The Homing Pigeons...

by Sid Bahri

  I returned back to Delhi on Sunday, confused, irritated and unhappy. Had I underestimated the depth of the conversation? Had the wounds of the riots been so deep, that nearly two decades of peace hadn’t been able to heal them? Just when everything was falling into place, why did this have to come up? My father was well educated, had travelled the world and was broad minded. Yes, if he had raised an objection on her being divorced and all, I would have been able to counter it. But religion? How do you counter that? I didn’t have a solution and that was worse than the problem.

  I was stressed – not only because of the conversation of the weekend, but also because I was committed. If I hadn’t said yes to her proposal on that night on the terrace, maybe, it would have been better. Why had I not brought this subject up with my parents before I had said yes? And now, when they were against the marriage, why didn’t I have the courage to stand up and rebel. Did I even love her? If I did, why were these thoughts crossing my mind?

  At work, my boss had promised me a promotion but thought he had enslaved me. I was expected to be present in office at the weirdest hours – on weekends, on late night calls and early morning conversations. I toed his line; I would have to do it at least until I got the promotion letter in hand. The pain was self-inflicted. I could have easily waited another year for the promotion and the money that came with it, but I wanted it now. I wanted to be at twenty-four what others become at twenty eight. Unknowingly, the promotion, career and money that had been a means to an end were beginning to become an end. I was obsessed with money, trying to learn to earn more. Hell, I even financed Robin to open a cigarette shop by night for a share in profits. I had changed, but I was still unaware. I was selling my soul for money. Much later in life, I have realised that selling your body is better than selling your soul.

  Radhika

  When I get back home from the movie, I think about what Divya had asked me. I’ll be honest; sometimes I do want to make love but I don’t want to have sex, like she had so cruelly put it. Every time, I speak about making love, I remember Aditya. Wasn’t it sometime after my divorce had been completed that he became such an animal. Initially, Aditya was hesitant and stressed when we made love but he was beginning to find his bearings and bringing me throes of pleasure. There was just one thing that we couldn’t agree on – he hated contraceptives. He thought that it spoilt the spontaneity of the moment. I wish I could tell him the repercussions of not using them. Hell, even if we did conceive, we would just marry and have the child. We’d tell the child that it was a premature kid, if the dates of the marriage and his birthday ever made him suspicious.

  Yes, it was just after my divorce when I had broken the shackles that I had so stupidly put around my ankles. Abhinav had met me a day before we were to meet our lawyers. He was his usual self – defiant, arrogant and uncompromising. He wanted to create a fuss about the alimony and the belongings. I was expecting a long, protracted legal battle of the lawyers to solemnize a separation but things changed, probably at the advice of his lawyers.

  The Indian judicial system was slow and inefficient. Add to that cauldron the new dowry laws and the powers it bestowed on women and you have the recipe for trouble. I think Abhinav realized that he could be in more trouble than this. When he came back the next day, he was as meek as a lamb. He was back in the United States within the week of filing the decree and we were both free to marry and lead independent lives. Whoever said that two wrongs can’t make a right was mistaken.

  Life was near perfect again, even though Aditya was obsessed with work and money.

  For the first time in my life, I was leading an independent life and making my own decisions. My trips to Chandigarh had nearly dried up. Earlier, I would visit once a month, but it had been three months now that I hadn’t made a visit. Worse still, I wasn’t missing it. At first, my parents had continued to pester me about going back to the States but now they had resigned. They still believed that I was ruining my life.

  I just wish I knew what was going on in Aditya’s mind. Why had he become so centred in the material plane? Why did everything boil down to money? I knew that he was ambitious and that was something that had made me fall in love with him. Even in YPS, when those spoilt brats would spend their vacations abroad, Aditya would try and get a summer job.

  I wished that I had told him that my happiest times with him were on his motorcycle. I still remembered the times when I would ride pillion clutching onto him every time he braked. Now, he wanted a fancier car, a home of his own and a promotion. It was as if the promotion and the designation that came with it were going to be the cornerstones of his existence.

