The Space Between Us (4 page)

“Marry her? Make an honest woman out of her?” There was a hysterical note in Ashok’s voice. “Arre, Bhagwan, am I going out of
my mind or what? Listen, old woman, I barely know your granddaughter. In all these years, I’ve spoken to her only five or six times and that, too, with other friends around, God is my witness.”

Bhima was about to protest, but the wild look in Ashok’s eyes silenced her. “This is a plot by my enemies, I can feel it,” he said, looking around the room. “It’s those Progressive Student Union bastards who have put you up to this. I know it. Bleddy, degenerate lefties. Always trying to discredit us RJS people. All those liberal PSU whores with their talk about secularism and shit. And their effeminate socialist ‘comrades’ who pant after them like dogs in heat. Even then, I never thought they’d stoop this low.”

“Beta, I came here to talk about Maya and nothing else—”

“Never would’ve guessed Maya was one of them,” Ashok said in a voice so low Bhima could barely hear him. “But no matter. She cannot harm my reputation. Everybody in college knows I’m an RJS man and that we believe in purity and chastity before marriage. Even some of the Christian students have secretly told me that although they don’t agree with the RJS’s goal of a Hindu nation, they respect many of its teachings. Of course, they’d never admit that in public. Too scared of the Muslim fanatics, I suppose. Anyway, in the RJS we are taught to respect our Hindu women, even fallen women, like Maya. But we also believe in fighting back. We must fight back when someone assails our reputation.” He glared at Bhima.

One of Ashok’s cohorts walked up to the table. “What’s up, boss?” he said, glancing at Bhima. “The old dame bothering you? We can take care of the problem, one, two, three.”

But Ashok shooed him away. “No, no, no. I can handle this one myself.”

“Chamcha.” Bhima snorted to herself, looking at the other boy’s retreating back.

But the truth was, she was done here. Ashok Malhotra’s stout defense of his character, the mad, paranoid gleam in his eye, his obvious contempt for Maya, and his not-so-veiled threats had vanquished Bhima completely, so that she felt herself folding like a deck of cards. There was nothing left to say, no real reason for her to be here any longer. She had failed spectacularly in her mission, failed so badly that she questioned its goal. “I’m sorry to have upset you,” she said quietly. “I hope you can forgive me, beta. I’m just a foolish, stupid woman. If nothing else, take pity on these gray hairs and forget about this conversation. My family”—and here her voice broke—“will never trouble you again. Please find it in your heart to forgive me.”

The canteen seemed to have grown twice as long in the time she’d been there. She walked out unsteadily, keeping her eyes to the ground, willing her ears not to pick up the hushed whispers and giggles that followed her. Her feet ached where the rubber slippers she was wearing rubbed against her skin.

The cabdriver was a young, gregarious fellow who clearly wanted to talk, but Bhima was in no mood for conversation. She stared out of the window as the cab flew past the dilapidated buildings and construction projects. Even the spray of the Arabian Sea, as they drove past it, failed to revive her, nor did the sight of its brown-gray water, which usually made her heart lurch with joy.

She went over her conversation with Ashok in her mind, trying to pinpoint the precise moment when it ran away from her like a herd of mad elephants, the exact moment when her heart broke and the future fell apart in front of her disbelieving eyes.

Also, the exact moment when she began to believe Ashok Malhotra’s innocence. Because there was no doubt in her mind that the boy had told the truth. And that it was Maya—Maya, the granddaughter whom she had rescued from death’s door; Maya, who had come to her as an orphan and grown up to be an intelligent, ambi
tious young woman; Maya, the only flesh-and-blood family member she still had near her; Maya, who had been the sole bright spot in Bhima’s bleak life; Maya, who was to make up for all of Bhima’s own unrealized hopes and aborted dreams, who was the golden focal point of all of Bhima’s fantasies and daydreams—it was Maya who had lied to her. It was Maya who had betrayed her. (But shouldn’t she be used to betrayals by now?) Maya who had embarrassed and humiliated her. (But shouldn’t she be an old hand at humiliation by now?) Maya who, it seemed, was intent on stuffing misery, like hard cotton pillows, under Bhima’s head. (And why, after all, should Maya be any different from the rest of her family?)

