A Suitable Arrangement

A moment: that’s all it took for the detritus of his life to float up at him – for him to realize how screwed-up his life was, notwithstanding his beautiful house, his elegant study, his chauffeur driven car, his fan following on Facebook, five thousand and growing. It hadn’t come easy, the following. It meant digging deep, discovering facts, collating them; then writing long opinion pieces no magazine would dare accept. Fuck them, fuck them all! The magazines were all leftists; they did not know what was good for them. Or for their readers. If they did, would they be in this position? Would they be begging for contributions? If you’ve liked this article, please donate, make your contribution today. Journalism of courage can only thrive with your support.

Courage, hah! The only one with courage was the prime minister of India. He was accused of genocide and he beat the rap; he was accused of ruining the economy but the stock market was booming; he was accused of being communal but had abolished the barbaric triple talaq system and introduced a uniform civil code. He had the masses by their heart-strings, the media by its gonads, the world watching, breathless. True or false, right or wrong: that could be debated; that was argued morning and evening. Storms raged online and offline; families fell part, friendships snapped; but speaking truth to power, understanding how it really was, he was here to stay, this man with a raised brawny fist, a hypnotic voice, an endless store of promises and hopes. The prime minister was every inch a leader, he had the strength and stature of one, and was not afraid to take risks, not afraid to upset the status quo and introduce bold reforms. The left-wingers did not like it when he took up for him. When he posted on Facebook that the real India was just birthing, it was stepping out of a dark, musty tomb of its own making. According to him, the whole idea of secularism was flawed; it had led India down the path of appeasement, of political cowardice. Then, along comes a braveheart leader who was ready to stick his neck out and change that. He was ready to take India back to where it belonged: its civilizational roots.

They – the leftists and some of his friends – thought he was being a sell-out, a cop-out, by thinking like this. All his theories were suspect if he belonged to “the other side.” The thing was, he had seen the glint in the leader’s eyes, hard, unflinching, and full of purpose. He had seen him tour the states, hold massive rallies, reference each culture and set of customs. He had seen him address the masses and whip them into a frenzy of adoration. He was convinced the leader could do anything he wanted. He could wipe out the opposition, rewrite history, teach China a lesson or two, shift the balance of power in India’s favor. And wasn’t that what the country needed? Wasn’t that what it deserved? A restoration of dignity, a raising of self-esteem, denied by hundreds of years of colonial rule and domination.

But right now it wasn’t the future of India that occupied his mind but a moment of truth, a slow daunting realization. He was at the microwave heating up his first cup of coffee; she was at the kitchen sink washing vessels; they stood side by side, and in between them hung a thick, impervious silence. There was no reason why they should break this silence. He was the sahib, and she, the maid, and they had nothing in common, except, perhaps, their common interest in keeping the house clean. That’s why she was hired: to sweep and swab the floors, to wash the vessels, to dust the furniture, and keep the house spotlessly clean, the way it was when they had bought it, two years ago.

The house had been his wife’s idea. What was the point of her working in real estate if she could not give them a decent address? she had said, looking at him anxiously. Even after twenty years of marriage his wife treaded carefully, she walked on eggshells, trying to gauge his moods and choosing her words with care. She knew it was safer that way. For him, for her, and for their marriage.

Balls! Balls! he had thought, frowning; she just wants to be in close vicinity of her family, she wants to be with that bunch of losers, whom he couldn’t stand for more than thirty minutes. That’s all it took for him to regret the visit, to shed his mask of promised good behavior and decimate them and the foolish ideas they held about India, about the kind of leadership it needed and which was lacking, according to them, ever since this man (they refused to even say his name) had come to power, ever since he had shanghaied the masses with his promises of free electricity, free housing, free rations, no more poverty, no more insecurity, no looking up to the west for validation, it was time the world saw India for what it was: a glorious civilization that had preserved its culture in the face of multiple invasions, a spiritual superpower with a deep knowledge of yoga, dharma, karma, nirvana: all that the world needed as therapy, all that humans needed to survive earthquakes, wars, pandemics, and Tsunamis. Yes, it was all here in India, said the leader, slapping his chest and raising his fingerskyward. And there was no reason to disbelieve him.

And yet our people were dying of hunger, Dalit women were getting raped and paraded naked, our children were begging bare-bodied on the streets, our prisons were bursting at the seams, our courts were overloaded with an impossible backlog, our youth were unemployed, kept awake by the pains of survival, the angst of fractured dreams and fading hopes.

