Acid

by Sangeetha Sreenivasan

  ‘Sure.’

  He ended the call and after a quick shower, walked towards their home. Nimmy and Anu were on the portico practicing the flute. Pascal was there too. Aadi had heard him playing the saxophone the other day. He looked at him with admiration now; Pascal smiled back. Nimmy shook hands with him and turned to Pascal.

  ‘Pascal, our young friend is leaving tomorrow.’

  Molière spent his evenings in front of his TV set—cricket, cinema, news and debates, whatever. There was no other furniture inside that room except the big TV and the speakers and some cushions. Molière had a big bowl of chips and a small bowl of ice cream in front of him. He was eating with both his hands. Dudu and Faristha were lying on either side watching him sitting there. When they saw Aadi enter, they lifted one of their eyebrows in greeting and continued as before. Nimmy brought a bowl of ice cream for Aadi. As usual, she started cracking jokes, but Aadi couldn’t join their laughter, he could scarcely breathe. He looked at the open curtains for a while and when he was about to leave, saying goodbye, Molière asked him: ‘Do you mind if I tell you a story—my story? Though I don’t know if it is relevant here?’

  Aadi nodded eagerly and sat down on the floor.

  ‘I was born in a house near an old school building, a school for the primary classes. During the holidays, a theatre group used to come there for rehearsals. It was a kind of festival for us children. We loved to sit around the actors and watch them practice, rehearse their dialogues. Sometimes the rehearsals lasted till the morning. The school didn’t have electricity at all at that time, and so, they extended the line from our house for the electric bulb. Not just electricity, my grandmother used to make black tea and snacks for them. Thus, we kids became popular among the actors. My sisters and I were the only children of the village allowed inside the rehearsals. Sometimes when there was a shortage of actors, they made my elder sister join in the sing-song of the chorus. Sometimes they allowed me to touch their musical instruments. Once, they even took me with them to draw the curtains before the play. I thought I was a real king, in control of the reins of a real stage. That was the happiest day of my childhood. Slowly I started doing minor roles in school dramas. Once I played Hitler, and Gandhi, who was the real hero of the play, came and converted me to non-violence—as easy as that. But that was not the real beginning of my life in theatre. That was a period when communism flourished in our area and my house was almost like a Communist Party office. We children used to wait till late night for the party meetings to end so that we could have our house back. During that time, the theatre came up with a new theme. They wanted to tell the history of the Communist Party in Kerala. It was a comparatively long play that went on for almost three and a half hours. There was a role for a boy in the play. Perhaps it was my luck, but the boy who had promised to do the part fell ill and couldn’t come for the rehearsals. They waited for him for days on end. In the end the director was forced to take a decision. He was depressed and he desperately wanted another boy for the role. It was when he asked his crew to gather around in a circle so that they could discuss the situation that he caught sight of me sitting in a corner. It seemed he hadn’t thought of such a possibility so far. In a flash, I saw his eyes glittering. He asked me straight away: ‘Why can’t you do this?’

  I had but one answer. ‘I will do it.’

  It was a sentimental or rather a complicated scene. The other actors were not sure of my competence. Every one of them was confused, except thirteen-year-old me. But the role was not as simple as I had thought.

  The boy had to hand over a very secret, confidential letter to the leader of the comrades. If discovered, he would be beheaded in no time. On the way, he got bitten by a snake, but his passion made him hand over the letter to the leader before he died. His name was Kalanthar. At the end of the play he returns to the stage once again, carrying a red flag. It was a feeling equivalent to nothing else. E.M.S. Namboodiripad and Jyoti Basu were among those sitting in the front row for the premier show. The play had seen some three hundred other stages and Kalanthar, undoubtedly, was well accepted. That’s when I decided to be an actor. I knew theatre would be my life.’

  Aadi smiled in admiration.

  ‘Have you any idea why I told you all this?’ he asked.

  Aadi had no idea what to say.

  ‘I want you to remember my story when you travel. Now, I will tell you a secret. Do you remember the day you told your story standing on the performance floor of the theatre?’

