The One She Was Warned About (13 page)

‘I’ve been busy,’ she said, trying not to sound defensive. ‘But I’m here for a week now.’

Her father gave her a quick look—which she missed, being lost in her own thoughts. He didn’t say anything. Shweta’s aunt, on the other hand, was a lot more vocal.

‘Are you ill, child?’ she asked, the second she set eyes on Shweta. ‘You’ve got dark circles under your eyes and you don’t look half as bouncy as you normally do.’

Shweta winced at ‘bouncy’. She didn’t feel as if she would even want to smile any time in the foreseeable future—being asked to bounce was almost an unforgivable insult.

‘She has a demanding job,’ her father said, wheeling her suitcase into the house. ‘Let her relax for a while. She probably doesn’t want to be bombarded with questions.’ But when Shweta had left the room he raised his eyebrows enquiringly at his sister.

‘Something’s happened,’ Anita said, unconsciously echoing Deepa’s reaction when she’d seen Shweta the day before. ‘I’ve never seen her like this before.’

Dr Mathur just grunted in response, but Anita knew him too well to be miffed. Even Shweta herself probably didn’t realise how much he cared for her.

After a day or so Shweta began to look a little less distraught. Her heart still ached when she thought of Nikhil, and a couple of times she almost broke down and called him. But being around her father and aunt helped. Neither of them were demonstrative people, but they cared for her deeply, and having them around was helping to centre her and make her think more calmly.

Nikhil not having called her was proof in her mind that he’d decided a break-up was the best option. Pride stopped her from making the first move, and as the days went by she was feeling more and more resigned to the possibility that she might never get back with Nikhil.

‘Dad, do you remember Mr Nair?’ she asked one day, in what she hoped was a casual manner. Dr Mathur was puttering around in the garden, and he carefully finished watering his roses before he answered.

‘The building contractor?’

‘Yes, he...um...had a son who was in my class in school.’

‘Nikhil? I remember him. Felt rather sorry for the boy—he had a lot to deal with. Got expelled from school finally, didn’t he?’

Shweta gaped at him. ‘Weren’t you on the board then? I thought
you
decided to expel him.’

‘It was a board decision,’ Shweta’s father said, frowning. ‘He’d been caught smoking on the school premises, and there had been other disciplinary issues earlier. We didn’t have much of a choice. But we did call the father down to the school and advise him to take the boy in hand. And we issued a transfer certificate instead of an expulsion letter when he told us that they were moving out of Pune. Why the sudden interest?’

He was looking right at her, and despite herself, Shweta began to blush. ‘I ran into him recently,’ she said. ‘He’s doing quite well—runs a large event management company.’

‘I’m not surprised. He had a lot of potential even when he was in school.’

Dr Mathur seemed to lose interest in the subject as he examined a fat caterpillar basking on one of his roses. When Shweta went indoors, however, he looked up. There was a thoughtful look in his eyes that his sister would have recognised.

Once inside, Shweta switched on the TV and began flipping channels. It was an indication of the depths of her desperation that she actually tuned in to the channel that had been screening the awards show, in the hope that they would do a re-run. Seeing Nikhil on TV would be better than not seeing him at all. The channel, however, was running a soap of the warring in-laws variety, and she switched the TV off in disgust.

* * *

It would probably have made her feel a lot better if she’d known that Nikhil was in as bad, if not worse shape. He’d spent the days immediately after their quarrel trying to whip up his anger against Shweta. Then slowly dull resignation had begun to settle in. The more he thought about it, the more convinced he was that Shweta’s hesitation in getting engaged, and her later insistence on his contacting his parents, had to do with the fact that she was ashamed of his background. Except he could no longer summon up the will to be indignant about it—at times he even found himself thinking that she was right.

The switch from anger to depression made his spirits sink completely. He was sure he still wanted Shweta—whatever else he was confused about, that fact stood out clear and incontrovertible. He’d tried visiting Shweta’s apartment, to talk her around, but Priya had told him that Shweta was in Pune for a week. She didn’t volunteer any further information, and Nikhil didn’t ask. He wanted to approach the whole thing in a more calm and rational manner than he had hitherto—chasing after her to another city would make things worse, if anything.

Then Veena phoned. ‘Nikhil, I’ve been trying to call Shweta but she hasn’t picked up her phone. Is she all right?’

‘I’ve no idea,’ Nikhil said, his voice bleak. ‘We’re not engaged any more.’ He waited till Veena’s agitated outpourings lessened, then said, ‘I don’t really want to talk about it, Amma.’

