by Anju Gattani
“Yes. Yes. Big people with big responsibilities are always busy.”
“I’ve come to request permission to take Yash off campus for the week and then home for the Diwali holidays.”
“Yes. Yes. Of course. We have six more days of school and curfew is still 6:30 p.m.,” he sang the words with apparent pleasure.
“I know, that’s why I’d like to spend afternoons with my son off campus.” Surely Dr. Chaturvedi would allow a half hour leeway. “I’ll have him back by seven.”
“Yes. Yes. Of course, that’s what you’d like to do. But you know rules are not made to be broken, Mrs. Dhanraj. Curfew is six-thirty.”
Sheetal glanced at her watch and crossed her arms. “I’ll need to sign some papers then? We have five minutes until the bell rings.”
He put one hand over his mouth, turned away, and coughed. He paused to breathe, but phlegm rattled in his throat, and he coughed again.
“Are you all right?”
“Yes. Yes. I’m fine.” He uncovered the glass of water, took a sip, and then handed her six forms, one for each day, requesting permission to take a student off campus.
Sheetal skimmed the fine print and signed each one, uncomfortable with the silence impregnated by Dr. Chaturvedi’s heavy breathing. “How are things at school? Have you had a chance to meet Yash?” Sheetal didn’t expect Dr. Chaturvedi to personally know Yash; after all, the man ran a school with over eight hundred students, but polite conversation always helped break the ice.
“Yash? Yes. Yes. A good student. An all-round, well-mannered, attentive boy interested in learning. A very confident boy. No complaints. Second standard, yes?”
“No. He’s in the fourth,” Sheetal replied.
“My mistake. I forget, sometimes.” He coughed. “However, I can make an exception for you. I will grant you an extra half hour with Yash in return for a small donation.” His attention diverted to the bangles on Sheetal’s wrist, and Sheetal slid her hand back down to her lap. “A series of paintings, perhaps?”
Newspapers and magazines occasionally featured Sheetal’s works, so she wasn’t surprised that Dr. Chaturvedi had heard of her accomplishments.
“Or one for my office or the library, perhaps? Your work is so renowned. What a privilege for our school....”
The series of orchids lying stacked in a corner of the studio would brighten this room ten times. However, Yash was not a commodity to barter. “Six-thirty is fine.” Sheetal smiled. “You know that rules are not made to be broken.” She handed back all six sheets and left.
She left the building that housed the school library and Dr. Chaturvedi’s office, slipped on leather gloves, and paused on the walkway to admire the view of Stonewall’s campus.
The partially shoved drive that looped through the campus created a salt-and-pepper ribbon through the expanse of trampled white grounds. The glistening snow had transformed classrooms, auditorium, dormitories, and gym into a mythical utopia. Beyond the main buildings, pristine snow hid the track and encircled the equestrian center. The fifteen feet tall stone fence that encircled the campus muted traffic noises, strengthening the impression of a detached haven. The wrought iron fence that encircled the dormitories looked like black lace adorning white satin.
Beyond the stone fence, gray tendrils of smoke rose from the chimneys of homes nestled along contours of mountainside.
Somewhere across campus, a school bell clanged.
Sheetal’s attention snapped to the trampled snow that angled toward the auditorium’s portico. She took a step toward the auditorium before she halted. If she left their agreed upon meeting location, she risked missing him as he left class. Surely, he’d remember her instructions and look for her at the library. Her shiver and pounding heart came from anticipation rather than cold. She’d have him to herself for six days.
Finally, doors began opening and children emerged, the boys in identical gray trousers, bundled against the cold. In clusters of twos and threes, they sauntered down the stairs that fronted the portico. Most headed toward dormitories. One boy separated from the group and headed in her direction.
