Fishy Chronicles 97 – The Webs We Weave (29)

Joys of school
(Photo credit: A. Peter)

At lunch I managed to sit in the chair next to Jimmy (FC96) just as Mobby lowered himself into it. The breath squeezed out of me, I became lightheaded and things blackened as Mobby’s butt pressed my chest and stomach.

“Hey!” Jimmy pushed Mobby with both hands. Mobby jumped off – too shocked to be his usual rude self. Jimmy shook me, and I took in a deep quavering breath and the room stopped looking grey. Unfortunately, the incident only excited more looks of annoyance among some of the elders, notably my mother, grandmother and father’s sisters. I ignored them. A little body pressed into my side, and I groaned. Rita and Eva, Sarojmama’s daughter – a pestilential 11-year-old, sat beside me. But in the next instant, Roma hauled Rita off her chair and flopped into it. Rita protested and tried to pull Roma off, but it looked like she was trying to budge a massive bull. In the end, Eva scooted to the next chair and Rita sat next to her sister. This was awful, like a silent inquisition, a surveillance in progress – I felt like a fly knowing a swatter was over its head.

I couldn’t ask my questions. Despite Roma disliking Jimmy she wanted to know all that we were doing. Anjali had once suggested that Jimmy might be interested in Roma and so never looked at her because he felt shy. But he talked and joked with other girls – so bashfulness wasn’t the reason for his disinterest.

Then Anjali suggested that Roma might be interested in Jimmy and was miffed by his inattention. That was an interesting point of view, so I watched the two at Sunday School, until I felt cock-eyed and decided to stop. Stopping had to do with the realization that I was overanalysing everything and clearly barking up the wrong tree.

“Masticate your food,” Jimmy muttered.

“Eh?”

“Eat! You’re attracting attention.”

I wanted to tell Jimmy that cows masticated their food, not humans, but he was probably learning a new word with all the livestock at his grandparents’ home. I could see what he meant when I looked up, so I mixed the sambar into the rice, my mouth watering with the aroma, and waited till his mouth was full. “Who’s C?” I whispered in his ear.

I acted innocent until Ashok stopped slapping Jimmy’s back. He had choked on a piece of fish and was red in the face. He blew his nose into his brother’s handkerchief, because of course he hadn’t carried one or had lost his, and gave me a filthy look. That day in the church courtyard (FC95), when Nidhi whacked me on the head, I knew who had written the love letter that dear ‘love pigeon’ Nidhi ferried about the church and school courtyards. I just could not figure out who ‘C’ was or why Jimmy was calling himself a humongous lover T and writing such rot. Anjali’s theory was that Jimmy was fronting for someone else.

I didn’t think so. Could it be the impossible had happened and Jimmy had fallen in love with someone in school?

He was grim all through his meal, though it did not affect his appetite. But I was forced to keep quiet because all the adults’ radars were trained on me now.

I used the ensuing quiet to work on my strategy. Jimmy was going to fob off every question I had. I had lost the advantage of surprise by asking him at lunch – where there was no privacy. Now he would build his defenses in anticipation of my next set of questions.

Whenever I glanced at him, he was eating stiffly, and his brother Paul’s eyes darted from Jimmy to me, forcing me to stay quiet.

Maybe I could use the telephone tonight. I had finally discovered the code – Appachan had been making a call and I was standing nearby. I had spent the rest of that day memorising it and celebrating the discovery. 

                                                            ******

Anjali and I couldn’t figure out why Jimmy was using the initial ‘T’.  Was he using an alphabet from his surname. Was he writing the notes to throw off anyone who’d intercept them? It was all farfetched. Why would someone make Jimmy write a note that his girlfriend might not be able to read? Jimmy’s handwriting was worse than a doctor’s.

Plus, it was too elaborate for Jimmy, who liked to charge ahead first and then think. He wasn’t middle-man material.

And then the letter explained Paul’s interest in it. Did he think his baby brother had a love interest? Paul should never know. Jimmy would tell me. In his own time. Maybe. Maybe later. Maybe never.

At the gate, while bidding them goodbye, I told Jimmy, “So you’re going to act as if there are no C and T and that you don’t know what the note is about?”

“Shhhh!”

“Why? I have nothing to hide!”

“Shhh!”

“Don’t shhh me! Anyway, Paul’s been asking me about the note.”

Before he could reply, his father grabbed his arm and hustled him into a rickshaw. As the yellow and black rickshaw hurtled down the uneven road, he looked dismayed and did not wave goodbye.

“What did you say to Jimmy?” Roma said softly, her breath tickling my neck.

I turned and walked back to the house. A few steps from the doorway, a sharp pain shot through my shoulder – Roma’s fingers were digging into my flesh. She pulled me away from the door and slammed me against the wall, her arm jamming my throat.

“You idiot. You dare fool around with me!” Roma thundered in my face, her breath smelling of sambar and pickle. There was a bit of curry leaf stuck between her bared teeth.

