The Two Krishnas (46 page)

It was only when she heard Ajay’s Mustang pull into the driveway as he came home from hanging out with his friends or from researching colleges at the library that she bothered to pick herself up and make lighthearted banter to belie her incompleteness without Rahul. Even then, seeing the topography of Ajay’s face so resembling his father’s, she felt a stab of pain and she wanted nothing more than to be confined up in their room where she could mourn, beg, or remain inert.

At times, when she lay paralyzed in her bed, she felt no different from when she had hidden in the dank bathroom all those years ago, too scared to face the world outside, a world without him. Except this time, Salim the driver wasn’t there to find her and pull her out like a whimpering child to see the horrors of a mass crematorium, a house burned to its very skeleton.

She did notice, however, a change in her son. Almost overnight, Ajay seemed to have grown up, turned more somber. He began spending more time around her, growing watchful, his eyes lingering upon her strained efforts to seem unfazed in her abandonment, and suddenly she wanted nothing more than for him to stay away as much as possible so that she could stop pretending. She could almost hear his mind, his emotions working up into a lethality that began with seeing his mother’s pain and then, through it, reaching his own.

* * *

Ajay found that the homes of his American friends were always brimming with life. There was the uninhibited, boisterous conversation about politics, movies, ideologies, life. Sometimes he also became privy to the eruption of an untimely disagreement between Nicky and his divorcee mother Ro, who had a bottle of shelf gin attached to her like a limb, so that Ajay had to excuse himself from the scene while Ro called her son a “good-for-nothing fuck” like his father and Nicky called his mother a drunken whore. Ajay was thankful that at least such things never happened in his home, but then again nothing else ever did either.

Apart from the confrontation Ajay had with his father late one night in the kitchen, most of the time the Kapoor household felt like an abandoned set, one upon which the drama had already unfolded but which had yet to be dismantled. The players, out of respect for a performance they had once banded together for, continued cordiality while moving on with their new lives—his father claiming to work obsessively at the bank and his mother left to confide in gods and cook curries. Whenever he did find his parents in the same room, there was always a marked composure. It was as if they were trying to keep their balance on the delicate bridge of glass between them, one that could easily be shattered with even the hint of a passionate outburst.

Now he felt he knew the real reason for this pretense. They had been deceived all along, forsaken long before his father had found the courage to move out and make it official. Remembering the time when he had confronted his father and been lied to knifed Ajay with the pain of betrayal. Witnessing his mother slip away into the depths of depression, no matter how hard she tried to appear unfazed, clutched him with a combustible rage, one that he tempered with the occasional hit of crystal Nicky provided for free.

It didn’t matter what his mother said anymore, about how people drifted apart; all that was just bullshit. It was clear as the dark crescents around her eyes and the whimpering that wafted from behind the closed door of her room through the night that this “drifting apart” was not of her choosing. She was just trying to protect him from the truth—the well-intentioned yet dishonest act that parents became complicit in.

* * *

When Pooja opened the door to a nervous Sonali one morning, she was filled with a sense of relief she never thought she’d experience with the bearer of such bad news.

She smiled weakly, too drained to carry any grudges. Even the way she had responded to the door, without any urgency—because the person she really wanted was not going to show up anyway, so what was the point?—was indicative of Pooja’s resignation.

“I’m only here delivering this package the UPS left at my place,” Sonali said quickly, defensively, one hand holding out a box and her body half turned away from Pooja in case of a brush-off. But it was obvious to Pooja that Sonali had dolled herself up in this buoyant yellow blouse, crisply pressed white pants and immaculate make-up and hair just to run this little errand in the middle of the day. In contrast, Pooja appeared downright bedraggled.

When she gently took the parcel from Sonali’s hand and stepped aside to let her in, Sonali had a proper moment to take in Pooja’s appearance. The look that washed upon Sonali’s face was an undisguised combination of sympathy and concern, the likes of which Pooja had never seen.

