For Fountainahas the night before Good Friday was a watershed in its rather uneventful history; many years after that fateful night, women in the neighborhood would habitually use it as a point of reference to establish facts: so-and-so’s age for example. ‘Oh! Don’t you remember? She was almost knee high that Good Friday!’ That night as Maggie lay on her bed fiddling with the safety pins that dangled from her bangles; her mind refused captivity. It strayed to the exact moment that afternoon when she’d bumped into Jacinto on her way to the bakery. She’d briefly dated the nerdy boy when they were both at the University. Thereafter, he’d left for some godforsaken country carved out of the erstwhile USSR for his medical degree. As the months passed the frequency of letters diminished; it finally came to naught when she learned that he’d married some blonde. Until today, he was but a faint memory for her: she’d even forgotten what he sounded like.

‘Magpie! Is that you?’ is how he’d called out to her. But for the endearment she’d have had no clue about the identity of this man.

‘Oh Jacinto! Is that you?’ she’d almost cried in astonishment, ‘after all these years!’

‘Doctor Jacinto Machado,’ he’d corrected her with a shy smile. She could see that he was genuinely pleased to see her; she was a tad embarrassed, but glad nonetheless. They’d spent the next quarter of an hour talking about loved ones gained and lost, his divorce, her loneliness, how she still looked young and the beauty of the Uzbek countryside. She was amazed at how little the intervening years showed on him. He was still muscular–– a slight paunch notwithstanding––his hair was still the same shade of coal, and he had retained his painfully shy demeanor. As they parted he’d extracted a promise from her for a visit to his clinic on the main street.

Just as Maggie rose to switch the lights off, they went off on their own and the noisy fan stopped whirring. She could hear the Lopes’ twins from the second floor shriek at the top of their voices; they would yell twice as loud whenever the power was restored. Convinced that a fuse was blown, Maggie struggled to find a torch in the darkness. As her eyes grew accustomed to the inkiness around her, she saw the metallic torch glistening eerily in the moonlight that crept in through the window. She hastily slipped a stole over her nightgown and walked busily toward the door with the torch’s narrow beam dictating her measured walk. As she opened the door, she was taken aback at the sights her eyes took in.

She could clearly see at least six burly policemen running up the wooden staircase. They were shouting instructions in Konkani to the remaining men who stood in the courtyard. Some of the men spread out around the Villa in some pattern that made no sense to her. She could hear their enormous dogs growling and barking; the shouts of her tenants added to the chaos. Maggie could clearly hear Sandra calling out for Mia––asking her to stop. Her heart missed a beat as she saw a man climb over the first floor grille, dangle there for some unsure seconds and finally jump into the courtyard. The policemen cursed from the first floor after the man and the men in the courtyard grappled the daredevil not before some gunshots were fired in the air. The cries of the womenfolk of Grace Villa woke up the entire neighborhood as the lights miraculously came on: both in the Villa and in the terracotta-roofed houses around it.

Maggie’s pupils got smaller and smaller until she could say for sure that the defeated man who was presently handcuffed was Lawrence. He was sprawled on the ground chest down, with his hands resting uncomfortably on the small of his back. His face was caked with sweat, dust and blood that oozed from his forehead. She winced as one of the men kicked him hard and pulled at his hair asking him to stand. Maggie could see Sandra holding onto a hysterical Mia as she struggled to break free from her mother’s grip. ‘Let me go mama, Laurie needs me,’ the girl pleaded amidst loud sobs. Finally, the police held Lawrence by the scruff and led him out of the Villa. At this point, Mia managed to break away from her mother and ran behind the party.

‘Don’t take my Laurie away from me! What has he done? He is innocent…why don’t you listen to me? Please don’t take him…please,’ she pleaded with the men in uniform, ‘Laurie! Why don’t you tell them that you can do no wrong…what will happen to our child Laurie? Oh God please!’ she fell to the ground as Lawrence was bundled into a jeep that soon vanished in the dark night. As the last of Mia’s words trailed off her tongue, Maggie saw Sandra slump to the floor. The voyeuristic crowd that had gathered for some titillating action soon dissipated. All of her tenants retreated to their apartments content in the knowledge that a juicy scandal was to entertain them for a long time to come.

Back in Sandra’s apartment, Mia had locked herself in her bedroom. As Maggie sat the beleaguered mother at the table, she could hear the girl sob. She felt a pang of guilt at first, but deep down she resented Sandra for her sloppy style of parenting. A mother who hasn’t a clue what her teenaged daughter is up to is no good. She’d read in magazines about how rebellious the girls are these days. The kind of questions that the agony aunt fielded made her puke: teen pregnancy, oral sex, drugs, late night parties, and orgies. Most of these girls weren’t even past twenty and were unapologetic about the lifestyle they chose. They saw it as cool, liberating––the kind who would have been branded forward in her youth. But even them forward girls were chaste compared to these stupid nymphs! She saw no sense why many women equated behaving crassly like men with liberation.

‘I knew that bastard was upto some mischief,’ said Sandra her reddened eyes brimming with tears, ‘tell me Mag where did I go wrong? Am I a bad mother?’