Bhima let the cab drop her off five minutes away from the basti. She did not want her neighbors to speculate on the reasons why she had taken a cab home. And today she was also in no mood to feel the sting of their envy. Many of them, she knew, were envious of her good fortune in working for someone like Serabai. “Ae, Bhima mausi,” Bibi often told her. “I’m just waiting until your Maya gets a tip-top job and you can retire. Then, I’m going to go work for your Serabai. I want to come home with Cadbury’s chocolate for my babies, also. That Gujarati woman I work for is such a kanjoos, if she gives me one extra grain of salt one month, I swear she tries to take something out of my pay next month.”

Bhima walked quickly, anxious to be home. The straps of her rubber chappals dug into her feet, but she was too lost in her thoughts to notice the pain. If not Ashok Malhotra, who was the father of Maya’s baby? And truth be told, did it even matter? Because the fact was, it was probably one of the louts from the slum who had impregnated Maya. It may even have been the insolent man who lived across from them and didn’t have the decency to look away when they performed their daily toiletries. Bhima’s face flushed at the thought. No, an abortion was the only way. The confrontation with Ashok Malhotra had taken the fight out of her. She
could not imagine going through this with another suspect. And there was no guarantee that that shameless girl would give her the right information this time either. Bhima’s cheeks burned with anger at Maya’s deception. Her right hand twitched in anticipation of the stinging slaps that she wanted to deliver to Maya’s face. She picked up her pace.

But as she approached the basti, a strange reluctance to enter her gloomy hut gripped her. She noticed again how shabby and disassembled the tin-and-cardboard structures looked, more like a giant bird’s nest put together by a flock of drunken crows than like a place where human beings lived. She lifted her sari with her right hand to prevent its hem from touching the brown, murky, stagnant water on the ground. With her left hand, she shooed away the flies that swarmed around her. As always, she felt the helpless despair that gripped her when she entered the slum. But today that despair had teeth marks on it. She felt a raw, naked hatred for Maya. Crazy, stupid girl had thoughtlessly thrown away her future like an old newspaper. She, too, would live in this filthy slum now, condemned to live out her days in the same way that she, Bhima, had. And the shadow of her aborted child would follow her always. This close she had come to leaving this place and making something of her life. But the family curse was obviously on her, also, hanging over her head like an open claw. The curse that had left Maya an orphan at seven would leave her childless at seventeen.

Of course, if she, Bhima, had not made such a scene at Maya’s college today, there may have been some way the girl could have gone back there. She could have had the abortion, stayed home to rest for a few days, and then quietly started classes again. If any of her classmates asked, she could’ve said she had—what was it that Ashok Malhotra had said his friends had?—malaria. Nobody would’ve had to know. But the moment her granddaughter had mentioned Ashok Malhotra’s name, some strange, irrational opti
mism had seized Bhima. The vision of the kitchen with the sparkling pots had captured her imagination. It was as if the devil had toyed with her, had infected her with a dangerous hopefulness, had enticed her all the way to Maya’s college, dancing ahead of her, pointing the way to Ashok Malhotra’s table, where grief and ridicule awaited her like a hot, steaming plate of battatawadas. Guilt ran up Bhima’s tired limbs like a radioactive dye. She had unwittingly destroyed her grandchild’s future. Whatever mistake Maya had made could’ve been corrected. But what Bhima had done—shared her family shame with a stranger, sullied Maya’s honor before a self-righteous, pious fool, disclosed her secret to God knows how many prying, curious ears—that damage could not be undone. She had stripped her child naked in that large, bright, crowded canteen, exposed her to the darts of their gossip and careless talk.

Perhaps it was the guilt that made her turn on Maya as soon as the girl opened the door. Gripping the right slipper, which had made a deep, bloody groove into her foot, Bhima waited until Maya shut the rickety door. Then, before she could walk away, Bhima struck out at the pregnant Maya, whose very face now made her sick with grief. “Come here, you shameless, lying girl,” she panted. “Take this, and this, and this. Come here, I want to obliterate you, never want to see your lying face again.”

Trying to deflect the blows, Maya’s hands instinctively flew to protect her abdomen. She swirled around, so that most of Bhima’s blows landed on her back. “No, Ma-ma,” she whimpered once, and then she fell quiet, wincing silently each time another blow landed.

