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The actors came forward, onto the stage; the audience couldn’t stop applauding. Laughing and bowing, they waited for the applause to abate; they wanted to introduce themselves. Aadi wished he could go near them and shake hands with them. He saw some of the audience climbing up and hugging the artists. There was a racket of laughter and shouting. The audience continued with their acclamation even after the performers had left the stage. He saw two girls getting onto the stage, to collect the portrait they had kept in the corner of the stage adorned with hibiscus flowers and incense sticks. He immediately recognized the person in the portrait, Sri Aurobindo, the author of the book Anuraktha had given him, the one still in his bag. He walked down the aisle unmindful of the dense crowd of people with the mingled images of light, pictures, music and voices playing in his mind.
The first artist said to him: ‘He doesn’t fit in.’
The second artist also said to him: ‘No, he doesn’t.’
Now it was his turn. He thought of his mother, Shaly, Shiva and himself. He looked at the audience and, bowing his head, said aloud: ‘We don’t fit in.’
Some of them clapped at the sudden and witty improv performance taking place in the middle of the aisle. Aadi realized that the boy who had come in had nothing to do with the man who was walking out. The blue teddy bear was no longer a problem, he could even wear a butterfly clip on his hair and walk through the crowded city centres if the need arose, there was nothing to feel ashamed of, there was nothing that really mattered. But one should always be sympathetic to those who were inferior; there was nothing to be gained by shocking them. You can dress like a cowboy and walk with a doll’s wig, but do it only if you really feel like doing it.
He saw a woman carrying the teddy’s mother on her hip. They were waiting near the chair he had been sitting on before the play, near the staircase. The girl seemed unquestionably unnerved, tears running down her cheeks. He recognized the woman carrying the girl. It was the young woman who had gone on the stage after the play to collect the portrait and the lamps. The girl was forcefully pointing to the seat—perhaps she had seen him sitting there before she decided to hand over her son. He tried to carry the teddy on his hip the way the young woman was carrying its blonde mummy. The moment the girl saw her teddy she began kicking the thigh of the woman who was carrying her hard and hollering so loudly that people turned back to see what was happening.
‘Don’t kick, it hurts,’ admonished the young woman.
‘That’s my Blue,’ the girl cried aloud.
Aadi held out the teddy to her to make her stop crying. She wriggled and worked herself free of the woman’s grip and ran towards him. She snatched the bear from his hand and started kissing it through tears.
‘Where did you get this from?’ the young woman asked.
‘She appointed me its babysitter a few hours ago,’ he said.
‘Thank goodness, we were going through hell.’
‘Is she your daughter?’ he asked.
‘No, she is the one,’ she indicated a woman coming towards them. A gorgeous white woman with luscious black hair—he couldn’t look away from her. She had the largest eyes he had ever seen. Bending down, he touched the little girl’s cheek. She blushed and smiled, her cheek was still wet.
‘What’s your name?’ he asked.
‘Amy Ammu,’ she said.
What kind of a name was that, half-foreign, half-native? As he left the theatre he realized he had forgotten to ask the name of the girl who was carrying Amy Ammu on the hip. That girl, he remembered, was beautiful, too. The artists were staying in the apartments attached to the theatre. He looked in the direction of the apartments for some time and walked off the premises. He needed to find a place for the night, it was important.
Somehow he found very cheap lodgings near the railway station. The room was small and so was the toilet, but while the room was bearable, the toilet was not. It was neat but the walls on either side were so close he thought he would die of claustrophobia. But he could not spend money lavishly on good hotels. That was not the purpose of his trip. Sitting inside the room, on the chequered bed sheet that was super cheap too, he listened to people talking on the veranda, the unnerved laughter of prostitutes, the clatter and din from downstairs and the traffic on the road. There was a phone in the room, but no facility for room service. He went downstairs and bought three bottles of water and returned to his room, taking the stairs both times since he couldn’t bear being in another confined space. Back in his room, he drank water and brushed his teeth using the water he had bought, he didn’t feel like using tap water, and then he turned off the lights and tried to sleep. Aadi had seen exquisite Russian gymnastics shows and dances that filled the senses with the pure pleasure of beauty. But theatre, he felt, was a different experience, a space where light, music, voice, body movements and texts became one, and the oneness elevated the mind.
From the background of the black and white curtains, looking at him, the Tenth Head sang a lullaby,
Once a fool wanted to fly
He wanted to leave the common ways
So he used waxed wings
And climbed to where no one had been.
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The chair started rolling to and fro; she was using her muscles to push it hard, stopping and changing directions, it seemed it had become a game to her. Once it began rolling, it was not easy to hold it back, to stop the motion; it crashed into the wall. This was no racing chair to turn fast or stop when you wanted; it was just a wheelchair, without which he believed it was impossible for him to live. So he shouted: ‘Get out of here—scram!’
She was shocked; she was playing half out of boredom and half out of her desire to amuse him. When the wheelchair collided with the walls this time, her fingers were caught in between, and blood clotted immediately above her knuckles. Her fingers were long and soft; she wore a turquoise ring on her forefinger, now it seemed the colour from the stone was spreading to the rest of her fingers. Sucking on her injury, she walked out of the room. He saw her fingers and realized how badly they were hurt. He called her back, and she returned and sat beside him on the bed.