‘Hell no Sandra! Whatever gave you that idea? You have been a good mother; I’ve seen the sacrifices you’ve made for your girl. ’

‘And yet this is what I get in return…my daughter carrying the seed of a useless drug peddler. Oh Mag, the stupid girl won’t relent for an abortion! She wants to keep it as a sign of her lo…’ Sandra couldn’t complete the sentence as she cried a river.

‘Sandy, you got to be strong. Girls these days are a spoilt lot. No matter how good you are as a parent, they’ll play tricks on you. These rabid foreigners---shameless all––have spoiled our land. The way their women behave sets a bad example for our girls. Why, only yesterday my nephew was telling me about this group of teenaged British girls running topless on the beach dead drunk! They forget that this is not their land…really, they should be condemned to some hedonistic hell.’

‘Mag, what is your point?’

‘I am making it Sandy. Our girls envy these foreign girls. If they can have it why can’t we? Poor Mia is a victim of this syndrome. I would say she is lucky that Lawrence is in jail by now. Only yesterday I saw a Polish movie where a boy sells his naïve girlfriend into prostitution for money. Can you believe that? People like him can go to any length to make money. Mia is lucky, she’s safe with you,’ saying mean things about Lawrence strangely brought a sense of calmness to Maggie.

‘What about the child? What will people say! A single mother is no good is what they’ll whisper at street corners. Like mother like daughter! Who will wed her Mag? Christ! How will I find a good boy for her if she waddles all over Fountainahas with a bump? She says she’ll slit her wrists if I force an abortion.’

Maggie rose from the table and walked toward the bedroom. She turned the door knob. Surprised by the unlocked door she softly walked inside to find Mia fast asleep. Her face was stained with tears; so was her pillow. She drew a sheet closely over Mia and softly kissed her forehead. The girl looked very innocent, almost angelic save for the tears for angels always smiled. It broke Maggie’s heart that the lord above would be so harsh on such a fragile girl. As she closed the door behind her, a new resolve added sheen to her face.

She stood by the window and gazed at the full moon. Her eyes narrowed and her jaw tightened as she charted out a neat plan. In the distance she could hear the church bells ring a dozen times. Still standing by the window, she finally turned to face Sandra.

‘Sandra, listen to me carefully. I have a cousin in Valpoi, Cecilia is her name; she lives alone in a pleasant house. She is a god-fearing woman and I am sure she’ll take good care of Mia.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You know what I mean Sandy. Let her stay there until her due date…’

‘Wait a minute Mag,’ Sandra shut her eyes tight and pressed her forehead grimacing all the while, ‘and I always thought you were a rational woman. You are as stupid as that girl if not more. You want her to deliver that illegitimate child! What after that? Leave it for good in some pile of garbage? Spend the rest of its life fighting a stigma? Tell me Mag!’

‘I’ll adopt the baby.’

‘Mag, you can’t be serious! Why would you do that? Why would anyone do such a stupid thing?’

‘I dunno Sandy. The choice is yours to make. I’ll take Mia to my friend tomorrow. He’s a good doctor. And if you agree with my plan, we’ll visit Cecilia. Don’t worry dear, the good lord takes good care of us all. Have faith in him.’

As the first rays of the morning sun filtered in through the window, Maggie could see a million motes whirling like dervishes in a narrow beam of light. Memories of last night’s dream came back to her as fresh as just scribbled ink.

The Zorroesque face was no longer a mystery and the recent addition--a cute cherub--completed the sunset postcard askew with colors.

Finis

This could be boring...reader discretion recommended.

As Lawrence’s chapped lips moved from the hollow between her collar toward her budding breast, Mia threw her head back in the crisp afternoon air. She briefly opened her eyes only to catch sight of the mishmash of green and orange and red of the flame tree  carelessly strewn across the cloudless sky. She felt vulnerable--like a fragile butterfly—caught in the curious fingers of a tanned boy. Yet, she trusted him completely; content in the knowledge that he will set her free, and marvel at the traces of residual color on the ridges of his fingers. His labored breathing, the gruffness of his callused fingers, the tantalizing warmth that escaped his parted lips and his smell intensified her blossoming feelings of womanhood. When his insistent fingers began to slide the zipper that held her frock together, she unlocked her lips.

‘What is the matter baby?’

‘Laurie, I have to tell you something. Promise me you won’t be angry.’

‘Che men, we can talk later. Don’t spoil it, come on now,’ he groaned as his fingers tried pushing the zipper down. Mia took his hands by the wrists, freed herself and sat under the tree with her back to him. Lawrence spat on the ground, lit a cigarette, and blew rings in the air patiently waiting for the stirrings in his groin to cave in. In the distance they could see a boisterous marriage party on its way home. The golden tassels on the whirling blood red umbrella shone gloriously in the summer sun. Her eyes followed the trail of dust that the party left behind it. Silence raised its ugly head as the revelers diminished beyond the bougainvillea that marked the start of their neighborhood.

