Cattle egrets. View from our window.
Photo: A. Peter
After tailing Genie and finding out what he was up to (Stalkers Ahoy) each morning, things went back to normal. More or less. What could be normal in a pandemic-induced lockdown? There was no doubt that Genie knew we had set out to follow him that day. We discovered there hadn’t been a woman, or a secret gym.
Despite our interfering behaviour and the run-in with the fat cop Motu (Fatty), Genie stayed cordial. When we tried to follow him out the next morning, he put a decisive stop to it. “Mhatre walks along these lanes in the morning.”
“Who’s Mhatre?” Anjali said.
“The policeman you threw the stone at yesterday… you call him Motu. His name is Mhatre. And, in all probability, he will be hanging about Sea View Society waiting for you.”
Anjali’s tea went up her nose and I slapped her back several times. I pulled up a corner of her t-shirt for her to blow her nose in, but she slapped away my hand and looked at me fiercely. I rushed away and got her a tissue.
“I did not throw a stone at Motu!”
“Hmm. That’s what the watchman said you did. Made Mhatre furious. I’ve never seen him run as fast as he did after you!”
Anjali and I stared at Genie silently. We were cornered. Genie knew we were barefaced stalkers and he stood in front of us, his face stretched into a broad smile and pink from the effort of holding in his laugh. Fish were laughing like hyenas in their tanks. I wondered sometimes if Fish had filled in the gaps for Genie or whether we were so naturally transparent that our every thought showed along with our gutless guts.
Anyway, we let that argument go. And hung back.
But every morning we were up early, sipping our teas, mostly to wish Genie a cheery good morning and then watch him through the peephole. Zeba’s door opened at the same time Genie stepped out. She tottered out in a long sleeveless caftan and high heels and canoodled. Genie’s deep voice sounded full of warmth and honey, but was low enough for us not to hear. Did he know we were watching him? Was this the way the rest of my life was going to pass… as an artless voyeur? On the other hand, Anjali was a writer, with many interests. But I wondered if she regressed when she was with me.
After our surveillance efforts at the door, we’d move to the sitting room window and watch who was watching Genie leave the society. Quite a few women, we found. And men. We realised many of the men were out to watch the women.
All this had become a morning ritual and Anjali gnashed her teeth watching Zeba with Genie. Everyday! But, we just couldn’t figure out what was going on with everyone else.
The paying guest (PG) boys, two sets in flats in adjoining wings, would wake up very early and squeeze into the windows in their sitting rooms. Both sets watched the PG girls on the sixth floor opposite my building, who wore thin night dresses or shorts and tank tops leaning out to catch a glimpse of Genie. It couldn’t have been anyone else.
And yet our Genie would walk leisurely towards the gate, nodding at Mrs Duggal and her friends. Some women would lean out of their windows and shout good morning. Their husbands would watch grumpily from another courtyard-facing room, or from their kitchens. Apparently, an annoyed spouse didn’t faze Genie.
“Do you think Mrs Duggal is happy when Genie looks her way?” I asked Anjali, who was keenly watching other spectators with the binoculars. I wondered when Peaceful Society would send us a notice for our “disruptive behaviour”. That was what Uncle John had called it, smiling sweetly.
“Any woman would choose Genie over Duggal!” Anjali said trying to squeeze through the bars of the window. If we held the binoculars outside the bars, we could see a little better.
I clucked my tongue in irritation. That was not what I was wondering. Mrs Duggal must love her odious husband in some way – she still got upset when he looked at other women!
“Do you think he loves Mrs Duggal?” I persisted.
“I don’t think Genie loves Mrs Duggal.”
“I meant does Mr Duggal love Mrs Duggal!”
“He goes back to her every day, na? So, most likely, yes. She’s probably grown on him. She’s the rajma chawal of his life. He’d go hungry and waste away without her,” Anjali chuckled at her own humour.
“Where else could he go?”
“To his mummy.” I glared at her and Anjali laughed some more. She removed the binoculars from her eyes, moved her body back into the flat and turned the binoculars on the boys upstairs. They waved and whistled at her. We saw the PG girls look at the boys. Though there seemed to be some interest between the two groups, I didn’t see them mingle in the building complex.
“They’ve all got girlfriends and boyfriends,” Anjali said reading my mind.
“How do you know?”
“They bring them to their apartments. Then there’s either a huge party, where there are lots of guys and girls, or things are unnaturally quiet. That’s when you know they’re up to something. Did you know the couple in B-606 are not married?”
“No. But how can you tell?”
“I saw an elderly guy going about with her for several days and asked the watchman. He said the old man was 606’s father. Then I asked about the guy who was in her apartment – I called him her husband. The watchman corrected me instantly. Said it was her boyfriend, who had to move out so her old man didn’t know the guy was living there. Though when he said it, it sounded positively… full of masala.”
“Would you live with someone?” I don’t know why that question shot out of my mouth.
“Maybe. If I liked someone. But only as a precursor to marriage. For now. You?”
“I keep thinking someone would have their fun and leave me. It’s like how we Surianis have marriages quick on the heels of an engagement – we’re afraid the marriage may not materialise if the two get to know each other during the engagement period.”
“I’m confused. Was that a Yes or a No?”
“I’m confused too. I doubt it. Besides, with my luck, even if I moved to the Himalayas, or another city, I’m sure someone would make a connection eventually and report me.”
“Even if someone does, you’re an adult. Everyone’s doing it. So can you.”
“Thanks. I’ll remember it… if I ever take such an extreme step.”
“See that word is all wrong – negative. Extreme. Drastic. Just sounds like a Never or Impossible. Do you know that many people get engaged and live together and then marry? Many Indians in the US and UK do that.”
“They don’t have their relatives in their faces.”
“They probably do, and care about what their families think, but it happens anyway.”
“Okay.”
“Well?”
“No.”
“That’s my girl. Prudery is embedded in your DNA. No wonder Joy Uncle and Saroj Aunty love getting their claws into you. After working their magic on their own kids, they are training their guns on you. The ‘action’ in their retired lives,” Anjali snorted derisively.
I’d always been their target anyway. “Why do you say that?”
“I thought you being divorced would keep you out of their line of vision. But frankly Danny’s appearance (FC 54) surprised me. Didn’t it?” Anjali said.
“Yes.” The only people who’d suggested remarriage were old friends of my parents. After meeting several divorcés, I had begged my parents to stop setting up the meetings. I had been a little confident then of finding someone on my own, but now it looked like I’d stay single forever. I turned around and saw Fish watching me quietly. I’d be an old maid, with old fish and maybe an aging parakeet. I wasn’t sure if Anjali or Genie would keep me company. I felt an uncomfortable weight in my stomach and my heart tightened painfully.
Anjali turned to look at me and put the binoculars down. “Let’s decide that by the time we’re 65 or 70, we’ll make serious plans to move nearer each other. Either you near me or me near you.”
I nodded. We had thought of this occasionally over the years. We were too young to think this far – being in our early 30s – but neither of us had parents or support of any sort.
“What if you marry?” I asked.
“What if you marry?”
“We’ll keep the plan at the back of our minds. You and me, if all else fails.”
Anjali crawled out of the window box and sat on the window seat next to me. The boys upstairs continued to wave at us and finally we waved back and moved backwards and out of their view.
******
This is a fictional series about the Mumbai-based narrator and her floating coterie.
