by Rohan Dahiya
“Wha … that doesn’t even make sense.” Sohrab called out to her.
She thudded down the stairs, letting her anger fuel every beat, and found her grandfather in the guest bedroom lounging on the wicker chair. The garden stretched out in front of them, darkening in the dusk where time slowed down and the crickets came to life.
“He’s quite a handful isn’t he?”
Sunaina settled down by the warm stone steps. “Papa’s always been this neurotic, hasn’t he? I guess over the years I barely saw him for long enough to realize it.”
He smiled. “Or maybe he just paled in front of your mother.”
“I can tell we’re all savage with our jokes,” she giggled. “So that explains where I get my dose of the crazies from.”
“Oh don’t be so sure just yet. Your father didn’t even believe me when I told him I was having trouble taking stairs – he went on this tirade about how I don’t have any trouble navigating the walk down to the river every day and working in the garden …” he shook his head. “How would he even know better? He only stays long enough to fulfill his own need for a break and then it’s back to the city life and those hyenas he calls his friends.”
She withered under his gaze. “Always be careful about who you trust, Sunaina, they’d throw you to the wolves sooner than save you. They’re not your friends.”
He shook his head and stared into nothingness. “Not your friends.”
“I think maybe we should go easy on him he’s stressed out, you know what I mean? He’s constantly got this wide smile – fake as shit of course – and it’s just permanently plastered on.”
The Commander guffawed. “Oh just you wait beta, if you think he’s got it bad you should see your Geetu bua. That’s been her defense mechanism since she was your age. Any crisis comes up and she has that veiny look on her neck, like she can’t breathe, and the smile comes up.”
It was then that Asim remembered when he’d last seen it, the smile on Geetu’s face that weekend when they met at the same table for brunch. The morning after Leela had abandoned him like the rats that leave a sinking ship.
Sunaina left him to his musings and found herself facing a coffee machine that looked more like a spaceship. From the hall she heard them.
“Arey I’m sure it’s the new style, us oldies won’t get it.”
“Nonsense!” Siddhant saw her in the kitchen. “My god Sana beta you’ve grown so much since I last saw you. How’ve you been bacche?”
He smiled and nodded in that specific way when someone pays no attention to what you’re saying. It didn’t necessarily make him a bad person, he was fresh off a long flight, but it was a terribly typical reaction. She noted his lack of interest and trailed off, coffee couldn’t make itself no matter how fancy the machine.
“Arey bud listen I hope it’s okay that you’re bunking with me yaar, dad’s just not doing too well with his knees and the mattress in the other room is a fuckin mess.” Hassan punched in a secret code and the inky coffee poured out.
“Abbe don’t be petty ya now. Just let me know if you’re bringing someone home I’ll figure something out, or watch TV for a few hours. Remember college days …” he looked at Sunaina and stopped short.
“Oh my lord uncle you’re toh just as bad as he is” she cringed. “And please don’t give him any more ideas, the house is at full capacity right now anyway.”
It had been a while since Hassan laughed that openly. “Arey what you guys don’t know shit. Remember in hostel how we were packed into those dorms?”
“Ohh lord don’t remind me ya with that bell the caretaker would ring for a full hour, and then Juggy would take his socks off.”
They dissolved into howls of laughter.
“I swear, Sana after that summer your dad and I did everything we could to never go back to school. Oh gosh he could put out an elephant with that toe jam, and they made him practice football till the end ah.”
She chuckled. “Well then why did you go back?”
“Yeh bhaisaab found a girl to run after, abandoned the plot midway and turned on me. Believe it or not but Hassan wasn’t always so down in luck with women ah,” he clapped him on the back, “he was worse. One look and bas Tina Sodhi was all we ever heard from him.”
“Oh not like you were of any help,” Hassan shoved him in jest, “this idiot pushed me into the riverstream once because –”
“Because you took her to our spot. I mean come on ya, we – your buas included – had played there by the river for years. Every day of every summer. You just broke that sanctity.”
“Yeah and you broke my tooth.” Hassan replied wistfully.