‘I am pregnant,’ she finally said in a tone that mimicked the guilt a child experiences while explaining a crumbled cookie jar. Veiled
beneath the guilt nestles a quiet conviction: that the other person
will somehow understand. She felt immensely relieved, much like the
aforementioned child--as if a boulder was lifted off her chest. For
almost ten weeks she’d let this secret—their secret--breed in her womb. The mere thought of letting it in to her mother scared her: not for herself but for her child. That her mother would drag her to the nearest clinic for abortion was not lost on her. She wanted to keep this child; she wanted it to have a father, something that she never had. She wasn’t sure how Lawrence would react to this news: he was always so careful about protection…

‘Mia, are you even listening to me?’

‘Yes.’

‘Mia! This is fucking crazy! Man! This is the fucking happiest day of my life! The great Lawrence Braganza will be a father…boy o boy,’ he drew her closer and kissed her on the mouth. Then he carefully placed his ear on her stomach and chuckled with the unbridled glee of a kid. He then lit another cigarette, sat facing her after seating her, and starting blowing perfectly circular rings in her face. The news jolted him out of his reverie that the cynical of the lot called life. The would-be mother was only seventeen going on eighteen in about a month’s time if he wasn’t wrong. If that old troll found out about them, she could pay the police whatever it takes to get his ass busted. The police were after his ass after the screwed up drugs deal that did not get them their cut. The great Lawrence Braganza was in deep shit and it
took an unreliable piece of latex to drive the last nail in his coffin.

‘Oh Laurie! What a fool I was to hide this from you! I am sorry…I
misunderstood you…I am evil, a bad Christian girl,’ she began to sob softly, ‘it is our child after all. I am so sorry…’

‘Don’t be sorry. I love you Mia, naah Mrs. Mia Lawrence Braganza. Sounds grand, na? Listen baby, It’s about time that we get married. You love that church in Mapusa, don’t you? We’ll marry there, after the first rains, which is only about a month’s time. But baby, we’ll have to be very careful, your mother especially, know what I mean dear?’

She nodded in agreement. She felt like a rabid sinner everytime she thought of her mother, the sacrifices that she’d made just to see her smile. All the years of want would flash before her eyes, the sight of her mother seeing her off to school on rainy mornings soaked to the bone, for she had to choose between a raincoat and an umbrella. But these feelings would be quickly gagged by those of rebellion and anger as her mother would rile at the mere mention of Lawrence. How could she despise the man who loved her daughter more than his own life?

Meanwhile, back at the Villa, Sandra closed the door of her apartment behind her and glided down the flight of stairs with the air of someone who’s got a million chores to do. She was dressed in a fine silk dress that she wore only on special occasions, the last time she wore it was on Maggie’s birthday. With a cane basket in one hand, her hair tied in a severe bun, and a dab of perfume behind her temples, she made her way toward Joe’s restaurant after depositing the key for Mia at Maggie’s. As was her wont, Maggie complimented her and bolstered her confidence about landing the job.

As Sandra sauntered onto the sunny street, she waved back at Maggie with a sheepish grin. Not far from the church where she’d first set her eyes on Mia’s father, Mia waved out to Lawrence as he mounted his bike and drove down the dusty street leaving her frantically fighting the dust storm that ensued.

To Be Continued

Note: Dear reader, I’ll be posting the subsequent parts in short bursts, so that the reader is not compelled to commit blogicide.

But nothing, absolutely nothing, killed the ageless romantic in her. To this day she dreamt of a swashbuckling prince charming, the years adding to his weight and subtracting from his mane, riding a rather tired horse, knocking her door on a starry night and gathering her up in one swift move. The image of them galloping down the street at breakneck speed into the sunset, her virgin white train billowing in the crisp evening wind, her tenants gasping in surprise, cheering and hooting the beautiful couple always gave her goosebumps. Her man’s face remained a mystery though, mostly because she had tears in her eyes, and partly because he wore a Zorroesque mask. This she took as a sign from the good lord that the right time to unmask her soulmate was yet to arrive.

Finally, in a fit of naked rage she brought her right palm heavily onto the unsuspecting devil, which miraculously disengaged its straw, furiously beat its fragile wings, and rose hastily into the sky. As she followed the flight, her eyes caught sight of the handsome Lawrence, her tenant on the first floor, working up foam as he brushed on a lazy Sunday morning. A decade-long umbilical chord separated them, yet she increasingly felt that the face behind the mask belonged to him. When their eyes met, he winked at her flashing an impish smile. She felt her heart beating furiously and hastily moved behind the curtains. A minute later, she peeped through a narrow nick, half expecting to find him gazing longingly at her window. Not finding him in the balcony anymore, she dejectedly made her way to the bathroom for a quick bath.

Today being the first Sunday of the month, she was to begin her rounds collecting rent from a total of five tenants. Both floors of her sprawling villa, bequeathed to her a decade ago by her father, were occupied by a motley group of tenants. Maggie often boasted that her villa was second to none in Goa. The tenants had every right to find her claim far removed from reality: the leaking ceilings, clogged drains and faulty wiring were proof
enough. Mr. Desai from the second floor had to be hospitalized for a week last monsoon, when he’d been blessed with a shock of his life mending a blown fuse. But low rent and a naive landlady was an inimitable permutation: second to none.