Yash? Sheetal started forward, her heartbeat quickening with each step. Was that him? No. Can’t be. The boy seemed much taller and appeared too broad at the shoulders. She squinted but couldn’t make out the details of his features at this distance. She lengthened her strides, mentally comparing the boy’s features to the last memory snapshot of Yash from six months ago when she’d helped him move in and then said goodbye outside the cottage. Accustomed to filling Yash’s absence with her imagination, every trip to Mansali turned into a guessing game of how tall Yash might have grown. How much had he matured? How much more did he look like Rakesh and less like her? Then they’d meet, and Sheetal adjusted to a new version of Yash, knowing he would have changed the next time she saw him.
The boy, now several feet away, was about five feet six, walked with a confident bounce, and carried a thick Oxford Dictionary in his gloved hands. “Good morning, Ma’am.” He smiled and walked past.
“Good morning!” What a fine young man. Would Yash grow up to be a confident teenager like him?
“Mum!”
Yash? Her heart leapt. Couldn’t be. Yash called her Mama.
“Mum!”
A boy waved from the bottom of the steps and ran in her direction. She ran toward him, desperate to run her fingers over the curve of his cheeks and chin, and stroke his hair.
He smiled from ear to ear and pounded one foot ahead of the other. “Mum!”
Sheetal stopped, knelt, and stretched her arms wide. Yash filled her embrace. His impact caused her to lose balance and she landed on her back with Yash on top. His curly black hair tickled her ear and laughter bubbled up her throat.
She ran a palm over his head and the black locks sprang back. Yash. Her son. In her arms again. She tightened her embrace and reigned kisses on his face as snow drifted down. Yash squirmed and wriggled to break free, but she held on with fierce determination. Yash was her reason for living and breathing.
“Agh! I can’t breathe!” He laughed.
She let go, rolled aside, sat up, cupped his cheeks in her palms, and ran her thumbs below the lower cradle of his eyes. Yash was and always would be the one true perfection in life. No painting would ever come close.
She tousled his hair. “You’ve grown, Yash. You look so...beautiful. Totally beautiful.”
“Beautiful!” He crossed his arms, pouted, and his rosy cheeks puffed. “Yuck! It’s a girly word.”
“Well, what do I use then?”
“Handsome,” he stretched the first syllable.
“How about toothless? For two molars. One on the right and another on the left.” She gestured for him to open his mouth, pinpointed the exact location of two missing teeth, and her heart sank. She’d missed another part of his growing up. “I missed you.”
“I missed you, too. Where’s Dad?” He looked over her shoulder.
Dad? Didn’t Yash call Rakesh, Daddy? “He couldn’t come because of work.”
“Always work, Mum! Why does he always have work? Can’t he take a holiday?”
“He wanted to, Beta, but there were so many important meetings.” The bank loan was due in six months.
“More important than me?”
“Nothing can ever be more important than you. I promise, he’ll come next time and you can spend as much time as you want with him.”
“I don’t want to come next time, Mum. I want to stay at home with you and Dad. Can I?”
The dreaded question. She looked into Yash’s eyes and her heart ached. “We’ll see.”
“You always say that.”
“I know, Yash.”
“You say ‘we’ll see’ every time.”
Sheetal took his gloved fingers in her hand and pulled him close.
“I don’t like living here alone.”
“You said you had so many good friends.”
“I do. But it’s not the same without yo
u or Dad. I really miss you.”
Yash loved Rakesh and Rakesh would give up the world for his son, but with Naina and Mummyji living at home, she simply couldn’t make false promises even though she desperately yearned for them to be a normal family.
“So, what’s with all this ‘Mum’ and ‘Dad’ business?”
“It’s what all the big boys say when they talk.”
Sheetal smiled, relieved she’d diverted the conversation. “So, you’re a big boy now?”
“That’s what Chopra Sir says.”
“Ah, your new House Master, right?”
Only male members of the teaching faculty were assigned charge of a residential cottage that accommodated up to sixteen boys. House Masters acted as guardians for the students under their care. Other faculty members led extracurricular activities after school hours. However, shortly after the first term began, the House Master assigned to Yash’s cottage had a family emergency and a substitute replaced him.
“So, how’s this new House Master?”
“Oh, Chopra Sir. He’s a little strict and teaches me science.”
