Is this also a delusion?
*
I see myself as a five-year-old child who is running on the grass barefoot wearing only a pair of blue knickers. The boy is carrying many lotuses on his shoulder, some in full bloom, some half-opened and some still closed. The path that he is on passes by the shade of the chinars and is almost completely covered by the leaves and flowers of the trees. The shaggy-leafed stinging nettle grows in a few of the dark and cold corners, but the child isn’t scared of them because he knows the treatment for it.
This scene appears clearly before my eyes, but I still can’t place it properly—I can’t remember its position in the order of life. It definitely happened in Kashmir, but I don’t understand why it’s been etched into the tablet of my memory in such deep letters, especially because I can’t remember any reason for it or any consequences either.
Shekhar’s father had been suddenly transferred, and after auctioning off the things he no longer needed one day, he said goodbye to his friends and brought his entire family to a bungalow they bought on the banks of the Jhelum River and began living there.
It was the time of the Great War when prices were high, but property values had come down.
Shekhar was around six years old when he decided that it was time for him to write a book and become famous.
He knew that his father wrote books. One day he had asked his father what he was writing page after page. His father told him that he was writing a book. He also explained that the book would have pictures in it, and also that the papers would be fed into a press so that this book could be made into hundreds and thousands of books, and each of them would have the same pictures. This idea captivated him and he decided that he, too, would produce a picture-filled book.
But where would he get the pictures? He didn’t want to ask his father for help since he was worried that he might try to stop him out of envy. But after thinking about it for a while, he had an idea—flowers! He collected flowers from all kinds of places and placed them in books to dry. He asked the gardener for their names. And now that he had acquired all of his materials he resolved to start his book.
The first problem was paper. One day, when his father had gone to the office, he stole his keys and opened the drawer to his desk and took his father’s best stationery, paper thicker than card stock, which was clean and glossy and decorated with the red government insignia of the lion in the corner. Shekhar had remembered that all books have thick and glossy paper for their pictures.
He took twenty or so sheets and had his sister sew them into a book. She was an assistant and a companion in all of his efforts—although for the labour of sewing the pages into a book she took five pages for herself. Now Shekhar was worried about the cover for his book and the solution that he came up with was so daring that he had to calm his pounding heart as he opened the bookcase and took out the gold-trimmed, leather-bound Bible, and with a single motion he separated the book from its cover. He hid the book in the pile of buckets behind the kitchen and placed his book inside the cover. All of this happened in a matter of mere moments.
When everyone returned home in the evening his sister spied him alone and the first thing she asked him was, ‘What did you do today?’ Shekhar’s guilty soul told her everything—he didn’t have it in him to lie. Then in order to keep his secret safe Shekhar had to forgo his share of the next day’s sweets and in this exchange he got his sister to sew and fit his book into the cover.
The next day brother and sister sat down to write the book. Shekhar fixed the different flowers to each page with glue. Sister brought her botany book and Shekhar looked through it and tried to describe his flowers in the same way that they were described in the book—first a description of the flower’s colour and shape, then its uses and then—what was this thing called ‘habitat’?
Sister said, ‘I don’t know. They didn’t teach this in school; they skipped it.’
Shekhar went and asked his father, ‘What does “habitat” mean?’
‘Habitat is a place where something resides or is found. Why?’
‘No reason—sister sent me to find out,’ he said and nervously ran out. Behind him he could hear his father’s voice, ‘Why doesn’t she come and ask herself?’
After a month’s worth of work, Shekhar had finished his book. When his sister had looked at it and given it her approval, Shekhar had decided that he would put his book into the press, too, and make hundreds and thousands of copies. So one day when he found his father especially happy, he went up to him and put the book in his hands.
But almost instantly, he turned red and ran out. He was there long enough to notice that his father’s expression had changed, and that he had opened the book.
