Boys without Names
Read Boys without Names Online
Authors: Kashmira Sheth
Boys without Names
For my uncle and aunt,
Rohit and Susan Trivedi
“We stay, we starve,” my father says. Baba's tone isâ¦
When I return home everyone is waiting for me. Sitaâ¦
It is still dark when I wake up and lookâ¦
We have second-class tickets, the cheapest fare. Aai boards theâ¦
Slowly the platform begins to drain of people and Babaâ¦
“What happened, Gopal?” Baba asks.
It is hard to have a footpath as your homeâ¦
By the time I wake up in the morning ourâ¦
Two days ago five of us arrived from our village.
In the morning, I want to find out if Jamaâ¦
When I wake up, a man with a crescent scarâ¦
From where I sit, I can't see the street, butâ¦
The day starts with a quick trip to the bathroomâ¦
I have been here for a week and Scar hasâ¦
During the next few days I put all my energyâ¦
One night I have a brilliant idea. If somehow Iâ¦
Night Chatterer cries and whines in his sleep. Clearly, heâ¦
I lie awake thinking about Jama's street, the bridge, andâ¦
It is hard to believe three more weeks have goneâ¦
Because GC and I fought, again there are no moreâ¦
In the daylight I stare at the nimba trunk withâ¦
The monsoon seems to have tapered off with soft rain,â¦
Over the next few days, I give Sahil the pillsâ¦
As soon as Scar comes in the morning, he clapsâ¦
With each passing day the air turns lighter and theâ¦
The next morning, on Kali Chaudash, Scar arrives early. We're upâ¦
The day of Diwali comes and goes without Scar, policemen,â¦
The inspector takes my friends in his car and oneâ¦
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“W
e stay, we starve,” my father says. Baba's tone is as firm as my grip on my mother, Aai's, wrist.
“Baba, you want us to move to Mumbai?” I ask. I feel giddy with excitement and fright, as if I've climbed to the very top of a coconut tree.
“Yes, Gopal.”
Aai's forehead wrinkles, making lines in her large red
bindi
. “We can't leave our
desh
, the land of our forefathers,” she whispers.
I feel the opposite pulls of Aai's worry about moving and Baba's fear of staying.
I envy the twins, Sita and Naren, who are outside with their friends without a care in the world. They're just six years old and too young to understand everything. I'm eleven, and for the last three years Baba and
Aai have told me about our troubles.
Baba rolls his eyes. “In the village all we will have is this mud-wall and palm-frond-roof home. In the cityâ” His eyes rest on Aai's round face, and his expression softens. “We have lost our farm and we will never get it back. There's so much work available in the city and it pays well,” he pleads. “We won't go hungry there.”
Aai turns away from Baba and nervously wraps the end of her sari around one finger. “It will be so lonely without our family and friends.”
I've never seen Aai so scared. I put my arm around her. “Don't worry, we will all be together.”
She shakes her head.
“The city is filled with people.” Baba's impatience sharpens. “Surely we will become friends with some of them.” He takes a deep breath. “If it weren't for the moneylender, I'd go by myself to Mumbai, but I can't leave you behind. He will come after you.”
Baba turns around and looks out the window. Aai is silent.
Baba is right. If he left, the moneylender would harass Aai and might force me to work for him. Besides, Aai, Naren, Sita, and I would miss Baba so much. It is better for us to go together.
Unlike Aai, I don't think of Mumbai as a monster, and I am not afraid to go there. One of my friends, Mohan, visited the city last year. He says that the city is the home of film stars, cloud-reaching buildings, markets that are
bigger than our village, mirror-shiny cars, double-decker buses, and dozens of languages. It would be so exciting to see all the things that are in the store windows, to watch people, and to learn different tongues. He even taught me a couple of new words they use in the city. One is
khajoor
, which means stupid, and other is
bindaas
, which means carefree.
Like many other villagers, we have lost our land and can't grow crops. But there are no other jobs in the village as there are in the cities. And we're poor. As poor as the
pipul
tree is bare in the autumn. In the past few months, the hunger has settled permanently in our stomachs.
When we still had our land, we grew
bajra
and onions on it. I love
bajra
bread with freshly dug onions dipped in salt and pepper. When Aai made spinach and potatoes or spicy fish with rice, we had a feast. And there was always something growing around the woods, like the sweet
gorus-chinch
, mangoes, or guavas I picked.
Baba always worked hard and paid the bills on time, but it all changed in the year of good rain two monsoons ago, when everyone had a bumper crop of onions. The price of onions tumbled, and Baba couldn't pay back the money he had borrowed to buy seeds and fertilizer. Last year, besides working on the farm, Baba worked at a quarry splitting stones, and Aai carried luggage for tourists at the nearby hill station of Matheran. But after we paid the interest on our debt, there was barely enough left to keep five bellies from growling.