‘Did you fight?’

‘No, we were having a wonderful time together. She just decided she didn’t like the shape of my nose,’ Nikhil said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. ‘Of
course
we fought.’

His stepmother stayed silent long enough for Nikhil to regret his rudeness.

‘I’m sorry—’ he began, but Veena interrupted him.

‘The fight you had with Shweta—was it something to do with your parents? Because I asked her to speak to you again. It wasn’t something she would have brought up otherwise.’

‘Yes, she told me that,’
Nikhil said slowly. ‘Why?’

‘I thought she would be able to change your mind,’ Veena said, sounding utterly devastated. ‘I know I should have spoken to you myself, but I
had
tried, and it only made you angry.’

‘It’s not your fault,’ Nikhil said gently. Veena in self-castigating mood could go completely out of control.

‘It is. So many things are my fault—I’ve ruined all your lives!’

‘Hang on,’ Nikhil said, sounding bewildered. ‘Whose lives are we talking about, here?’

There was the sound of sobbing, and then Nikhil could hear his father’s voice in the background. He seemed to be trying to calm Veena down—unsuccessfully—and after a few minutes he came to the phone and said gruffly, ‘Amma’s too upset to talk to you now. I’ll ask her to call you back when she’s feeling a little better.’

Nikhil didn’t reply immediately. It was a long time since he’d last spoken to his father and it felt odd to hear his voice.

‘What’s wrong, though? Why’s she saying she’s ruined my life?’

‘All our lives,’ his father said dryly. ‘We don’t agree with her, but she’s going through a bad patch right now.’

Veena’s voice could be heard in the background, raised in tearful and self-recriminatory protest. Nikhil could hear his own mother’s soothing tones as well, and in a while Veena quietened down.

‘I’m glad I’ve got to talk to you,’ his father was saying. ‘It’s been a long while—the last time we spoke we both said a lot of things we didn’t mean.’

‘Right,’ Nikhil said awkwardly.

Veena’s saying that she’d ruined all their lives was making him think—Shweta had put doubts into his head already, and his father no longer seemed the villain of the piece.

‘Your mother’s wanted to speak to you for a long while too,’ his father said. ‘But she’s with your Amma right now, trying to calm her down.’

‘I’ll call her later,’ Nikhil said. He couldn’t yet bring himself to apologise for all he’d said during his last quarrel with his parents, and he knew his responses to his father sounded stilted and perhaps a little cold.

‘That’s all right,’ his father said, and to Nikhil’s surprise he added, ‘Right now your priority should be making up with your young lady—from what your Amma says, she seems pretty special. And, Nikhil...?’

‘Yes?’ Nikhil said in neutral tones.

‘Veena told Shweta a lot of things before she left Mumbai—things she’s not spoken to anyone about for a long, long while. She made her swear not repeat any of it to you, but she’s going to release Shweta from that promise.’

‘Is this something to do with why she waited for fifteen years after I was born before she divorced you?’

‘That’s part of it,’ Mr Nair said. ‘I think it will come better from someone outside the family. All three of us have made our fair share of mistakes, and unfortunately you’ve been the victim of most of them.’

‘Shweta and I aren’t on speaking terms,’ Nikhil said abruptly. ‘So maybe you should tell me yourself.’

‘And maybe you should try and get back on speaking terms with her,’ his father said. ‘If she refuses to talk to you that’s different, but somehow I’m very sure she won’t.’

TEN

The sound of
a powerful car engine made Dr Mathur look up from his beloved roses. The car pulling up outside their house was black and lethal-looking, and the magnificent specimen of manhood emerging from the driver’s seat looked as out of place in the little suburban street as a hawk in a chicken coop. He strode up to the little metal gate that separated the garden from the road and Dr Mathur peered up at him, suddenly feeling very old.

‘Shweta’s not at home,’ he said. ‘But you can come in.’

Nikhil hesitated. The change in Dr Mathur was disconcerting—he still remembered him as a toweringly imposing figure, and the contrast between that image and the frail, elderly man in front of him took some getting used to.

‘I don’t know if you remember me,’ he said, hesitating a little.

Dr Mathur shot him a piercing look from under his bushy grey eyebrows. ‘Nikhil Nair,’ he said. ‘Even if I didn’t remember you I’d have guessed. Shweta’s mentioned you a couple of times since she’s got here. Have you had lunch?’

Nikhil shook his head. He’d left Mumbai at eleven in the morning and driven non-stop for five hours, but he was too keyed-up to think of food.