  When I had just moved to Gurgaon, we would promptly meet at 6 p.m. just as the crowds left to take the bus back to Delhi. Then, we left a little later. My work wasn’t as taxing and I would while away the hours, surfing the limited Internet that was available. Now, that timeline had slipped to as late as 8 p.m. I wished I could bring this up at some time but I felt he was too obsessed to understand or appreciate what I expected. Even then, I asked him, “Why do you have to stay in office so late?”

  “I have a lot of work to do,” he replied back a little brusquely.

  “Everyone else seems to finish up by six.”

  “They’re working a job and I am building a career,” he said.

  I didn’t question him again on the subject for a very long time.

  Sometimes I would wonder if Aditya was really wrong in what he was doing. Didn’t we all have the right to dream? Wasn’t I dreaming of owning a home, of being married to Aditya and of our children?

  I reached back home after work on Saturday, not really looking forward to a lonely weekend without him. He was making one of those rare visits to Chandigarh to meet his parents and I was beginning to worry about how I would be able to live the weekend without him. The weekend was our dress rehearsal of when we would marry. I would go back with him from work on Saturday evening, change and go out for a bout of drinks. We would return drunk, sloshed and uninhibited. Our passions would take us over and I would spend the night with him. On Sunday mornings, he churned out a lavish spread of bacon, ham and eggs. Robin, who hated his kitchen being taken over, would insist on brewing the coffee.

  After breakfast, we would laze around in bed, reading the newspapers when he would snuggle in. It didn’t take long for me to be aroused in his company and invariably we would end up making love. I had come a long way – from the village belle that I once was, to a woman, now divorced, almost living in with a man that I loved. I wondered how scandalized my parents would be if they ever came to know the truth about my sexual escapades. I laughed to myself when I pictured my mother’s jaw drop. It would almost hit the ground.

  It was after that weekend in Chandigarh that he changed, and worse still, he refused to speak about it. Every time I broached the topic, he would ignore it, looking through me as if I were made in a glass factory. Our love affair continued despite the waning intensity. I wanted to reignite the passions that had helped us go through thick and thin. After all, hadn’t our relationship withstood the test of time and heart break? Only if he would talk to me, we could find a solution. Everything had a solution.

  It was the second Saturday of March 2001, when he said, “I have work this weekend. I won’t be able to go out.”

  I let him be, giving him the space, hoping that whatever was on his mind would auto correct. I went back home to see my roommates getting dressed. Shilpi, the girl, who worked in Max New York and the one that I was relatively close to, asked me, “Home on a Saturday evening?”

  “Yes, he had work” I replied. It was an open secret that we were dating and would be marrying soon.

  “What’ll you do at home all alone? We are going out for a party. Want to come along?” Shilpi asked me.

  I didn’t have anything to do. I would probably end up lazing in front of the TV. So, I agreed to go. I was so short on my social life that I really had no notable friends. My world had just revolved aro
und Aditya for so long. Maybe, that was what was wrong. Maybe, that was suffocating our relationship as too much familiarity does. In a life that we would spend together, it was important that we give ourselves the space to be able to create room for our own personas to blossom.

  We went to Rodeo, one of the few choices of eating joints in Gurgaon. They called themselves a Tex Mex restaurant and so, you couldn’t blame them for not being unique. The moment I walked into the restaurant, I felt out of place and wondered if I had been better off whiling away time at home. It probably was so, because I was alone with three couples. The others attempted to make me feel comfortable, but I concentrated on my drink. The others had a conversation going and I only had a drink. So, I drank faster than the others. I could feel myself a little tipsy and I should have stopped, but I continued, ahead of the others. The alcohol went to my head, bringing up the thoughts that were uppermost in my mind.

  Why was he acting so strangely recently? Was it something that I had said or done to him to behave this way? Why couldn’t it be perfect like it was earlier? Didn’t he love me anymore?