Then Naren came down with a cold. Aai had to stay home to look after him. For a week she gave him warm milk with turmeric and tea with ginger, but his cold turned into a nasty cough and high fever, and we had to take him to a doctor. The doctor's visit and the medicine were expensive. The pills were each a quarter of the size of a
gorus-chinch
seed, but they cost Baba almost one month's income. We had to borrow more money. At the end of last year, Baba sold the farm to pay the lender.
We all cried the day we sold our farmâeven Baba did. He didn't speak a word for a week. And yet, selling the land has done no good because the debt keeps multiplying. And now there is no farm to feed us. The debt is like hunger in our bellies. The interest we pay is like the food we eatâjust enough to get by. The debt and hunger never leave.
Baba moves away from the window and breaks the silence. He stands in front of Aai. “I will find work as soon as we get there. You can do the same. Think of our children. Do you want them to rot here?”
“But our village, ourâ”
He cuts her off. “With or without us, the village will still be here.”
“We will visit,” I say.
Aai twists the end of her sari around her finger tightly. “It might take a long time.”
Baba rolls his eyes and points to the ground. “Why do
you want to come back, anyway? There is nothing here but lumpy soil and clumpy roots! Even when the harvest is good, it harms us. Mumbai is the place for us. They call it
maha nagari
, grand city, for a reason.”
Does Baba never want to return to the village? I ball up my hands in fists at his words to hide my sadness and anger.
“Don't forget, it is called
mayavati nagari
, make-believe city, too,” Aai says.
Baba paces back and forth in our small mud-walled home. In one corner is our kitchen with the wood-burning clay stove, pots, and dishes. In another corner, we keep our sets of clothes folded neatly in a stack on top of a cardboard box. We sleep in the far corner, where our blankets are piled.
I see Baba's hands, clasped together behind his back. They are raw, red, and scabby. His hands were rough but healthy when he only worked on the farm. But the hard work of splitting stones in the quarry has given him a hunched back and worn-out fingers.
He puts a blistered palm on my shoulder. “Sit down.”
I let go of Aai's hand and sit on a mat on the floor. She sits next to me.
Baba kneels down. “Listen, both of you.”
The mat is unraveling at the edges and I pick a thread and tug it. It frays a bit more.
Baba holds Aai's gaze. “As long as we stay here, there's no way we can pay our debt. I want to get out of here.”
“Without paying?” Aai's voice is shrill.
“We've been paying off our debt for almost two years, and yet we owe more than ever. When I saw the moneylender last time he said, âBring your son with you. He can work and help you pay off the debt.' Do you know what that means? He will have Gopal by the throat for who knows how long. Gopal is smart, and we must send him to school so he has a future. I don't want my son's lungs filled with dust and his life to be wasted like that. I won't allow it.”
Now I know why Baba's breathing is so labored at night, heavy and gasping.
“Baba, but howâ”
“It is shameful and wrong to go without paying the money we have borrowed, but we have paid the moneylender many times over. If we stay here he will own us. I see no other way out.” Baba stares at the floor.
A tear rolls down Aai's cheek.
Baba wipes it away with a fingertip.
Aai reaches to me and before I know it, I am enveloped in the folds of her sari. It has gone through many washes and is soft and smells of Aai. She extends her other hand to Baba. “If there is no other way then we will go. But I will miss⦔ A sob soaks the rest of her sentence. Baba and I hold her tight.
“When do we leave, Baba?” I ask.
“Tomorrow, before the sunrise, quickly and quietly. And don't tell a soul.”
Aai's eyes are wide. “So soon? We don't have money to buy the tickets for Mumbai.”
“We do.”
Aai and I look at each other. We know who gave Baba the money.
Only a few weeks ago, Jama, Aai's brother, showed up wearing new clothes, shiny leather sandals, and a wristwatch. He brought a blue marble with white and navy swirls for Naren and a red plastic hair clip for Sita. Then Jama slipped his hands in his cotton bag and pulled out a notebook and a slim pencil for me. On the cover of the notebook in gold letters S
HREE
T
OOLS
, I
NC
. was printed. “That is where I work,” Jama said.
That evening he tried to convince Aai and Baba to move, saying, “I work hard in Mumbai, but I don't have to toil until my bones ache. Besides, the children will get a much better education there. You can stay with me.”
Baba wanted to go, but Aai refused. Later Baba and Jama must have talked alone and made plans.
“Did Jama give you the fare money?” I ask Baba to make sure.