  Aadi drew in a shuddering breath and looked at him in disbelief. ‘Yes, I was sitting in the top gallery. You bowed at the end of your speech, didn’t you?’

  Aadi smiled in embarrassment, his face blushing. The gallery was dark and the pillars inside the theatre were black and there was no light inside except for what filtered in through the slits on the walls. He had thought there was no one inside, he had not seen anybody.

  ‘It was touching. Beautiful,’ Molière said.

  Aadi knew his eyes were welling up, he thought he would break down.

  ‘You can come back here whenever you want, you are family. The doors will be open for you, Aadi.’

  Molière hugged him and waved him off.

  ‘Love you.’ Nimmy kissed him goodbye.

  They laughed aloud. They were happy about the newness of the heavily brocaded layers of costumes, crowns, stars and decorations they were wearing. Golden cornrows glistened in the hue of the evening sun. Laughing, they looked at each other as they ran and tumbled down the slope to the soft meadow, which was slightly overgrown. They got up. They got up as fast as they could because they were on the run. They ran after the stage that revved and moved across the meadow on heavy wheels. They were clumsy, lovable, and laughable, like termite flies, hoping against hope. The air was filled with the flapping of their rainbow wings. Some of them crawled on the meadow, chasing after the running, rolling, thudding, jumping stage. They called themselves actors. A hilarious group of people—at times sorrow-stricken like the rest of humanity. Their costumes proclaimed their manifesto. They had stories to tell. Invariably, they all wanted to mount that running stage and perform. And they wanted you to watch them, to shout for an encore and applaud. Their steps steadfast, their voice candid, they would announce themselves:

  The bell tolls for you. Come, join us. Ask your children to join in the race. We are sure your kids have not been exposed to the kind of stories we have in store. We are afraid we can’t stop and wait for you. But we must talk to you. Carry your old people on your back and run. Don’t shy away. Remember, only your babysitter complained about how much you weighed. Who is he? Your grandpa, your Spiritus Mundi of story-store house! Let the old man clamber up on your shoulders. Let the land and house and lords be abandoned. What is there to safeguard now?

  What did you say, your 52” TV set?

  What, refrigerator?

  Folks, please go easy. Bring them all. We may need them on the way. Grab that brand new recliner too. Let the lambs stay back and free birds fly. Sometimes we do need materials, don’t we?

  They kept calling.

  Come.

  58

  ‘I want to talk to you,’ Madhavan said as calmly as he could.

  There was no change of expression on her face even when she heard his voice over the phone. She didn’t answer either.

  ‘I’m planning to come home next week. If I come there can I see you and the children?’

  There was no answer. She was still thinking.

  Anybody else would have stopped talking, but he continued.

  ‘Could you please give me an answer?’

  Madhavan was literally begging. Kamala thought she was pleased about this. She tried to smile. How should we move our lips when we smile?

  ‘Hello! Hello? Are you there?’ His voice was louder now. She wondered what was wrong with him. Somehow, she said yes. Her yes was nothing better than a puff of air.

  ‘Are you ill? Hello . . . are you okay?’

 
She said, ‘Fever,’ and disconnected. She kept the receiver near the cradle, sat down on the chair and leaned her head on the table near the telephone stand. Now she could hear the endless humming of the receiver out of the cradle. It felt good, the humming, buzzing, and roaring—it felt good inside the brain. Good for her. She imagined him as a burglar, breaking a pane of glass in one of the windows in her bedroom and letting himself in. She was glad there were no glass panes; they had solid wood windows, not easy for a burglar, not easy for anyone, least of all Madhavan.

  He must be missing them a lot. Good for him. She looked at the few small objects on the table and sighed.

  ‘The children won’t be any trouble for you, don’t worry, but spare me,’ she whispered. ‘I’m too tired to look after the kids, to take care of my things.’