After a few minutes his curiosity got the better of his embarrassment and his fear. The sounds of the echoing laughter of his mother and father drew him back, and when his father saw him, his laughter doubled. He caught him by the waist and picked him up and said, ‘I haven’t laughed this much in ages. It’s a marvellous thing, your book.’
This made Shekhar nervous because he wasn’t sure if this was praise or something else. To him it seemed an object of praise—the book was written in beautiful letters and the pictures were also quite beautiful, and their names were written in red. What better descriptions of fuchsias and violets were there than this:
Fushia, Vylet flower with fore red small leeves vary prety Kashmiri girls put it in there hare nurse zinnia puts it in her ears to dance in the kitchen.
Habitat, Shalamar gardens and Chashma Shahi.
Iris, very butiful some are bloo some red and some white there is a yellow stick inside the flower.
Habitat, Mr. Chatterjis house near gupkar the best were in our house but the flud took them away.8
But for some reason, no one liked it any more than something to laugh at. Shekhar was downcast, and his father’s indulging words—‘Don’t worry, son, you’ll write something better next time. But don’t ruin my books!’—depressed him.
This was the end of his first literary endeavour—or you could say that it was the beginning of the end because the real end took place two years later when it was eaten up by the white ants and various other insects in the rubbish heap.
The production of literature is like a call to a living death. The writer earns little in producing literature, he derives no satisfaction from his creativity because as soon as he finishes he realizes, ‘Wait, this isn’t what I intended to make.’ As if he were the messenger of energy, he never intends to stop anywhere—he has to wander continuously, provoke agitation, set things on fire and never be at peace—he never intends to stop anywhere. Perhaps that is the reason that Providence stops him at the beginning of his journey and says, ‘Look, don’t go this way. This path isn’t made for your feet.’ If he stubbornly advances, it reminds him, ‘All right, but understand—you’re responsible for what happens.’ Then cruelly, it cuts his name from its ledger, from the list of its nurtured and protected children.
Shekhar tried again six months later. This time it was poetry.
It was spring and Shekhar was in Jammu. The streets in Kashmir were blocked off. It was getting quite warm, but Shekhar still went around barefoot and bareheaded. After a while, when his feet couldn’t bear the heat any more, he would run back into the room where his classes were about to start in a few minutes. He wanted to spend whatever time was remaining in physical activity. That’s when his brother came in with the news that the teacher had arrived.
The teacher was an American named John Gass and Shekhar always called him ‘Mister Gass’. Today, though, when he saw that his leisure time was going to be disturbed, he got angry at his teacher.
As he walked towards the room, he came up with a plan. In other words, he was inspired by the muse of poetry.
Ever since Shekhar’s book had been derided, the humiliation and the laughter were eating away at him, and he had decided that if he ever got the opportunity he would reclaim his lost pride wi
th a supreme poetic gesture. Today it suddenly dawned on him that this was his opportunity, and he realized that he was a poet.
He stepped up to the teacher and like a trained parrot meekly said, ‘Good morning, Mister Gass.’
The teacher said, ‘Good morning,’ and sat down. Shekhar’s eyes, which had been dazzled by the bright sun outside, seemed to have darkness within. He slowly meandered to his stool and as he sat down he said, ‘Mister Gass, I wrote a poem for you.’
Mister Gass smiled and said, ‘Really? Let’s hear it.’
Shekhar responded immediately in a sing-song voice:
My teacher’s name is Mister Gass,
If G is gone then he is an ass.9
Approximately half an hour later, Shekhar was rubbing his reddened cheeks, sitting in a garden of bulletwood trees a mile away from his house, and bemoaning the injustice of the world. His father had chased him to this spot beating him all the way, and when he had gone back, Shekhar sat there thinking.
Between moments of frustrated rage he would remember where he was and then pluck a blossom or two and sniff and then lose himself in thought again.
*
Brother and sister, even though they are brother-and-sister, can remain unfamiliar for a long time—can even remain strangers their whole lives. Shekhar, too, came to see his sister as his sister only when he was six years old and only when a childhood girlfriend explained to him what sisterly affection was. That friend was Shashi.
