Locked in Vanity

by Sravani Saha

  ‘Noone can stop me. I will continue to rule the industry as long as I can. Dad, are you watching?’ Ruby laughed in her sleepy tone.

  CHAPTER 6

  Chris took a draft from his bottle and tossed it on the seat on the passenger side. The bitter liquid stung his throat as it made its way southward. Once the liquid settled, he opened his mouth to let out an acerbic steam.

  The early hours of the evening flashed before his eyes. She looked angelic. She looked inviting. She looked scorchingly seductive. He was even considering a second date. He was with Ruby, the face of the modern billboard, the object of every man’s desire, the embodiment of ultimate beauty.

  But the turn of events left him shocked and he was still recovering from the trauma of the date. Ida had already dumbfounded him with her voyeuristic tendencies. And then, Ruby!

  ‘She! She...really! I can’t believe this,’ he thought.

  He stretched toward the passenger seat for the bottle, took another gulp and tossed it back. But Ruby! He could not believe his eyes. He felt a desperate need to tell someone. Should he tell Ray? He took another draft from the bottle. Maybe he should talk to Ray. But life had other plans for him.

  Even before he turned his head to see the road ahead, his felt his eyes turned foggy for a moment. He shut his eyes hard and reopened them to find his vision clearer. But a look of terror clouded his face as he grabbed the steering wheel harder and harder until the rubber grip left impressions on his palms. He could not feel his hands. They had turned heavy and it was a mammoth task to move them.

  He lifted his right hand and tried to bang it on the wheel to feel the pain but only succeeded in honking hard. With enormous effort, he grabbed an old can of diet cola and pressed his left index finger below the pull tab into the open cavity and waited to feel the pain. But there was no pain. His eyes shuttled between the road and his finger. He noticed a deep impression of the sharp rim on his finger which gradually deepened until the flesh around turned pink. He screamed when the pink turned red and the rim of the cavity entered his finger. Still no pain. He did not know if he screamed on seeing the blood ooze out or because he could not feel the pain.

  He continued driving with the can dangling from his left hand while his beige trousers absorbed the intermittent drops of blood trickling from his finger. While he drove on, he could almost feel his heart pounding in an unnatural rhythm. Suddenly, his car stopped though he did not remember pressing the brakes. He was losing senses from his feet as well. He hit the brakes harder and harder while the car almost jolted with the impact but he had lost it in his legs too. Now they felt too heavy to be moved.

  A strong surge of fear overpowered him. His limbs were failing, his heart pounded with a monstrosity he had never experienced before, and he was not sure if he could manoeuvre the car any more. His eyes turned foggy again, but with unyielding focus, the vehicle moved on until everything turned misty. The car swerved right and left as if possessed, and he could hear his heart beat with a passion that would almost rip it out of his body.

  His mouth felt a bitter taste and he threw up on the steering. With fear overtaking his thoughts, and with failing senses, he was almost reduced to a stump that was holding on to the last strains of his bodily faculties.

  He did not know where the brakes were and with a massive effort, he could move his foot. This foot did not land on the brakes. It landed on the accelerator and with his suspended senses, he could only feel the car zoom on until a terrible impact uprooted him from his seat and hurled him into the open. There was complete silence within his body.

  The road came to a standstill and the sound of sirens ripped through the air.

  A few hours later in the morning, Ida entered Ruby’s room and drew the curtains. Sunlight flooded the bed and Ida noticed the photo Ruby clutched in her sleep. She gave her a gentle push, kept a cup of freshly brewed coffee next to her pillow, and a newspaper that showed a crumpled red car dashed against a wall on East Street.

  Ruby looked at it with sleepy eyes. She knew that car. She sat in it last evening.

  Ida looked at her and smiled.

  CHAPTER 7

  Ida was alone at home. Ruby had a quick photoshoot and Ida had done her hair already before she left.

  ‘I’ll be late though. I’ll be out after the shoot,’ she told Ida.

  Ida went to each room of the house and finally entered Ruby’s room. She sat on the bed and looked up straight at the ceiling. The giant fan stared down at her. She turned it on and watched its gigantic arms start moving round and round slicing her vision of the ceiling.

