No Presents Please

by Jayant Kaikini

  Feeling strangely drawn to these women, Mogri went up to a few of them and shook hands as she said goodbye.

  Kaka went with her in the bus to the train station. ‘Sorry for troubling you. You don’t have to come here again,’ he said.

  ‘No, Kaka,’ she began, but did not know what else to say. She had to run to catch the nine p.m. local.

  Mogri clung to a pole awkwardly in the crowded compartment, her eyes filled with the light of Kaka’s world. What free and easy relationships there were in his empire! These women clutching their bags and purses in the Ladies’, the heaps of hanging men hugging each other willy-nilly in the general compartment next door, the wire mesh between the two compartments and the countless eyes looking at the women hungrily through the mesh. It seemed as though a single creature with many eyes stood there. Outside rows and rows of houses were going past. A flash of a tiny home seen from the train – curtains, vessels, families that cooked a meal and rolled out the mattress just for their own members. When the train stopped at each station, an enormous flood of people poured in and out of the compartments. When Mogri started walking towards her chawl from Mulund Station, she felt stifled. She remembered the Nepali girl Susheela lying down under her Sholapur bedsheet.

  As she entered the chawl, she heard a loud cry. Scared, she walked faster. Her mother was clinging to the water drum and crying loudly as she beat her chest. The women of the chawl were standing around her, but at a safe distance. They stepped back when they saw Mogri, who kneeled down beside her mother.

  ‘What happened, Maa?’ she asked.

  ‘Your father – he had a stroke on his mistress’s bed,’ said her mother, wailing again.

  ‘How did you find out?’ Mogri asked.

  One of the women from the chawl said a man had come from Jogeshwari with the news, and had even left behind an address.

  ‘He left such a lovely family and went after that whore. And to think he’s fallen down on her bed,’ Maa went on crying.

  Mogri was more upset at the way her mother was crying than at the news about her father’s stroke. In the woman’s wails, the word ‘bed’ kept coming up again and again. Anywhere else would have been fine, but to have a stroke on ‘her’ bed! Maa was trembling with anger. But neither she nor Mogri could think of what to do. When the crowd scattered, the two lay down to sleep. Mogri opened the biscuit packet Kaka had given her, and both of them ate the biscuits as they lay in bed. The door was open like Kaka’s painting. Outside was a morbid mixture of light and darkness. Mogri’s ears filled with the sweet, uninhibited chatter of Kaka’s girls.

  As soon as they woke the next morning, Mogri’s mother said she would go and see ‘him’.

  ‘Yes, let’s go together,’ said Mogri.

  ‘No, no, let me go alone. You can go some other time. Write a letter to Ratnagiri. Don’t tell them where it happened.’

  Both of them left the house together, and had a cup of tea near the station. Mogri went with her mother until Dadar, and put her on the train to Jogeshwari after explaining how she was to get to the address they had been given.

  ‘I’ll come in the evening. Stay there until then if you can.’ Marvelling how her slender mother managed to get inside the crowded compartment, Mogri caught her train to Victoria Terminus.

  Until she reached the Light of India, Mogri’s eyes were filled with the image of her Maa who had gone to see her husband who lay paralysed in his mistress’s house. She wondered if her little stepsister was frightened about what had happened. When she reached the restaurant it was raining lightly in spite of the sunshine. Kaka was looking out for her anxiously, since she was late. His eyes widened, and he smiled when she came in. Mogri put her handbag down on the counter and set about her work. When Kaka came near, she asked him how Susheela was. As if to say she was fine, Kaka inclined his head, smiled, and patted Mogri’s hand. Calmly, they stood together, looking at the incandescent door.

  ‘Mogriya Satsanga’, 1991

  A TRUCKFUL OF

  CHRYSANTHEMUMS

  Dwindow in the last kholi of the municipal chawl is always open. Seen from the street, the open window looks like a blind man’s eye. Covered with a Sholapur chadar that smells of Amrutanjan, Durgi lies with her eyes open, her small arms and legs making her look like a child in spite of her sixty years.