In the bathroom, she trembled as the cold shower numbed her senses, and strands of her hair snaked around on the tiled floor. She soaped her now slippery skin; humming her favorite tune with eyes closed, all the while fantasizing kissing Lawrence by some turquoise lake. The bath was cut short when the tap went dry and she wasted no time summoning the choicest curses: everybody from the local councilor to the US president was targeted.

Dripping wet, she stood naked in front of the mirror turning this way and that, assessing everything that she saw with a critical eye. Her focus finally shifted to her face, and she practiced ex-pressions that would befit a hard-as-nails landlady. After much deliberation, she put on her finest dress, dabbed her favorite perfume, and smeared her lips with her favorite shade of lipstick. Lighting a candle before a cheap replica of the Pieta she’d bought at the church fair, she prayed and made her way to the first floor.

The voice of a fight too loud for her liking greeted Maggie as she neared Mrs. Dsa’s doorstep.

‘But Mia, that thing you are wearing…modern you call it…is too short. Nothing doing, you are not wearing that to church,’ Mrs. Dsa was too busy admonishing her daughter to notice Maggie.

‘Mom, this is what girls wear these days! If you could, you’ll make me wear a burqa I swear!’

‘If I could? I can very well…’ the sound of a deliberately coughing Maggie broke Mrs. Dsa’s chain of thoughts.

‘Oh Maggie! I am so glad you are here. Will you make this silly girl see some sense? Look at what she’s wearing to church!’ She almost dragged Maggie by the hand into the living room all the while pointing an accusing finger at Mia. The girl to her credit was unmoved by her mother’s hysterics and looked very fetching in the gorgeous peach frock. It is short thought Maggie, but she’d seen other girls wear skimpier clothes. The poor girl obviously felt awkward, dressed as she was by Mrs. Dsa in severe frocks that did nothing for her budding curves. The peach color went well with her clear skin, auburn hair and added light to her deep eyes. The neck was quite low though and drew attention to her taut breast; Maggie thought of her own reflection in the unforgiving mirror...

‘Maggie?’

‘Sandra! Let the little girl be! The frock is just fine; this is the fashion these days. Add a stole and she’s all set to floor them boys,’ Maggie winked at Mia.

‘O Maggie! A single mother is judged by one and all. I don’t want people to…’

Maggie walked across to the dresser, opened the chest of drawers, and after rummaging through it drew two stoles: black and deep copper. Mia draped the copper-colored stole around her neck, slipped her feet into a dainty pair of sandals and was out of the door in a jiffy. The sound of her ‘bye mom...bye Maggie’ ricocheted off the stairway. Mrs. Dsa looked dejectedly at Maggie, who gave her a reassuring smile.

‘Sandra, she’ll be fine. Mia is a responsible girl!’

‘Oh Mag, before I forget! I had a most amazing dream last night. I saw you walking down the aisle with a handsome man. Oh! What a gorgeous couple you guys made! You were wearing the most beautiful gown Maggie. You looked so pretty! Your hair was done up in a bun so soft, like dew on a blade of grass. The church was decked out with exotic flowers, the choir boys sang the most melodious tunes and the guests wore their best clothes. I was there too, all teary eyed as you kissed your man after the vows. O Maggie, my cheeks were all salty when I woke up this morning!’

‘Really Sandra?’ Maggie couldn’t think of anything else to say. Sandra was good at them tarot cards. Some of her past predictions had rung true. Like the time she’d cautioned her
against Xavier, the guy who owned a seedy restaurant down the street. ‘He’s after your villa Maggie. He doesn’t love you…he loves your money. My cards never lie to me,’ she’d said with a grim air. Sure enough, that scoundrel had ditched her for the daughter of the local strongman. On her part, Sandra was thankful to the good lord that he fashioned
coincidences when she most needed them. Society frowns upon a woman abandoned by her husband; she wasn’t even married to that lecher when Mia was born. As luck would have it, he died in an accident and she was christened Joe’s widow by one and all. As the years flew, she’d passionately immersed herself into the occult. The townsfolk often
gossiped that the local strongman paid for her sustenance in return of harmless favors: that was years ago. Now with her sagging bosom and burgeoning waist, money was hard to come by.

‘Maggie! When was the last time I lied to you? Wait, let me get my cards. Let’s see what they have to say. Will you draw those curtains please?’

Maggie was familiar with the routine. She drew the curtains, laid out the frilly tablecloth on the circular table, and placed two chairs facing each other. She then patiently sat on one of the chairs, waiting for Sandra as she donned her Madame Fortune paraphernalia. Sure enough, she emerged wearing a deep-necked black dress complete with a colorful scarf over her head and her hands carried the exalted pack of cards. Madame Fortune wasn’t Sandra and Sandra wasn’t Madame Fortune. Madame Fortune was a dour lady of unverifiable age who was rarely known to smile. She laid out the tarot cards on the table in a neat semicircle with an experienced hand. She motioned Maggie to pick a card with the swift movement of her arched eyebrows unevenly darkened with kohl. Maggie took a deep breath and picked up a card that lay at the very centre of the pack. Madame Fortune took one look at the card and a feeble smile betrayed her thin lip.

