The Benefit Season (16 page)

I reach around her slim waist and lift her
off the ground and press her into the tree. She folds her legs
around my hips and I try to enter her again. But her flaps are
sticky and salty and so I dip a finger in my mouth and curl it in
and work up the juices. When the rusty pipes are flowing again I
spit on my wiener and quietly slip it in without further formality.
Monal suddenly goes stiff in my arms and then shudders violently.
Like a leaf she trembles in my arms, her body wracked by ripples of
release. I wait for her to be done, and gently grind my hips into
her. She sighs and whispers; ’don’t come inside’.

I nod and rake up the tempo- her hips
slamming into the squishy trunk. When I feel I can hold the
tadpoles in no further, I dig myself out and rub the wiener on her
belly till the penis-pudding catapults from my sausage pistol and
is squashed all the way up to her breasts. It’s my turn to lay my
head on her shoulder like a well-fed baby and sigh with relief.
When the baby is done nuzzling and the water is risen till the
knees, ‘tis time to leave.

ϖ

Long after the act, shame, like the darkness
stretched out against the sky, casts a gloom upon my generally
sunny view on life. The chirpy bird is mute, her ditty lost to the
city. The shade is cast wide from the tree; the leaves flutter
aimlessly in the breeze. The cookie crumbles lifelessly in my
mouth, the coffee is stone cold. Simple Aarti fades from view,
Monal glitters as gold.

‘
What’s up, dude?’ Aarti
says.

We are seated in a sunny coffee bar, empty
mostly, save for an odd couple, and an old Parsi lady sitting alone
having a milkshake. The afternoon is warm and we had both decided
to meet up for a quick coffee and chat as some office work had
brought us together in the same neighborhood. We are seated by the
tall, freshly polished French windows, overlooking the bustling
sidewalk.

I still find it hard to dismiss the thought
of the soft edges of Monal’s belly, where the golden brown loaves
of her thighs start their journey to her pink toes.

‘
You’ve been silently
stirring that lone lump of sugar for the last half hour’, Aarti
says, her voice coming from a distance.

‘
Oh!’ I take the spoon out
and take a sip of the coffee gone cold, and grimace.

Aarti laughs and motions to the pale Nepali
waitress with the flat chest to fetch another coffee for me. ’Make
it piping hot- the last one literally sent him to sleep’.

‘
My hero’, she says,
addressing me with her straw, ‘always fighting office battles.
What’s bugging our soldier this day?’

‘
This, and some of that’,
I push away my cup and her toes that have crept up to my
knee.

‘
Papa doesn’t want to play
with mama today’, she says, and lights up the table with a wide
grin. ‘Papa only wants to work’.

I look at her and shake my head. She is
every inch perfect- but suddenly perfectly plain. She has the right
dimensions: she rises to the correct length from the ground, and
then fills out in perfectly rounded contours. She is of robust
design and provides year-round comfort; warm enough in the wintery
nights and cool and shady when it’s heating up. Her surface area is
without blemish, and her façade pleasant to the sight. When you
shelter in her you feel blessed and you feel saved; she lengthens
your days. She is all of mother, and sister, and woman, and
savior.

Monal- she’s the salt seasoning of life.
Olive-skinned, with eyes that gleam in mischief; her dangerous and
forbidden allure is what compels men to soak weed and wage wars.
Thy neighbor’s coveted, fornicating wife- she’s what god had in
mind when he wrote with his finger on a stone tablet the tenth
commandment on Mount Sinai.

Having tasted of her meat, all else is grass
to me.

‘
Are you even here?’ Aarti
taps on my temple to snap me out of my reverie.

‘
Huh?’

‘
As I was saying, my dad
is gathering my trousseau. Can you imagine the old man doing it?
And guess who’s helping him?’

‘
Yeah, he sure needs
help’. My attention is riveted on the ripples in my cup as I swirl
the coffee with a finger.

‘
Your mom, dork!’ she
says, pulling my finger out and indulgently licking it clean. ‘The
poor man was complaining she doesn’t let him pick
anything.’