  I pulled out the cell phone from my purse and typed a message “I love you” and sent it.

  I went back to my drink, sitting in isolation within the crowd. Two swigs later, I pulled out the cell phone again from my purse to see if the beep of an incoming message had been drowned out by the music. There was no message. He might have been busy with work. He was always busy with work. Why was he so obsessed with money? He had said that he wanted a promotion and then he would ease up. And even that was a certainty now. Why didn’t he stop now and take a short breather to rejuvenate? We had enough between the two of us, for even I was going to be promoted this year. We could easily have a very comfortable living. I replaced the phone into the floundering depths of the large purse.

  Two more swigs later, my drink was finished. The others were ordering the next round, so I ordered it too – my fourth.

  I opened the purse again, searching for that elusive message that he had forgotten to send. It was still not there. I stepped out to make a phone call. All thoughts about giving him space had vanished, not unlike the alcohol from my glass. He didn’t answer. Was he trying to avoid me? Why? What had I done to wrong him? Why didn’t he love me anymore? It had to be the alcohol that threw up more questions than there were answers.

  Disappointed, I went back to the table and gulped down the rum and coke that sat there in one single gulp. The conversations sounded like gibberish and I put my two bits in. I was slurring, but still, I continued to talk. I was talking about Aditya – raving about him one moment, and calling him names another, for not replying to my message. They weren’t interested; they didn’t know Aditya. Hell, they’d only met me once before and here I was, a stranger talking about another.

  They exchanged embarrassed glances at each other. I was making a fool of myself. I could make that out but to prove my innocence, I was talking much more than I ever had. Shilpi suggested that I should go home and sleep, as politely as she could, but I had no way of going home. Aditya had been my ride for so long and so, I called him once again. This time he answered. I couldn’t explain where I was and had him speak to Shilpi’s boyfriend.

  I was leaning on the two boys who helped me get to the parking lot when he arrived and took me away. My last recollection of the event was when he said “I love you too” in response to my “I love you”.

  I woke up on Sunday morning without the customary breakfast being brought out on a tray. I looked around. He was still sleeping beside me. The events of last night had left me red-faced. Why did I have to drink so much that I had lost my senses? I vowed to myself that I would quit drinking, even socially. I went to the wash and then to the kitchen. As horrible as I was with the eggs, I thought they turned out well. The yolks didn’t run this time but they were still not half as good as the eggs he made.

  Talking about eggs, I was due to release mine in about fourteen days which meant that I was to start bleeding today but it hadn’t happened until now. I looked at the watch; it was still only nine and an entire day lay ahead of me, but the familiar pain that preceded the event had also not started. No, not again, a voice in my head reminded me. The same voice said that this was different – this was Aditya’s kid and I was with Aditya.

  I woke him up and presented him with the tray on which the breakfast lay. I don’t know if the eggs weren’t to his liking or whether he was upset about last night’s episode but he wasn’t his cheerful self.

  “I am really sorry about last night. I was really upset about not being with you. I had a few more than I should have had,” I said.

  He just shook his head, ignored the tray that lay in front of him and walked away to the bathroom. I didn’t even remember my conversations with him. Had I said or done something I shouldn’t have? I waited for him to come out of the washroom and it took almost an eternity.

  “I am sorry,” I said again to rid me of my guilt.

  “It’s okay,” he said. However, it didn’t seem like it was okay.

  Why had he lately started sounding so superficial? I missed the guy who spoke from his heart? The guy whose voice would implore you because it sounded so genuine. I missed the voice of the man that I had fallen in love with.

  Aditya

  Bang! Bang! I wake up to the sounds of someone knocking on the door. I am sweating. I realize that I am in the middle of a power cut. The AC that I can now afford has switched itself off sometime in the middle of the night, leaving me to sweat in the unbearable August humidity. Through the sleepiness of my eyes, I see the clock sitting on my bedside. The cheap rooster hasn’t yet blown its trumpet, so it has to be before eight. The clock confirms my fear; it is only seven fifty-five. It is too early to have customers. Maybe, it is Bhatoliya who is knocking. Maybe, he went out for a walk and forgot to take the keys, leaving him stranded on the street.