“Hey hey what’d I miss?” Sohrab had stationed himself by the counter before she knew it. Now, when she saw him, he’d sucked all the air of the room out.
Sohrab Sood had the presence of the person who shoves himself between the occupants of a small bench and then makes himself at home. Every breath he drew in chafed against her spirit. And so, just as the kitchen was warming up to her, just when she was beginning to feel like home was home and she might not leave it again, he came into the room.
“Dad if you don’t mind I’m gonna take a shower.”
She grit her teeth. It was his accent, among the other things immediately offensive about him was his American Boy accent.
“Super Sid you also get recharged. Take a nap if you want then we can get some dinner.”
“Arey Hassan what’re you saying let’s unpack the whiskey buddy! If I sleep I’ll be dead for the next twenty four hours.”
“Sunaina why don’t you make dinner reservations for us.”
She swallowed her betrayal with the coffee and wondered who she could call for a recommendation. Sohrab smiling like nothing made him happier than to watch her squirm, leaned over to bump his shoulder against hers.
“Yes Sunaina,” he was distorting her name on purpose, “find us a good restaurant na beta.” She grit her teeth. “Please.”
She put on a smile and excused herself.
Chapter SIXTEEN
TO THE MOON AND BACK
(BADLUCKSOULMATE#9)
The air was trilling with tension since the Thursday of 15th when the email came in, not in the least because it disrupted their ritual screening of a Studio Ghibli film that Usui insisted was a part of the cultural zeitgeist and thus imperative for them all. Sentences were cut short and nerves drawn tight. The atmosphere at work was no less stressful that at home.
Vir stared at the sinew stretching across his neck as Usui straightened up, the final artwork now staring back at them in quiet anticipation. On his other side Lyra had her head on his shoulder completing the diorama. She squinted at the screen, he waited till her eyes softened before swinging his head in the finalizing nod though it wasn’t enough to validate the weeks’ worth of hard work on the part of the design team.
“We’re good to go then?” Usui asked gruffly.
“It’s stunning,” Lyra leaned over and hugged his waist. “But I think there is some tension here and we need to have an open dialogue.”
Both Vir and Usui rolled their eyes.
“Now don’t behave like children, I’m heating some miso soup and we’ll talk about it – we can do it here or we can go get hammered downstairs and then talk.”
“I fuckin’ hate miso soup,” Vir said but no one believed him so he continued sulking. Lyra made him swallow every last spoonful with a promise of cold soba noodles after.
With her camera wrapped firmly around her fist, she led them downstairs and pushed them right to the same hole in the wall bar at the tail end of the business district where university kids and businessmen drank side by side and the night always ended with a free round of sake for the worst karaoke singer. Usui had a standing record for selecting one song and singing another so even though he did the most unusual mashups they turned out well and nobody wanted to give them free sake no matter how much honey they spewed. As luck would have it, Usui ran into a gaijin group
who were on their way to a party.
“What party?” Vir balked. “We should get to the office early if you want to –”
“Oh fuck off, it’s an anything-goes party,” he threw back a sakëbomb and handed one to the both of them. “You’re leaving us anyway right?”
Vir fiddled with his ear gauge, trying to think of how to reply while also calculate how long it had been since his last drink. “So that’s the deal then, you think I’m abandoning you guys?”
Lyra pushed her way between them. “What’s an anything-goes party?”
The queen in Grace Jones drag brushing past them at the entrance was answer enough. Usui allowed himself to be carried into the thick of it, he had a way with charming out of towners into buying him drinks. Lyra held her bag close to her chest and Vir by her side; they pushed their way to the bar. One drink with a shot of alcohol and some anywater soda every hour alternating with a full glass of water and then a long drawn cigarette break every forty minutes – Vir’s sobriety plans were flawless. He never factored in the possibility of a party pill dropped in by the bespectacled bartender with his stiff collar like antennae he’d use to feel them up. The room was a mess of sweating strangers of every size and shape rendered into that same rhythm of yellow, then blue, then pink. With his sweat breaking through, in tandem with the first set of shirt buttons coming loose, Vir staggered away from his spot where Lyra had her shitbox camera pointed at the Grace Jones madame.