There was nothing for it… I pinched her breast hard. She screamed and let me go, grabbing her chest but feeling embarrassed to rub it. I darted into the house, and looked for a hiding place. None was available, so I sat near Pilipochyan, and pretended to be interested in a Malayalam magazine. Roma rushed in and stopped. I looked up nervously. She gave me a dirty look, but seemed intimidated by Pilipochyan’s presence, especially when I held out the magazine and pointed at an article. Roma marched off. She would be waiting for me, sometime and somewhere, probably with her minions.

                                                            ******

“I tell you, Anjali, he’s hiding something! He’s probably T!”

“No way! There’s no girl in school who could make him interested in her.”

“What rubbish. There are hundreds of pretty girls in school. It’s a paradise for boys.”

“But you know Jimmy, na. He doesn’t like ordinary girls.”

“Kuch bhi. He talks only to ordinary girls.”

“Why are you whispering? And why are you calling me so late at night?”

“Everyone’s sleeping and I’m not supposed to be using the telephone here. They’d skin me if they knew I was making a long-distance call. Why haven’t you been replying to my letters?” My cries of desperation in longhand, I wanted to add.

“Er, I was busy.”

“Doing what?”

“You know Trevor?”

“Trevor Mascarenhas, your brother’s friend?” And Anjali’s latest crush.

“Yes. He’s got a new girlfriend.”

“What! Who’s your source?”

“It’s not important.”

“Of course it is.” It was the difference between reliable and unreliable gossip.

There was silence on the other side, so I asked, “How is Anita taking it?” Anita was Trevor’s erstwhile girlfriend. She was a year our senior in school and only became our focus because she and Trevor had become close walking up and down the shady corners of the school during recess. Their break-up had been a hot topic for days in our class, because many girls had a crush on Trevor. And, unfortunately for Anita, she was in our school bus. Not that she spoke about Trevor, although when she did speak to her friends about him it was in whispers. We tried to catch every word despite the sounds of whooshing air and Mumbai traffic coming in through the bus’s open windows. We closed the window next to us, and suffocated in the heat while listening to the whispered conversations going on in the seat in front of us. We heard snatches, mostly cuss words and expressions of sympathy from Anita’s friends.

For this privilege, we had to dislodge the kids that were already in the seat behind Anita, which led to a one-sided scuffle. One sided because we were bigger than the younger kids, although we had to get through some loud wailing and the occasional well-aimed kicks to our ankles. Things settled down soon, when the children couldn’t get a rise out of us – our efforts at eavesdropping meant we stayed hunched unresponsively in our seats for most of the long ride home.

“I think Anita has taken the breakup very well. She’s hooked up with Benny Wong.”

“What!”

“And Trevor took Sarita Kumar to Juhu Beach.”

There were too many things going on. Suddenly Jimmy was unimportant. Trevor-Sarita, Benny-Anita – the mind boggled. All the girls wanted to be friends with Benny, because he was clearly a foreigner, though his family – originally from China – had been in Mumbai for over 60 years. He was very cute and a flirt. A charmer, a girl’s boy. Anita was the unattainable hottie, and Trevor’s ex.

“So where are we on ‘T’…?” I spotted the bunch of keys dangling from Appachan’s drawer. He rarely forgot them at his desk. At night he dropped the keys into the top drawer of the chest of drawers in his bedroom. But tonight they were innocently stuck in a keyhole. I pulled the drawer’s handle – it was open. I moved the lamp closer to the edge of the desk – papers, envelopes, official-looking letters, printed pamphlets.

“You’ll have to try harder with Jimmy,” Anjali said, startling me. This was easier said than done. Anyway, I had probably run up a large telephone bill for Appachan. Would he ask the telephone exchange for a bill with all the telephone numbers listed, like the cops did in American TV serials? Or maybe he’d call all the telephone numbers and verify them for himself. “Will ring you another day, Anjali.” I hung up before she could reply.

Anjali would be annoyed, but there was Appachan’s desk to be explored. I listened for a sound around the house, then used the keys to open the other drawers – files, bundles of cash – 100s and 500s and smaller ones of lower-denomination notes, a little filigreed silver bowl containing small change, a pair of spectacles. In the lowest one, I found some dried flowers sticking out of a dictionary, big fat books that seemed to be encyclopedias but were ancient telephone books, some smooth white stones that I suspected were the ones that were found in the flower pot in Sarayumama’s room and had likely been in my jhola the day I damaged Bobby (FC72, FC73), and irrevocably spoilt relations with my eldest aunt at the start of my vacation here. In the lowest drawer, there were some albums, yellowing documents and leaves of loose paper, and… I gasped, feeling the adrenaline rush through me faster, the photographs from the loft – the ones of the handsome Sardar and Sarojmama (FC69, FC70). How had Appachan been able get up into the loft and retrieve them?