Since Aadi’s departure, it felt different, being there. His mother never came this way, it seemed she had forgotten her son, or had begun to see him as a strange monolith occupying one of the bedrooms. Some time in the future, maybe she would think of dusting it. These days, it was Shaly who helped him to the toilet, to his platter of food. The little bits of poop on the edge of the toilet disgusted her, and only then did she realize what Aadi had been going through all these years; she felt sorry for the poor child. Sometimes she asked Janu for help, though Shiva didn’t like Janu much.
He took her hand in his; his hand began to tremble as he kissed her bruised fingers. They maintained a silence that was strangely pleasant and after some time he said he was sorry. She said it was all right and tried to sustain her composure, but after a gap of five or ten minutes she asked, though she wanted him not to be troubled by her question: ‘May I know why you got so angry then? Nothing happened, right?’
He answered her point-blank: ‘My chair isn’t a plaything. I hate when Aadi sits on it; I don’t want anybody to sit on it except me. This is the goddamn countryside. I don’t know if anyone here will be able to help if something happens to my chair. I am afraid I would not be able to handle it. Every day I try a little to get out of this bed and sit on that chair by myself, it is not always easy for me though. Even when I do manage to sit on it, the thresholds and the antique furniture don’t let me move around freely, the way I used to in Bangalore. To be honest, that wheelchair belongs to me. I’ve told Aadi this as well.’
She wanted to run out of that room and cry.
44
He thought he was a lone figure, walking around, up and down the streets. He was one among the many city walkers, the one against the many—the one untouched by the many. He thought he could go to Japan, if he really wanted to, if he had enough money to travel, it was easy
to plan a trip—suddenly the world seemed small and the day longer than the world. But however long his day was, he didn’t wish to think of his mother’s native place and her mud mansion. He called his brother as if he were performing a ritual, something like the bell before the commencement of classes at school. It was necessary. Both of them behaved like perfect strangers, searching for the correct words and using the right expressions to explain things. Though the indifference in the voice of his brother alarmed Aadi, he didn’t ask why he was talking like that. Maybe he was bored, maybe it was because of the signal. Aadi spent his day in the different malls in the city, which seemed an easy solution. He spent a long time in Café Coffee Day, watching people come and go, and those who, like him, stayed to while away their time.
Shiva had noticed the tears in her eyes but he pretended he hadn’t seen them. He stretched his arm towards the wheelchair and touched it.
‘You and me now, let us rock!’ he said to the chair and laughed. He heard the chair laughing too.
Aadi dialled Shiva’s number once again, as if he wanted to make sure that everything was in order. The automated voice informed him that the phone was out of range. One second you are within range, and the next second you are out of it. Instantly, hatred for that house welled up in him. Just then he was called to fetch his third cappuccino of the day. Slowly, he got up to collect it.
What is the difference between me and him, Shiva wondered. We were born on the same day, to the same mother. He has everything; he even got to travel to meet his girlfriend, Mother might have given him enough money to last a month, maybe longer, who knew. The only thing I am doing is lying in my bed! The twin thoughts, the twin troubles—he sighed and tried to kick his helpless foot on the bed. When was the last time I watched television?
One realized how large this building was only when one looked out from the top. He was kneeling against the steel railing of the top floor of the mall. If he fell now, he would be flying. He looked at the girl who was announcing something standing on the raised platform near the landing of the escalator. Her voice through the microphone echoed and scattered all over, making it impossible to understand. What was there to understand anyway? She was a babe, a beautiful one, dressed sexily like the air hostesses on board some cheap flight. Whenever she took a break between announcing the winners or before asking the next question, they played the music. Shakira . . . Shakira . . . Where was the song in the din?
The next time she came to his room, he was unmanageable, he refused to talk to her, and she wondered what had happened to him all of a sudden. Life was becoming rather stiff-necked these days. This was the first time the twins were living separately. Could that be the reason? She couldn’t be sure. She wanted to be a nice person, a reliable one, for that was the duty she thought was assigned to her. He said he wanted to go out, he was obstinate; she said it was impossible at this time of the day, no use being pig-headed. But later on she changed her mind and went to his mother’s room to ask for her permission; he smiled and she thought his look was villainous.
The girl had stopped announcing. She sat with one leg crossed over the other on the chair on the corner of the stage. She had beautiful thighs. They started the music again, people walked through the aisles with trolleys, shaking their asses to the music.
She helped him get out of his bed. He placed his arm around her shoulders, stretched it down and, occasionally, touched her breasts. He had the right to seek pleasure, he was not incapable of happiness. He probed it slowly, he wanted to excite her long nipple.
What did you do, he asked himself, where did you touch? He smiled.
Poor child, she sighed.
He tried again to reach him. He heard the phone ringing at the other end, thank God.
Janu helped Shaly take Shiva’s wheelchair out of the entrance house and then she went back.
‘Where do you want to go?’ she asked him.
‘To the riverbank,’ he said.
The phone in his hand was vibrating. He checked the display: it was Aadi. He rejected the call.