He awoke to the angry bark of the cabbie who cursed him and his gaijin trash for singlehandedly buttfucking the country. He scrubbed his bristly buzzcut with cool sweat-numbed fingers and with his weaving stagger managed to find his way back to the apartment. Usui was still sulking, he could feel it in the marrow of his bones, so with a quivering helpless lip he pulled out the futon and fell asleep before he could undress.
Back home waking up was one of the hardest things Vir had to do in his day. He would set alarms at fifteen minute intervals and keep hitting snooze till he couldn’t sleep anymore. All in all from the first ring it took him a full hour to roll out of bed. He was the boy who could sleep all morning and start his day with a beer and two hour workout, only otherwise leaving the house to go to a bar. Clubbing-shubbing, as the folks back home called it, was his thing. It was everybody’s thing those days; the party literally never stopped. No one stopped him from ordering another round of tequila, from driving his nose down another line of coke in the bathroom, or the hood of a car, or his girlfriend’s navel. No one stopped him from smoking too much, or driving too fast, no one told him NO – because Vir Pratap Singh had lost his father and was simply mourning in his own way and it wasn’t anybody’s business to judge, but then at Sameer and Vrinda’s wedding their best friend died of an overdose. It wasn’t the first wedding in Delhi where something like that had happened, it wouldn’t be the last, and no one said anything. It was Vir’s stash. He could’ve gone to jail, or so he was told, and from the moment he saw the body carried into the ambulance and the way they tossed the bag with the bag of skin and bones like it was nothing more than daily trash – nothing was ever the same.
Sweat dribbled off of him like rain so he made a mental note to wipe down the machine properly. High intensity interval training was supposed to be this miraculous makeover for his body but so far the late nights and skipped meals had largely nullified his efforts. Some mornings the sun was too strong, some days he just needed an extra hour of sleep.
He missed the freedom of running in a proper park, the kinds that had a stone path lined on both sides by Ashoka trees, fresh morning air filling his lungs. But from everything he’d read about the condition of the Delhi air, it didn’t seem like the safest option anymore. With a flush he recalled the mask Usui had bought for him.
There is a certain freedom that comes with shedding your older self, sadly it’s one of those very specifically indescribable things about life that exists in the no man’s land of feeling and the absence of it. It is the weight lifting off your chest that leaves you light headed, like the soul residing in your body has begun healing itself. Looking back at who he had been once was more than just a way for Vir to feel better about himself, it was the deep lungful of air while sprinting the last mile on the treadmill that faced the sprawling city below. As the sun rose higher Vir unfurled from the lotus position and went back downstairs to wake up the others and begin to make amends for having to go home.
Back at the apartment Usui was still sulking, Vir stared at the wide set of his shoulders as Lyra leaned over from behind and hugged him, her hair veiling them in platinum blond silk. She spotted him by the door and called him over, kissing him on the head when he curled up against them, ignoring the obvious discomfort it caused Usui. He filled his lungs with her smell, the thought of his flight home looming ominously closer. She muttered a reassurance in his ear and walked over to the kitchen to heat a pot of miso soup.
Usui grumbled something about how he hated miso soup, which she immediately dismissed and as the warmth wafted through the house everyone settled down.
“Don’t go.” They now sat facing each other both too tall to fit in the couch without their knees and legs brushing against each other.
“I have to” Vir tried not to sound too sad, “my sister’s getting married.”
He took a foot and began massaging in the hope that the touch of skin against skin would convey what words couldn’t.
“Then let’s move up the launch, we’ll talk to Miya and get it all sorted but you can’t not be here. Why don’t you get it?”
Vir stared back patiently. “Lyra a little help here?”
“You should stay back till we’re live Viro!” She called out. “How can you forget how long you’ve been at that stupid 3d printer?”
“I already rescheduled my flight twice to keep up with these changes and now I can’t afford any more delays. It’s my sister’s wedding.”