I pulled out the envelop and looked at the photos. They were a handsome couple. The colours in the photos were fading. There were some photos taken in a garden against a large flower bush. Sarojmama had a large red rose behind one ear and her long plaited hair rested on one shoulder. There was a photo of them holding hands with the Taj Mahal in the background, just one photo – a polaroid snap. I had a strange sad feeling looking at the pictures. I looked at them over and over, wondering what had happened to their romance, why they hadn’t stayed together. I put the pictures back into their cover reluctantly and then saw the letters addressed to Sarojmama, tied in a bundle, right at the bottom. I tugged one out from the side, but it was likely to tear. I knelt on the ground and reached in. My heart jerked at the sound of a door opening.

I shoved the envelop and its photos back on top of the bundle of letters and moved the rest of Appachan’s papers over them and locked the drawer as quietly as I could. I stayed under the table, switched off the lamplight hurriedly, and gently slipped the key back into the top right-hand drawer of Appachan’s desk. I wanted to come back and read the letters, but I didn’t want to risk taking Appachan’s keys – he would raise hell if he couldn't find them. But it was unlikely this opportunity would come again. I wondered if I should have kept one of the photographs, if I needed them. For purposes of blackmail or to put my aunt in her place in an argument.

The door to the bathroom in the corridor opened, and closed noisily. I keyed the locking code back into the telephone and ran back to my bedroom.

                                                            ******

The narrator makes a long distance call to her best friend and is apprised of new developments. 

This is a work of fiction and is the latest episode of the Webs We Weave series. You can read the earlier ones here   FC69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80,81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96)

                                                            ******

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Fishy Chronicles 95 – The Webs We Weave (27)

 

A shadow fell on me. I belatedly realised it was a cloud.

My legs felt leaden but I pushed myself to put one foot ahead of the other. I felt I was crawling, but reached Appa’s side in a matter of seconds. I forced myself to look at the fair man standing next to Sam Uncle. He was handsome as hell, especially with his black hair slicked back. Sam Uncle’s son Paul Mathew took in my slow plod expressionlessly. His equally handsome cousin Ashok Thomas, who had a fan following (male and female), in school, smiled, looking embarrassed.

Some weeks ago, my cousin Roma, her best friend Serena Mammen, and I were watching a group of boys from a corner of our church’s compound in Mumbai. We mimicked an intense conversation, but our eyes and ears were on the group of boys-cum-men in front of us.

Evelyn John, a senior at school and from another parish, had started coming to this church and was often seen in the company of these boys.

“Why is she hogging our guys?” Serena groused.

Had the boys ever been ours in any sense?

“Beauty Verghese said Evelyn already has a boyfriend in her church. She was found out, but is still seeing him. Why is she coming here now? Do you think she’s broken up with him?” Roma said, looking at Serena.

“Is Beauty related to Kurian?” Serena said, referring to the tallest skinniest boy in the group.

“One of those guys is her brother or cousin," Roma said.

“Isn’t Ashok’s sister in your class?” Serena looked at me.

“No.”

Roma poked me. “She is!”

“No. She’s not,” I said with feeling. Nidhi made my life a living hell. She had hated me for no reason for years, had managed to isolate me in class, and made snide jokes behind my back.

“Why so hoity toity?” Serena turned her warm caramel eyes on me. It felt like a pool I could slowly drown in. Did girls like girls? Yes, they were called lesbians. I shook myself and continued to look at the boys. I saw Paul, now in engineering college, glance our way and a heavy sigh escaped me. Our eyes met and I turned around and began to walk to the other side of the church. I needed to go home and eat.

A hand grabbed my shoulder, and forced me to slow down. The arm attached to the hand quickly slid around my neck and Serena fell in step. “What happened at school yesterday?” she asked softly.

Roma was on my other side and they had me hemmed in. “Nothing.”

“I heard you got into a fight with Nidhi Thomas.”

I took a deep breath. These nosey, irritating girls. Didn’t they know a mob would set on me if I blabbed? I walked on, with difficulty. Both girls now had me in a vice-hold, forcing me to stop.

“No fight. I’m not talking to her and she and her… ‘friends’ … have been troubling me.”

“Why?” Serena asked.

“She thinks I’m interested in Ashok and warned me off.” Ashok was Nidhi’s older brother.

“Really?” Roma said with glee.

“I don’t know how she came to know this.”

“So you are interested in Ashok!” Serena said.

“NO, damn it! I’m not!”

“See, when you get so defensive it means something’s up,” Serena said.

“I agree,” Roma chimed in. They now had me pinned against a pillar near the church’s doorway. Roma started tickling me.

I laughed. I couldn’t stand it. “No. Noooo. No! Anjali likes him and I’m keeping tabs on him. But please, please, please it’s a secret.”

“She’s a Hindu and nobody would stand for it,” Roma said of my best friend.

“Who’s getting married? We just look at them. It’s not like they look back!” Those pretty, very hairy, boys only had eyes for the beautiful girls in school and in church. What chance did two 14-year-olds, that everyone looked through, stand at romance. Worse, Anjali looked Rastafarian with her curly hair, which resembled dreadlocks.

Nidhi and her group were giving me side glances and giggling. It was awful being near them. Worse, other girls had started ignoring me and keeping their distance.

Roma and Serena looked at the girls opposite us and murmured. I had been sharing my misery with Roma at recess everyday and even then my trauma didn’t lessen.