“I bet you’re one of his favorites.”
“He doesn’t have favorites. There are so many in the class, he says he has to be fair to everyone, but you know what? He watched me audition and said I did great.”
“What audition?”
“Announcer. Compère for the spring concert.”
“Oh, yes. I remember.” Sheetal and Rakesh telephoned every weekend and she remembered Yash mentioning something about auditioning for a school concert, but they hadn’t talked about it since.
Stonewall’s annual spring concert in April, two weeks prior to final exams, gave parents an opportunity to watch the school’s theatrical production, which required months of preparation and showcased the best talent. Competition to secure a leading role was fierce because boys from families with strong business and political backgrounds competed with children of Bollywood celebrities who were naturally gifted.
“How many others auditioned?”
“Seventy-five. And guess what?”
“What?”
“I was chosen!”
“You what?”
“I was selected as compère for the concert.”
“Oh, Yash!” Sheetal’s heart soared with pride. She hugged him again. The achievement, an honor in itself, proved Yash’s talent and confidence and validated her rationale to have enrolled him at Stonewall. He never would have thrived at the Dhanraj’s. “I’m so proud of you and so happy!” She rained his face with kisses. “Why didn’t you tell me on the phone?”
“Because”—he giggled through the shower of kisses—“I wanted to surprise you and Dad.” He turned his head left and then right. “Stop, Mum! They’ll tease me.”
“Who?”
“My friends.” He wormed from her grip and jumped to his feet. “Snow fight, Mum.”
“Next time,” she said. “Let’s go somewhere we can talk. We have so much to catch up on, and I can take you anywhere you want.”
“Home?”
Sheetal rose and dusted snow off her jacket and jeans. “Not so soon. You still have another week of—” Something smacked her in the face and she numbed. She raised a hand to her nose and brushed snow to the ground.
“Sorry.” Yash took a step back.
Sheetal bent, grabbed a handful of snow, and threw it.
Snow struck his jacket pocket and crumbled. “You got me!” He squatted, scooped another ball, and threw it at her.
Sheetal retaliated and received another blow in return.
Yash ran.
“Come back here.” She chased Yash, zigzagging across the yard, hitting, missing, and tumbling to the ground. Oh, how she wanted to freeze the moment and remain giddy in a world that spun only with Yash’s laughter.
Chapter Twelve
Frozen
Sheetal left the Holiday Inn and descended a concrete slope as a chilly breeze rippled the knee-length hem of her blue kurta. She kicked pebbles in her path, sending them reeling down to nestle among pockets of melting snow and chips of broken asphalt. A cold breeze rustled the few leaves that still clung to overhanging branches, and the sun hid behind a thick gray padding of clouds. She tightened her jacket’s hood.
A light blue Fiat approached. The taxi driver rolled down his window as he slowed and stopped. “Where would you like to go, Madame? I can drop you.”
She wanted to walk. She treasured the freedom of anonymity and didn’t want to be boxed inside four walls again so soon. “You carry on, and I’ll figure out my destination,” she replied in Hindi.
“I can drop you off at Mall Road,” he said.
Sheetal shook her head. Mall Road was an easy downhill walk from the Holiday Inn and cut through the quaint town of Mansali. Shops, hotels, open-air food stalls, street vendors, and family-owned restaurants lined both sides of Mall Road while bungalows and private schools dotted the hillside.
“Where are you going, Madame, in such cold weather?”
“I’ll figure out.” Sheetal tightened her grip on the strap of the handbag that hung off one shoulder. To her relief, he drove off.
As she walked, the town of Lower Mansali peeked from a dip in the valley, a patchwork of green, yellow and brown squares, with ponds the size of her fingernail glistening like mirror work stitched onto a lush carpet. The breeze picked up and the temperature plunged. Sheetal rammed her fists into the side pockets of her jacket as tendrils of hair flew about her face. Then the clouds scudded and the sun burst forth and Lower Mansali sparkled on a living and breathing canvas.
