A Fine Balance (68 page)

“Hahnji, but the great religious experts will tell you that it wouldn’t be enough to frighten away the evil spirits,” said Ishvar sarcastically.

“These Atom Bombs will scare the gods as well,” she said, retreating from the verandah. “In Lord Ram’s place, I would run straight back to the forest rather than face the explosions of these fanatics.”

With a plug of cotton wool in each ear she started to work on the quilt. Ishvar followed her in a few minutes, sitting with his hands over his ears, and she got cotton wool for him too. At the next boom he beamed, to say it was working.

Maneck and Om refused to relinquish the verandah, though they stuck fingers in their ears if a reveller began preparing a string of red cubes. “Too bad we’re watching,” said Om. “Or they’d be in bed – jumping, for sure.”

“Who?”

“Dinabai and my uncle, who else?”

“You have a dirty mind.”

“Yes, I do,” said Om. “Listen, a riddle for you: to make it stiff and stand up straight, she rubs it; to make it slick and slide it in, she licks it. What is she doing?” He was laughing before he had finished reciting the question, while Maneck hushed him with a finger to his lips.

“Come on, answer. What’s she doing?”

“Fucking, what else?”

“Wrong. Give up? She’s threading a needle,” said Om smugly, as Maneck clapped a hand to his forehead. “Now whose mind is dirty?”

There were six days of vacation left before college reopened, and Om had an idea for more fun. He knew that age and moisture had distorted the bathroom door and its frame, leaving a sizeable gap when shut. He said they could take turns peeking while Dina bathed. The other would keep watch, to make sure Ishvar didn’t catch them at it.

“Your story about the bathing ayah gave me the inspiration. So what do you think?”

“You’re mad,” said Maneck. “I’m not going to.”

“What are you scared of? She won’t know, yaar.”

“I just don’t want to.”

“Okay, then I will.” He got up.

“No, you won’t.” Maneck grabbed his arm.

“Aray go! Who are you to tell me?” He wrenched his arm away, whereupon Maneck gripped his shoulders and pushed him back in the chair. They grappled in earnest. Om lashed out with his feet but Maneck worked his way behind the chair and pinned him to it. Om gave up, unable to move.

“You’re a selfish bastard,” he said softly. “I know you. All those months you lived alone with her, you must have watched her naked every morning in the bathroom. Now you won’t let me have the same fan.”

“It’s not true,” said Maneck vehemently from behind the chair. “I never have.”

“You’re lying. At least admit it. Come on, describe her for me if you won’t let me look. What about her tits? Are the nipples nice and pointy? And the –”

“Stop it.”

“- and the brown circles around the nipples, how big are they?”

“Shut up, I’m warning you.”

“And the cunt? Is it big and juicy with lots of –”

Maneck moved in front of the chair and slapped him across the mouth. Shocked, Om clutched his face silently for a few seconds. The pain filled his eyes. “You lousy fucker!” He came to life then, and sprang at him, swinging his fists wildly.

The chair fell over. Maneck caught one blow on the head, the rest landing harmlessly on his arms. To subdue Om without hurting him, he grabbed his shirt and pulled him into a close embrace; now the fists had no room to travel. There was the sound of something tearing. The pocket came away in his hand, and a rent appeared below the shoulder.

“Bastard!” screamed Om, redoubling his efforts. “You tore my shirt!”

The commotion grew loud enough for Ishvar to hear over the sound of his machine, bringing him to the verandah. “Hoi-hoi! What is this goonda-giri?”

In his presence their desire to fight suddenly evaporated. It was easy for him to separate them. Now the violence was all in the looks. They glared at each other for a moment before turning away.

“He tore my shirt!” cried Om, staring down at the disembowelled pocket.

“Such things happen if you fight. But why were you behaving like that?”

“He tore my shirt,” anguished Om again.

Meanwhile, Dina had heard the shouting and cut short her bath. “I can’t believe it,” she said, when Ishvar told her. “I thought it was ruffians on the street. You two? Why?”

“Ask him,” they each muttered.

“He tore my shirt,” added Om, “look,” and flapped the torn pocket before her.

“Shirt, shirt, shirt! Is that all you can say?” scolded Ishvar. “Shirt can be repaired. Why were you fighting?”

“I’m not rich like him, I only have two shirts. And he tore one.”