Her silence infuriated Bhima. She wanted to draw blood, yes, but more, she wanted to draw Maya’s tears, as if the tears would baptize them both, purify them, wash them clean of this evil that had wormed its way into their lives. “Say something,” she demanded. Then, in the rhythm of the blows, “Say…something…Beg…
forgiveness…you demon child…you…mistake of your mother’s womb.” But it was Bhima who was close to tears instead, the events of the day having caught up with her—the humiliation and the exhaustion, the cheated, helpless outrage of having been lied to by her own grandchild and, now, her horror at her own uncontrolled behavior.

The ache in her forearms made her stop. Maya crouched on the floor, looking at her with big, fearful eyes. Her look broke Bhima’s heart, made her want to take that young, trembling body and cover it in kisses with the same urgency that she had covered it in blows a minute ago, but she steeled her heart. It was this very same leniency that had allowed Maya to stray in the first place.

“Ashok Malhotra,” she spat out. “Father of your bastard child, hah? Arre, a loose woman like you would have to take nine births to land a decent, God-fearing, religious boy like him.”

Maya stared at her. “How do you know Ashok is religious?” she asked.

“I met him. I went to your college today to make him a marriage proposal.” Bhima laughed bitterly, shaking her head at her earlier naïveté.

“You did what?” Hysteria made Maya’s voice loud. “You did what, Ma?”

Bhima forced herself to keep her gaze on her granddaughter’s face. “It’s your fault. Or do you tell so many lies that you have forgotten what you told me about him? Anyway, it’s really my fault. Imagine, believing the word of a fornicator.”

Maya winced. “Stop being so cruel, Ma-ma, I beg you. You can beat me with your chappals or a stick, pour gasoline on me and burn me alive, I don’t mind. But don’t beat me with your words.”

“Me beat you? Beta, wait till you see how this cruel world beats you up when the news of your pregnancy gets around. You know how Yasmeen, the Muslim woman in the next basti, wears the purdah? Well, you won’t need one. Your shame will act as your veil.”

“And now you have spread my shame like manure, all through my college,” Maya said bitterly. “I know that Ashok. I never fell for his Hare Rama stuff. I’ve seen how he likes to gossip, especially about girls he doesn’t like. And he is such a bigmouth, it’s like he was born with a loudspeaker in his throat. The whole college probably knows already.”

Bhima gulped the guilt that tasted like sour milk in her mouth. “You should’ve thought of that before you falsely implicated him. Before you looked in my eyes and told a lie.”

“You forced me to,” Maya said, and for a second, there was a flash of the old, spirited Maya. “You hounded me and hounded me, and so I said the first, most improbable name that came to my mind. What does it matter who the father is, Ma-ma? The fact is that the baby is growing in
my
stomach, not his. That makes it my curse and my blessing, no one else’s…”

“Blessing? You refer to that—that thing—growing in your stomach as a blessing? Have you gone mad, girl? Or are you plotting to kill off your old grandma so that you can inherit this palace that we live in?”

Maya put one tentative hand on Bhima’s thin arm. “Don’t talk of dying, Ma-ma. You are all I have in this world.”

So this is how a heart breaks, Bhima thought. This is how cold, how delicate, how exquisite it feels, like the high-pitched violin note on the classical music records that Serabai played. Bhima wanted to hug Maya and kill her, to rescue her and destroy her, all in the same explosive moment.

“All right,” she said gruffly. “Don’t act like Meena Kumari in
some Hindi picture. Go start the stove. The growling of my stomach will soon scare even the rats away.”

Maya made to turn away, but Bhima drew her back. “Listen up, girl,” she said. “Tomorrow I’ll talk to Serabai about taking you to an abortion doctor. Too much time has already passed.”