‘
No one should trust his
choice. Or for that matter him.’

‘
He goes to this store and
fills up his cart with baby clothes! And we don’t even have babies-
at least not yet’.

‘
We don’t? How do you
tell?’ my gaze strays to the billboards outside, across the street,
over the tumbledown buildings to the dark mangroves lurking in
their shadows, and the pools of swirling waters in the high tide
and, pressed against a tree a naked Monal, creamed with the seed of
a man spoken for by another. Forgive me O lord for I have sinned.
And shall sin again. And again. For the call of Sodom and Gomorrah
is great indeed and I hearken closely. The spell is cast on me and
I am slave to my own flesh.

‘
And he picked out ten odd
suits for you- all of the same color, and
different sizes
!’

‘
He could have gone
for
different colors
too’.

‘
I don’t believe you!’
Aarti says, giggling, keeping the talk in play. ‘He even picked out
honeymoon tickets for us. Guess for where’.

‘
Somewhere by the sea
shore, where it’s windy and there are mangroves and swirling pools
of muddy water mixed with dead fish and flotsam?’

‘
Nooo…even worse! He was
going to get us train tickets and a booking in the army mess in the
brigade he commanded at Jamnagar! Imagine soldiers bringing in tea
at six in the morning and serving up army rations. That’s
gross!’

‘
Yeah - even for
him’.

‘
Thank god mom got wind of
it and nicked his designs’.

‘
I didn’t know you had a
mom?’

‘
I always had a mom,
silly, only she’s no more. I was referring to
your
mom. And you get to call dada,
dada’.

‘
I’ll refer to him
as
the one
you
don’t speak of
. I’ll get him a tie for
Father’s Day if you insist. But no more- thank you.’

‘
I insist’, she says. And
before she can carry on with the parlay, a loud crack draws our
attention. The Parsi lady’s walking frame has snapped while rising
and she has collapsed back in her chair. She is examining the
broken frame helplessly and is close to tears. Too proud to seek
help, she shakily tries to rise on the remaining aluminum stump,
but can’t. She leans the stump against her table and hangs her head
in embarrassment; twisting her stole around her knotted fingers.
Everyone has seen what happened but no one comes forward to help.
People look away as she raises her head and glances furtively
around.

‘
Excuse me’, Aarti says
and strides over to the lady. She bends over and then sits next to
her on the empty chair. She beckons to me.

‘
Can you please bring the
car around? She lives in the next block,’ Aarti pleads.

I pinch her cheeks and nod.

The lady beams happily at me; ’thank you’,
she says, looking relieved. I smile down at her and walk out to
fetch the car.

It is such random acts of kindness that keep
me anchored to Aarti. She is the solid ground beneath my feet, the
studded crown on my head; I bask in her unending goodness and
compassion and joie de vivre. I am again reminded of what a stroke
of good luck it is for a sap like me to have her in his life. What
was I even thinking? Lose this gold standard girl over an
unscrupulous married woman? Swap a dignified living with a lifetime
of jumping through hoops held up by a dark enchantress?

I am saved! From stepping blindfolded off a
cliff! From hurting the very people I love- most of all myself!

I turn on my feet and head back into the
café. Aarti rises to her feet. ‘Back already’, she asks.

I grab her in a tight embrace and kiss her
hair.

‘
What happened?’ Aarti
wriggles out of my embrace- a little embarrassed with the attention
we are getting- a little amused with the hangdog expression on my
face.

‘
I just came back to make
sure you’re still there, waiting for me. I’ll get the car now’. I
turn and head out to the parking lot, leaving two very surprised
ladies behind.

I know what I have to do now. I must avoid
that bewitching adulteress at any cost if I don’t want to wreck my
life any more than I have already. But by the time evening falls
the specter of Monal rises to torment me again. The snaky memories
of hers entwine around me and squeeze the wits out of me.

It is time to seek wise counsel of a trusty
low-wage earner; I call out to the mom. ‘Yo, diaper changer, maker
and provider’!

