Family Planning (21 page)

She thought for a moment. She bit her lower lip.

“Stay,” he said, “I like you.”

It appeared, for once, that he had said the right thing. She said quickly, “I like you too.” Then: “But have you seen this part of Delhi? It’s my favorite part of Delhi. Everything else is so boring. Here at least there is culture.”

He looked enviously at two men unzipping side-by-side under a giant keekar tree. He admired the gall of the peanut seller who was scratching his pelvis. The city at crotch level was where he belonged. He put the tulsi plant on the ground
to commemorate the beginning of his relationship with Aarti.

“Let’s go for a walk,” she said.

Walking was good. Walking fast was better. It kept his bladder dancing. He used Aarti’s cell phone to call home and asked that Balwant Singh bring the car to Nizamuddin, and yes he was fine, he was just buying a plant, he’d be right back, okay bye.

Then he clicked the phone off and turned to Aarti and started talking about the band. He told her how they’d forged a signature rock style on the flyover. How they’d one-upped their competition by choosing as their summit a place still swirling with searchlights of dust and dampness; how the passing cars had all plunked gravel into the dicey-looking pits below. She was duly impressed, and said, “Where do you practice regularly?”

“On a flyover, yaar,” said Arjun.

Suddenly the band name was clear to him: The Flyover Yaars. The next day in school he presented it to his band-mates amid much fanfare; the four boys threw themselves into the project of mythmaking. They broadcast freely to their classmates about their bold shenanigans on the Godse Nagar Flyover. Drew diagrams of musical levitation on the blackboard that shimmered at noon, chalky pulsars radioactive with rumors. Preached the legend of the band to the white-uniformed masses. Were even felicitated with free offerings of slimy chow mein in the canteen, which they set on fire to see if they truly contained petrol, as the popular legend went. But there was no soy-blaze, no biohazard, only extra-charred noodles.

Aarti said, “Here we are.”

They entered the shanty through a narrow alley smeared with slush. On either side were tiny shacks serving tea and huge fluffy naans and rotis. Men glanced at them as they reached with giant spears into the glowing cylinders of their tandoors. Goats strained at their tethers; Aarti reached out to pet one. All around Arjun were alien-looking signs in Urdu: Muslim bookstores, Waqf boards, tube-light shops. The men and women in the area appeared to be staring at Aarti, her bare knees poking forward into the dusty afternoon light. Yet she was utterly un-self-conscious. Arjun walked a little behind her, both hands dug into his back pant-pockets.

He was squeezing his butt to hold in the piss. It appeared, strangely, to work.

“Don’t you love that this is the middle of Delhi?” she said. “All these women in burkhas and all these beautiful dilapidated buildings. But wait till you go into the dargah. Sometimes they have qawallis here. It’s really amazing. Do you know how old this is?”

To Arjun it all just seemed poor. They entered a quadrangular space between buildings and stood at the edge of a tank filled with water. Children were climbing up to the precarious ledges of the buildings, hanging their shirts on the spikes of TV antennae and then diving down into the tank as if this were the most natural thing in the world. They screamed and cursed. In the dappled light Arjun studied Aarti’s reflection in the water, only to have it shattered with a splash. They both stepped back.

“The culture is so rich,” Aarti continued. “What do we Hindus have in Delhi? It’s really boring being a Hindu. All the temples—well, except Hanuman Mandir—were built like two days ago. And then we don’t have any strict traditions. You can do what you want and you don’t have to do what you don’t want. That’s why I get bored when my Dadi goes to the temple. I know nothing bad will happen if I don’t pray.” She sighed. “Do you know—sometimes I wish I was a Muslim.”

“Well—”

“What? You think I’m weird?” she said, bobbing her satchel up in defiance.

“No—you’re damn boring.”

“Shut up.” She giggled.

“But can I tell you a secret?” said Arjun.

They passed through an arch into the main courtyard of the dargah. It was unremarkable to Arjun. It looked like the inside of one of those long filthy tiled old Delhi kothis that his father sometimes visited to massage constituents and local chieftains. In the middle of the courtyard was a tiny tomb.

“What?” said Aarti.

“Promise you won’t tell anyone?”