It was Shaly who had discovered the short cut to the riverbank, the way Columbus discovered America. Aadi was glad she had discovered it; Shiva said he missed the cremation grounds. Carefully, she wheeled him over the uneven surfaces. She was afraid she wouldn’t be able to manage him all on her own. She regretted not asking Janu to accompany them.
‘Can we please move faster?’ he asked her.
Once or twice, his head brushed against her hand. She pretended not to notice. She was not happy or resentful, just sad. Painfully, she smiled.
The wind was blowing non-stop near the riverbank.
‘I feel like running over the bank,’ he said, and watched closely for the pain in her eyes. She knew it had become his habit these days, to talk about things that evoked sympathy, that might hurt others. He had changed a lot since his brother had gone. Though Aadi was a silent presence in the house, everything was so different when he was there. There was order and a beauty to things. The nerves of the house used to calm down watching the slowness of his pace. She missed that darling boy. Now, there was pain in her eyes.
Shiva seemed satisfied and sighed in an affected way. He said, ‘I couldn’t do anything even if I wanted to, I am tired of life.’
She didn’t answer.
‘I want to commit suicide. Could you please help me?’ he said.
Again she didn’t respond. When he saw her eyes bore no expression, his eyes welled up. Like a child who had failed miserably at a match, he sat in his chair, his head bowed.
She had nothing to say. In a sense, she was tired too, tired of emotions, half of which were unwanted, uninvited. The sky began to change colour. He saw it changing hues rapidly. Very soon, darkness would cover everything; he was frightened, he wanted to go back. He raised his head and looked at her—she was seething watching the river. He felt her eyes were the same colour as the river.
‘Shaly, come, let us go back,’ he said to her.
On the way back home, she gave him considerable thought. Words, formed in the mind, stammered under the weight of boredom. She didn’t want to talk to anyone. But she was determined to talk to Kamala about him: he needed a mother, he needed attention, he was no longer a child or even a teenager. In a way she was responsible for everything, in a way Kamala was responsible for everything. It was imperative that they move house as soon as possible; Shiva ought to have the biggest room, with his big screens and gadgets. These rooms with the black pathways that connected them, with their unnaturally beautiful projections on the walls and the unexpected dents and hollows on the floors were nothing better than torture chambers. They all needed fresh air.
Amy Ammu was playing inside the theatre. She had braided her hair like Princess Elsa and was wearing a loose pink frock. There were some butterfly clips in her hair, red and blue. Her mother was sitting in the front row on the second seat, chatting merrily with her friends. The pretty young woman he had seen joined them in a short while, wearing a salwar kameez with dangling jhumkas and a red bindi and a beautiful multicoloured dupatta decorated with matte-finish golden and copper sequins. Now Amy Ammu wanted that dupatta. The little princess didn’t look too happy at what the young woman told her. She made an upset face and put her hand over her head as though to ruin her Elsa braids, then pouted and threw herself on the floor, on the red carpet of the aisle, and started crying. The young woman quickly removed her dupatta, draped it around Amy Ammu’s shoulders and knotted the two loose ends on the front strap of her pink frock just below her neck. Now she looked extremely happy, with the train trailing after her as she walked up and down the red carpet. She walked like Elsa on the ramp and paused casually, closing her eyes and blowing a kiss to some imaginary prince.
Blue was sitting on a chair next to her mother and was watching her. When she saw Aadi, she strode towards him and asked, ‘Can you babysit my Blue?’
Before he could say yes or no, she turned and started her princess glide. He smiled, and
everyone else, looking at her, was smiling too. She took Blue, who was sitting on the chair idly, and came back. Carefully, she made him sit on Aadi’s lap and blew some kisses at him. She talked to him in a language he didn’t understand. Looking at Blue, she blinked her eyes several times and bent her head forward and sideways, all code words, maybe. The lights dimmed, the din died down and she ran back to her mother holding the loose end of the dupatta in her hands. On the chair Aadi sat with both feet on the floor, the teddy on his lap, to watch the play. The sing-song began:
Call me head,
More precise the Tenth Head . . .
Ravana’s tenth head continued its sing-song, looking at Sita,
Unlike you, I’ve never been an independent head
A head that can think on its own
A head that can breathe on its own
A head that can fornicate on its own
The simple pleasures of an independent head
Never there for me . . .
Now he looks back and sees the nine heads,
I’ve always been with those nine rascals, Madame . . .
Suddenly Aadi’s cell phone rang inside the theatre. He shuddered. It was his mother. The man sitting in the front row turned around to give him a severe look. Immediately he pressed his finger on the reject button. The organizers had made several announcements before the play began requesting everyone to silence their mobile phones and not use flash photography during the performance. How had he forgotten to turn it off? He remembered he had been busy with Amy Ammu and her Blue. He punched Blue on its head. It felt good. He turned off the phone and kept it back in his pocket. He decided to call his mother after the performance. He felt proud at his capacity not to panic. I don’t want to be associated with those three rascals, he said to himself, but the next second he panicked. He missed them badly and on the stage, the Tenth Head sang,
Once a fool wanted to fly,
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