That’s how his wife’s family argued with him, that’s how his visits would pan out. Her father, brother, and sisters, all speaking at the same time, all responding like they were part of some wild, primitive tribe seeking to exile one of their own. Damn them! Damn their ways! They were always ready to pick holes in any initiative ventured by his beloved leader, who was working so hard to correct India’s mistakes, to heal the wounds of the past. How could he explain this to them without losing his cool, without showing his contempt and walking out, a dark stomping giant, fuming, smoldering, swearing never to return, never to cross their threshold again?

Many an evening had ended like this. His father-in-law, swearing under his breath, would hit the bar. His mother-in-law, hearing raised voices, would rush out of the kitchen; she would be asked to stay out of this one, the boy had gone too far, too far, besides, he had no idea what he was talking about. His sisters-in-law would swear never to speak to them again: why must it always end like this? they would ask, anguished. And his brother-in-law would make a discreet phone call and drive off some place. From the looks of it, he had something going on, perhaps with a married woman, or perhaps with a man.

His wife wouldn’t speak to him for days after that, and, frankly, he couldn’t give a damn. He was used to her brooding and sulking, freezing up like an outraged nun, making him feel responsible for their stupidity.

But now, seeing her face flushed with hope (he could hear her say I am just hopping across to Dad’s place; I might have dinner there; don’t wait for me, please), he had felt himself soften.

The move did not seem a bad idea, after all. Andheri was getting unlivable. Because of the overhead metro, neighborhoods like theirs were deprived of sunlight, and the air was thick with dust and traffic fumes. Besides, it was all about new money: how to make it, how to flaunt it, how to multiply it, roll it. In that scheme of things, he just did not fit in.

Did they have the funds for a new apartment? he asked. Did she?

He had to be honest with himself: she was the bread-earner, and he, the dependent. Ever since he could remember she had picked up all the bills, sitting with her credit card at the computer, chewing her lower lip, then punching at the keys with two tentative fingers.

He wished sometimes that she would slap him with the accusations that lurked in her mind: his inability to hold a nine-to-five job and bring home a steady income; his dependence on her all those years; his failure at getting a publisher and turning his manuscripts into books. Could he even call himself a writer anymore? he wondered. As of now, he had three manuscripts

languishing on his computer. He had spent twenty years of their married life working on them. Twenty goddamn years, and nothing to show for it!

She said they did. Not the full amount, but enough to put down a decent-size deposit. The rest would be a loan, which would be paid out of her salary. Her boss was giving her a raise, she added. That would help them clear the loan in two years, perhaps even earlier.

His face had broken into a smile. “Miracle Man!” he exclaimed. “He’s coming through for us again. He’s the one who’s fixed this, hasn’t he? What would we do without him?” He reached out with both hands, excitedly. But seeing her face tighten, his hands fell loosely by his side. It was not going to happen, the physical connect. Too much emotional baggage. Too many unspoken regrets. Too much of a history here. Too late to do anything about it.

Yet, these were moments that united them, that proved that there was a marriage still, they could still share some good news and exult in it. Besides, they were both tired of Andheri: of the crowds, the traffic, the unceasing construction work. Everywhere you looked there was dust and debris. And, in the midst of that, swank and swagger. People with money, people with a future. God, how he hated seeing them, in coffee shops and restaurants, with their gym-toned bodies, their measured accents, their laptops open before them, speaking into their cellphones.

Now he and his wife: their hearts were in Bandra, good old Bandra. That’s where they had begun their lives. That’s where they had met and courted. That’s where they had made love the first time, on a rainy Saturday afternoon, in his one-room bedsitter on St. Paul’s Road. Both of them had been shy and awkward, disbelieving that a single act of intimacy could provide so much pleasure. Perhaps, by moving back, it would improve, he thought. Perhaps it would bring back the old memories, get the chemistry flowing again. He wondered if she ever thought about that: the way they had been before she pledged herself to the job, and he, to his writing.

The funny thing was: they had similar tastes in films and books. They could relate to the same directors – Abbas Kiarostami, David Lynch, Richard Linklater, Spike Jonze, the Coen Brothers, and Michael Moore; and the same writers: James Baldwin, Isaac Babel, Saul Bellow, Albert Camus, Anton Chekhov, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Gustave Flaubert, John Steinbeck, and Richard Yates; and among the moderns: Aimee Bender, Margaret Atwood, Cynthia Ozick, Jennifer Egan, Junot Diaz, Ben Fountain, Rick Moody, and Ron Rash. It was almost eerie how they agreed on their providers of literature and culture, without any prompting or discussion. It was a shame in a way, because had they done that – entered into conversation and shared their observations – he wouldn’t have had to spend all those hours on Facebook, writing long posts late into the night, then waiting to interact with total strangers, waiting to see if they would like it, love it, comment….