“Yes—”

“I was born a Muslim,” Arjun blurted.

She didn’t know what to make of this. In the shadows of the buildings her face was softened; he felt he could reach out and touch it and it might fall through his fingers like a curl of smoke.

“I mean. I’m like them”—he nodded toward the boys div
ing from ledges—“down there. I’m circumscribed. I mean, circumcised. Sorry, am I disturbing you? No? Good. We are adults; we can say these things. But I was adopted by a Hindu family. That’s why I never tell you about my family. I’m actually adopted. My real mother died when I was three.”

He had said it and yet the statement seemed curiously lacking in weightiness. He himself could feel nothing for Rashmi; he had lost only an abstraction.

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

“It’s okay. I’m a stepson—I’ve always been treated like one. I have twelve brothers and sisters, and I’m forced to do all the work and take care of them. That’s why I needed to start this band. So I could escape.”

“You have twelve brothers and sisters?”

“Yes. Yes. Yes. I’ve never told anyone. I don’t know why I’m telling you.”

Here is where the plan went awry for Arjun. His eyes began to redden with tears.

Aarti said, “Are you okay, Arjun?”

They were standing side by side at the threshold of the shrine with the outer edges of her satchel and his backpack pressing against each other. She was close enough that he could smell sharpened pencils and shampoo and face cream. But she hadn’t turned to face him. Her shoulders had gone stiff. She was teasing and coiling her hair nervously with both hands. She was at a loss. She was looking left and right.

“Are you okay, Arjun?” she said.

“Yes, I’m fine,” he growled. “Sorry. Let’s go. My car will be almost here.”

They started walking back out in rapid steps. Why was he crying? Was it scientifically possible that piss held in on one end could become tears on the other? His throat and nose and sinuses felt coated with crushed glass. Then they were back on the main road, back in the hubbub. He’d stopped crying but was still sniffling, and she turned to him again and said, “Arjun, how long have you known? That you were adopted?” She was looking at her feet.

Arjun said, “I don’t want to talk about it. Sorry.”

“Okay, sorry.”

“No, no, no, it’s okay.”

Now they waited at the bus stop in silence. He stepped into her shadow on the peanut-strewn pavement. Inside, he fumed and fumed and fumed. Why had he chosen to tell her such a huge, stupid lie?
I was born a Muslim, I’ve been treated like a stepson.
Great! Now he could never have the band and the family and Aarti in the same place. He could never organize a concert. His life was compartmentalized beyond repair. No one—not even Aarti, the girl to whom he’d wished to confess everything—would know who he truly was.

No one would know, Arjun thought, that there wasn’t much to know.

There it was, that hideous self-pity, and his eyes began to redden again in defense, and so it was a great relief when he saw the car thundering through the traffic toward them, the
way he loved it—siren ablaze, the government-spoke on the hood fluttering in slipstreams, windows tinted as if to protect a supermodel from the paparazzi. He enjoyed the pomp and ceremony of a government car, the way an Ambassador—an ungainly, diesel beast—changed into the ultimate symbol of plush power as soon as it was fitted with a siren. He liked the way the drawl of the car’s approach took people by surprise; how they tried hard to not ask,
Is your Papa in the government?
And how they always failed as soon as the powerful AC blast knocked them flat against the cool leather upholstery.

Unfortunately, he had told her already about his father. There was no element of surprise left.

So when the car arrived, he refused to get in. The driver, Balwant, had rolled down the window and said, “Oye, Handsome,” and he hated that. He hated being called
handsome
or
hero
.

“I have to buy another plant,” he explained to Aarti as she got in the back. “For my science project. I don’t know why I put it down.”

“Maybe it’s here still?” she said, half out of the car.

“It’s gone,” Arjun said, ruefully.

She didn’t believe him, didn’t believe he needed to buy a plant; he could tell. She mussed her hair with both her hands, then dropped one hand to adjust her stockings—economizing on the action by bending down and doing a graceful half-turned wave—the other hand still coiling strands around the fingers, releasing shiny ring after ring of hair.

Arjun turned to the driver. “Balwant, please drop madam to Defence Colony.”