Nidhi’s pack began to swan towards us. One of the girls shoved me aside and walked into the church. I backed away.

Just then Santosh George, a boy two years my senior in school, waved at Nidhi and she went over to him. They had a short conversation and he passed her a piece of paper. She smiled like she had eaten a big bowl of custard and began making her way towards the church entrance. Most of her friends were now inside. One of them waited at the doorway. Nidhi wrestled with her fluorescent pink satchel, took out her pencil box, shoved the folded paper in and closed it.

But Nidhi didn’t notice it fall out and flutter to the ground. I walked past her and picked it up. This particular kind of blue paper note was being passed around by some older girls in school – they huddled in groups and giggled over it. Did people spray perfume on it, like in the movies? I felt a sting on the back of my head. I felt another harder blow and whirled around to see Nidhi’s face stretched into an ugly snarl. She hit me on the forehead, before a hand caught hers and Paul said angrily, “Stop it, Nidhi!”

Roma and Serena were now by my side, as were Paul’s friends. Roma babbled angrily at Nidhi and tried to press my forehead. I felt tears fall and pushed away. I slammed into my father.

“What happened, mol? What happened?” He tried to pry my hand off my forehead, but I couldn’t stop the pain in my temple or stop crying. He held me close and around me there were sounds of people coming nearer and questions from the parishioners. Serena and Roma were taking turns to tell Joychayan what had transpired. Appa pulled me backwards, to the side of the church, out of everyone’s view, and after a long time I let him look at my face. He touched what felt like a mountainous swelling on my forehead and I moved his hand to the back of my head to rub gently at the other nubs of pain, where that vicious, vicious girl had hit me twice more.

He massaged my head silently. My mother was by our side in a few minutes, asking questions and wiping my face with her sari pallu.

Appa disappeared soon, and Amma ordered me to stay put and rushed after him. I followed them, suddenly frightened for their well-being – Nidhi’s family were bigshots in church, and everyone either fawned over them or claimed they were related to them.

Nidhi’s father had his hands on my father’s arms and was talking to him, rather calmly considering the severity of his daughter’s crime. But my father was staring angrily at Nidhi, who was now conveniently bawling into her brother’s shirtfront. Joychayan tried to push away Nidhi’s father Joey, but seemed more interested in the conversation. Soon, Nidhi’s uncles and aunts surrounded her family and they all slid into their cars and evaporated. The remaining onlookers, mostly friends, were embarrassed at being caught watching. Joychayan made light of the incident – much to Roma’s and Serena’s indignation. Something was clearly rotten in the state of Denmark. So, so unfair.

I sat on the bench at the side of the church and felt sorry for Appa and Amma. We were as minute, invisible and powerful as an atom in the universe. And unfortunately Appa lacked even his brother’s loyalty.

Which is why I could not understand how Appa was being so friendly now to Joey Uncle’s brother Sam. They are good friends, the contrary voice in my head reminded me. But I lost my nerve looking at Sam Uncle, his son Paul and nephew Ashok, feeling guilty and embarrassed – even though I was the one who had been damaged. That word seemed most appropriate considering the overall harm Nidhi had caused me – the beating, the mental trauma, the intense humiliation. She was Satan’s spawn and I was breathing the same air as she in school, in church and as family friends… and I couldn’t do a thing about it. I fretted about her tyranny over me most days and it was affecting me emotionally. My only support was Anjali, who had a name for Nidhi – bully, or rather several – big bully, stupid bully, brainless bully, crack bully. Nidhi was scared of Anjali, and for good reason.

Nidhi, or one of her cronies, had locked Anjali into a school toilet one day, leading our class teacher to punish Anjali for loitering. Nidhi and her friends had laughed when Anjali was ordered to stand outside the classroom for the whole period.

But Anjali fought back. She locked the girls in the toilets or classroom several times after that, forcing all of Nidhi’s mean girls to be in a constant state of terror. Not just that. Their things disappeared. And sometimes they were found lying outside, on the ground below – probably thrown out of our classroom window. Even if Nidhi and her friends could see their belongings strewn on the grounds, by the time they raced down three storeys their things had disappeared. The crows took little things like sweets and shiny objects and tore apart small packets of chips and snacks, while the kindergarteners on the ground floor took whatever they could get to before the crows. Most of the KG class kiddies burst into tears and screamed if the big girls tried to prise their belongings from the little ones’ fists, pushing the KG teachers to complain to the principal.

The girls complained, and their parents did too, to the class teacher. But Anjali and everyone else denied all knowledge of what was going on. And when the parents became bold enough to approach Anjali’s parents, Narayanan Uncle, a well-known lawyer, suggested they advise their children that it was a crime to harass and beat children, even if their children were minors.

Also, Anjali’s siblings were popular in school and Nidhi soon stopped trying to bully Anjali.

Appa dragged me along with him, his arm firmly around me, and Sam Uncle and Paul fell in step.

“Feeling okay now?” Paul asked me.

“What do you mean?”

“Your head. Nidhi.”