  She looked like a crushed woman drawn with charcoal on a cheap, torn, yellowing piece of paper. She was in pain when she crossed the threshold of her room, in deep pain when she heard his voice over the phone, but it was a sort of numb pain. She had sent Janu’s father to the flat in the morning to help the Movers and Packers men unload their stuff and to give them direction. If they dumped all their stuff in the front hall it was okay, she had her own dreams for arranging it. The interior design could wait, let her fever break first.

  Shiva had stopped calling for his mother. He hadn’t even asked for Janu in the past two days. He was happy after the phone call with Aadi. He was sure his brother would come back, perhaps even bring Shaly with him. Shiva wanted to get out of the house, at the very least go to the burial ground—anything more than that would be a surplus of pleasures.

  He turned back when he heard footsteps near the door. He was frightened. He saw a dark silhouette. Was that his mother?

  His mother, who was standing by his door, was also taken aback to see her son, now a total stranger. They looked at each other with the threat of pain in their eyes, their eyes screaming in terror. The next second, they withdrew their eyes, their voices didn’t come out: only the shock remained.

  This was not the mother.

  This was not the son.

  Kamala looked at his wheelchair. The look in her eyes frightened him again.

  That wheelchair was his.

  The black hole, the darkest, and the blackest! As she looked, the blackness of it flowered in front of her. There was nothing but darkness inside. Outside she had seen the sun blazing on the top of trees and on the fallen trunks and leaves. In the yellow light of wrath, the sands on the shore pretended to be asleep, remembering something. In the blindingly incandescent light she saw the darkness of the circle widening in front of her eyes, engulfing her. Which was the star that was perishing itself to swallow me in the middle of the day? She felt weaker than a leaf, and believed her death would be weaker still. But the hole remained where it was, the mouth of it started working like the suction hose of a vacuum cleaner, sucking up the spiders in the corners, ants on the floor, moths on the wall and small lizards on the roof, cleaning by consuming everything that was living. She waited for her turn. But in the whirlpool of the wind the hole was sucking in, faster than the fastest speed she could ever imagine, she saw two boys swirling in, uncontrollably, helpless in the constant suction. Her heart thudding, she realized what this was.

  This is a supernova explosion, Kamala; there is no escape for anyone. Inside the black hole, you, your children, the Brahma, will all be one.

  ‘But isn’t it the mind that devastates Brahma?’ she asked.

  ‘Who said that? The mind is just a game of Brahma, a toy, you might call it. Using the toy one may get to know Brahma, but the access to Brahma is very limited my friend, you could never create Brahma, or recreate him.’

  White dwarfs and black holes started dancing around her. She was scared out of her wits, she grew submissive, and she saw her power dissolving. She couldn’t lift her feet, for they were glued to the ground. Meanwhile, her children were slipping into the hole faster and faster.

  ‘You are the one who wanted to know the Brahma. But when you see the ways open in front of you, why do you hesitate? Why do you cling on to the ground as if you have no other recourse? Look at you; you are shivering like the leaf of a banyan. But the desire to know the Brahma is killing you, all the same. You are a joke, my dear, you look like one of those tiny paradise flycatchers with long white tails.’

  She drew her wings, her feathers closer to her body, she knew that the sun that was about to die was pulling everything towards its centre.

  It is insane to stare at oneself.

  59

  Shaly sat down on the chair in the kitchen, shelling beans and watching Rita Mama staggering through the house with heavy steps, the weight of her body troubling her as she moved around. She knew Rita Mama could not manage on her own for long. This she had discovered on the first day itself, when she was trying to get a foothold in the house after her exhausting journey. She had seen Rita Mama injecting insulin into her swollen thighs and sighing with a display of pride and achievement.

  As usual her cache of memories started hovering around and above the forbidden old house where her soulmate lived. One by one, she analysed the changes that had slowly taken over her, the way she doubted, the way she feared, the way she had lost her confidence and health, the way she had started isolating herself, begun exploding for no reason. There were times Shaly had forgotten to make a phone call; there were times Kamala had walked through the night like a madwoman with the cell phone in her hand calling her a thousand and one times, if time had permitted her. There were times her spirits were running low, and there was a time they simply stopped running.

