did you play, Cassius or Casca?’
‘The centurion,’ Abie said.
‘Who?’ PK said.
‘The centurion, for god’s sake, are you deaf?’ said Abie.
‘He had no lines,’ Ray said. He remembered poor Abie, wearing a ridiculous skirt and standing at the back of the stage in his first and last attempt at a career in the dramatic arts.
‘He won’t do, saar,’ Selva said.
‘What do you mean, I won’t do?’ Abie said.
Selva placed a half-eaten jantika on the table and walked up to Abie. He put his thumb tips together, his forefingers formed right angles. He framed Abie carefully. Then he did a circular track shot of his subject, zooming in and out now and then. He shook his head and returned to his jantika.
‘Won’t do. Not enough personality to play a big-time executive,’ he said.
Sumi tried not to choke on her snack.
‘I’m not going to anyway,’ Abie said, getting up. ‘I don’t know about the rest of you but I live in the real world. A place where people have jobs, have to look after their families and generally avoid trying to go to jail.’
‘Case closed,’ Ray said. He felt something akin to relief.
~
Ray couldn’t sleep. Dog Raj had figured that out half an hour ago. He had offered the partially eaten shoe on the bed to him several times for a game of fetch but Ray had got tired after two throws. He decided to read the rest of his father’s script.
…that night Vivek is unable to sleep, a million questions in his mind. Is this what his life was? His seemingly kind, loving, compassionate parents, whom everyone looked up to – is this what they were capable of? Was he alive only because he was male?
Impulsively, along with his bewildered wife and child, Vivek jumps into a car in the dead of the night and drives to Chennai. On the long drive on the highway, some of the hitherto overlooked incidents in his life begin making sense. The unusually large number of infant deaths among his relatives, the relatively small number of female cousins, the stony resolve of his mother after the ‘miscarriages’, his father’s almost indifferent response to the birth of his own daughter…
Vivek’s blood runs cold when he realizes what could have happened to Sanjana had she been born in Vaniyampatti. And what about his unborn child? He is so shaken by the possibilities that he stops the car on the side of the road, trembling with fear.
Vivek ignores the countless phone calls on his mobile from his parents and leaves for the US. Back in the US, he is unable to wipe the recent horrific events from his mind but he tries to carry on with his life. One day, a month or so later, he sees Sanjana talking to her mother’s belly. She is saying, ‘Don’t worry, baby, I’ll always take care of you.’
Vivek applies for leave and heads back to India, this time alone. No amount of pleading on Shanti’s part helps. He goes to his village and confronts his parents. He tells them both they are cold-blooded murderers and asks them to surrender to the police. That day, Vivek sees an unseen side of his father. In the altercation that follows, a venomous Jagannathan tells his son he is mad, and that education and Western ideas have made him forget his roots. He says that infanticide, foeticide, jallikattu and many other customs were perfectly acceptable in their community and have been followed for centuries. To Vivek’s astonishment, the father says there’s nothing wrong in what he had done twenty-odd years ago and he would do the same now if he had to, except that technology would help him abort the foetus.
In a fit of rage, Vivek attacks his father. They are separated and Vivek storms into the police station. He tries lodging a complaint against his parents and is surprised by the inspector’s uncooperative attitude that borders on the hostile…
The phone rang. It was Abie. ‘Asleep?’
‘Not really,’ Ray said. ‘What’s up?’
‘I’ll do it.’
‘Do what?’ Ray said.
‘He’ll do it.’ It was Sumi on the line.
‘Don’t be stupid. There’s nothing to do. I’ve called the whole thing off, Sumi. It was insane, to begin with.’
‘I’ve spoken to Selva and PK. Nothing’s called off. It’s on tomorrow,’ she said.
‘But—’ Ray said, before being cut off.
‘Call me mad, Ray, but in my book that’s what friends are for…’ she said.
Sumi’s long, grand defence of his own mad scheme turned into a hum.
Abie and Sumi – these were his siblings. Abie was there when his mother had died. He had been there to see him off when he had first left for the US, roughly shoving five-hundred dollars into his pocket (for emergency lap dances, he had said). Pretty nearly every memory of Ray’s had a frowning Abie in it, doing what needed to be done in spite of himself. If they were going to take over things, maybe it wasn’t that unnatural. Family did that for one another. Lakshmi, or for that matter, his cousin Shobha would do it, too, at a pinch. It was just that he had thought it wiser not to involve them.
Rationalization – that was what he was doing. It was the life-blood of criminals.
‘Okay, Sumi, what can I say except thanks,’ he said.
‘Here, speak to your pal,’ she said.
Abie came on the line.
‘Hey, you don’t have to do this, you know,’ Ray said.
