Married Woman (34 page)

We stayed with P.’s mother. I slept on the divan in the big room, she with her mother in the bedroom. Her mother didn’t say much to me, she is a house parent, besides being a middle-school class teacher and quite busy. Does she know we are lovers??? I ask P.

‘I think so.’

‘You told her?’

‘She has eyes.’

So does my mother but even if I told her, I bet a thousand to one she would not believe it. I said as much.

‘She has always known how I am feeling, that is the important thing.’

It seems Pip has the ideal mother-daughter relationship, just as she had the ideal marriage. I wonder how these things operate?

Pip organised a street play around interpretations of history. Among other things she used my pamphlet,
The
Testimony
of
the
Black
Pillars.

Last night we went to P.’s favourite restaurant in Bangalore, a great relief after school food, though to listen to P. it was manna from heaven.

(n.b. If I am jealous of every thing about P. that doesn’t include me, perhaps I should not mind so much her attitude to my family.)

January 4th

We are leaving on the Karnataka Express. The Yatra has reached Gujarat, then it is going to Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh.

In the evening P. said, I don’t want you to go home.

What is she saying, it is almost a month, is this another test? Did I not pass the first one?

Stay with me a few days in Delhi, please. You can always go back to them a bit later.

I agreed, but for the first time, the thought crossed that perhaps P. was not always wholly reasonable. Maybe I should assert myself. (How?)

January 7th

We came yesterday. Took a scooter to her flat, stopping at the market on the way to buy provisions: milk, bread, eggs, fruit and vegetables. It seems strange to come to an empty place, no one waiting, nothing done. You have to do everything yourself the minute you come, clean, organise, buy, cook. If it is so tiring in winter, what will it be like in summer? But this is Pip’s life, and she doesn’t complain.

Pip has gone to Ujjala, I make the bed, dust, clean the cobwebs, cook lunch, and then haul out this diary to write.

I wonder how Anu and Himu are managing. I can’t tell on the phone. Their school is opening today. Did they finish their holiday homework? Does my mother manage to get them up and off in time? Are they all right? They say yes to everything. P. says I worry to feel needed.

I feel disturbed here. Why isn’t Pip coming? She promised to come quickly, she might have gotten caught up with meeting her colleagues, Neeraj probably, while I am here waiting. It was much better in Bangalore.

January 8th

Awful, awful. Couldn’t sleep. Last night we fought. She left this morning without telling me where she was going.
What did I do, it was nothing.

‘In a few days you will be gone‚’ she started over the dinner we had cooked together.

Oh no. ‘Yes.’

‘And then?’

‘Then?’

‘Back to the way it was?’

She was spoiling for a fight. I was determined to say nothing, but she went on, ‘You don’t really want to be here.’

‘I do‚’ I said quickly.

She started withdrawing. Leaving a trail that I followed. ‘Would I be staying if I didn’t?’

She glared at me, pointedly left the table and began clearing away the dishes. Doesn’t she realise what I go through because I want to be with her? I am in the same city as my children and I cannot meet them. Still she broods. Is this how she wants to spend our time in Delhi? To fight, sulk and turn away from me?

Why is she like this? I wish Aijaz were still alive, but then she would never have been interested in me. They had the perfect marriage, she hankers after that wholeness. What can I do? I live my life in fragments, she is the one fragment that makes the rest bearable. But a fragment, however potent, is still a fragment.

This morning I got up, made her breakfast, but she would not relent, continued cold. If she wants to punish me she certainly doesn’t have to try very hard. I am in such misery, I don’t care what I do. To be with her, yet distant, anything is better than that. She has left me alone here, God knows for how long. I might as well go home.

I wish I had the energy to hate her, but I don’t. I feel sick.

January 9th

Home. They all exclaimed how thin I was.

I left without saying goodbye, or leaving a note. What will she think when she comes back and finds me not there?

January 13th

Jaundice. I vomit all the time.

P. is all right, then how come me? We drank the same things, but some germ from some water drop has lain inside me, waiting for me to be safe at home before moving in for the kill.

February 15th

What was the point? I can still barely eat. I look yellow and horrible. I smell.

I have travelled from P.’s house to my own via the tip of the continent, a long detour.

This is what happens when you leave your home. The in-laws, the mother, the husband, the servants all unite on this.

I feel exhausted.

My mother is still here because I am ill.