“Please, come in, Sonali,” she said, opening the door wider. Sonali hesitated only momentarily, shifting from one foot to another like an apprehensive child before stepping in. Whatever Sonali Patel’s faults, she was not to blame for Rahul’s unfaithfulness, thought Pooja. Bringing this information to her had required courage far greater than the perverse joy Sonali normally distilled from other peoples’ troubles.

Sonali settled gingerly onto the sofa while Pooja placed the package on the coffee table and went toward the kitchen. “I’ll just get us some chai. It’ll take a minute only. Or do you want some lassi? You prefer lassi, don’t you?”

“No, no, really, don’t worry,” Sonali said quickly. “Just some soda will do.”

Not used to Sonali being so amenable, Pooja paused suspiciously in the kitchen doorway. “You sure? It’s not a problem at all, really.”

“Oh, too hot for chai anyway,” Sonali said, tossing her head back and fanning her neck theatrically with her hand. “Some cold-cold soda will do. Oh, but diet please! You know I have to watch my weight.”

Pooja returned with two glasses of cola with rocks of ice, and placed them on the coffee table without bothering about the coasters. Almost immediately a thick pool of sweat formed at the base of the glasses, threatening to destroy the teak’s luster.

“Ai!
What, there’s no coasters or anything?” cried Sonali. “Put something quickly under the glasses,
na?
You’ll ruin the beautiful table!”

But Pooja sat back in the armchair next to Sonali and smiled indifferently, as if this was her very intent, little acts of vengeance against the home that she had built with Rahul and in which he was no longer interested. This seemed to make Sonali even more cautious and she looked at the ordinarily sensible Pooja carefully, wondering what was coming next.

“Your package,” Sonali said, nodding her head at the table. Pooja just shrugged without any concern. Taking a sip of the soda, Sonali looked dreamily into space and broke the awkwardness with, “You know what I miss about Bombay? Vadapav and Masala Coke! My God, sounds so ridiculous when you think about it, doesn’t it?” she said, letting out a high-pitched laugh and putting an immaculately painted hand over her mouth. “God, what an assault it is on poor Coca-Cola! I swear when the soda starts frothing up, it’s because it feels assaulted! I tell you, Indians just can’t stay away from their
masalas.”

Pooja gave a short laugh, appreciating Sonali’s attempts at lightening the situation. How it humanized her, she thought. Who would have thought the Sonali who boasted of her lust for beluga caviar, actually had secret and nostalgic cravings for the humble roadside food eaten mostly by slum dwellers? In the sudden lightening of that moment, she thought ruefully of just how much she missed the companionship of an adult, a familiar face with whom she wouldn’t have to pretend sanity. In what had clearly been an exile no different than what Sita had endured with Rama, she could see that what she has missed most about being back home, in Kenya, was the company of her friends, lounging in the patio under the ylang-ylang tree, laughing, gossiping, talking about inconsequential things, dreaming, trying out clothes and jewelry, indulging in double entendres and lewd remarks. Despite everything, she was grateful that Sonali had done so much to recruit her as a friend, because America had deprived her of the friendship and warmth that emanated from people of the same country.

Pooja said with a melancholy smile, “I miss roasted maize…with chili and lime, and
mogo
crisps served in those large newspaper cones. We used to eat that every Sunday at the Lighthouse.” Almost instantly she remembered resting her head on Rahul’s shoulders as they contemplated their future together while standing at the edge of the Indian Ocean. Her smile faded as if making way for the moisture in her eyes.

Sonali sighed powerlessly.

“I am so sorry for behaving the way I did, Sonali. It isn’t your fault that this happened. It’s just that I didn’t know how…I still don’t how to…”

“Oh, Pooja! I know what you must be going through,” she said, pressing her hand against her heart. “I so wish I hadn’t even been there, that horrible day. But maybe it was meant to happen, you know, so that you would discover the truth.”

Pooja started crying.

“Pooja, be strong.”

“It’s just so…” She could not bring herself to speak.