Then he slammed the door and watched the car rev away. A blizzard of dust caped after the car and covered his tongue with soot. He was stranded in a flickering daytime slot of Delhi, a soap opera that no one wanted to watch. Cars and cows and scooters passed him by. They didn’t even honk. How peculiar to be pandering to an audience of one. How tiring, draining, terrifying. He parked himself before a keekar tree and took a piss that lasted several generations, his legs splayed out in a broad V. He felt pleasantly crushed; his bladder pistoned with relief; his old optimism returned. What had happened today was private. Mama would never find out what he’d said about her, and to cancel his sins, he’d go home and prove to her that she was more than an enforced intermission in his increasingly-cinematic life. He’d be a good son. He’d do something special for her. Offer a free massage. Or buy her VCDs. Or better still, take her to watch a movie.

As a result of this altruistic scheming, he wasn’t quite ready for the news that awaited him at home.

T
HE HOUSE WAS UNDER SIEGE:
dozens of men and women had settled in the driveway and were squatting on either side of the phalanx of dozing ministerial cars, newspapers twisted over their heads against the relentless sun. They were either constituents (they wore the hassled expressions of people who’ve asked their minister to install water pumps in their villages one too many times) or money men (hassled in general). The garden, meanwhile, was surrounded by a rampart of speakers. Into its denuded pliant mud had been plunged wooden posts, and from the wooden posts was hung a massive, gaudy, maroon tent. It was the same brand of tent one saw at weddings; some macabre dusty sheet patterned with
arabesques, and it was beneath this tent, in awesome shade, that Mr. Ahuja sat on a chair in a white kurta getting his hair cut. He was old-fashioned that way. He kept his eyes closed and smacked his lips as the barber snipped at his hair with exaggerated karate-style chops. His hair looked wrong and jagged, but even more disconcerting was the red rose Mr. Ahuja held daintily in his hand between thumb and forefinger, sniffing it every time his barber came to the end of a sequence of chops. The barber was not much older than Arjun and so stopped respectfully when he saw him approaching.

Mr. Ahuja opened his eyes; they were bloodshot in a regal, Mughal way.

“What is all this, Papa?” Arjun said.

Even as he asked, he thought:
a concert. He is making up for yesterday by organizing a concert.

Mr. Ahuja said, “Beta, I understand this is very sudden. But we are going to have to move in one month’s time from this house. So I wanted to have a party at the earliest. Tomorrow night.”

“We’re going to move? What do you mean?”

Mr. Ahuja sat upright. “Look. As you know, I have resigned—”

“But, Papa—”

“And not only have I resigned. But, for once, my resignation has been accepted!” Mr. Ahuja chuckled unconvincingly. “And thus we will move.”

They were living in a government-sanctioned home, a VIP accommodation.

“But, Papa, I thought you said the government will also fall. If the government falls, then can’t you keep the house till the next election?”

“Come again?”

“I THOUGHT YOU SAID THE GOVERNMENT WILL ALSO FALL.”

“Who says the government is falling? There is a Sixth Front being formed between Rupa Bhalla and the CPI. I thought Yograj was also going to withdraw and so the government would collapse. But this is not happening. And I have decided to stand by my decision. Sometimes one must do the thing that is morally right.”

“You’ll still be a Member of Parliament I thought. Even if you are not in the government you’re an MP, right? As an MP you can keep the house.”

Mr. Ahuja was impressed by his son’s interrogation. He said so. “Very sharp you’ve become, eh? Look, the situation is this. I will be frank. This house we are living in is bigger and better, more spacious than the house of any other MP. Do you know why? Because we are staying in the house that was allotted for Rupa Auntie. I am only leasing the house from her. So now that she and I are no longer on talking terms, she will cancel the lease. I know her too well. We will have to move. We have no choice.”

Arjun dug his hands into his pockets. How to explain to Papa that Rupa Auntie could have taken away the house (the sacred birth place of nearly half his siblings), the garden (the burial ground of soiled diapers), and the guards, and it would
all have been fine, if only there was a way to preserve the bus route that came bowtied to this prime location? He’d have to change buses if he changed neighborhoods, and then there’d be no Aarti to unwrap every morning or to festoon with offerings of wit. To think he’d only been moody with her today because he knew he could remedy it tomorrow with sniveling kindness and a Bryan Adams reference. What if there was no tomorrow. What if this was the end. Hello, Good-bye. His massive, smooth forehead contorted with suppressed speech; Mr. Ahuja could sense it.