‘Just as I told you Maggie! Love and marriage knock at your doorstep very soon. Keep your ears open at all times! I am sure you wouldn’t want to miss it this time. Maggie? Are you listening?’

‘That man in your dream! Sandra did you see his face?’

‘I sure did. He was very handsome like I told you. My! What broad shoulders he had and deep eyes that spoke fluently!’

‘I mean did he look familiar? Someone from our town? Someone we know?’

‘I am not so sure of that Maggie. Those were fleeting images actually…grainy too…like them old movies.’

‘Oh Sandra! Please try to remember. Okay okay…did he resemble Lawrence? Please tell me Sandra!’

Maggie instantly regretted what she’d blurted out in the heat of the moment. She wasn’t even sure if he had any feelings for her. Well, he did flirt a lot with her and the last time she’d been on her rent rounds, he’d almost kissed her mouth. But the fool that she was she’d rushed out of his room empty handed: without the kiss and the rent. On lonely evenings she would stand by her window and wonder why she was denying herself all that life offered. Love was just a flight of stairs away, yet she found that distance impossible to traverse. Several cold nights when she pined for a warm body next to hers, she’d think of running up the stairs in her night dress to him, but a warm blanket and
shame would keep her bedridden.

‘Maggie! Are you out of your mind? Don’t tell me you have fallen for that useless idiot!’

‘Well, Sandra…’

‘Listen to me dear, he’s no good. Unless you are looking for an energetic bunny in bed. The scoundrel has been jobless for as long as I’ve cared to know. If I am not wrong, he hasn’t paid you for how many…six months? People tell me he’s into the drug trade pleasuring those shameless firangs who infest our beaches. Joshua, my nephew, tells me he’s seen Lawrence walk with them white girls into their rooms in the dead of the night. Even if none of this is true Maggie, how can you forget that you are much older than him? Nothing wrong with marrying a younger guy I say, but for how long can you keep him on a tight leash? Know what I mean? That bastard has been eyeing Mia for quite some time now. I’ve warned the scum that if I catch him inasmuch as looking at her, I’ll cut his balls and feed them pigs!’

‘Oh Sandra!’ she rose with a start as she glanced at her wrist, ‘it’s been an hour! I better get going now. It’s the first Sunday of the month you know…’

‘Maggie, I haven’t had much money lately. You know, not many believe in tarot and with Mia’s rising expenses…but next month I’ll pay all the arrears. I’ve decided to take up a job at Louis’ restaurant. He so loves my pasta! So you know…’

‘I will wait Sandra; not a problem. You’ve been so good to me. Never charged a paisa
for these sessions! I owe a lot more to you. In fact, if your prediction has any grain of truth in it…I might as well waive a month’s rent or so!’

The earnestness in Maggie’s voice reassured Sandra that she was still good at fleecing people: a must have if one wishes to succeed as a fortune teller. For her part, Maggie was still a strong believer in innate goodness that resided in people. She collected rent from the other tenants and passed Lawrence’s locked door with a hint of sadness. Back in her bedroom, she deposited the fifteen grand in her dresser’s drawer after counting them again. She changed into a misshaped maxi and busied herself in the mundane
chores of the household.

Far from her busy kitchen, in the shade of a flame tree behind the church, two lovers kissed as the summer breeze blew away wayward bronzed leaves.

To Be Continued

Full marks to the sheer genius of Illaiyaraja. The tune was used for the title track of Cheeni Kum. The movie"s story seems to have "inspired" Bhansali"s Hum dil de chuke whateva...

As Sorabjee made his way down the wooden stairs, he took extreme care to do it as noiselessly as possible.  With his left palm firmly on the banister, he placed his feet very carefully on the rungs, much like one blows softly into a lover’s eye. He descended the stairs in steps of ones and twos, halting after every six rungs to catch some breath, all the while pressing the cotton balls in his ears tight. He disliked the creaking of the wooden stairs—he it hated more than his advancing age, his arthritic joints, and his loneliness.

‘Those idiots in the society office; doing ghotala with other peoples’ money all the time! They should be thrown down these very stairs! How many times…how many times did I tell them about this creaking mess? More times than all of their ages combined. Motherfuckers all!’ he grumbled softly. It was an art he’d mastered: his soft grumblings sounded like the sieving of talcum.

It was only six in the morning, and he did not wish to awaken the residents of Sea View Apartments. Especially the loutish Mehroo on the second floor––a floor below him––who never let go any chance to ask for a small favor everytime she saw him coming down the stairs. In his mind’s eye he often saw an image of her sitting on a stool behind the door, a narrowed eye firmly on the peephole, her sagging bosom heaving with every deep breath, waiting for him to appear in the circular world seen through it. A graying voyeur. A pain in his bony ass. Was it a surprise then that she hardly had any friend?