“No, I’m not. How can I be?” I forgot how tongue-tied I got in Paul’s presence. “She’s a brute and was allowed to get away scot-free!”

Paul’s mouth tightened and his back stiffened. He hurried forward to join Ashok.

I felt something in me sink. I couldn’t remember a time when we ever conversed, and here I had driven Paul away by tearing apart his cousin. But Nidhi was someone who needed to be torn apart.

While I looked longingly at his bobbing back, my father whispered in my ear, “They are coming back with us for lunch. You know Sam is a good friend of Rajan. Your Upappan (paternal uncle) will be happy to see him.”

                                                            ******

All through our journey home I wondered how to handle things hereon. I didn’t want to spoil my relations with Paul or Ashok just because Nidhi was an unadulterated ass. We were all family friends and because of her conking me on the head with her metal pencil case relations between our families had become strained. This was why I was staying mum about how Nidhi was treating me in school.

We were never friends. I was too boyish and she too girlish and we did not care for each other from very early on.

As we got off our scooter at the house, I felt a tap on my shoulder and Paul murmured, “Hang back a bit. I need to talk to you.”

My spirits soared – what did he want with me?

I dawdled while Appa led the others into our house. I walked towards my guava tree and Paul followed. Most of my family had come into the sitting room to greet Sam Uncle and Ashok.

“What is it?” I said, trying not to sound hoarse. I felt nervous alone with Paul.

“What was in the note you read that day?”

“Eh?”

“The note you picked up in church last month.”

There was a kind of intensity in Paul. “Why do you want to know?”

He was taken aback. “Just… curious.”

“I didn’t read the note.”

“You’re joking! You spent almost a full minute reading it.”

It had taken me that long to read the six lines because of the shitty handwriting. Perhaps the reader had had to guess at things and imagine love. Perhaps that was why the notes were an ongoing affair.

“Did you forget that your cousin conked me on the head?”

“Who was the note addressed to?”

“I couldn’t make out. The handwriting was bad.”

“Bullshit! Stop toying with me. Be careful or you’ll have more to worry about from me than with Nidhi! Spill it out!”

I stared at the pink-faced fart in front of me. I couldn’t believe he was threatening me.

“Abhay sala, kuthe, kaminey. How dare you stand in my compound and threaten me. If I shout out my uncles will come and make mincemeat out of you and spread you under the tapioca trees like manure!”

I opened my mouth to recite this Bollywood-style dialogue I had just concocted. The swearing I had been practising for some weeks to lay it on whoever I could, after duly evaluating how far I could get with it of course. I closed my lips and licked them. As the air cooled my lips, I realised I was tossing away my fraction of a fraction’s chance to marry this man of my dreams. If I was an idiot and used my angry-young-woman dialogue, I would probably stay unmarried for life. Even though the voice in my head laughed at the idea and told me I had a better chance of marrying Brad Pitt, I wondered what Nidhi would do. Anjali’s voice sounded in my head, “She would act like a pathetic, whiny, sugary, twisty woman!” We had debated that often, watching older girls in action – the extra-wide coy smiles, unwavering eye contact, fluttering eyelashes, wild laughing at bad jokes, inability to smell the boy’s terrible body odour, etc, etc. Mostly it involved smiling and being constantly wide-eyed and blinking. It looked uncomfortable, but according to Anjali’s dad, who was listening to us while we watched a couple through a pair of binoculars, it would get easier in time. Anjali and I agreed he was joking.

The reason I couldn’t tell was that I was afraid of Nidhi. I had told only Anjali what was in the note. We knew it had to stay a secret.

“Well?” Paul demanded.

“Please believe me, I couldn’t read the note. The handwriting was very, very bad,” I said in a breathy baby-girl voice like Marilyn Monroe’s.

His nostrils flared, and he looked as though he was debating whether to believe me. “Who was it addressed to?”

I shrugged and began to hurry towards the main door.

In the whole minute it took me to read the note, I had chuckled at the rubbish in it but hadn’t been able to figure out who the “baby doll C” was or “your humongous lover” the writer T.

But one thing was certain. Paul knew more about the note than he was letting on.

                                                            ******

The narrator is remembering a long summer vacation at her paternal grandparents home in Kerala. Initially idyllic, the vacation soon takes a dark turn. (Please note this is a work of fiction and is the latest episode of the Webs We Weave series. You can read the earlier episodes at: FC69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80,81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94)

#love #school #youngadult #fiction #YA #paul #mathew #sam #ashok #fishychronicles #nidhi #sundayschool #younglove #boys #girlfriend #boyfriend #church #crow #kindergarten #kids #children #foodpackets #lovenotes #bluepaper #perfume #loveletters #schoolyard #scooter #bollywood #bollywooddialogues #kaminey #kuthe #sala #hindiswearwords #bully #brainless #crack #pencilbox #bumponforehead #snacks #kurkure #apeter #websweweave #tapioca #trees #manure #mincemeat #babydoll #C #yourhumongouslover #lover #writer #marilynmonroe #bradpitt #marriage #unmarried #fractions #hollywood #younglove #carameleyes #lesbian #romance #rastafarian #curlyhair #dreadlocks #cousins #mumbai #bodyodour #kerala #keralavillage #vacation #fictionseries #summervacation #summerlove

Fishy Chronicles 91: The Webs We Weave (23) – Black sheep

My heart beat loudly in my ears and throat. When Rita began to squirm I realised I was holding her too tightly. My arms loosened and she stepped back a little. We stayed quiet, listening for noises in the corridor. 