“Yes.”
“How will we find his home?”
Baba takes out a piece of paper from his pocket and hands it to me. “Gopal, this is Jama's address. He told me if we get off at Dadar it is a short walk from there. Any of the shopkeepers will help us.”
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Aai starts to make
roti
for our trip while Baba goes to the market for jute sacks. I sit cross-legged in front of Aai to tell her I feel as sad as she about leaving my friends and our village. I want to promise her I will study, work hard, and bring her back for a visit, but before I open my mouth, Sita and Naren saunter in.
“What are you making, Aai?” Naren asks.
Sita rolls her eyes. She has picked that up from Baba. “Can't you tell it is
roti
?” When she comes closer her eyes widen with surprise. “So many!”
My chance to talk to Aai is ruined, because I don't want the twins to find out we are leaving. They will run out and tell their friends. I get up to leave.
“Mi jato,”
I tell Aai as I grab the notebook Jama gave me.
“Sambhalun ja!”
Aai tells me to be careful, which means she knows I'm going to my favorite spot.
“Ho,”
I reply.
“Where are you going? Can we come?” Naren shouts. But I am out the door and don't look back.
Without thinking, I start walking toward the homes of my friends, Mohan and Shiva. I do want to talk to them one last time before we leave, but Baba said not to tell a soul about our move. Can I do that? Once I speak to Mohan and Shiva, they will know from my voice that I am hiding something. If they ask me questions, I won't be able to keep our secret. It is better to avoid them.
I turn around and walk in the opposite direction to the edge of the pond. I stop by the
gorus-chinch
tree.
There are some fruits left, so I pick a handful of pods and settle on the limb of a nearby
nimba
tree that arches over the pond.
The light shines through the leaves onto my notebook. The shadowy sunshine is cool and I have a view of the world through curtains of lacy leaves, but the world can't see me.
Aai thinks it is dangerous to sit on a branch above the water, but I can't stay away from it. Sitting here, I used to dream of being a king, a pirate, a pilot, a cricket player, and even a magician. Every year when branches were crowded with small, white, fragrant flowers, I would pretend to be the Mogul king Akbar sitting in my garden that extended all the way beyond the pond and into the woods. I haven't dreamed like that in a long, long time. Now I come here to think about how to get rid of our troubles, to get away from Naren and Sita, to write in my notebook about my plans, and to watch the birds, trees, and pond.
Today, swollen green beads of
nimba
fruits have replaced the flowers; in a couple of months they will be bigger and ripe.
I open my notebook on my lap and flip pages. On one page I have written,
What can I be today? An innocent man who is ordered never to return to his land and sneaks back in disguised as a magician?
Underneath is a picture of a bearded magician, dressed in flowing robe. Even though it is a pencil drawing I know the beard is silver and the robe is red.
I turn the page. There's a story about a boy who loves stories and opens up a bookstore so he can read all the books he wants to. The store is small but the line of customers extends all the way out into the street.
Suddenly, a flock of parrots fly above the pond, making a ruckus.
I realize I have not written a single story about my village, friends, and neighborsâabout my lifeâso I hold my pencil between my thumb and middle finger and find a blank page. Furiously, I write. I describe not only the trees, pond, and birds, but also the clumpy soil, the fluffy clouds moseying along, and the meandering path into the woods. I draw Mohan with his crooked smile and Shiva throwing a stone, because his stones always traveled farther than mine.
On another page I write how one day walking home from school, I fell and skinned my knee. I was six years old and started to cry. Mohan stayed with me and Shiva ran ahead to tell Aai. She came rushing and carried me home. I scribble about Mohan's and Shiva's families, our school, and my teacher, Mr. Advale, who thinks I am smart, and about the horses and the tourists I have met in the summer. I write about all the fun Mohan, Shiva, and I had even though we worked all day carrying luggage for the tourists. As we climbed the Matheran Hill the sun floated up from a misty horizon like a red balloon. Sometimes we rode horses, and we always chased monkeys. When we watched a swift flutter its wings, take off from
a hill, and soar above us, it made us happy.
I hope next summer maybe Aai, the twins, and I can come back to the village. Then, like the last two years, Mohan, Shiva, and I can work in Matheran together. I know that unless we pay off our debt we can't return. Once more, sadness washes over me.
When I look up I realize more time has gone by than I thought, and I have a kink in my neck.
There is so much more to write and there is no way I can put it all down. Frantically, I write some more.
I won't be here to eat the fleshy yellow fruit of the
nimba.
Will they have
gorus-chinch
in Mumbai? I will miss these trees, leaves, pond, sounds, soil.
Tears trickle down my cheeks.