And he used that time of the night for other things, too. Like getting onto the porn sites and plundering them for all they had to offer: teenage sluts, ebony goddesses, swinger wives, and insatiable cougars. He used those sites for a break from his work, for physical release, and to numb himself to the fact that he barely had a marital life and that his professional life – if you could call it that – was in the dumps; it was a non-starter to begin with.

Perhaps his wife suspected. Perhaps, that’s why she had given him a study in their new house, 250 square feet of sheer privacy, where he could shut himself in. Here his imagination could take flight; here he could indulge his fantasies; here he was free to brood and ponder, to seethe and launch his offensives. Here, he would plead his case with publishers, promise them a manuscript that was nothing less than groundbreaking. One that would live beyond its time.

Perhaps his wife had bought her own freedom by giving him all this space. She couldn’t be the wife he wanted, so perhaps she could just be large and accommodating about it. She had been brought up to believe in the sanctity of marriage, to make sacrifices for her man, to remember that a marriage, once solemnized in church, was cast in stone, it was for ever and forever. Which is why she had chosen to stay with him despite his moods, despite his contempt for her family, despite his inability to get along with people and be commercially relevant, like other husbands. There were also times when he’d used his hands on her. Rough, brawny hands that left her battered and broken. That’s when she had closed up like a clam, gone dead on him.

But: whom the Gods deprive, they also compensate. She was at the lowest point in her life when she’d met Miracle Man. She was looking for a job, and he for an assistant. It had to be a woman who was pleasant and responsible, in her twenties, preferably without child and free to work long hours. And certainly not over-smart or over-ambitious, for, in real estate, they traded in secrets, they dealt in large sums of unaccounted cash.

Twenty minutes into the interview and Miracle Man was convinced. There was something honest and appealing about this woman. She openly confessed her limitations and, equally, her willingness to learn. Something profound too, as though she was searching for a deeper meaning to life, as though there was a wound in her that had not healed, that had left her sad, vulnerable, and craving protection.

He had hired her, taught her the ropes, and entrusted her with some of his smaller clients. And he never asked why she chose to work long hours, sometimes weekends, too, or why she never applied for long leave and went on vacation. Just the sight of her crouched over her laptop or speaking earnestly into her cell phone, assured him that he had picked a candidate who was dedicated, who was pure gold.

Soon she rose to become his highest-paid employee. And together they had built the firm, taking risks, cutting deals, and cashing in on the real estate boom in the western suburbs. Bandra to Borivali, they had swung the biggest deals, brought in the banks, the corporates, the embassies, and the IT companies. He saw how his clients warmed to her and how easily they trusted her. He, in turn, could trust her to close a deal, while he was busy prospecting elsewhere.

Now Miracle Man was the one who advised her on where to invest and multiply her money. He was the one who taught her how to save on taxes. He was the one who upgraded them to a new car every three years; who paid for the chauffeur and the gas. And he was the one who had made the new apartment possible. He had struck a deal with the builder, getting them a twenty percent discount on the purchase price. And he was the one who had advanced them a friendly loan, giving her all those out-of-turn raises and fat commissions, which took care of their monthly instalments, and which left him free to write. Miracle Man! They owed him big, owed him everything good in their lives, and he wasn’t even aware they called him that. And not that that he’d have approved of the moniker. Because – hell! – life hadn’t spared him, either. It had given him a wife who was paralyzed neck downward, and who – from the confines of her wheelchair – looked at him with loathing.

And now it struck him while he waited for his coffee. Everything in the house had been paid for by Miracle Man. The TV, the furniture, the home theater system, the stove, the microwave, the fridge … Every time they clinched a new deal at the office, some new gadget had found its way in, something was replaced. Miracle Man had even wanted to pay for a CCTV camera, but he had refused, because he did not want his late-night viewings to come to light.

And now the maid was looking at him in a strange sort of a way. Almost reproachfully, almost tenderly. As though she knew that memsahib was traveling again and that he was alone. And who had sent her but the Miracle Man? He had said that she was reliable and that she needed the money. She wouldn’t fuss about doing any extra work and wouldn’t skip a workday. He said she knew her stuff and that they wouldn’t have to supervise her or worry about locking up their valuables. Besides, she was a great masseuse – for a little extra money she could ease out the knots and remove the tension blocks.