‘That’s what you think. Try telling Sumi that.’
‘Thanks, da. What can I say?’
‘Well, just so you know, Kris Lokapalli will be bringing along his hot secretary,’ Abie said.
‘What do you mean?’
‘Ask Sumi, she’s directing this episode,’ said Abie.
26
Ray knew it could jeopardize everything but sitting at home waiting for Abie to call wasn’t an option. This was his suicide mission. If they were going to crash, he wanted to be the first to burn. Already far too much had happened with him ‘out of field’.
He had chosen the newly opened Regency Towers because the hotel was not as yet on the radar of the rich and jobless. But it wouldn’t be too long before the aroma of excess reached the ever-vigilant nostrils of the Page 3 people. Like most new malls and hotels in Chennai, it was situated on the site of a once-famous mill that had succumbed to a family feud. The bar overlooked the restaurant in the lobby where the action would take place.
The good thing was that RR had agreed to the time and place.
Ray watched Abie and Sumi, or rather, Kris Lokapalli and his second-in-command, Mona Mathai, walk in. They were ahead of time, which was how they had planned it. From where Ray was sitting, Abie looked like he had at his wedding – suited, out of place, and vulnerable.
‘Mona’, on the other hand, looked like she owned the hotel.
When he had first seen her in this avatar earlier in the day, the only response Ray could come up with was a ‘thumbs up’. Sumi had not just scripted herself in, but, going by her impeccably tailored pantsuit and her Baywatch-worthy bosom, had decided to upstage the male lead. If Rajarajan was the man he was reputed to be, ‘Kris Lokapalli’ could have gone as a Roman centurion and he wouldn’t have noticed.
‘I know, I know … the cleavage,’ Sumi had said, on seeing the drooping tongues on display, first of which was her husband’s. ‘They’re not implants, don’t worry. Just some smoke and mirrors. You won’t believe the things you can do with a wonder bra and cotton wool.’
‘I like them. I mean it. The whole idea, that is,’ Ray said.
‘Don’t forget they are mine, okay?’ said Abie, making an air circle in the area in question and giving Selva a preemptive scowl.
Selva put his hand on his head in the Indian version of the scout’s honour.
‘She’s like a cousin sister, saar,’ he said.
Sumi had christened herself ‘Mona Mathai’. Whether it was a tribute to ‘Mona Darling’, the default moll in Hindi films of the ’70s, or whether she wanted to get even with Abie by being Syrian Christian for a day, one would never know. As for poor Abie, his worst nightmare had come true. Not only was he being asked to act as someone else, that someone was Kris Lokapalli, a Telugu Brahmin, of all things. The idea of possibly being a vegetarian, even in a fantasy life, must have been nothing short of gut wrenching for Abie. It had been an identity designed to suit the acting range of the previous leading man, PK, and one that couldn’t be changed.
Ray looked at his watch. Nearly time. There was nothing to do except pray for a lenient judge.
‘Can you hear me?’ said Ray.
‘Yeah, what are you drinking?’ said Abie.
The SpySound II was working. What were formerly James Bond’s special-issue gadgets, handed out grudgingly by Q, were now available on the street. Ray hoped the device wouldn’t be visible under the hair covering ‘Kris’s’ ears.
‘It’s twelve, noon. Maybe a shandy, just so the bartender is happy,’ said Ray.
‘Shandy’s for pansies. Bastard, you’re drinking, and here I am, about to soil my underwear.’
‘Look at your secretary’s bazookas. That ought to calm you down.’
‘That is the reason why I might soil my underwear, you fool,’ Abie said.
‘He’s coming,’ said Sumi.
‘Not as yet,’ said Abie.
‘Not you, you fool. Rajarajan.’
Ray’s phone went pip-pip. It was a text from Selva: Bastard is here!
If Selva did embark on a career in writing, his prose would be muscular, if nothing else.
Rajarajan made an entrance, scanning the surroundings. The massive lobby and artfully spread-out coffee shop yielded a smattering of posh hotel staff with their fixed smiles and gliding feet and a couple of tables occupied by preoccupied business types. No army of admirers with autograph books, their camera phones pointed at him like six guns. He caught sight of a suited arm waving from the furthest table and walked towards it.
‘Hi, I’m Kris, and this is my associate, Mona,’ said Abie, hand outstretched, getting his opening line spot-on.
He was glad he had managed to say ‘associate’ instead of the politically incorrect and sexist ‘assistant’ as he had been saying repeatedly at practice. He noticed that the man’s firm grip had a bit of clam to it. He wondered if the sweat drops trickling down his own sideburns were noticeable.
‘Rajarajan,’ the man said, extending a hand to Sumi.