I put my finger to my lips, mostly to stall Rita’s questions and to think of an excuse. I had serious thinking to do.

A phone call to Johnny was out of the question now, not that I agreed that Sarah’s engagement needed to be broken. Johnny was a prick for making Sarah fall in love with him and letting her go – a maha prick.

But Sarah… maybe we had to leave her alone now. That was what everyone else was doing. She had more or less hidden herself since the news broke. For a while things at home had been subdued. I wondered often if Sarayumama had had a hand in it, but I didn’t think her intelligence stretched so far.

But how would she have known about Rebecca and Roy. Whenever I could, I watched my aunt. When her gaze settled on Sarah she sometimes smirked, but as the days passed her joy too diminished.

A door opened and we heard footsteps, they approached the store room and Rita and I crouched behind the table in the store room. It was Rita’s mom Elsamama. I put my finger on Rita’s lips and shook my head. Aunty was going to start working on tea and snacks. Soon a couple of other footsteps followed. The low murmurs were hard to decipher, but I heard Sarah mentioned, and when they paused by us in the storeroom my mother’s arm was around Anniemama’s shoulder. In a few minutes, Anniemama straightened, wiped her face with the pallu of her sari and they walked into the kitchen. We tiptoed to the doorway and looked out carefully into the corridor.

We touched our palms in a silent high five and disappeared in different directions. But at my door I found Mobby and Bobby in their room’s doorway. They gave me filthy looks and Bobby kicked the door shut.

I sighed in relief. It saved me some explanations. My father was fast asleep on his side and I lay gently on my mother’s part of the bed.

“Where did you go?” Appa asked, turning onto his back. I shot up, fright coursing through me.

“Appa!”

“Where did you go?”

“O-out in-in the-the compound,” I stuttered, my heart in my throat.

“Where were you planning to go?” my father was on his side now, facing me, his expression guarded.

“Er, er, nowhere.”

“You don’t know or don’t want to say?” My father’s look was uncompromising. There was no way I could lie. I looked ahead, at the ancient faded calendar on the wall. It had a picture of Jesus on it and so the calendar stayed on the wall, turning more yellow over the years.

“Mol… what do I keep telling you?”

“Er,” my mind raced. Appa gave me all sorts of advice all the time. “Er, not to lie or steal or cheat?”

His nostrils flared and his hard look relaxed somewhat. He shook his head. I tried again. “Er, not to eat other people’s food without asking?”

This time Appa chuckled. “Have you been eating other people’s food without asking?”

“No!”

“Do you know who visited me just before you came into the room?” (FC90)

The air emptied out of my chest and heat suffused my face, but I could only stare at Appa helplessly. I closed my mouth and straightened my back.

“Well, mol?”

“I think I did all the errands Ammachi wanted me to do today…” I looked at my hands.

“That is not what I asked.”

“No… I… don’t know who came to meet you.” Maybe one of the two men who came in through the front door about 20 minutes ago. In all probability my two eldest uncles, whom I would try hard to avoid today and until they lost interest in me.

“Rajanoopapan said you were spy…er… listening to their conversation from behind the shed.”

“I did not spy on them!”

“Then what were you doing behind the shed.”

“I was waiting for Rita and I saw Georgiechyan and Rajanchyan coming towards my spot near the tree and so I ran behind the shed because I didn’t want them to ask me about why I was there.”

“Why were you there?”

I gritted my teeth and glared at my dad. I was fed up of this bullshit cloak-and-dagger stuff. “I was waiting for Rita.”

“You just told me that. What were you going to do?”

“We were going to the junction to make a phone call…” 

Appa looked irritated. “How many times have I told you not to leave the compound without us knowing, and taking Rita too! She’s only eight years old!”

“Ten, Appa, 10! And we did not leave the compound.”

“But you have before!”

“Er, not really. Never alone, Appa. But I do go to Kunjappachan’s house alone, which you know about because I always tell you.”

“But you have stepped out of the compound without telling us.”

“Mostly with Sarahchechi.”

“Mol, just tell me the truth about why you were roaming about the courtyard when you were supposed to be in the house.”

“I-I wanted to call Johnnychyan and ask him why he broke the engagement.”

My father’s brow knotted, his mouth tightened and he inhaled very slowly. “What did I tell you about interfering in things that do not concern you.”

“I know Appa, but they are in love. They spoke every night after the engagement, for a-a long time.” Hours really, but Appa didn’t have to know.

“What?”

“Er, how can you just break an engagement?”

“One can, all the time. But you don’t need to go and set things right because you think you have a stake in it?”