  The discarded dresses of the girls of the house, who have grown quite big, now clothe Durgi. Even those sit loosely on her. However weak she feels, Durgi crawls to the window on her stomach and looks out. When she sees a new day spreading itself out on the street, she opens her eyes as though a flower of gratitude had bloomed. She looks down at the children going to school, without the strength to call out to them. Her belongings: the old cup, the plastic mug, the comb with its big teeth, the palm-size plastic mirror, sit near her mat. A strange silence seems to surround this mat.

  Sudhir Mahajan worked in a municipal office. His wife Jyoti, on the strength of a long-ago college education, gave tuitions at home. The two children, Rashmi and Varsha, were growing up rapidly. Both had the mother’s attitude and the father’s walk. When the elder one Rashmi was an infant, Durgi came into this one-room envelope of a house to look after the baby and do the housework in exchange for two meals a day, a sari once a year and the promise of a separate bank account ‘in which we will put your salary’. When Rashmi was three years old, Varsha was born. By the time the baby woke up and needed to be fed, the older sister had to be made ready for school. By the time Durgi plaited the girl’s hair, it was time to wash the clothes and scrub the vessels before the water supply stopped for the day. Just as all the household chores were done, it was time to go and stand in the ration queue. Since there were so many things to take care of, the Mahajan family did not think of throwing Durgi out, and thus twenty years passed. By the time the girls’ dupattas were to be found lying everywhere in the house, and they had gone through college, Durgi had become an inseparable part of the family, like the worn iron handle of the metal cupboard, and like the faded embroidered cloth over the TV set. ‘She’s of some help to us, and who else does she have?’ With this wobbly logic, Mahajan stopped putting money into her account. After dinner, on the rare occasion when there was an apple being eaten, the fact that Durgi always got a small slice was a matter of great pride for the Mahajan family.

  For the grown-up children, however, Durgi’s presence was like an obstacle. Where has my hair clip disappeared to? they would rage. When Durgi sat down to supper after they had all eaten, the girls would start taking out their homework as though to hasten her. In that small space, there was no question of all of them sleeping with their limbs stretched out. Especially after the girls had grown so tall. They all felt as though they were sleeping standing up, like in the local train.

  It was during Rashmi’s tenth standard exams that the symptoms of Durgi’s illness first began to seem serious. She kept getting a fever. Without sending her to a doctor, the Mahajans treated her with balms and aspirin. Since Rashmi had to study late, it was almost impossible for Durgi to sleep whenever she wanted. Her face and limbs began to swell. A hundred aches and pains exhausted her. ‘You take it easy, Durgi. Don’t put your hands in water. It’s not good for you,’ Mrs Mahajan would say. But since she never got up to do a task, Durgi would end up dealing with the chores. Then Mrs Mahajan would pretend to be angry. One day, unable to contain herself until she could reach the mori, Durgi puked all over the house, and on the people around. Then she began to wipe the vomit desperately with her weak hands from a thigh here and an arm there. The crack that existed between her and the others revealed itself in that awful silence. They all sat unmoving while Durgi tried to clean up the mess from their clothes. From that day onwards, the smell of vomit lingered permanently in the house.

  ‘All this happened because we’ve let her stay here. Let’s at least send her away now,’ whispered Sudhir Mahajan.

  ‘What will the neighbours say? That we threw her out after all these years when she fell ill? Let
’s take her to the doctor and then send her off,’ said the wife.

  As though possessed, Mahajan dragged Durgi to three different doctors. But it didn’t look like the sickness was going to end soon. Seeing the blood test reports, one of the doctors began to speak gravely of big treatments in big hospitals. Mahajan’s limbs began to shiver. He never took his wife and children to doctors for fear of the expense. So he came home with a few lies: taking some vitamins will do the trick, maybe a change of climate would work. He spoke without looking his wife in the eye. Mrs Mahajan remembered the days when Durgi, upset at some small thing, would say she was leaving, and her employer would cajole her back saying she was like her elder sister, and that they would look after her.

  ‘But is she your real sister? Is she a blood relation? If you pay a salary, anyone will work for you. There’s a limit to how much we can do,’ said Mahajan, drawing his wife outside.