His wife had started using her services. Saturday afternoons – while he was in his study – this maid, Rohini, would have access to his wife’s body. They would disappear into the bedroom and shut the door behind them. There, his wife would leave herself in the hands of the maid, who would first press her down with hot towels, then douse her with almond oil. The maid would rub the oil all over his wife’s body, then press down on his wife’s neck, once, twice, thrice. And whilst doing so, she would have raised her sari up to her knees, her feet arched and her heels pointing upward, so as not to dirty the starched white bedsheets. With working-woman fingers, she would knead his wife’s neck and shoulders. Then, with two fingers joined in a V, she would work the spine, top to bottom and bottom to top, increasing the pressure each time. And this would make his wife moan. How he remembered those moans! How easily he could call them to mind. They were more like whimpers, pleading with him to stop, telling him she just couldn’t take it, all that wild plunging, those heights of ecstasy he was leading her to, did he even know what he was doing, where he was taking her? He could imagine her sigh and bury her face in the pillow, her hair loose and scattered against the sheets. He remembered that and wondered where it had all gone: the vows, the chemistry, the intimacy, where they spoke only with their breath and heartbeats. And where each new stab of pleasure was also a promise of love and protection. He tried not to look down at the bulge in his shorts. The bulge that was straining, flickering, mocking him …

But now his wife was off again, she and Miracle Man, attending a real estate conference in Bangalore. Why Bangalore? he had forgotten to ask. He never did ask! It had never occurred to him all these years. But now it did – like a gentle awakening, like that church bell that chimed in the distance, softly, admonishingly – and he had some questions, real questions. Like: Why Dubai? Why Bali? Why Colombo? Why Johannesburg? Why so many conferences in a single year? What were they learning? What were they gaining? It all came at him in a rush, and he knew who had all the answers. Who was the answer.

Leaning against the black granite platform, he watched the coffee mug swirl inside the microwave. The coffee was on its last round, and he was happy to wait, for he liked it steaming hot. The mug rattled on the hotplate as though threatening to explode. But he knew it wouldn’t; it would stop just in time. He could feel the maid’s eyes on him, could feel the tension rise between their two bodies that had been given all this space on a still, quiet Saturday morning. Was it providential that he had refused the gift of a CCTV camera? Was it a coincidence that he found himself alone with a stranger who knew his wife’s body better than he did?

A flame rose in his thighs, in his gut, rushing its terrible heat to his eyes and mouth. His throat felt dry and constricted, his lips felt parched and swollen. He turned to the maid, and flashing her a weak smile, forced out the words: “Memsahib was saying you are very good with massage, that you help her to relax. Perhaps you can give me one today. I will pay you well, of course.”

His heart pounded while he waited for the answer, which came slowly and with what he thought was a faint smile. “I don’t mind, sahib; don’t mind at all,” she said. “But don’t tell madam, huh. She might not like it, she might not approve.” She looked at him beseechingly, and something passed between them, a current of understanding, a silent pact.

Turning back to the sink, she continued to scrub at a vessel. The soapy suds dissolved under the thrusting vigor of her arms; the stainless-steel vessel gleamed like new; her body gyrated back and forth, throbbing with strength; and a lock of her hair dislodged and fell over her cheek.

The microwave beeped three times, each time louder than the other. And each time it felt as though someone was pressing a finger to his heart, his soft, gelatinous heart, full of veins, blood, arteries, and tender flesh. A heart that still hurt for the wife he had lost and for the destiny that was denied to him. A heart that poured itself out, in his books, in his Facebook posts, in his love for his country and his leader. He pressed the “stop” button and the door sprang open. There it stood, the coffee mug, smoking, smoldering, against the dimly-lit dark of the oven. He removed the mug and snapped shut the oven door. “Okay,” he said, almost in a whisper. “Madam won’t know, I won’t tell her. And you also don’t say anything to anyone. After you finish, just come into the bedroom. I will be waiting.”

Holding the coffee mug, he walked out into the living room. He tried to appear nonchalant, tried telling himself he did not owe anybody an explanation. He bolted the main door as noiselessly as he could, not knowing why he did that. Then he treaded his way to the bedroom, where he placed the coffee mug on a side-table, drew shut the curtains, switched on the air conditioning, and fiddled with the knobs till the lighting was down to a bare minimum, just enough to cast its glow on the crimped beige wall.

His eyes fell on the wedding photograph on the sideboard of the bed. A tight close-up – he, in a stiff gray suit, awkward with disbelief; she, in a white satin gown, brimming with joy – and he felt a lump in his throat, a sick acrid taste in his mouth, and a tightening of his chest muscles. But then he realized it was only on his side of the bed, only what had remained of their marriage.

In a few moments, the past would give way to the future. Or rather, the future would act out its agenda. It would rise to eliminate the past.

Sitting on the bed, he brought the coffee mug to his mouth – an angry bubbling swamp of flavors – and he felt his senses stir, his sinuses open up, the last bit of sleep vanish from his eyes. And then he waited, waited for the sounds from the kitchen to fade.

By Murzbanf Shroff