What beauty! What brilliance! Sheetal halted and absorbed the warmth that spread across the land, then she angled toward a cliff bordered by metal railings.
This vacation would have done Rakesh so much good. Or maybe not, considering his lack of patience when it came to appreciating natural beauty. She imagined him standing next to her lighting a cigar and complaining about the wind chill. He would have had the taxi driver follow close on their heels, and have checked his cell phone for email updates at least five times by now. He would have lost cell phone connection a few times, cursed the town, cursed the mountains, and when done, he’d have jumped into the vehicle and ordered the driver to take him to a five-star hotel for a drink.
She tensed, and deliberately released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Maybe Rakesh’s absence would do her good. Her shoulders sagged with relief, and she reveled in the pure joy of being able to forego the pressures of everyone’s expectations and escape the gravity of a million responsibilities. Oh, to soar with the freedom of a bird every day. What must it be like to live a life in the mountains? What if she could make this life permanent?
After marriage, a woman's status transferred from her father's responsibility to the husband's, and she was the husband's property even if the husband proved to be unfaithful to their relationship. A woman could not expect a second chance at marriage to a bachelor because after the first marriage, she was considered damaged goods and would likely be considered for the role only by a widower who needed a mother substitute for his children.
Sheetal bit her lower. She couldn’t be selfish and desire what clearly fell out of reach. She shouldn’t desire, let alone seek, an escape from Rakesh.
***
As Sheetal strolled along Mall Road through Upper Mansali, restaurant owners called to passersby to come in for a meal or some hot masala chai. The fragrances of spicy dals, bubbling tomato gravies, steamed Basmati rice, deep fried fritters, oven-baked naans, and white-flour flatbreads peppered the air before the restaurants gave way to an open-air market. The market’s stalls were separated by colorful bedsheets tethered to wooden poles and manned by animated vendors. The makeshift stores sold colored glassware, crocheted table mats, runners, potholders, refrigerator magnets, and other trinkets.
“Arrey, gori gori Memsahib!” a waving vendor addressed Sheetal as beautiful Madam. “Three for twenty. Buy as many
as you like for yourself and your friends.”
Sheetal picked up a multi-colored glass trinket box and held it against the sun. Light streamed through and refracted off the tiny green, orange, and pink triangular shapes that formed its design. She marveled at the glowing colors, thumbed open the lid, and pools of green, orange, and pink flooded the four-by-four-inch cavity.
“Buy it, Memsahib.” An elderly lady in a faded salwar suit and stringy-knit jumper smiled to reveal four missing teeth. “I give you special. Only seventy-five rupees.”
Sheetal closed the lid and returned the box to the wooden shelf. “I was only looking.”
“What’s there to look when you can buy?”
“Arrey, Memsahib,” called a neighboring vendor in a multi-colored sari and black shawl, “come take a look at my collection.”
The Dhanrajs gave gifts of gold and silver to friends and family members, not trinket boxes purchased from open stalls run by a toothless old woman out in the middle of nowhere. Even if she bought the box for herself, it would appear out of place on her dressing table filled with crystal bottles of imported perfumes. Maybe she could position the box so it hid from Rakesh’s view but caught light from her bedside lamp. She could get rid of the magazines and—
“Khareed lo, Memsahib!” The old lady beckoned her to buy the trinket box.
“Thank you, but maybe next time.” Sheetal walked on and ignored the lady’s request to name a price.
A gust of icy wind slithered down the collar of her jacket and tossed a lock of hair that brushed a corner of her lip. Sheetal tugged the wisp behind the curve of her ear, but the strands leapt free. Her legs ached from the three-hour walk and she longed to sit down. She lifted the sleeve of her jacket to look at her watch. Two-thirty. She had another hour and a half until Yash’s classes ended.
The door to a nearby restaurant swung open and a man wearing a turban exited, a heavy, rolled carpet balanced on his shoulder. Sheetal caught a glimpse of his face and thought she recognized him. Then the carpet slipped and he caught it diagonally across his chest. The taxi driver! Sheetal turned away to avoid him and his chatter.