Maneck rushed to his room, grabbed the first shirt in sight, and returned to fling it at Om. He caught it and threw it back. Maneck let it lie where it fell.

“You are acting like two little babas,” said Dina. “Come on, Ishvarbhai, let’s get to work.” She felt they would reconcile faster if left to themselves, without the burden of saving face.

Maneck stayed in his room all day, and Om sat on the verandah. Ishvar’s attempts to joke about the sour-lime face or hero number zero were stillborn. Dina felt sorry that the vacation was winding down on a bitter note.

“Look at them,” she said, “two mournful owls nesting in my house,” and she made an owlish face at the boys. Ishvar laughed alone.

Next morning, Om announced with the air of a martyr that he wanted to work full days again. “This holiday has lasted much too long for my taste.” Maneck pretended not to have heard.

The sewing started badly, and developed into a full-blown disaster. Dina had to warn Om: “The company will not tolerate this. You must keep your bad humour out of the stitches.”

As a badge of his martyrdom he continued to wear the torn shirt, pocket hanging loose, though it would have taken less than ten minutes to fix. At mealtimes, he pointedly avoided the knife and fork, which he had mastered by now, and used his fingers. In the absence of speech, a war of noises broke out. Maneck’s cutlery clattered against the plate, sawing a potato as if it were a deodar log. Om replied by slurping from his fingers, his tongue sucking and licking like a floor mop sloshing industriously. Maneck speared meat like a gladiator lunging at a lion. Om retaliated by involving his palm as well, suctioning food off it with little gurgles.

Their extravagant performances might have been amusing were it not for the palpable misery around the table. Dina felt cheated of the happy family atmosphere she had come to rely on. Instead, this wretched gloom sat uninvited at dinner, residing unwanted in her home.

For a fortnight after Divali, sporadic firecrackers kept puncturing holes in the night before dying out altogether. “Peace and quiet at last,” said Ishvar, throwing away the cotton-wool plugs he had saved carefully beside his bedding.

Maneck got his marks for the first-term exams, and they were not very good. Dina said it was due to his neglecting his studies. “From now on, I want to see you with your books for at least two hours. Every night, after dinner.”

“Even my mother is not so strict,” he grumbled.

“She would be if she saw these marks.”

Prodding him into the study routine turned out to be easier than she expected. His resistance was nominal, for there was little else to occupy him. Since the fight with Om, they barely spoke, though Ishvar kept trying valiantly to rekindle their friendship. He also supported Dina’s attempt to make Maneck work harder.

“Think how happy your parents will be,” he said.

“Never mind your parents – study for your own sake, you foolish boy,” she said. “You listen, too, Om. When you have children, make sure you send them to school and college. Look how I have to slave now because I was denied an education. Nothing is more important than learning.”

“Bilkool correct,” said Ishvar. “But why were you denied an education, Dinabai?”

“It’s a very long story.”

“Tell us,” said Ishvar, Maneck, and Om together. It made her smile, especially when the boys frowned to disown the coincidence.

She began. “I never like to look back at my life, my childhood, with regret or bitterness.”

Ishvar nodded.

“But sometimes, against my will, the thoughts about the past come into my head. Then I question why things turned out the way they have, clouding the bright future everyone predicted for me when I was in school, when my name was still Dina Shroff…”

S
ounds on the verandah announced the tailors’ preparation for sleep. The bedding was unrolled and shaken out. Soon, Om began massaging his uncle’s feet. Maneck could tell from the soft sighs of pleasure. Then Ishvar said, “Yes, that one, harder, the heel aches a lot,” and inside, bent over his textbook, Maneck envied their closeness.

He yawned and looked at his watch – everyone in neutral corners. He missed their company, the walks, the after-dinner gatherings in the front room with Dina Aunty working on the quilt while they watched, chatting, planning next day’s work, or what to cook for tomorrow’s dinner: the simple routines that gave a secure, meaningful shape to all their lives.

In the sewing room the light was still on. Dina was maintaining her vigil till Maneck closed his books, making sure he did not shave a few minutes off the end of his study shift.

The doorbell rang.

The tailors bolted upright on the bedding and reached for their shirts. Dina came to the verandah and demanded through the door, “Who’s there?”

“Sorry for the trouble, sister.”