A
s Sera waits for the elevator, she wonders if it is safe to leave Bhima alone at home. She has never seen Bhima look so old, so tired, so—what is the word?—
defeated
as she did today. Not even when Gopal had left and taken with him the most precious thing in Bhima’s life. Oh, Bhima had been scared then, no question about that, but she knew she was still responsible for Pooja, and that responsibility toward her daughter had emboldened her, kept her from falling apart. No, Gopal may have broken Bhima’s back, but Maya had broken her spirit. Ashok Malhotra, indeed. Sera tries to muster up some anger toward Maya but finds that she can’t. She tries to picture Maya as she is today—wary, corrupted, defensive, manipulative—but all she can recall is the shy, scared, tiny seven-year-old in the red ruffled dress and golden slippers who had stood before her and Feroz, all the time gripping her grandmother’s hand. Bhima had just returned from Delhi with her grandchild, having traveled all night by train, and Sera could see the dark circles around the little girl’s eyes. An orphan girl, painfully thin, who Sera won over by giving her three pieces of Cadbury’s milk chocolate day after day. Who, two months after Bhima began to bring her to the Dubashes’ residence with her while she worked, one day surprised and delighted Sera by saying in English, “Where my chocolate?” It was on that day, or soon after, that Sera decided this was an intelligent child and worthy of a life different from
what her grandmother could give her. And that she, Sera, would assume responsibility for Maya’s education.

Sera steps into the elevator and spots Mrs. Madan, the fifth-floor neighbor. “Kem che, Sera?” the woman says. “Long time, no see, dear.”

“Oh, I’ve been fine,” Sera says. “And you?” She regrets the question as soon as it leaves her lips.

Mrs. Madan sighs. “Chalta hai, chalta hai,” she says. “Life goes on. The arthritis is getting worse. See this thumb? See how swollen and red it is, like a big, fat tomato? Baap re, you can’t imagine the pain. Still, what cannot be cured must be endured, as my dearly departed Praful used to say. But I tell you, Sera, that’s because he never had a migraine headache. Sometimes they are so bad that I can’t open my eyes, even. Thank God my servant knows exactly what to do for me then. She’s been with me a long time, you know. Not as long as your Bhima, of course. That is truly exceptional, I have to say. No wonder you treat her like a family member. My Praful always used to say that you’ve made that woman sit on your head, if you don’t mind my saying so. But these men, they are hard at heart, no? Not softhearted like us women. I always say, ‘Sera will be rewarded in heaven for the way she treats that Bhima.’”

“Heaven has nothing to do with it,” Sera begins. “Bhima is a decent person and a good worker—”

“Oh, I know, I know. That’s exactly what I tell everybody. No, you are softhearted like me, Sera. See how you go every day to check on your old mother-in-law? Don’t think I don’t notice, even though I am almost blind because of my cataracts. You may not go to the agyari as often as some of us, but you are religious in your own way, I know. Chalo, time for me to go pick up my prescription. Doctor says I should go for a walk every day, but I tell you, the footpaths are so bad in Bombay today, I’m afraid to step out of the house. Open manholes and construction pits everywhere.”

That Mehru Madan is an idiot, Sera thinks as the two women part ways. Confused theology, confused medical facts, confused brain. She remembers that Feroz used to refer to Mehru as Old Scrambled Brain, and the thought makes her smile.

She is still smiling as she gets into the elevator in Banu Dubash’s building. The liftman notices her smile and grins back. “Salaam, memsahib,” he says. She nods curtly, annoyed that he has caught her in an unguarded moment.

“Second floor,” she says, although she is aware that the man knows perfectly well which floor Banu Dubash’s apartment is on.

The Monster is lying on her bed, her long but scanty hair tossed like a mane around her pillow. She is asleep when Sera turns the key to the front door and lets herself into the apartment. The familiar smell of Tata’s eau de cologne and rubbing alcohol assails her nostrils as soon as she walks in through the door. As always, the heavy curtains are drawn shut because the Monster likes her lair to be dark at all times. The old apartment smells musty, and Sera feels a moment’s claustrophobia, so that she fights the urge to part the faded curtains and fling open the windows to let in much-needed air and sunlight. As always, her critical eye is drawn to the drab, dirty walls with the peeling paint, and she thinks of how much she would love to have a crew of workers come in and paint these ancient walls a bright color. As far as she can recall, this house has never seen a new coat of paint since she came here as a young—well, not so young—bride, all those years ago. She shudders involuntarily at the memory of those miserable years when she lived in the Monster’s home. Thank God she had the gumption to leave and Providence provided her with her own home. Not that living alone with Feroz was paradise. But still. She would’ve jumped off the balcony of this house years ago if she’d continued to live with her in-laws.