  ‘You have to look after her Ida,’ she remembered her master telling her. ‘She is very young, and without a mother. Of all my governesses, she likes you. I want you to be here for as long as she wants. Make sure she never cries. Make sure she is never hurt. Always keep her happy, no matter what you have to do.’

  ‘I will Sir. I will take care of Ruby. I will make sure she never cries. ’ she had promised her master.

  Ida sat on the bed and tried to count her tenure with Ruby on her finger joints. Soon, she lost count and tried doing it mentally but gave up.

  The fan moved slowly and walked her back in time. She remembered the day when Ruby was just 10 and wanted to touch the fan. She stood on the bed and tried but her little hands failed to reach it. Ida had brought in a step stool and placed it on the bed. Ruby stood on it, reached the fan and in a fit of excitement, jumped on the stool only to topple on the ground with a huge thud. The little child cried and had a plastered hand for the next one month.

  ‘Use your brains Ida,’ her master had rebuked her. ‘You promised to never make her cry.’

  Ida had cried that day. The little child was in pain.She promised to herself never to hurt Ruby and have an unwavering loyalty to her master and his daughter. Twenty years later, she was still here fulfilling her promises.

  Ida was only 20 then and at the prime of her youth and beauty. Full of exuberance, she took charge of Ruby. The girl had become immensely close to her. In the absence of a mother, Ida was the mother figure she looked up to.

  The first time Ruby went out to play alone defying the prying eyes of Ida, she came back crying. A boy from the neighborhood had troubled Ruby and called her names.

  The next day Ida went to the park with Ruby and gave the boy a mouthful. Ruby knew the magical power Ida had. The boy never spoke to her again. Since that day, Ruby fathomed the magical power Ida possessed. She spoke to Ida when she needed a patient ear. She talked to her when she needed to share her girlish fantasies. Ida became the shoulder Ruby could cry on, and also the punching bag when Ruby was cantankerous.

  Ruby had just turned sixteen when one night, Ida heard her master scream from the living room. She ran upstairs to find her master and Ruby engaged in a verbal battle over modelling. Ruby had been adamant about taking up modelling and her father refused to allow her to walk the ramp. The scene was no less than a battlefield with Ruby having smashed artifacts in the room to prove her point and to appease her raging hormones.

  ‘I’m not looking for your permission Dad. You are no one to stop me,’ Ruby had yelled back.

  ‘Yes, I am. I am your dad. Modelling is not a career for the respectable. It is not for you. Besides, men take advantage of young girls,’ he had said.

  Ida had listened to the exchange of hot words with deliberate intent of understanding the point of view of both parties but she did not utter a word.

  Ida did not know what exactly was her position at home: a mother, a friend, or a sister. She tried hard to establish the part of the sister but failed because she didn’t know what needed to be done so Ruby could acknowledge her as a sister. She wasn’t the mother at all. She thought a friend was too diaphanous a membrane between Ruby and herself. Gradually, she dusted off the idea of stamping a title to herself. She remained Ida, just Ida, and picked loyalty as her thread of support for Ruby. She was strong at keeping promises and made sure she remained dutifully devoted to her.<
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  Ida got off the bed and walked to the vanity dresser. A pair of taxidermied canaries stood there. She touched the head of one of them. ‘Hey little one, remember how you got here?’ she asked.

  When Ruby was 21, she brought home a pair of canaries and put them in a beautiful bird cage with Indian motifs. The birds sand and warbled, and Ruby warbled along with them. The house reverberated with high pitched sounds of happiness. One evening Ruby came back home from a day long shoot and found deathly silence at home. The birds had never stopped chirping since she brought them. But that day was different.

  She ran to the cage to find it empty.

  ‘Where are they? Ida!’ she screamed.

  Ida had rushed in the kitchen to find Ruby crying.

  ‘Where are my birds Ida?’ she shook Ida and asked her.

  ‘I’m sorry Ruby. They stopped breathing suddenly,’ Ida said. The soft sadness in her tone made Ruby sure that Ida wasn’t lying. Ida never lied.