Sonali made a sound, half impatience and half sympathy. “Pooja, my darling, we women, we can’t just give up. We cannot let these men destroy our spirit. We live for more than ourselves, do we not? You have Ajay to think about, that poor boy.” She unclasped her purse and fished out a pack of tissues and handed one to Pooja. “Wipe your tears, darling. Oh, they really don’t do any good. Trust me, I know. I know.”

And although she should have appreciated the sympathy, Pooja looked at her and felt the uncharacteristic urge to scream and shout and hit her. What was Sonali living for, her chimes? How could she have any idea of such suffering? After all, even her husband Sanjay had been a model husband and doted on Sonali until the day he died. “I don’t know what else to do,” she said, the tissue like a crushed gardenia in her hand. “I’ve tried everything.”

“You can divorce him,” Sonali said, wagging her finger in the air vehemently. “That’s what you can do! Pooja, you know you’ll be taken care of for the rest of your life. You know that, don’t you? There’s not a court even on Mars or Jupiter that will let him get away with this shamefulness!” But when Sonali saw Pooja shaking her head, the mere suggestion of such an act making her wince like someone was plucking the hair out from her skin, she clamped up. “I’m sorry, Pooja. Oh, but what else is there to do?”

“You’re trying to help, I know that, but I cannot hear of such things. No matter what has happens between us, we’re married.”

“But is that what he wants?”

She looked away, remembering her last meeting with Rahul.

Sonali, seldom at a lack of words, tried, saying, “Did you…I mean, where there any signs? Surely, there must’ve been.”

“No. Yes. I don’t know,” she replied contemplatively. “You’ve heard about how if you drop a frog in a pot of boiling water, it will jump out. But if you place it into a pot of warm water and then slowly turn the heat up, bringing the water to a boil, it will just stay there. Get boiled to death.” Pooja looked at her imploringly. “Nobody must know, Sonali. Please, you must promise me! If anyone found out…if Ajay…Oh, God.”

“No, no, what are you saying?” Sonali said, leaning forward and squeezing Pooja’s hand reassuringly. “You have my word, darling. Nobody will know, absolutely nobody. Your secret, it is my secret. But,” she added emphatically, “you can’t go on like this. Oh, I can’t stand to see you this way! At least for now, Pooja, you must promise me that you will go and see your doctor. Get something,
na,
some anti-depressants or something? They will help, Pooja, really.”

But Pooja looked lost again, as if another life was being played out in her mind and her body was simply delaying following its thoughts into another realm. Sonali dipped into her purse again and pulled out her cell phone. “I know your type,” Sonali said, punching a few buttons until she arrived at what she was looking for. “You will do nothing, just suffer. I’m going to make your appointment with my very own doctor. I’m sure he’ll take your insurance so don’t worry—”

“No, no, Sonali!”

Sonali leaned back determinedly from Pooja, waiting to be connected. “Come on, Pooja, we have a deal now and I intend for you to keep your end of the bargain. There was a time,” she said ruefully, “when I should have done something but could do nothing. But now, yes, now things are very different indeed.”

* * *

Alone again. Her back propped up by the decorative pillows she had always been careful not to crush for fear of unraveling the delicate beadwork and embroidery, Pooja tugged the opening stub of the UPS box, only to find that it snapped mid-way. The beads on the pillow pricked her back through the thin cotton
kurta,
but she did nothing to avert the discomfort, remembering only how she had chided Rahul for plopping down upon them, how he had asked what was the purpose of such pretty things if they didn’t at least provide some comfort?

She pulled from the other end of the box and lifted out a hardcover book wrapped in white tissue. Gently, she unwrapped it, found a hefty collection of poems by the Persian poet, Rumi. She flipped through the book, glanced at the neatly compiled stanzas, and then back at the shipping label on the box, made out to Rahul. She had never known Rahul to enjoy poetry. At once, she knew this was intended as a gift for someone else, something ordered a while ago, while he was still here. Imbedded in the book, she also found a receipt with Rahul’s internet purchase transaction. She put the book aside, feeling the urge to cry.