  ‘But Durgi looked after our girls without neglecting them. During your strike, for months she lied to us that her stomach was upset, and ate only a small meal once a day. We can’t forget all these things,’ said the wife.

  After this discussion, both of them would come back with fresh enthusiasm and put up with Durgi for a while longer. ‘Let me know if you want to go to your native place, or to your relatives. I can take you there. Try to remember, do you have any relatives?’ coaxed Mahajan. But Durgi only stared blankly at him. Even during daylight hours, Durgi’s tattered mat was always spread out, and seemed to make the silence harsh and noisy.

  The students began to avoid coming for their tuitions. Rashmi and Varsha began to kick up a row over the smallest matter, and sometimes would get up and leave in the middle of dinner. They said their friends didn’t want to visit them at home. The chawl people began to say Durgi’s sickness was infectious. But they would come to borrow some onions or a matchbox, and say how good the Mahajans were, how nicely they were looking after their sick servant without sending her away. Now Durgi could not stand up by herself. She had to be led by hand to the toilet. She had fallen down while coming back from the chawl’s common bathrooms, and it needed several people to lift her and bring her back. After this she took to her bed permanently. Mahajan sat with his hand on his head. It was clear that Durgi would not now leave the house alive. Even if she called out from her bed, they pretended not to hear. The couple had been saving every paisa for the weddings of their daughters, and did not dare think of a hospital for Durgi. And the neighbours kept saying so that Durgi could also hear: ‘How good you people are. Even her family would not have looked after her like this.’

  Mrs Mahajan could not stomach having to help Durgi with her ablutions. Durgi, who could have died of embarrassment for causing trouble, stopped eating altogether. Only when her mouth dried, Durgi sprinkled a few drops on it. Mahajan’s blood pressure started rising. His daughters, instead of sparkling, were looking like the windows of bankrupt shops.

  ‘Now people will start coming home to see the girls. How can we have them in here?’ Mrs Mahajan began to cry out loud in the neighbours’ houses.

  Some said to her: ‘Stop giving her food and water’.

  ‘Cheh, cheh,’ she would respond, but on coming home she would peer into the water tumbler by the mat to see how much was remaining. It was still full.

  ‘Why don’t you drink the water?’ Mrs Mahajan would shriek tearfully.

  Like a frightened sparrow, when Durgi put out her shaking hands towards the tumbler, Mrs Mahajan screamed, ‘Don’t drink it if you don’t want to. Don’t do me any favours!’ And Durgi would draw her hand back inside her sheet.

  Mahajan spoke to his well-wishers at his office. On someone’s suggestion, he went to a doctor in an old lane of the suburb. The doctor welcomed him silently. In a low voice, he asked for details of Mahajan’s problem. Then he took a large amount of money as his fee, and said: ‘My name cannot be mentioned anywhere, mister. Give her these ten pills before she sleeps. Let her swallow them herself. You may go now.’

  Trembling, Mahajan walked back through the lane.

  Although it had been nearly a month since Durgi stopped eating and drinking, her life still burned bright. Her eyes looked deeply into things. Like an animal, she would drag herself, stomach on the floor, towards the window, where she would cling to the bars. Outside on the street was a wholesale distribution centre for fruits, vegetables and flowers, where trucks came from all corners and emptied themselves. Years ago, she herself had come in one such truck, having begged a ride from its driver. She wondered where that truck was now. The incense burning on its dashboard still lingered in her nostrils. So many kinds of trucks, carrying watermelon, cabbage, cauliflower, orange. As she gazed, her sight grew dim and she leaned on the window bars. When she opened her eyes again, the trucks stood empty. But the truck full of chrysanthemums in the corner stood as it was. She gazed until her eyes dimmed again, and then dragged herself back to her mat. In her eyes, the truck of chrysanthemums kept standing there without ever getting empty.

  That night the Mahajans sent their daughters out of the room, and after bolting the door, they came and sat with their heads bowed in front of Durgi.

  Mahajan began to say ‘Durgi…’ and could not finish his sentence.

  ‘Rashmi, Varsha, to be married … society…’ stammered Mrs Mahajan, her throat dry.