Stake? What did he mean? “Appa, Sarahchechi didn’t know why Johnnychyan wouldn’t call her. I just wanted to know why. Doesn’t she deserve the truth?”

“Yes. But if Johnny doesn’t want to level with her, after… he talked to her, every night you say?”

“Yes.”

“How do you know?” 

I hesitated. 

“Your TV business?” Appa said, with sudden clarity.

“Yes, Appa, I wanted to watch TV. I walked in on Sarahchechi soon after the engagement and I thought my ear would come off my head.”

“Serves you right. If Johnny doesn’t want to talk to Sarahmol then that is what she will have to accept.”

“But that’s cruel!”

“Yes.”

"How can that be okay!”

“It isn’t, but that is the way things are.”

“Aren’t we going to ask his family?”

“And lose our dignity over it? No.”

“But why not!”

“They are not worth the effort.”

“If it was my daughter I’d go over there and beat the shit out of them!”

Appa grinned, his teeth showing, and just as quickly the smile disappeared. He held out his arms, and I crawled across the bed and we leaned back against the headboard. A thought struck me. “If someone broke his engagement with me would you stay quiet?”

Appa stiffened, “I’d want to know why this boy didn’t want my beautiful, brilliant daughter. But then I’d think it was probably for the best – perhaps you were better off without him.” Appa looked at me, “What do you think, Mol?”

“If I fell in love with him, I’d want to break his legs for ending things with me.” Appa laughed. “But I hope someone never does that.”

Appa body moved when he nodded. “You know that listening to a conversation is bad manners, right?”

“I’m sorry, Appa.”

“You will have to apologise to your uncles.”

“No! No, Appa, please don’t make me! I will die of shame.”

“Good. It will teach you something I haven’t been able to. And whatever you heard, stays with you.”

I remained silent, feeling glum and embarrassed. When he threw off his bedsheet and started getting up, I held his shoulder. “Mol, I cannot let it go, you have to tell Rajan and Georgie that you are sorry.”

“Er, no, Appa. I wanted to ask.. did you know about Roychyan and Rebecca chechi?”

Appa let out a sigh. “Not until Rajan told me this morning.”

“What will happen now?”

“Nothing.”

“Er, I meant about Roychyan and Rebecca chechi?”

“Nothing.”

“But, but will Georgiechyan and Anniemama be angry? Will they force them to divorce?”

Appa turned and held my hands. “No, Mol. We cannot divorce for such silly reasons. I imagine Georgie will be talking to the two, but there’s nothing both sets of parents can do about it. Georgiecha and Anniemama and the rest of the family will have to make peace with it.”

“Er, what about Kunjappachan and Ammachi?” I asked about Roy’s grandparents.

“Maybe they will be just as angry as your Appachan and Ammachi. We’ll have to wait and see. Don’t share any opinions, be quiet at all times.”

I glared at Appa, it didn’t sound polite. He saw my angry look. “It’s not our business, and all of the family will be under tremendous stress. So, stay out of everyone’s line of vision. Don’t offer an opinion, don’t resurrect broken engagements, leave Sarah and Johnny alone. If Johnny thinks he can get better, he is welcome to. Now come on, that smell is wonderful.”

“You eat etheka appams almost every afternoon!”

“Yes, but today it smells especially good. I want your apology out of the way by tonight.

“Okay,” I said feeling very small.

                                         ****** 

In the dining room, I was less than thrilled to see my eldest uncles seated together. They looked up, Georgiechyan’s eyes instantly narrowing and Rajanchyan’s crinkling in a smile. I couldn't understand why. He waved at my father and Appa’s hand pulled my elbow along. Did he want me to humiliate myself in full view of the family?

Appa made me sit next to Rajanchyan and he sat at my other side.

Uncle smiled and put a faded quarter plate in front of me and two etheka appams on it and asked me if I wanted tea. I nodded, looking at him from the corner of my eyes. I needed to be on my guard. Plus, I had to fit in an apology somewhere. The sooner I could slide it in the better.

“I believe you are in the company of adults now, Mol,” the etheka appam was too hot and I unceremoniously spat out the large bite, dropping the appam in a hurry into my plate. There was a gasp from my grandmother, followed by her and her eldest daughter screwing up their faces in my direction. I put the piece of appam back in my mouth, after making sure it had cooled. That elicited another few murmurs of disgust from the ladies, but no one else seemed to have noticed.

“What do you mean, Rajanchyan?” Why did these adults talk in circles? Pilipochyan always wanted me to glean a moral out of whatever he said, so too Appa, and if I was slow in understanding any of what Ammachi said, I was sure to understand better with a beating – even if I didn’t understand. There had to be an expiry date for beatings. I looked at Appa, he was looking at me oddly. So I looked back at Rajanchyan, rather my eyes veered away from his to his ears which seemed pointy at their topmost tips like Mr Spock’s.

“What you heard was only meant for the adults, ok, yes?” I felt shocked, but nodded vigorously.

“I-I’m sorry, I d-didn’t mean to listen to what you were saying… but I was waiting for Rita a-and didn’t want to be found by anyone else. So I hid behind the shed.”