  ‘How? How Ida?’ she screamed. ‘How did my birds stop breathing? What do you mean ‘suddenly?’ Ruby demanded to know.

  ‘I can’t say a thing about birds Ruby. They were fine one minute, but I just went out of the kitchen and when I got back, they were both lying dead on the floor of the cage. There was no smoke here, in the kitchen. I do not know what happened to them,’ Ida said.

  ‘Ida! They were my favorite birds Ida. Do you hear the silence at home? Do you hear it?’ Ruby cried.

  ‘I can feel your pain Ruby. I loved them, those two yellows. They sang the whole day and I knew I had company. I spoke to them and they listened. Now they are gone Ruby. I’m so sorry,’ Ida said.

  ‘I don’t know what to do. Dad left me without telling me. Now these birds!’ Ruby sat on the floor of the kitchen, her knees drawn up to her face. She dug her face into her elbows that rested on her knees and cried bitterly.

  Ida had not seen Ruby cry except when her dad passed away. Ruby cried silently in the corner of her bedroom that night. Even as a child, Ida had never seen Ruby shed a tear. The resilience of the girl made Ida like her. She cried again only when her birds died.

  Ida spoke to Ruby in the kitchen telling her how life was vulnerable to death and how we’d have to keep moving on despite death striking us at every other curb. Ruby refused to listen. She cried and refused to eat or drink anything. All that she wanted were her birds; the same birds. She would not accept new birds too.

  Finding no other way to calm the girl down or to make her happy, Ida decided to preserve the birds. She kept them in the freezer for a few days after which she feared they would decompose. She decided to speak to Ruby about burying them but Ruby was at her childish obstinate best. Ida promised Ruby that she would preserve her birds.

  Ida cleaned out the offals of the dead birds and kept them in a mix of salt and borax for a week. She took them out gingerly, removed all other traces of air from under the wings, delicately tried to place the heads under a wing, and then freeze-dried them in different packets. To keep Ruby’s hopes alive and to keep her happy, Ida showed her the packets consoling her that her birds may well live with her forever, though they may not sing. Finally, after a few months of freeze drying the birds, they were perfectly mounted in Ruby’s bedroom.

  The birds never sang but they lived with Ruby ever after. Ida was relieved to find that she had kept her words and made Ruby happy. She remembered her master that day and offered a little prayer to him.

  When Ruby fell violently sick when she was only beginning to get calls for ramp shows, Ida took on herself the onus of getting Ruby better. She worked incessantly to feed her, and give her a bath, and put her to sleep. Ruby had turned reed thin and her eyes had a hollowed look of hopelessness. This was exactly the time when she was working on her body and striving to be a model. Her doctor advised against crash diets, and Ida ensured Ruby was nourished well.

  Ruby, during this period, turned more close to Ida though she developed a feverish insecurity about her own looks. Every night, she asked Ida to tell her she looked beautiful, and Ida was easy to oblige. Every night, she asked Ida to take her head on her lap and speak dewy words of love to her. Ida spoke to her and pointed out the strength of her pulchritude. Ruby got back with a renewed strength and gumption to make it bigger in the glamor business. Her aggression defined her at the workplace and she met Ray who was convinced of Ruby’s acumen and beauty and decided to sign her ont. He got her all the contracts she needed and that could make him rich. Ida noticed Ruby’s efforts to keep herself fit and how she became the cynosure of all eyes.

  Ruby employed her to the coveted position of her hairdresser and Ida felt pregnant with pride at being able to perform additional duties for Ruby.

  Now after so many years of living with Ruby, Ida felt her life was fulfilled with promises kept and loyalties maintained. With no strings attached to her own roots, she was happy that her otherwise jejune life had taken a turn for the better when she came to live with her master and Ruby. She felt proud to see the little Ruby grown up into an enchanting woman.

  CHAPTER 8

  Ida was proud of being the ‘chosen one’ for Ruby. She affirmed the belief in herself and blessed herself for being her unfailing cushion. Now when Ruby wasn’t home, she walked around in her room and chanted it like a mantra. She stopped to see a photo on the nightstand. Ruby looked breathtaking in a little black dress in the photo, and her curves showed. It was no wonder she was so famous and men wanted her. Ida stared at the photo for a while and wondered if she could feel beautiful and men would want her too.