Ray looked down on the scene playing out twenty feet below him. Part of an outrageous film based on his hurriedly written script with amateur actors, his only shot at success the last-minute inclusion of a Tam-Brahm item girl. He took a large sip of his shandy. The moist glass slipped from his hand and he managed to grab hold of it just in time.
‘Well, shoot,’ said Rajarajan, after the perfunctory small talk.
‘India is big in our plans … as you know…’ Abie said. From the minute he had set eyes on the guy, he had been asking himself why he couldn’t finish it then and there – with one well-aimed left-hook that would dislocate his receding chin. But he had to stick to the script. ‘…and we think you could be a big part of that plan,’ he said instead.
‘Yes, you said that on the phone,’ Rajarajan said.
Rajarajan had been having a difficult time concentrating on the small talk with that woman sitting across him. He had a crick in his neck trying to keep it from tilting sideways to get a better look at her breasts. God, he had to get his hands on her. While filmi women – the starlets, the dancers and the ADs – were his staple diet, he liked to pepper it with as many ‘civilians’ as possible. If they were qualified and in positions of power, even better. It gave him a sense of achievement. The woman smiled at him like she could see the filth in his head.
Rajarajan turned his attention to the man. There was something about him he couldn’t quite put his finger on.
‘And, you, sir … you know, you sound quite different face-to-face. Earlier, your voice seemed more…’ Rajarajan said.
Abie cleared his throat and smiled uselessly. This was a problem they had foreseen. He had tried doing PK doing an American accent and stopped when Selva, cheeky bastard, had asked him if his underwear was too tight.
‘You know, that’s the problem with people like us,’ said Sumi. ‘We travel so much – India now, Australia tomorrow and back home in the US the next day that our accents are all over the place. It makes us sound like a different person every day. We hear that all the time, don’t we, Kris?’
‘Kris’ nodded. Twenty feet above them, Ray looked up to a higher power.
‘Hey, all your “W”s have become “V”s,’ said Sumi, imitating a non-existent friend commenting on her accent. ‘Are you in Germany?’
‘Yeah, we hear that all the time. “Hey, Kris, you’re rolling your “R”s. Are you in Scotland?”’ said Abie, remembering the joke from his school days. ‘…and I always say, “No, that’s because of my high heels.”’
From the look on Rajarajan’s face, it was obvious he hadn’t been to Vidya Vihar.
‘Oh, I get it. Rolling the arse because of high heels. That’s funny, Kris,’ said Sumi, bending low and attempting what she considered was a throaty laugh. She hoped she sounded like Lauren Bacall in her heyday and not like Amrish Puri having a bad day. If they got out of this alive, she would kill Abie first and listen to the recording later.
Whether it was the husk in her voice or the HD view of her augmented bosom she would never know but Rajaraja
n decided to move on.
‘Why me?’ he said, ‘of all the people in the film industry…’
Up in the bar, Ray removed the earpiece. What the hell was he going to do, listening in? Jump in with stage directions? They had the ‘brief’. They would either wing it or not. He drained his shandy and raised his finger to the waiter without taking his eyes off the proceedings below. He thought of Padmini. What would she say if she knew? He thought of his colleagues in the US. An image of Clive watching a news clip of him being handcuffed and taken away popped into his head. He put the earpiece back in. He was here, after all, to be in the middle of it.
‘You are not the only one, RR.’ Sumi giggled. ‘May I call you that? We’ve got Raju Hirani, Mani Ratnam and a couple of others in our sights as well. They are very keen…’
‘In fact, we are meeting Mani in the evening,’ said Abie.
‘Oh … really? I thought he was in the South Pole for the next month, along with his music director, composing music for his new film. It was there in all the papers,’ said Rajarajan.
‘Mona’ looked at ‘Kris’ while Sumi planned to kill Abie. Why was the man exceeding his brief?
She leaned close to Rajarajan as if to whisper. He could smell the Issi Miyake on her neck.
‘He’s back. Please don’t tell anyone. You know how secretive he is. He’s come specially to meet us. He returns tomorrow,’ she said.
‘Yeah,’ said Abie, ‘we chartered a flight for him.’
He looked up and could see Ray peering out of his crow’s nest. He was really getting into his role now. He was thinking on his feet, coming up with last-minute saves. He wanted to give Ray a thumbs up but desisted.
‘Seriously?’ said Rajarajan. ‘You’re flying him all the way down from the South Pole and back? That must be costing you a bomb.’
‘We are Google, pal,’ said Abie. ‘In a billion-dollar project, what’s a million or two?’
‘Oh, good. I suppose my checking out your operations in the US won’t be a problem then,’ RR said.
Sumi looked at her stilettoed foot. Maybe she could spike Abie’s large foot with her heel to stop him from getting them any deeper.
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