Shekhar first saw Shashi when he was around four years old, when Shashi was a little more than three. Shashi’s mother, Vidyavati, was like a sister to Shekhar’s mother and so she had come with her daughter to see her and stay with them for a while.
Shekhar was asleep when she arrived. When he got up in the morning, he saw that there was a bed not too far from his bed and a girl was sitting on it and looking at him with curiosity.
That’s when his mother came and told him, ‘Shekhar, this is your sister.’
Shekhar wouldn’t accept it, even though he didn’t say anything. It didn’t make sense that someone could just say, ‘This is your sister’ and make someone your sister. There was Saraswati who was his sister. She had been living in the same house ever since he had known her. She played with him and got scolded by Father. And when she got angry she would beat him up.
And her? Shekhar tried to imagine getting beaten up by Shashi and immediately thought to himself, ‘No way.’
He realized that even if someone said it a million times, Shashi was Shashi and not his sister.
After a little while, Shekhar’s mother said, ‘Come, the two of you need to take a bath.’ The two of them were taken to the bathroom and made to sit.
Shekhar’s normal method of bathing was as follows: he would use a towel to plug the gutter that would drain the water from the bathroom and when water got to the top of the gutter, he would splash around in it. He started repeating the same procedure today. Shashi stood in one corner and watched him; Shekhar ignored her.
The water filled to the top. Shekhar began to bathe. Shashi stood where she was.
Then Shekhar’s mother returned and gave Shashi a small brass mug and said, ‘Use this to take a bath.’ And then she left.
Shashi started to fill up her mug at the faucet with her small hands when Shekhar went up to her and said angrily, ‘That mug is mine.’
Shashi kept looking at him with her big eyes wide open, not speaking or moving, letting the mug fill.
Shekhar came closer and said, ‘It’s mine. Give it.’
Shashi stepped back and said, ‘No. I’m going to take a bath.’
‘Give it!’ Shekhar screamed as he lunged at her. He took the mug and at the same time hit her on the head with it. Shashi shouted, ‘Ma!’ and started crying.
Shashi’s mother came and immediately understood what had happened. She asked Shekhar, ‘Did you hit her?’
When Shekhar saw the blood on Shashi’s forehead he immediately put the mug on the ground and stood there frightened.
Shekhar’s mother ran in with a rod in her hand and said, ‘He hit you, didn’t he?’
It wasn’t clear if it was because she looked at Shekhar’s face or at the rod or for some other reason, but Shashi pointed to the mug and said, ‘The mug fell on me.’
‘How? Did Shekhar hit you?’
‘It fell on me by itself,’ she said and resumed crying.
Shekhar’s mother gave him an angry look as she showed him the rod before she left. Vidyavati checked Shashi once more. Then she started washing her forehead gently.
Shekhar didn’t wash any more. He quietly put on his clothes and stood there for a minute. He looked at Shashi for a second before he jumped up, snatched the mug and walked out.
He didn’t talk to Shashi afterwards. But when it was time to eat, he quietly filled the mug with water and put it next to her plate before he started eating.
When Shekhar saw her pick up the mug and take a drink from it without giving him a look, he felt as though he had acquired something better than all the mugs in the world.
Shashi left that evening and then Shekhar didn’t see her again for another ten years.
*
Shekhar’s sister was named Saraswati. She was five years older than him, and after her were Shekhar’s two older brothers, Ishwardutt and Prabhudutt. Shekhar was named ‘Buddhadev’ at birth, but for some reason, when Vidyavati saw Shekhar for the first time she went to his mother and said, ‘Sister, you should call him Chandrashekhar.’ Despite the arguments she got from others, she kept calling him Shekhar, and because of her persistence, everyone eventually started doing the same.