Lyra walked over. “So we have a soft launch, what’s the problem?”
She kissed the top of their heads and pulled them over to the glass dining table where the broth sat simmering in a fat porcelain pot.
It was a familiar feeling, being stared at. Some folks tried to be discreet while others looked at him like a raging flamingo on the loose. Vir stood at least six inches taller than everyone no matter where he was, only the mixed crowd of an airport brought him the comfort of anonymity. There his short crop of hair wasn’t odd, his ear gauges weren’t an eyesore, his uncomfortable smile wasn’t catered to – everyone had that too wide smile that usually accompanied the anxiety of having to encounter large crowds or the general flatulence bubbled out between connecting flights.
His lips still lingered with the sweet kiss of goodbye, he’d promised Lyra and Usui that he’d call as soon as he landed – but for now all he wanted was to wear their touch on him like a stamp of love, an impenetrable bubble of warmth that couldn’t be broken by the others. He walked past the raised eyebrows and the discreet exchange of looks – he was an immediate scandal dressed for comfort not street style – and took his seat at the rear end of the business class cabin.
Everyone Vir ever knew claimed a certain reaction to airports and flights, usually polar views depending on where they were and who they were with. Some absolutely loved airports, the thronging travelers each with a distinct personality coming together to create the sort of scene found in Renaissance paintings. Like a reality show playing out for your eyes only. Some people spoke of their utter disdain of waiting in queues, having to navigate stray bags, feet, sometimes the smell of sweaty backs. Worse still was sitting next to a child of any age younger than fifteen – which may have been the only acceptable age for a person to be seen outside and be tolerable. They mourned of sitting next to a fatty-pattie or someone who pushed their elbows off the armrest, worsened only by solo travelers who enjoyed striking up conversation like it was their god-given right.
Vir found that airports didn’t bother him and given a comfortable seat with enou
gh leg room, neither did the flight. Because he only felt the stares, an acknowledgment of his otherness more often than not blatantly tossed at him. It wasn’t always negative given the volume of American and European tourists that flew in and out of the city, he only sparked interest when the words flew out of his mouth with the practiced precision of a native. He was the undisputed brown-boy Jane Goodall though not always received as warmly – in fact he’d had to change his grocer-cum-launderer twice as a student.
As they pushed through the grey-brown haze the seatbelt sign dinged all across and he moved to fetch the mask from his backpack, only to have a stewardess rush him to his seat with a garble of Japanese and English. He opened his mouth to argue but the eyes directed his way pushed him down to his seat. The stewardess resumed her innocent face and walked back to the front galley. When she looked back at the cabin to draw the curtain she nearly fainted – Vir had a long arm snaking upwards to the overhead compartment. He picked up his bag and brought it to his lap barely breaking a sweat, he removed the mask and restored the backpack to the bin, locking it in place without even unbuckling his seat belt. He deliberately flashed the girl a smile and thumbs up as the aircraft began its descent into the sepia city.
The difference was immediate, and it had nothing to do with the blaring sunlight burning up the tarmac outside or the mix of odors that puffed up every time a shoe hit the carpeted floor inside. Once again he found himself thinking about the kind of people who claimed to be intrigued by airports – at the transient quality of them, the constant flow of people of all shapes and colours. As for him Vir wove his way between flatulent uncles and aunties in hoodies over silk suits, bickering over how many trolleys to take. He brushed past the instagrammers, the pajama travelers, the businessmen who’d wither as soon as they’d hit the hotel bed.
The baggage carousel was another shitshow altogether, a tableaux of people already edgy from the flight with elbows brushing against each other to somehow take their bags before anybody else, with the mustachioed dads standing wide legged to hog up all the space and with the ladies who wore sunglasses indoors. They were the worst, easiest to recognize with the belt that looked more like a runway for Nappa Dori’s latest, clutching their Louis Vuitton bags and brows risen so high they’d cut you down with a look. He felt their eyes follow him past the trunks and suitcases and the oddball rucksack pulled up by a smiling dreadlocked hippie who hadn’t bothered showering the India off of them.