The day nurse, Edna, is dozing in the large armchair in the right-hand corner of the room where the Monster lies sleeping, her rhythmic snores filling the space with a dull music. Sera first sees Edna through her reflection in the full-length mirror that makes up one of the panels of the mahogany cupboard that sits next to the Monster’s bed. The second panel features a vertical painting of a forest scene—there are giraffes and elephants and fawns. The huge wardrobe had fascinated Sera when she first saw it. The Dubash household had been filled with antique furniture in those days—a carved mahogany dining room table that could seat twelve, two coffee tables with marble tops, a four-poster bed made of solid teak.

Sera clears her throat deliberately, and the sound startles Edna into wakefulness. “Oh, hello, madam,” she stammers as she leaps to her feet. “I didn’t hear—Banu aunty was sleeping after her morning sponge, so I—”

“It’s okay,” Sera says curtly. “So, everything is all right? The night went well?”

“Mostly well, madam. She had one loose motion last night, at about two in the morning.” Edna catches the expression on Sera’s face and is immediately remorseful. “I…I’m sorry, madam. I just thought you’d want to know. Some families want to know every detail about their patient, you know.”

Sera takes in the dark, bony, tired face, the frayed edges of the white nurse’s cap, the faint outline of a brown stain on the worn-out uniform, and suddenly feels a rush of pity and remorse. “No, no, that’s good. We do want to know what’s going on with her. Now, Edna, how about if you make us both a nice cup of tea? I’ll straighten up a bit in here while you make us a hot-pot cup of Brooke Bond.”

Her reward is an unexpectedly joyous smile, as clear as the sky outside. “Okay, madam,” Edna says. “I’ll make a pot of tea—how
you Parsis say?—fattaa-faat. Maybe Banu aunty will like some tea, also.”

As if she knows that they are talking about her, the old woman stirs in her bed. For the umpteenth time Sera marvels at her mother-in-law’s prescience. During the years that Sera lived in this home, she had truly believed that Banu had three extra eyes bored into the back of her head. No matter how discreetly she and Feroz tried to argue about something, no matter how low Sera tried to keep her voice during one of their fights, Banu always seemed to know exactly what had transpired in their room.

Once, she had tried telling Feroz this. “Do you see how your mother looks at me whenever we have a fight? What does she do, spy on us or something? I try so hard to hide our problems from her, but she seems to know each time there’s trouble between us.”

“Are you on your menses?”

“What?”

“Are you having your period?” Feroz repeated. “Because that’s when you get hysterical and paranoid like this, thinking people are spying on you. Next you’ll be like those stupid Americans, believing in UFOs and all.”

She stared at her husband in silence, more hurt by his dismissal of her concerns than she felt she had the right to be. “Okay, Feroz,” she said finally. “Keep making fun of me.”

“Well, if you made sense, I wouldn’t have to, my dear. Acting as if my mother has nothing better to do than to waste her time watching you.”

When Edna leaves the room, Sera resists the urge to follow her into the kitchen. Even after all these years and despite Banu’s current helpless, paralyzed state, she is still uneasy when she is alone with her mother-in-law. The bad memories of the past chatter in her ears, like those monkeys in the trees of Khandala. There are too many ghosts in here, and despite the ghostly, half-dead remains
of the paralyzed old woman lying on the bed in front of Sera, the dead she most remembers and mourns is the young woman who lies buried in this house. With what hopes that newly wed woman had come into her in-laws’ house. With what fervor she had been pursued and seduced by the man who became her husband, who had brought her into that house like she was precious cargo, a fragile piece of bone china. What brightness, what radiance there had been in those days, as if someone had perched an extra sun in the Bombay sky. She and Feroz had been golden then, not young exactly, but that had made their luster all the more dazzling, because it had been hard-won and unexpected. They had found each other at a time when neither had expected to.

She can hear the nurse setting the teacups down on the kitchen counter. “Tea’s almost ready, madam,” Edna sings from the kitchen. “One garma-garam cup of chai coming up.”