Saraswati and Shekhar used to play together, but Saraswati’s hands and Shekhar’s cheeks played together more often than the two of them did. And ever since Shekhar’s father had given her the directive to teach him, Shekhar came to believe that ‘sister’ was the name of that creature who argues while playing, beats you even when she’s wrong, annoys you, teaches you compound consonants immediately after teaching the single characters (though Shekhar didn’t call them compound consonants at the time), tells Father when you didn’t study and, in the middle of an argument, obtains a fatwa from Mother that says because she is older, Shekhar has to listen to her. When they were in Kashmir, Shekhar got immense pleasure from quietly leaving the window open on a rainy night so that his sleeping-next-to-the-window sister, Saraswati, would get drenched. (Shekhar had insisted that he sleep next to the window because he liked to look at the moon, but his mother had said no to this because he was little and would catch a cold.) But suddenly, one day in that same Kashmir, in that same rainy season, ‘Saraswati’ turned into ‘sister’ and sister turned into ‘Saras’—although he never uttered that last intimate name, keeping it hidden in his own mind.
It rained continuously for eight days. The melodious ripple of the Jhelum River gave way to an unremitting, deep roar. Shekhar’s father ordered that all of the expensive things in the home be carried up to the second storey of the bungalow. That’s where they were staying now, and Father often sat by the window, looking out with worry. A cigar hung from his mouth. Occasionally, when he remembered to, he would take a drag or two from it and then get lost in some thought or another.
The bungalow was on the riverbank in the midst of an orchard which was surrounded on all four sides by a ten-foot-high mud wall. To get inside, there were stairs at the centre of both sides of all four walls. The walls were thirteen or fourteen feet wide at the bottom and quite thin at the top. The water level of the river had reached up to the ground and water began spreading everywhere—it was slowly rising above the level of the ground inside the walls. The roar of the angry river could be heard clearly, leaping across the flowers near the bungalow inside, as if it were running wild with freedom.
Tense anticipation fell over the bungalow. Shekhar stared at his father and thought, ‘Why is he looking at the wall closest to the river with that fixed, unblinking, thoughtful look?’ He couldn’t
figure it out. Nor could he understand why his mother sometimes looked at him, or at his brothers, or at Saraswati with those tearful eyes. But even though he didn’t understand, it seemed as if the electric atmosphere had swallowed him up as well and he, too, was looking around at everyone with the same unvoiced, shapeless worry.
Suddenly he saw the worry of something happening outside spread clearly across his sister’s face. He slowly slid up next to her and softly asked, ‘What is it?’ With her finger, Saraswati gestured to him to follow her and they quietly went towards the stairs. The two of them went down silently—no one saw them.
As soon as they got to the bottom, Shekhar asked, ‘What is it?’
Saraswati angrily said to him, ‘Mouse holes.’
‘What mouse holes? I don’t understand.’
‘You’re an idiot. The water is rising outside. It’s going to start coming in through the holes—and then? They have to be closed up.’
Shekhar understood. The two of them went to the closest wall and started to pack the holes with mud. They even pulled up their beloved iris plants and packed them into the holes with the mud.
Shekhar lifted his head to look at Saraswati. She was at that moment standing there indecisively with an iris plant in her hand. In an instant, she broke off one of its big, beautiful blossoms and tucked it in her braid and then stuffed the plant in the hole. Shekhar thought it was strange that this curious girl could be thinking the exact same thing he was—but in a moment he forgot all of this and went back to work. It was clear to him, and to Saraswati, that they would only be able to work as long as no one inside discovered their absence. They also felt as if something was going to happen any second now (they didn’t know what) and Father would never let them remain outside. And so they were working very fast. Not out of fear of some impending disaster, but out of a fear of being called inside.
Their backs began to ache, but they seemed to make no progress. Each time they almost finished closing one hole another would burst open and keep getting bigger—it was as if a fountain had erupted inside. And from the height of the fountains, Shekhar estimated that the water was four feet high on the other side of the wall. He had yet to consider what would happen when the water level reached the top of the wall . . .
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