  I wear my pyjama over my boxer shorts and groggily walk to the front of the house to the source of the noise. I open the door to see Jasleen standing at the front door. She is clad in jeans and a white top and has a small overnight bag in hand. She would’ve taken the overnight train from Chandigarh. I am not sure why, because it has been nearly nine months that I have moved to Delhi and she hasn’t had the need, desire or the inclination to see me. It is mutual; I haven’t made a trip to Chandigarh either. Then, why today?

  I rub my eyes, to ensure that if I am hallucinating, she disappears. She doesn’t.

  “What’s going on?” she asks. Her mouth is in a grimace that tells me that the cat and mouse game is over. There are no hugs, no kisses, and no feigned or superficial expressions of love. It just doesn’t exist.

  “Nothing; just woke up,” I try to brush aside the question. I hold the door open for her to enter.

  “I figured that. My question is – what’s going on?” she asks again. Women have a special talent of asking an open ended question that can be interpreted in various ways.

  “What?” I ask, I still play the farce and avoid the question. She walks into the reception area and looks around at the contents of the room. There is a small podium like desk in a corner and a couch that is seldom used, as most customers come in with prior appointments.

  “What are you up to? What is this place, this HappyEndingz Massage Parlour? I want to know.” she says. She plonks herself on the sofa.

  “What’ll you have? Water? Coffee?” I ask.

  I am embarrassed at having been discovered. The truth is that if I had a clue that she was coming, I would’ve removed the board, moved furniture and cancelled appointments. She hadn’t, which leaves me with only coffee as an option to delay the moment of truth.

  “Coffee, but only if you’re going to come back and explain what’s going on,” she says. It gives me a little time to dwell on what I will say. The lack of caffeine never lets me think straight.

  I walk to the kitchen and take out a saucepan and fill it with water. In the background I can hear the shrill rin
ging of the telephone. It is Bhatoliya’s cheap Nokia handset that should have been upgraded about five years ago.

  I add a dash of milk to the water, still thinking about how I can explain myself. One way is to give her another cock and bull story. In person, I am sure she will not fall for it.

  The phone is answered; Bhatoliya’s voice wafts through the house. In the kitchen, it’s just slightly louder than a whisper. I look into the saucepan again, trying to find a solution to my conundrum. I can tell her the truth but knowing her, it would be the end of our marriage. Not that the marriage is alive in any case. The water and milk boil, starting with small bubbles at the edge of the pot which gradually move inwards until the whole thing is a cauldron. Bhatoliya is in conversation.

  “Divya called. Ratna wants you at three in the afternoon, full service, our place, saying she loves the way you touch her. I need to call back and confirm. Are you in?” Bhatoliya’s voice booms through the house. The saucepan almost drops from my hands.

  Somehow, with shaking hands, I carry the two mugs of coffee into the reception. She is staring at me. It is a cold stare that raises the hair at the back of my neck.

  “Who’s Ratna?” she asks.

  “A client,” I can’t look her in the eye.

  “What do you do for her?” she asks.

  “I give her a massage and….” I let the sentence trail off, leaving her to imagine the rest. Bhatoliya has given away enough already.

  “And?” she asks me.

  I can give her the gory details; I can tell her every sensitive part of Ratna’s body that I titillate and the things that she says in return for that favour. I choose to keep quiet.

  “What’s going on Aditya?” she asks.

  And so, I tell her. I tell her of my journey from being an unemployed banker, who was living off his wife’s money, who was treated like manure and had a golden break of servicing rich, middle-aged women. I tell her the success story of the massage parlour that we have been able to put together and that it is more profitable than working at the bank could ever have been.