Sera doesn’t answer, afraid of waking the old woman up. Better to let sleeping dogs lie, she thinks and then feels a twinge of guilt at comparing her mother-in-law to a dog. Still, she is enjoying her moment of privacy and escape from Banu’s watchful eyes. Despite the fact that the stroke had rendered Banu helpless and bedridden, despite the fact that she could barely speak, the old woman’s beady eyes usually followed Sera across the room, watching her every movement, much as she used to in the early days of Sera’s marriage.

Now, taking comfort in the fact that Banu is still asleep and that her darting eyes are shut tight, Sera tiptoes up to the old woman. Banu sleeps with her mouth open, breathing loudly, every third breath released in a loud, guttural snore. A thick trickle of drool wends its way from her mouth onto her pillow. The sight makes Sera ill. Despite the fact that she stops in every day to check on her
mother-in-law, Sera can never control the nauseated, closed-in feeling that hits her when she is in this house. She stares at Banu, takes in the shriveled, mousy woman lying in the bed that seems to have grown around her, and reaches deep within herself to pull up a strand of pity but comes up empty-handed. Or rather, she pulls up an endless cord of rope, like the rope used to lower the buckets into the wells at Parsi fire temples. Into the rope are woven bitterness and resentment. The rope feels black and charred in her hands, burnt by her simmering fury. After all these years, she, Sera Dubash, loyal friend, loving mother, benevolent employer, helpful neighbor, generous patron of the arts, cannot forgive this shell of a woman who lies before her. She is both ashamed and strangely exhilarated by the thought.

Sera’s eyes fall on the large oil painting of her father-in-law, Freddy Dubash, that hangs above Banu’s bed. Freddy looks uncharacteristically serious in the painting, but the sight of his beloved parrot, Polly, perched on his right shoulder, makes Sera happy. If the early days of her marriage had been a dark coal mine, Freddy was the single beam of light that shone from the miner’s helmet. He was the reason she had not lost her way completely.

Sera smiles involuntarily, the way she always does when she thinks of her father-in-law. Gazing at Freddy’s bald head and familiar face, she remembers the first time she met him—and of course, the ever-present Polly. Three months after they’d started dating, Feroz had invited Sera to his parents’ home on a Sunday afternoon. Freddy Dubash, one of Bombay’s most successful lawyers, had walked into the living room in a red, embroidered bathrobe with a parrot perched on his shoulder.

“I’m Farokh Dubash,” he said. “The Boy Wonder’s father. But everyone calls me Freddy.”

“Nice to meet you,” Sera murmured.

“Feroz tells me you like classical music,” Freddy said. “Is that so?”
“My father and I have been going to music concerts at Homi Bhabha since I was seven,” Sera said simply. “He’s a big music fan.”

Freddy turned to his parrot. “Polly, we have a new friend. Shake hands with a fellow music lover. Come on. Shake hands.”

And sure enough, the bird lifted a scrawny claw and held it out. Sera turned toward Feroz uncertainly, not knowing what to do. He looked bemused. “Yah, go ahead, shake that animal’s hand,” he said wearily. “Then your initiation into this crazy family will be complete.”

Banu was fussing around, looking embarrassed. “Really, Freddy,” she began, but Sera moved toward Freddy with her hand outstretched. “How do you do?” Polly said, when Sera brought her hand up to his claw. Noticing the look of surprise on her face, the others began to laugh. “It’s my husband’s little trick,” Banu said, her voice tinged with embarrassment and pride. “Took him weeks to teach Polly to do that.”

“Weeks, my foot,” Freddy said. “He learned it in a matter of days. That’s because parrots are birds with uncommon intelligence,” he told Sera. “Much smarter than dogs, if you ask me.”

“Yes, yes, Daddy, you taught Polly this trick in a matter of hours,” Feroz said indulgently. “Minutes, even. After all, this damn bird is more intelligent than your own son. Polly is really the son my father never had,” he added, turning to Sera. She thought she heard a trace of bitterness in Feroz’s voice, but his face was smiling.

But Freddy ignored his son. “Polly likes you,” he said to Sera. “Like me, he can spot a classical music lover miles away.”

Why did Freddy pappa have to die before the Monster did, Sera thinks, not for the first time. After all these years, she still thinks of the eccentric, good-hearted Freddy as her savior, the man who rescued her from this hellish house.