H. grates on my nerves. It’s all my fault, does he never get tired of finding different ways to say this. He likes me to be ill and dependent.

P. comes to visit in spite of their hostile attitude.

I am sorry, she said, I’m sorry I left you like that.

I am sorry, I replied, that I didn’t wait for you.

We talk of other things.

She told me there was a bomb blast attacking the Yatra in the Punjab, two people were killed.

Suppose it had been us?

Have I been struck by this dreadful illness because I left my home to be with the one I love? I feel so weak I can’t get out of bed. When Hemant comes home and puts his heavy arm around me, I want to tell him everything just to see the look on his face. But then I’ll have to cope with the rest of it.

My children draw pictures with huge Get well soon Mamas on them. I keep them by my bed and look at them often. Pip calls, concern in her voice.

I can’t deal with my life. I want a safe place, a warm place, a loved place.

(n.b. Who doesn’t?)

Gradually Astha’s bilirubin count came back to normal, as did her diet. Her mother departed for Rishikesh, yet she remained tired. When Pipee dropped by on her way to work, she did her best to be amusing and interesting. Pipee should not feel she was in love with an invalid, but it was so much effort, she almost wished she wouldn’t come. Yet the days she didn’t, she felt unloved and anxious.

Every morning she gazed piercingly and objectively in the mirror. She looked haggard, yellow, ugly and undesirable, she would perfectly understand if Pipee never wanted to see her again. When her lover left, she again checked the mirror, despite her better judgement. Maybe in the interim she had grown more beautiful, maybe Pipee had spotted something attractive that had missed her eye in the morning.

‘I wish I didn’t feel so exhausted‚’ she permitted herself to moan occasionally.

‘It’s only natural.’

‘Yes, but it’s so boring for you.’

‘Let me decide that.’

A pause.

‘How’s your work going? How is Neeraj?’ asked Astha to cover up the anxiety of the silence.

Everything was fine, Pipee assured her, as she got up to leave.

After these visits, Astha felt depressed and gloomy – why can’t we be like we were during the trip – what’s the point – I wish I were dead – while her family put her listlessness down to her fragile state of health.

Meanwhile tension in the house gathered. The workers of the factory went on strike, despite ClearVision offering fifty
thousand rupees to the strike leaders, couched as temporary relief measures. It was clear that the rival union meant business, and soon another six TV factories in the area saw labour unrest.

These factory owners were not united. Meetings ended acrimoniously. They could not decide on an incentive package, though all of them felt that the demands of the union were unreasonable.

Every day that passed meant greater losses for the company, as well as an erosion of their market share. It was more than the owner could bear.

‘Half pay‚’ Hemant fumed, ‘we still have to pay them half their wages. Where do they think I am going to get this money if there is no production? The company will be ruined. Bloody fuckers.’

He spent his days running around looking for a solution, meeting lawyers, representing his case before the Labour Commissioner of Noida, trying to get the strike declared illegal. Meanwhile they were losing their share of the market at a time when there were over four hundred TV manufacturers in India.

Two months later the Labour Commissioner declared the strike to be a lock out. No work, no pay.

Triumph reigned in the Vadera household, it was seen as the silver lining in the dark cloud that had lain across their home.

The next day the manager’s car was damaged, and every window of the factory broken. The number of guards were increased, but a few days later a fire broke out on the premises. It was detected before great damage could be done, but Hemant could not risk further vandalism and was forced to hire a private security agency, with instructions for twenty-four-hour surveillance. More money spent without any sales to cover the costs.

Despite being declared illegal, the strike continued. Too many workers, owners, factories were affected for there to be any immediate resolution.

Hemant developed chest pain. The doctors diagnosed hypertension, told him change your food habits, quit smoking, cut down drinking, exercise every day, and avoid anxiety. The early forties was a vulnerable time for men with stress.

Hemant was seeing the work of the past eleven years go down the drain, and he wasn’t able to respond to this advice.

His parents went into damage control.

It was decided that as soon as school shut for summer, he, his wife and children would go on a holiday, and spend a relaxed time with Hemant’s sister Seema in the US. When Hemant came back, they would work on the lifestyle-food habits-exercise thing. Meanwhile Papaji would manage things in the factory.

Astha told Pipee of these plans while they were having lunch at a restaurant in Connaught Place.

‘How long will you be away?’