  One night, a few years ago, Ruby came home a little tipsy with a boy in tow. Ida eyed him; he was more than a boy and not a man yet. There is often a rarefied level between boyhood and manhood that people linger in, almost like being in limbo when they do not know if they are man enough to have a Jagerbomb, or boy enough to still gulp down cola reluctantly allowed by the mother. Ruby’s companion was in this limbo of life-stages.

  Ruby dragged this boy up to her room. Ida followed them, and Ruby asked her to leave them alone but she stood outside listening to them. The door was shut and soon enough there were playful moans that changed to passionate ones. Ida stood and listened hard but the moans died a sudden death, as sudden as they had initiated. Ida ran back to her room and came out when she heard footsteps coming down towards her room.

  Ruby stood there almost naked and clearly angry.

  ‘Ida, Nick hurt me,’ she cried. ‘Ask him to leave right now,’ she said.

  ‘Who’s Nick? That boy up there?’ Ida asked her.

  Ruby nodded. Ruby described her lovemaking session with Nick. She explained how Nick had touched her breasts and kissed her hard in the mouth. Ida wanted more details.

  She continued to give a visual picture of her lovemaking jaunt with Nick. Ida asked for more details.

  She explained how Nick squeezed each of her breasts and melted his lips on them. Ida asked for more.

  Ruby narrated Nick had no condom on him but she didn’t want to move ahead without one. She rushed out of bed to get a condom from the wardrobe but Nick had grabbed her from the back and pushed himself in. Ruby didn’t want it this way and forced him out with an impact. He fell on the bed but got up and grabbed her again.

  Ida stopped her midway and excused herself to the bathroom. She shut the door and moaned while she felt herself get wet. Finally relaxed, she came out and expressed her apologies for leaving Ruby midway in her conversation.

  ‘I need a man Miss,’ she said once Ruby had settled down. Bring me a man. Can you?’ she asked.

  Ruby sensed the needy look in her eyes, and held her hands.

  ‘I’ll try to set you up,’ she said.

  The next week Ruby called Ida from work.

  ‘Doll up right now. I have someone you can meet,’ Ruby said.

  Ida was confused how to behave. She had never been with a man. She dressed up in her lacey best inside but wore something plain on the outside. When the man was ready to pick he
r up, he looked at her and asked her to change. Ida changed and went out with him for the evening. The man wanted to come home with Ida. She called Ruby to ask for her permission to bring him home.

  ‘Feel free Ida,’ Ruby said. ‘This man is for you. Enjoy your night.’

  The man entered her room, took off his clothes and without uttering a word, he rode on Ida like an animal.

  In the middle of his act, Ida stopped him. ‘I’ve never felt so good in my life. This is the best night I’ve ever had.’ He covered her mouth while she spoke and resumed his act.

  Once done, the man came out to leave but he looked around the house with awe and asked Ida if she and Ruby lived together.

  ‘If you got to explore, why not join us for a little threesome?’ he asked Ruby. ‘That way I can choose,’ he said.

  Ruby threw him out of the house. Since then, Ida seemed disillusioned with men and hesitated to ask to be set up with another.

  Ida had asked Ruby only once more to set her up again but Ruby declined. She said she didn’t have the time or inclination for it. Ida told her how much she craved for sex. Why don’t you watch me have sex with someone at times, and then go satisfy yourself? She had suggested and laughed.

  Ida took her suggestion too seriously. The curtain at the door became her spot to hear the sounds of lovemaking post which she would go back to her room. Ruby never stopped her from watching. She knew Ida meant no harm. She also laughed at the foolish trust Ida had invested in her and somewhere deep within, she knew she was the mistress of the home and could play around with others.

  Ida was grateful Ruby allowed her to stand behind curtains. She was happy with whatever little she had in life.

  She turned off the fan in Ruby’s room and walked out.

  CHAPTER 9

  Ruby was perked up for the day.

  ‘Ida, I’m packing up early today but I’ll be home late. Don’t wait up for me,’ Ruby said.