  As though she understood everything, Durgi waved a trembling hand at her and then put her hand out obediently.

  As though sleepwalking, Mahajan reached out for his office bag, took out the packet of pills with a shaking hand, and gave it to Durgi. She seemed to be struggling to say something. Mrs Mahajan bent down and put her ear close to Durgi’s mouth. ‘I’ll take them … but tomorrow … I’ll take them tomorrow,’ whispered Durgi.

  As though all this did not concern them at all, the Mahajans rushed out of the room and started walking in the street. If they stopped, they seemed to hear Durgi’s helpless plea: ‘Tomorrow…’

  Let her be today, they thought.

  When they came back to the chawl, Rashmi and Varsha were already eating their dinner. They had the TV on full blast. The husband and wife did not have the courage to look in Durgi’s direction. Mrs Mahajan changed the water in the tumbler next to Durgi’s mat. She went to plait Durgi’s hair, which she did once a week after oiling it, and Durgi refused, pressing her head tight against the window. But afterwards, she called Varsha and Rashmi and insisted that they should be the ones plaiting her hair.

  Afraid of the fiery look their mother gave them, the girls quickly put some oil on Durgi’s thin hair and then braided it. As she shook her head while it was being oiled, the reflections of the tubelights in the room trembled like silver lamps in Durgi’s eyes. Then Durgi spoke with great effort about a long-forgotten birthday of the infant Varsha when she had piddled in front of all the guests. She asked them to hold a mirror in front of her, and gazed into it as though looking at a picture. She then signalled to everyone to turn out the lights and go to sleep, and dragged herself to the window. Rashmi and Varsha fought with each other as usual over the bedsheets. The Mahajan couple sat sleeplessly at the entrance to the room.

  As the night wore on, there were fewer and fewer people in the street below, and one could see it quite empty in the distance. The empty trucks were hiding here and there. Except for the truck of chrysanthemums, the rest of the fruit market looked like a piece of waste paper. Soon someone would open the back of this truck and start shovelling the flowers into the street. This longest night of the century was holding off tomorrow with all its might.

  ‘Sevanthi Hoovina Trakku’, 1997

  TICK TICK FRIEND

  The Nanavati Hospital in Vile Parle West has recently set up a television studio in the basement of the building in front of the main hospital. Different television channels use this studio to shoot their quizzes and antakshari contests. So in the hospital environs, one sees a peculiar mix of people: the patients and their relatives along with the young quiz contestants and
their ambitious parents. The parents of the contestants are sometimes taken aback by the wheelchairs, the OPD queues and the patients; but the patients sometimes get enthused by the contestants and their minders, who in a show of sheepish pride caress their bright-eyed, neatly combed children from time to time.

  ‘Who is the American President who cultivated peanuts?’

  ‘In which sport is the term Chinaman used?’

  Forgetting the answers occasionally, the children go through general knowledge books in helpless last-minute concentration, disturbed only by the ambulances which come in with their sirens screaming. The children watch with fearful eyes as a patient is brought out of one such ambulance and taken away into Emergency, looking fragile on the stretcher.

  ‘Don’t look there,’ say the parents.

  ‘Do you want some chips?’ ask anxious fathers.

  At least four or five episodes are shot every day. The cameramen and assistant directors who come out to smoke mingle with the white-coated young doctors and the nurses on their rounds.

  When Madhubani came running into the hospital compound to join the throng, her father Sohanlal was left behind, unable to walk any faster. They had arrived just that morning at Dadar Station from Bhusawal, and had paid to get into the waiting room to finish a hurried wash, got into the local train asking for Nanavati Hospital, gotten off at Vile Parle station and had been told by a tea vendor that the hospital was only ten minutes away, and then hurried to the quiz venue. As soon as he said ‘Nanavati Hospital’ on the train, someone had asked, ‘Arre, who’s sick?’

  Sohanlal had immediately responded, ‘No, no! It’s the zonal level TV quiz contest – my daughter’s very clever; she’s already at the Taluk level; she…’ Before he could finish his sentence, the train stopped at a station, and people began to push the father and daughter aside, ‘Chalo, chalo … get down … utro … don’t stand in the way.’