‘I don’t know yet.’

‘I suppose you have to go?’ asked Pipee a little hesitantly.

Astha remained silent. If only she didn’t have to put her husband’s health over the companionship of her lover. But not going was like getting divorced, a public statement of difference and separation.

‘Look, it’s not working out‚’ said Pipee suddenly.

‘What is not working out?’ asked Astha desperately.

‘One should never have affairs with married people, they are the worst.’

Astha looked at the face she had kissed lovingly and in such detail at least a thousand times, and said resentfully, ‘Why did you, then? You want to spoil what we have.’

‘I had thought that with a woman it would be different—’

‘So did I. With a woman—’

A silence fell, in which the air-conditioners fought audibly against the April heat. The glass on the windows let in blue-tinted light. At certain places the glaze had peeled and spots
of glare came through. Astha dabbed at the breadcrumbs left on the table from their soup rolls. Pipee looked moody. ‘You can tell me all about your nice little domestic holiday when you come back‚’ she remarked coldly.

Astha stared at Pipee anxiously, ‘You know how it is. The workers are on strike, he has got high blood pressure‚’ then she stopped, hearing the words of a devoted wife in her ears.

Pipee concentrated on her empty glass. ‘No. I don’t know how it is.’

‘You are independent‚’ said Astha bitterly, ‘so you can talk like this.’

‘And somebody is holding your hands, preventing you from being the same?’

‘You need money‚’ flashed Astha, ‘or do you think I should be independent on his money? Stand in the streets with a begging bowl? Live in an ashram like my mother? What about my children?’

‘Your children, your children, don’t hide behind them. Live with me. Bring them.’

That old thing.

‘But no – you don’t even try – Ant why don’t you even try?’ Pipee swallowed once or twice. ‘Have an exhibition, do something on your own, or are you waiting for Hemant to give you permission?’

‘You are not being fair.’

‘Yes. Well.’

The anticipated vacation split Astha more decisively than anything else since she had got to know Pipee. There was her lover and her lover’s feelings. But there was also the visas for the USA and the UK, the foreign exchange, the getting ready, choosing suitable clothes and shoes, the packing and shopping for presents.

With their holiday abroad Hemant and Astha joined the have-gone-abroad club, whose denizens created envy and ill-concealed curiosity about how much money they were going
to spend, where had they got it from, even with the factory in trouble they can afford to go, they must have stashed it away all these years.

Many people took their proposed trip badly. The most immediate was Sangeeta who was there as usual for the summer holidays. She insisted on being part of the discussion and planning that revolved around itineraries, addresses of friends of friends, cheap fares, cheap central hotels, foreign exchange. Astha had to brace herself against the flow of her resentment and curiosity.

‘One day I too will go abroad. Seema is always inviting me‚’ she said.

It has nothing to do with me, thought Astha, if she is angling for a trip let her angle directly. Sangeeta sighed, announced Poison was her favourite perfume and disappeared upstairs for the day.

Anuradha said now her friends would not be able to act so superior, she too could tell stories of abroad, and Himanshu said now he could have the latest in Nintendo and Sega, and could they please go to Hamleys.

‘Hamleys? What is Hamleys?’ asked Astha.

‘A shop in London‚’ said Himanshu. ‘Everybody goes there.’

‘He is so retarded‚’ said Anuradha.

Astha hoped the trip wasn’t feeding into her children’s materialist desires.

Astha’s mother was delighted. She wrote from her ashram: God bless you my little one and your family. Poor Hemant needs a break from all his troubles. You do not give him enough attention. Remember men have to bear the burdens of the outside world, home is their refuge.

Pipee retreated further into herself, getting ready for her summer, Shahjehanpur, Shiksha Kendra and Ayodhya, we’ll compare notes when I get back, bye, no need to drop me to the station, have a nice time, call me on your return.

Astha felt Pipee’s abandonment, but maybe she thinks I have left her, she brooded in the middle of the night, when the electricity went, and the couple lay sweating.

‘I will be glad to leave this fucking country‚’ muttered Hemant.

‘So will I‚’ muttered his wife.

Delhi, the trap in summer, with power cuts, water shortages, heat waves, dusty winds, and pollution emanating from all its pores. Not the garden city of their youths, but fourth, third, creeping up to second, now coughing and wheezing its way to first, yes, almost the first most polluted city in the world.