“Look, beta,” he continued, “I know this is very difficult to swallow. It is very difficult for me also. Put yourself in my shoes. But we will get over this. In fact, you must play an active role at this party tomorrow. I will introduce you around. And you can even perform with your band if you like. We can turn the party into a concert.”

“No. We’re not good. The band’s not good.”

“Of course you are.”

“You don’t know what good music is.”

“That is not your concern,” said Mr. Ahuja. He brushed off a few darts of hair that were poking out of his shoulder. “I will arrange that.”

“How is it not
my
concern if
I
am playing?”

“Arjun, please. Why would you pay? You asked me if I had provided food and booze, and I said yes.”

“Ah, Papa! I said, You have no idea WHAT GOOD MUSIC IS.”

Mr. Ahuja laughed at himself. “Yes, you’re right. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry too.”

Arjun looked away from his father and scratched his cheek. He was surprised by his stubble and scratched some more.

Mr. Ahuja persisted. “Arjun, have the concert. You can even invite the girl you like. The one who goes on your bus?”

Arjun wanted to hand it to the man—he had a marvelous sense of timing and an unlimited number of informants, how could he possibly know about an insignificant bus romance?—but then the source of the information came to him in a thunderclap of consciousness: his siblings. They’d betrayed him, the bastards. They’d pay for this.

“There are many girls who go on the bus, Papa,” he said. “They are
all
my girlfriends. When the right time is there, I will invite all of them. You can help me choose even.”

“But your brothers and sisters told me—”

“Forgot what they say, Papa. They’re all liars. They have nothing better to do but tell lies about me. They’re stepbrothers and stepsisters, and they want to have a stepsister-in-law. This is the sort of thing I have to deal with all the time. Maybe I should also resign. Will you accept my resignation? I resign.”

Arjun had intended to sound joke-y, but the last two lines were spat out; his tongue hissed and flickered between his teeth.

Mr. Ahuja said, “Very funny, let me consider it,” and tittered uneasily. He was not a man much given to tittering.

After Arjun stomped his way back to the house, Mr. Ahuja sat in the chair under the tent and massaged his head. He beckoned
the barber over and had him point a giant industrial fan at his face. The brutal surge of wind was suffocating, but the trick was done: the shorn hair was sucked off his face and shoulders and nose and into a minor jetstream that plummeted and scattered into the camouflaging greenery of the garden. Still he prickled from his recent snipping; he had sensitive skin; he felt the full weight of Arjun’s immaturity. It appeared to Mr. Ahuja that Arjun was setting himself dangerously against the family. Already he considered them step-relations. He wasn’t doing well at school or at home or with his band. He needed to be distracted away from this zoo, or more trouble was in store. There was only one place for him, Mr. Ahuja decided with a sigh, there was no point denying it, and so when he entered the house, he took Arjun aside from the dining table where he sat peering dumbly into a notebook—a rare scene of homework-in-progress—and said, “I have thought about your proposition.”

“I’m sorry, Papa” said Arjun. “I was only joking.”

“No, no, it’s okay. You will not
resign
or any such thing, but you have to help me with the next campaign. What do you say? You will be one of my political advisers. Tonight you’ll come with me to a function. You’ll be my right-hand man. What do you say?”

Looks of pure thrill are rare: Arjun’s face became a singularity, a thing invented solely to fulfill the promise of the moment, all of the self and its self-consciousness and history obliterated by the delicate dance of muscles that signify wonder. He forgot all about helping Mama as he’d planned; he
forgot even, for a moment, about Aarti and his siblings and his homework. He looked like a baby, he was a baby.
He’s not cynical, he’ll have to be taught everything from scratch
, thought Mr. Ahuja, and even though he knew he was inviting disaster—even though he knew that the two of them could never get along—he felt glad. He’d done the right thing.

“Are you serious, Papa?”

“What do you say?”

“Yes, Papa,” gasped Arjun. “Of course, yes, Papa.”

Then the disasters began.