“I believe you, Mol.” I didn’t believe him, but bobbed my head some more. Nobody believed me. My stock was at an all-time low here. I felt relief quarrel with suspicion. “Can’t tell anyone though.”

What did he think I was! “Of course. Er, but… but isn’t everyone going to know soon?”

Appa tapped my shoulder and Georgiechyan looked at me menacingly. He always seemed a pussycat in front of his daughters. I looked down at my appams, which were fast losing their charm.

But Rajanchyan chuckled and despite myself I looked up at him. “Yes. Very soon. But it’s best you leave any news breaks to the adults.”

“Okay.”

“Any questions?”

“Eh?”

“Aren’t there anymore questions.”

“Yes, but you said I can’t ask.”

“I did not say that.”

“Okay. Appa or someone else must have.”

“What do you want to ask me?”

“What’s going to happen?”

“What’s going to happen where?”

I took a deep breath. Rajanchyan’s eyes were laughing and Georgiechyan’s face was hardening. Appa was listening raptly.

I pulled Rajanchyan’s face nearer mine and said, “What’s going to happen to Rebecca chechi?” I turned my ear towards his mouth for his answer.

“Nothing really. There will be a lot of drama here, crying, threats, some blackmail, mostly from the elders and Sarayu. But no one here can break the marriage.”

“So then, what’s the problem?”

“They are second cousins, things will be uncomfortable for the immediate family for some time. But things will blow over after a while.”

“Will we be forced to stop talking to Rebecca?” That had happened to one of Appa’s cousins. My aunt had eloped with a Hindu man and only a few years later did the family allow her to visit. One year, Ammachi would not open the front door, despite the visitors knowing we were at home. Kunjappachan had never had any such issues.

“Will Kunjappachan have a problem? And Thomaskuttychyan?” Thomaskutty was Kunjappachan’s second son and Roy’s dad.

“Probably. But we’ll have to wait and see. Anything else?”

“If there can’t be anything done about it, why the fuss?”

Rajanchyan threw back his head and let out a bark of laugher. His arm squeezed my neck and I started tapping it for him to loosen his grip. He loosened his arm and pulled me closer to him and laughed some more. His children looked surprised. When he had composed himself, he said only so I could hear, “I agree, Mol. Why the fuss. It will be a novelty only for a few days. They are not exactly siblings, though if it were a marriage between outsiders, it would be an excellent match.”

That was true. Both Roy and Rebecca had beauty, brains and ambition. And from the little I understood of family connections, they were well placed.

“And after I heard the stories about you, I thought this family was missing its black sheep and keen to find a replacement.” He wiggled his eyebrows and grinned.

Me, a black sheep? I shook my head several times. They had it wrong. Black sheepery was for more serious crimes.

“Do you know what a black sheep is?” Rajanchyan asked softly, placing another snack on my plate, and pushing my tea closer.

“Er, yes, sort of.”

“Do you consider yourself one?”

“No!”

“Good. Don’t bother about what other people think or say. Just be yourself.” He paused, “Do you think I’m one?”

I hesitated. All the stories I had heard pointed to him being one in his youth. He had been a rabble rouser – part of the student union, disappearing from home without notice for days due to local political campaigns, his activeness in church, and he was very handsome in his early pictures. Plus, he failed a year in college. But all that changed when he met Sisly Aunty. His family had made peace with all this, but his parents couldn’t forgive him for following his heart. “No. I don’t think you are one.”

“Anyone here look like one?”

I looked around the table. My family ate noisily and bantered loudly, while the kids ate with their mouths open and spilled tea on and around the plastic place mats that Ammachi insisted we use. Most of them were undiluted idiots, including Rajanchyan’s kids, but how to be impolite and say so. And how could a sheep be wicked because its fleece was black. He was just being a normal sheep. Clearly his colouring was due to his genes – a black daddy or mummy. When my father and Uncle started laughing, I realised I had said it aloud. I was also thinking of the black cat that people were afraid of in the village. My neighbours considered it evil. What was wrong with its black fur? The villagers and even people in my neighbourhood in Bombay took torturous routes around the black cats they encountered or threw stones at them. But Kunjappachyan next door loved the black cat and it often lolled under the shade of a jackfruit tree near the window of his room or on his window sill.

I watched my family looking at us with interest and my grandmother frowned, her eyes on me, for sure assuming I was the villain. Rajanchyan continued to murmur in my ear, “Well, for now, you and I have been displaced by dear Rebecca.”

I heard a car pull up outside the gate. It squeaked steadily as it was opened and the tyres of a car churned the gravel in the courtyard, slowly and heavily. We heard car doors shut and about a minute later the doorbell rang. A sudden silence fell on the group in the dining room. And then as one, chairs scraped backwards and people began to scramble towards the main door.

                              ******

This series is fictional and follows the narrator who is remembering events related to a family vacation in Kerala. 

Mol's father confronts her about eavesdropping on her uncles' conversation.

Read the entire The Webs We Weave series here FC69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80,81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94

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