A trip abroad would be nice, no matter whom one loved and whom one left behind.

Finally the family took off on their cheap flight to Miami, Florida, with a stopover at London on the way back.

Hour after hour into the dark night they flew. Four abreast, in the central section of the plane: father, mother, daughter, son going to holiday on Western shores.

‘Are you all right?’ Hemant would ask from time to time. Astha nodded, her eyes closed. She wondered at the great silence concerning the discomfort of planes, the torture one had to undergo to get to the lands of milk and honey. Her knees were hurting in the small cramped space, her shoulders and back were aching, a headache was coming on, would she make it to the bathroom to throw up if she had to. Excuse me, I am sick, I have to throw up, madam use the bag in the pocket in front of your seat, ah, there it is, sorry, not at all.

The rest were enjoying themselves. Himanshu was absorbed in the child kit the airline had given him, Anuradha had her headset glued to her ears, and fiddled with the dials constantly. Hemant was nursing his drink, chewing with relish on the peanuts that came with it, tinkling the ice and the alcohol in his glass, twitching his toes in the airline socks, his shoes neatly stowed away under the seat in front of him.

He shouldn’t be drinking, thought his wife, but she was in too much pain to comment or persuade.

They stayed for three weeks in Florida. Hemant talked incessantly of his life as a student, and how he had slummed it, how he had worked to earn a little extra money, how he had slept two hours a night, how the great American tradition encouraged self-reliance from babyhood, how you had to sink or swim, how the whole society was geared towards meritocracy, not towards blackmailing people by going on strike. Loafers wanting something for nothing were not tolerated here.

Seema and Suresh sympathised completely, never mind, you have family, family still means something, and they talked of here and there, there and here, till Astha felt her ears would fall off.

Three weeks crammed in their guest room, three weeks of Anuradha feeling jealous of everything that Sushma (the daughter) had to show her.

‘School in the USA is like no school at all‚’ she announced to her mother. ‘They get hardly any homework, they choose what they want to study. Her maths, I can do it with my eyes shut.’

‘I am sorry, darling‚’ said Astha looking at her daughter’s angry face.

‘Why should you be sorry?’ said Anuradha turning upon her mother, the easiest person in the world for her to turn upon.

‘The system here is not so demanding, that’s all I meant.’

‘She thinks she is so clever, but she is not, Mama, I know much more than she does. Her handwriting and spelling are so bad, you wouldn’t believe, but she doesn’t care, and neither do her teachers. She says in the computer everything comes out OK, so what is the point? Imagine!’

‘You are better off beti, you can write, you can spell, you can do maths, when you come here for higher studies you will be at an advantage.’

Anuradha looked mollified. ‘I’ll show her‚’ she muttered.

‘Quite‚’ said Astha, ‘and while you are about it, do remember that we are guests in their house, and that she is your cousin.’

‘She has an American accent.’

‘That is not something she can help, she only knows this country, poor thing.’

Mother and daughter smiled slightly at one another. Nothing is so much a bond as criticising relatives.

The marriage of Seema and Suresh was a source of great amazement to the brother and sister-in-law. Seema and Suresh constantly deferred to each other. Suresh cleared up after meals, ran the dishwasher, did the grocery shopping, mowed the lawn on weekends, and went to the park with his son to kick a few balls in the evening, almost as a duty.

‘What has happened to Suresh‚’ wondered Hemant. ‘He was never like this at home.’

‘This is not home‚’ replied Astha.

‘Poor chap‚’ went on Hemant. ‘You should have seen him when he was just married. Boozing and smoking with the rest of us. Now he doesn’t even touch a cigarette.’ Hemant fumbled for his own packet and lit one, to further express his disgust.

‘Perhaps it would be better if you took a leaf out of his book‚’ said Astha. ‘Suresh looks just fine to me, at least he is not a source of worry to his family.’

‘He is ashamed to look me in the eye‚’ declared Hemant, surrounding those very eyes with smoke.

The high point of their US holiday was a trip to Disney World.

‘It’s built on 27,000 acres. Acres of fun‚’ said Suresh, while Seema sketched the delights of the fairy tale park, water park, animal park, future park, past park, sports park. She spoke with all the pride of ownership.

They planned to drive to Orlando and spend three days there. The hotels were expensive, but to absorb such wonders money was necessary.