On the way to the agiary, women from the building often gossiped that her sons were busy chasing non-Parsi girls all over Mumbai.

Their men weren’t far behind.

‘The Mistry boys are such cads I tell you Sorabjee! I caught the elder one…what’s his name…yes Hormadz…I caught him the other day with a girl at Chowpatty. She didn’t look Parsi to me…not a chance! She was so dark I tell you! I’ve forbidden my boy from befriending them. They are bad influence…a stigma to our people,’ an armchair critic from the third floor had once told him, his forehead perspiring exponentially in absolute agreement with his agitation.

‘What can one expect from a womb like that…Jamsetji Jeejibhoy?’ Sorabjee had almost spat in distaste.

Mehroo had married a non-Parsi, a scandal that had rocked the community, and had led to the premature death of her father. Moreover, she’d divorced shortly after her second son was born. That she’d spurned the proposal from a then strapping, raven-haired Sorabjee was something that was never discussed beyond closed doors in Sea View Apartments.

Subsequently, Sorabjee married loneliness, for it could not spurn him.

‘The day she married that madrasi, I knew theirs was a relationship destined to fail. How many such marriages have lasted? I can count them on the fingers of my right hand; more fingers than successes I say! Can those madrasis ever match a Parsi boy? Can anyone ever equal a Parsi?’ he’d often vocalize his grouse to any Parsi within earshot as he bought eggs, bread, liniments, and lip balms for her over the years. Occasionally, he’d end up paying from his pocket when Mehroo went broke, but that was years ago when her boys were still in primary school.

Presently, as he neared the landing on the second floor, he pursed his lips and espied her closed door with relief. The dried toran on her door rustled softly in a cool wind that filtered in through the grilled concrete at the end of the flight of stairs. On the floor a chalk design of the fish he’d seen yesterday made it amply clear that the old lout was still asleep. It was a Sunday after all; not everyone would be up at this unearthly hour: for a newspaper of all things.

As Sorabjee’s back faced the Mistry household’s door he heard the deafening click of a latch.

He gritted his teeth in absolute defeat.

‘Arrey Sorab, it’s raining heavily baba. You aren’t carrying an umbrella, can’t you see outside?’ Mehroo rattled in her sing-song voice as she stood in her doorway with a tray in her hand that carried some chalk powder, a cheap plastic mold with a dotted fish across its face, and a divo.

‘Mehroo, it’s a slight drizzle for God’s sake!’

‘Nothing doing! Wait, I’ll get Hormadz’s umbrella for you. I can’t see my dear brother getting drenched to the bone while I sit here in the warmth of my home.’ She placed the tray by the door, and walked into her flat. He could hear Hormadz’s sleepy, agitated banter. The divo’s flame swayed from side to side; he helped end its dilemma with the sway of his arm.

‘Brother she calls me…’ His mumble stopped abruptly as he heard her footsteps approaching the door.

‘Here Sorab, take this umbrella. Be careful…if a strong wind blows, it might turn turtle. Hormadz got it repaired yesterday only. Can you do me a small favor? Buy me some milk from the bhaiyya.’

‘Mehroo, I need to buy the newspaper! And the bhaiyya is…’

‘Is only a few steps ahead Sorab. In fact it’s exactly ten steps ahead if you trust me. Walking is good for your heart!’ she smiled and handed him a twenty rupee note.

‘Then Mehroo, it’s an exercise you’ll never need.’

Sorabjee stocked the crumpled note in his shirt pocket.

As Mehroo sprinkled the chalk powder on the mold, she could hear the stairs creak a few decibels louder.

‘This man will never change,’ she smiled as she lit the divo.

         ¤¤¤¤

The corridor was still dark when Sorabjee returned to his flat. He fumbled for the keyhole for a few seconds as he felt its rounded hollowness alternately with his wet fingers and the key. Finally the levers tumbled. The trip to the newspaper kiosk wasn’t uneventful. The umbrella did turn turtle as Mehroo had warned when the rain was at its fiercest, leaving him soaking wet.

‘She did this on purpose…the hag that she is. Gave me an umbrella that’s as useless as her boys! I am sure she’s by her window behind those curtains amusing her wretched self with a little laugh,’ he’d cursed her as he struggled to rein in the umbrella all the while glancing at Mehroo’s window.

He threw the umbrella in a corner, and sat on the sofa without bothering to fetch a towel. Beads of rainwater traveled down his spine as he wiped his palms on the softened suede. The newspaper was spread on the teapoy, and taking turns he tossed the main pages, the sports supplement, and the women’s magazine that came every Sunday on the floor. His face broke into an awkward smile once he spotted the ad he’d placed in the Parsi Samachar.

Though he hated to admit it, Sorabjee was a lonely man. Through the years, the loneliness grew over him, like a second skin that he increasingly found difficult to shed. Ever since his retirement, the increasing spare time he had on his hands became his greatest concern.  The last time the demon of loneliness stabbed at his heart was when he’d fractured his arm. Though Mehroo did look after him; the lonely nights in rooms that smelled of antiseptic, the constant stream of visitors for the patients resting next to him, and the pitying faces of the nurses drove home the point real hard: that he was lonely.