  No joint on earth can give man the pleasure of the first experience a second time.

  Shaly lit a cigarette. Instantly she hated herself. She wanted to quit smoking. She had seen Rita Mama crossing herself before the crucifix. The smell of the smoke might have disturbed her prayers for she heard her curse. She threw the cigarette away. Rita Mama was a special lady, she thought, beautiful in a way, but her beauty was masked by a veil of hatred, which was not real. Had she ever known the loving presence of anybody in her life?

  It was all her carelessness. Janu felt terribly sorry, she went about barefoot and running to where her father was pointing. The temporary shed-like structure in which Kamala had parked her SUV was covered in overgrown stems and leaves of trailing creepers that formed a wilderness. A small portion of the steering wheel was visible through the tender stems poking their heads up. The last three or four times she had to go to the city, she had hired cabs as she thought the tyres were in bad shape and it would be dangerous to use the car. It was fortunate that they had seen it, otherwise it would have been completely overgrown with weeds in just two or three days. Janu went inside the house and returned with a wooden stool with a saddle seat, and a large and heavy knife from the kitchen. How fast these creepers grew, with white and red flowers hanging down in bunches from the stems. It was sad to cut down flowering vines in bloom.

  The paint on the gate was not yet dry. The pink paint was clogged in several places, making simple patterns on the railings. The house, with its flowers and balconies overlooking the mud path, had such a clean and inviting look in the evening that he felt like simply walking in. Cautiously he opened the gates and entered; he was careful not to step on the wet cement on the landing. But still, the gate marked him with a pink line on the back of his Inlander rucksack. He could hear his heartbeat from outside, as if a dog were panting nearby. Like the gate, the house was also newly painted in pink. There were white strips on the lintel that ran like a carousel along the length of the walls and a European-style wreath of roses hanging on the door. He searched for the calling bell. It was not easy to find it as the bell was fixed on the centre of a bronze dragonfly which again was hidden in a riotous profusion of colourful jingles. Altogether, it seemed like Christmas and the house looked like a huge Christmas cake, like one of those old-fashioned plum cakes with hard icing. Before he could ring the bell, S
haly was there in front of him, crying loudly and hugging and kissing him. Hearing the noise, Rita Mama came outside, dragging her feet.

  ‘Who is this boy?’ she asked.

  ‘This is my son, Aadi,’ Shaly said.

  Rita Mama smiled at him.

  ‘Haven’t I told you that I have two sons and a husband and a wife?’

  Rita Mama’s smile faded at her poor joke.

  ‘Ask him to come in, don’t make him stand outside.’ Rita Mama walked in and they followed her into the house. Shaly wanted to hear each and every detail of his travels, his experiences, the lessons he had learnt, his happiness. Aadi had brought her candles from Pondicherry, for he knew she loved candles. He remembered she always had candles in her room, back in Bangalore. These candles, he said as he opened the pack, are special, scented and beautiful.

  She had already declared a holiday for boiled tapioca and yam in advance and had made mutton stew and palappam for dinner. But she had prepared fish for Rita Mama as usual. Rita Mama loved the mutton stew.

  Aadi said he had started missing her cooking a long time ago. It was such a grand and lovely dinner, in the light of the candle he had brought, its perfume washing over them, they felt like crying. After dinner they went to the veranda and sat there for a while. It was windy there, cool and pleasing. The breeze brought them the scent of the nocturnal flowers. Aadi talked to her about Kamala. Somehow both of them had avoided the topic so far, in the presence of Rita Mama. But he couldn’t contain it any longer. ‘I think Amma is not very well these days.’

  Shaly didn’t show her sadness, and tried to console him instead.

  ‘It must be the migraine; you know it hurts badly. You must take her to a good doctor as soon as you get back. It won’t be easy to convince her, she will not be ready to consult a doctor, but Aadi, you have to do this for me.’

  ‘Yes, I will do that.’

  ‘Promise me, because it is very important. I don’t want her to suffer.’