She recognized the rent-collector’s voice. Absurd, she thought, for him to come at this hour. “What is it, so late?”

“Sorry to bother you sister, but the office has sent me.”

“Now? Couldn’t wait till morning?”

“They said it was urgent, sister. I do as I am told.”

She shrugged at the tailors and opened the door, holding on to the knob. The next moment, two men behind Ibrahim shoved the door aside, and her with it, charging in as though expecting to meet heavy opposition.

One of them was nearly bald and the other had a mop of black hair, but their straggly moustaches, cold eyes, and slouching, bulky torsos made menacing twins of them. They seemed to have fashioned their mannerisms on cinema villains, thought Maneck.

“Sorry, sister,” Ibrahim smiled his automatic smile. “Office has sent me to deliver final notice – orally. Please listen very carefully. You must vacate in forty-eight hours. For violating tenancy terms and regulations.”

Fear brushed Dinas face lightly, like a feather, before she blew it aside. “I’m calling the police right now if you don’t take your goondas and leave! The landlord has a problem? Tell him to go to court, I will see him there!”

The bald man spoke, soft and soothing. “Why insult us by saying goondas? We are the landlord’s employees. Like these tailors are your employees.”

The other one said, “We are acting in the place of courts and lawyers. They are a waste of time and money. These days we can produce faster results.” He had a mouthful of paan, and spoke with difficulty, dark-red trickles escaping the corners of his lips.

“Ishvarbhai, run to the corner!” said Dina. “Fetch the police!”

The bald man blocked the door. Trying to get past him, Ishvar was sent reeling to the other end of the verandah.

“Please, please! No fighting,” said Ibrahim, his white beard trembling with his words.

“If you don’t leave I’m going to start screaming for help,” said Dina.

“If you scream, we’ll make you stop,” said the bald partner in a reassuring tone. He continued to guard the front door while the paanchewing man sauntered into the back room. Ibrahim, Dina, and the tailors followed helplessly. Maneck watched from his room.

The man stood motionless, looking around as though admiring the place. Then he exploded. He picked up one of the stools and began battering the sewing-machines with it. When its wooden legs fell apart, he continued with the second stool till it, too, had shattered.

He tossed it aside, kicked over the Singers, and started to rip the finished frocks stacked on the table, pulling them apart at the seams. He was struggling now – new cloth and fresh stitches did not give easily. “Tear, maaderchod, tear!” he muttered, addressing the dresses.

Ishvar and Om, paralysed up to now, rediscovered movement and rushed to rescue the products of their labour. They were both flung back like bundles of cloth.

“Stop him!” said Dina to Ibrahim, grabbing his arm and pulling, pushing him towards the fray. “You brought these goondas! Do something!”

Ibrahim wrung his hands nervously and decided to gather the wrecked frocks. As fast as the paan-chewing man could scatter them, he picked them up, folded the torn pieces, and placed them carefully on the table.

“Need any help?” called the partner from the door.

“No, everything’s fine.” Finished with ripping the dresses, he started on the bolts of cloth, but this time the fabric, in its abundance, refused to tear.

“Set fire to it,” was the bald man’s advice, and he offered his cigarette lighter.

“No!” panicked Ibrahim. “Whole building might burn! Landlord won’t like that!”

The paan-chewing man conceded the point. Unfurling the cloth in a heap upon the floor, he sprayed it with the paan juice his mouth had worked up. “There,” he grinned at Ibrahim. “My red nectar is as fiery as flames.”

Pausing to survey the room, he spied the pinking shears that Ashraf Chacha had gifted to the tailors. He examined them. “Nice,” he said appreciatively, and lifted his hand to fling them out the window.

“No!” screamed Om.

The goonda laughed and released the tailors’ dearest possession. The crash of the shears landing on the pavement came through the window as Om rushed at him. The puny attack amused the man before he decided to end it, slapping Om twice, then punching him in the stomach.

“You bastard,” said Maneck. He grabbed the pagoda umbrella hanging from the cupboard and went after Om’s assailant.

“Please! No fighting!” begged Ibrahim. “There is no need for fighting!”

The man took a whack on his shoulder, noticed the steel shaft’s formidable point, and dodged around the fallen sewing-machines. Maneck feinted, relishing his superiority, while the man jerked backwards. He feinted again, and whacked him twice over the head.