Help Wanted

A sixty year old Parsi gentleman invites

PARSI GIRLS ONLY

to play his daughter for a day.

The girl should be a good cook.

Suitable person will be rewarded

handsomely.

Interested

parties please contact: +91-022-561660785

Adding the +91 was Sorabjee’s idea, though the Samachar’s executive was rather adamant that their newspaper wasn’t read beyond the municipal limits of Greater Mumbai.

‘The motherfucker would not have another word from me!’ he’d told Mehroo, ‘what if some good Parsi girl sees this ad in Jerusalem or Tehran? I wouldn’t allow a few missing numbers to…’ he moved his closed fist in a gesture that said screw.

Placing an ad for a maid in the Parsi Samachar was Mehroo’s suggestion; though she certainly wouldn’t have approved of the ad as it appeared this morning.

‘Arrey Sorabjee, ever since Nauheed left, your house is so empty. Why don’t you hire a full-time maid to look after you? By the grace of Ahura Mazda, you have enough money that will take good care of all your needs till the dokhma invites you,’ Mehroo had told him shortly after his niece had been married off to a boy in Dahanu.

‘For a change, Mehroo, you are making sense.’

Though he just about tolerated his niece, the thought that his sister eyed his sea-facing flat troubled him more.

‘She’s worse than a C-grade actress I tell you Mehroo. All she wants is this flat…this flat which our father bought…where we were born. A flat she visits once a year on the pretext of visiting me.’

Coomi was born when he was almost twenty, and the chasm between them had only widened over the years. The last time the siblings met on a happy note was when he attended his niece’s Navjote in their ancestral home in Diu. Shortly after the Navjote, Nauheed was promptly sent to look after him.

‘Coomi, why burden the little girl? Let her play and have fun. What help will she be to this old man anyway?’

His sister would not relent; at current property rates the flat would certainly fetch more than a crore! What if this senile man bequeaths it to some useless charity? So on a rainy August morning, the old man and his niece boarded the express train for Mumbai. The train ride had been ordinary, like it always used to be, nothing changed here at the outskirts of Mumbai: this often came as a relief to him. The only remarkable thing about the journey was a realization; that the little girl was as useful to him as a tampon. He’d gone all the way under the seat to fish out the inflatable pillow from his bag; the girl was amused at her uncle’s antics, but the thought to help him did not cross her mind.

‘Mama, why do you carry a pillow? It’s not an overnight journey!’ she’d asked him while trying to stifle a smile.

‘At least the girl isn’t fake…does not pretend to be what she is not. I wonder whom she’s taken after, not her mother of course,’ he’d chuckled at his little joke.

The months that followed were as chaotic as the peak hour Virar fast. She’d filled the ageing flat with her youthful energy, but she was extremely lousy at household chores. To his horror Sorabjee had once caught her with one of the Mistry boys on their terrace well after dark in a passionate liplock. Mehroo had dismissed the incident by reminding him about some episode when he was a boy.

 That reminder had curtly drowned the agitated complaint.

With the passing years Sorabjee showed no sign of kicking the bucket, and this gave Coomi sleepless nights. At times she felt that he might have to attend her funeral if her health continued its downward spiral accelerated by asthma. So reluctantly she’d married Nauheed off, and prayed to the good lord that He make her brother a good uncle.

That was six months ago. In the days that followed an assortment of maids had made his life hell. One was an atrocious cook, the other a petty thief, and the worst of the lot had made a pass at him. Everyday as he descended the stairs, he’d crib to Mehroo about these maids from Hell.

‘These ghati women are no good I tell you Mehroo. This morning I found a piece of Rin in my sadra. Can you believe that?’

Sorabjee fetched a pair of scissors and carefully cut a larger area around the ad along jagged edges. He then proceeded to cut finely along the black lines that bordered the ad. This was the third ad that he’d placed in the Parsi Samachar––the last one. Not one person had called in the past weeks. He’d checked and rechecked the phone number, the font size, and the message. Everything seemed fine to him. Not one day passed when Mehroo failed to ask him whether anyone called.

‘I have placed the receiver off the hook Mehroo. Riff raff from all over Mumbai keep calling. Not one decent Parsi girl!’

He placed the ad in a file which carried important documents ranging from his school mark sheets to his first offer letter to the love letters he never gave Mehroo.

‘A city of millions and not one good Parsi girl,’ he mumbled as he made his way to the bedroom to change into another sadra pyjama.  

As Sorabjee stood by the window, with his eyes closed, listening to the rain; the phone rang.

¤¤¤¤

‘You are a liar,’ Sorabjee minced no words.

His stern gaze failed to unnerve the portly figure seated on the sofa across from him.

‘Excuse me?’

‘You lied to me on the phone…about your age.’

‘Oh! Did I? A woman always does. I did tell you that I am old enough to be your daughter. Am I too young? Will people mistake me for your granddaughter?’ she asked all the while fussing over a muck stain on her kameez.

‘How old are you?’