‘
Yo Yo, apple o’ the eye,
fruit o’ the earth. What blows the ship homeward this day; what
trouble brews over yonder waters? What foul wind blanches the fair
cheek?’

‘
Aw c’mon mom, I call you
every day. Don’t make up stuff of theater’.

‘
It is so, ‘tis so. So
how’s Aarti?’

‘
Aarti! Aren’t I supposed
to figure first when you read from left to right your
brood?’

‘
If she’s fine I know for
sure you will be too: thus the question, my
crib-absconder’.

‘
Well she seemed pretty
rosy to me the last I saw her- she was picking up the pieces of an
old lady off a coffee table and having me deliver the package
home’.

‘
That’s my girl, always to
the fore. Now tell me quickly what a good boy you’ve been so I can
go back to my tipple; Khosla- remember him- the father of the
bride, is here, drowning the sorrows in our scotch.’

‘
Khosla! What do they
think- the mom comes as the dowry? Aren’t you drinking too much
these days ma?’

‘
Naah. I only drink a
bottle a day-‘

‘
Maa!’

‘
-Of soda, and whatever
else that goes with it- gin, vodka or plain whisky’.

‘
Keep away from him- he’s
bad company’.

‘
He spawned Aarti, didn’t
he? He’s good for me’.

Mom has that simple logic which arranges
most things in life in neat little compartments for her. Not a
thing overflows, or blurs over.

‘
How’s office- I believe
the boss is a keen patron of my womb-sprout?’

‘
She’s a keen patron of
anything that brings home the cash. She is a worshipper of
hard…’

‘
Hard what,
cub?’

‘
Hard slogging, ma. You
should see her; how she rides people, how she brings them to
peak…’

‘
Is madam running an
office or a ladies ranch?’

I am carried away already.’ What class mama!
She would draw catcalls even if you walked her in a nun’s habit in
the kindergarten! She would win a skin show even if you covered her
in a burqa- if even a twinkly toe peeped out…’

‘
Keep the noise down-
there are children around. She’s been showing skin lately, has she?
And what’s her husband up to, while her twinkly toes are peeping
out- peeping into other woman’s pants I’m sure?’

‘
He’s another lady-killer,
they say; I don’t think he takes much care of her’.

‘
So she needs taking care
of now, does she, by my fresh-faced boy? Well let me tell you: son
of my man; you look after my
bahu
, and leave other men’s business
alone!’

‘
Your bahu is not going
away anywhere maa, she’s stuck to me’.

‘
What was that? Stuck?
Would you please spell that out for me? It sounded a little like
you were tiring of my gold-standard heirloom already! Fat on the
belly I can live with; fat in the head I can’t! Even if it’s my
bed-wetting daft punk.’

‘
Come on maa, I didn’t
mean it like that! She’s…she’s the perfect mate, I
know…but…’

‘
But what, butt-head, come
out with it!’

‘
I know her for so long-
since forever. In fact she’s the only one I know! I want to meet
other girls as well mama; it’s trite.’

‘
Married girls? Are you
straying? And you haven’t even married yet! What’s up little
dumbbell, what’s going on?’

‘
Hey maa, chill. It’s
cool; it’s nothing. I was just thinking aloud’.

‘
If that’s what you are
thinking these days, well it’s banned. No more thinking for you.
Stay away from married women; understand? My son- I won’t have my
firstborn run down the family name messing up with other’s
wives’.

‘
Hey maa, keep it down,
Khosla might hear ya’.

‘
Let the whole world hear
what a fine dimwit my womb has sprung forth, and what I think about
it! You men are all alike! I was hoping you wouldn’t turn out like
your dad, but no, the blood runs thick!’

‘
My dad! What are you
saying ma?’

‘
Yes, your dad! He may
have died a hero in battle, but he was a coward for me. For
ditching his bride and infant son for a married whore!’

‘
Maa!’

‘
Yeah, soak it up- you
asked for it! Your dad deserted us, for a younger woman! His own
adjutant’s wife! Just imagine the lives they wrecked for a bloody
fuck!’