‘A-ha. It takes six decades of bad manners to ask a woman her age, and a newborn’s naiveté to expect an honest number. At sixty, you should be teaching me manners!’ she smiled.

‘A father ought to know his daughter’s age!’

‘Fair enough, let me explain. You are allegedly sixty, so assuming that I was born when you were in your early twenties, my age would be…’ she began fussing over the stain again, scraping it with her index finger, the dirt settling snugly in her outgrown nail.

A chill went down his spine as she continued to scrape the stain. He could see images of the dirt—whether it was dog shit or human was beyond him—mixing with the dal as she sprinkled salt in it.

Salt as she saw it, but salty shit as he saw it.  

‘Late thirties?’ he tried diverting her attention.

‘Bingo! Late thirties, what a delightful play of words! I almost tell you my age, and then I almost don’t.  I love these generalizations, their ambiguity is so reassuring. I mean I could be 36 or 37 or heavens forbid 39! I’ll place my bet on 36 if I were you. You not too honest with your age either Mr. Mubarakai.’

‘Am I?’

‘Yeah. I mean look at you!’

She took a good look at him. Sorabjee found it rather difficult to hide his discomfiture. He did not like being examined, not even by a doctor. And here he was, being examined like an excavated mummy, by a woman he’d never seen before, and worst of all he was to be blamed for this predatory humiliation. He played with the mole on his left arm, felt its fleshy mass, his eyes focused on the wall behind her.

‘You don’t look a day over fifty…fifty five. If you do away with that paunch, and dye your hair, I’ll make that fifty. Sounds good?’

‘Your eyes are brown. I’d rather have a daughter with sea-green eyes; just like me,’ he spoke as he gazed at the shimmering sea in the distance. It was a murky gray, as the city relentlessly emptied its constipated bowels in it.

‘The ad missed out on this detail Mr. Mubarakai. Moreover, I am not a big fan of inserting colored pieces of glass in my eyes. No way! Not even for a million rupees, let alone doing it for a rent-a-day father. By the way, do you believe in genetics?’

‘That’s not important as long as you can see, which I assume you do. Will you be kind enough to tell me what compelled you to come? Now that it’s clear that a million rupees can’t dissuade you from doing what you won’t do on a normal day.’

‘Excuse the exaggeration Mr.…what should I call you?’

‘Sorab will do.’

‘I was exaggerating papa. I am sure you wouldn’t want your daughter to call you Sorab. Would you? You can call me Mimi, that’s what everyone calls me. Even my boys!’

‘Mimi! What kind of a name is that? And why do you boys call you that? I will call you Navaz. Why are you here Navaz?’

‘Well, you wouldn’t mind your daughter calling you Sorab. So there. Navaz sounds quite pompous to them and to me. I hated the name as a kid, even now; I would rather be called gangubai! Do you listen to FM? Have you ever heard the sunshine show on 96.3 Sunny FM eight to ten am every morning? Where we play the latest songs, hottest happenings in the city, and traffic updates with a lot of masti, magic, and chutzpah.’

‘Feels like I am listening to one now.’

‘I hosted that show.’

‘Hosted? You mean you are jobless?’

‘Not yet. The show’s producer found a PYT who is good both in the boardroom and the bedroom.’

 ‘And you knock my door for the money. Neat plan I should say. Come here every Sunday; show some pity on an old man you wouldn’t give a second look otherwise.’

‘You must be joking.’

‘I am not.’ His patience was running thin.

‘I mean did you expect your ad to throw up an angel filled with daughterly love, complete with a halo, and delicate wings that crumple at the slightest touch!’ she batted her eyelids mocking a demure angel.

‘I did not expect you either.’

‘Fact is stranger than fiction, isn’t it? I expected a gentleman, and I got you. So the deal’s even. What will you like for lunch?’

‘Before you cook, you’ll have to cut your nails,’ he walked toward the showcase.

‘Boiled nails?’ she arched her eyebrows.

He paid no attention to her senseless wisecracks. Nothing made sense to him; she wasn’t his real daughter. She was being obnoxious from the moment she had opened her loud mouth. If she were indeed his obnoxious real daughter, he would have kicked her out. Compared to this uncouth woman, even Mehroo seemed to belong to the crème-de-la-crème. Yet, here she was, still sitting on the sofa. He wondered why he tolerated her; he didn’t have to. But he did.

As he opened the glass-fronted door, and salvaged a nail cutter from a plastic box, he could see her digging her nose.

¤¤¤¤

Sorabjee sat at the dining table surveying the culinary concoction laid out in front of him. The dal, rice, cabbage, and curds looked edible all right. In fact, he found the aroma appetizing; the last time he had a delicious lunch was at Mehroo’s insistence.   

She’d brought a bowl filled to the rim with kolmino patio, which he’d politely refused to accept.

‘Did Coomi pay you to poison this patio? Or did she promise you one of the sea-facing rooms?’

Only after she’d insisted a little more that he’d reluctantly accepted the bowl.

By now it was clear to Sorabjee that Navaz loved audible chewing. He gulped the dal and rice with a spoonful of curd here and a mouthful of cabbage there as noiselessly as possible.