‘Will Shweta be back soon?’ he asked.

Dr Mathur grunted. ‘I have absolutely no idea. She’s gone to one of those shopping malls to get her aunt a Diwali gift.’

The disgust in his voice when he said ‘shopping mall’ was the kind usually reserved for words like ‘cockroach farm’ or ‘horse manure’. Nikhil smiled involuntarily. ‘Which one?’

Dr Mathur evidently thought Nikhil was clean out of his mind, going to a shopping mall to find Shweta, when he could wait in the garden for her and admire the roses instead. Still, he gave him directions to the mall, and added, ‘She was planning to get some curtains as well, for the living room—though why we need new curtains I don’t understand. These are perfectly OK.’

Glancing at the hideous flowery curtains at the windows, Nikhil grimaced—he could see why Shweta wanted to change them.

Shweta was wandering despondently through the mall, wishing that the Diwali decorations weren’t quite so in-your-face. Not to mention the dozens of happy families milling around—it was enough to turn one’s stomach. But she had managed to get her father some books he wanted, and she’d picked up a pretty cardigan for her aunt. The last ‘to-do’ on her list was getting a set of curtains for the living room of the Pune house. Traditionally people spring-cleaned and painted their houses before Diwali—Dr Mathur would protest vigorously if she tried to get painters into the house, but there was little he could do about new curtains other than grumble.

She was comparing swatches of curtain fabric with a set of cushion covers when a shadow fell across the bales of cloth. ‘Refusing to match, are they?’ a deep voice said, and she looked up.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asked Nikhil ungraciously, though her legs felt so wobbly that she was glad she was already sitting down.

Nikhil surveyed her silently. She looked a little thinner, he thought, but perhaps that was his imagination. Her eyes were challenging as she looked at him, but her lips trembled slightly and he took heart from that. ‘Leave these for a bit,’ he said, taking her hands and pulling her to her feet. ‘Let’s take a walk.’

Like a marionette, Shweta found herself obediently trailing out of the store behind him. He took her hand and drew her into an almost deserted coffee shop.

‘I’ve missed you,’ he said softly. ‘I can’t tell you how much. Will you forgive me and come back to me?’

She was still looking at him, her eyes troubled. ‘Do you still think that I...?’ she began.

He was already shaking his head vigorously. ‘No, I don’t,’ he said. ‘I was being unreasonable and unfair, and... God, Shweta, I love you so much. I can’t imagine what I was doing, letting you go like that.’

He was holding her by the shoulders now, rather tightly, and she gave a little gasp. ‘I love you too,’ she said, and then his lips came down on hers in a hot and hungry kiss.

It was a few moments before they realised where they were. Shweta emerged from his embrace with her hair tumbled and eyes glowing, took a look at the large and interested audience they had collected around them, and promptly buried her face in Nikhil’s chest.

He laughed and swung her around, shielding her from the crowd with his body. ‘Let’s go,’ he said, and they walked out of the mall, with Shweta hurrying a little to keep up with Nikhil’s long strides.

Once they were in the parking lot, Nikhil took her into his arms again, kissing her unhurriedly and very, very thoroughly.

‘I want us to get married as soon as possible,’ Nikhil said.

Shweta nodded. She was in a state of deliciously blissful confusion—if Nikhil had suggested moving to the Andamans and living under a coconut tree she would have probably agreed just as willingly.

‘Should I speak to your dad?’ Nikhil asked, after another short interlude punctuated with kisses and little moans from Shweta. ‘Ask him for your hand in marriage? Or do you want to tell him yourself?’

‘I’ll tell him myself,’ Shweta said. ‘Might as well do it now and get it over with. Somehow I don’t think he’ll be surprised.’

He wasn’t.

‘I suppose I should have guessed,’ he said when they told him a little later. ‘Well, both of you look happy, which is good. Shweta, did you remember to buy the
diyas
for Diwali?’

Shweta looked immediately guilty, but her aunt stepped in. ‘That’s all right—what a thing to ask the girl when she’s telling you she’s just got engaged! I’ll go and buy the
diyas
.
I’ll also get some sweets and things, so that we can celebrate their engagement properly.’

‘Why don’t all of you come to Mumbai with me and Shweta?’ Nikhil asked. ‘We can celebrate Diwali there together—I was thinking of calling my family down as well.’

Dr Mathur thought it over for a while. ‘Why don’t you get your parents to come here instead?’ he asked. ‘They used to live in Pune. I’m sure they’d like to see the place again.’

‘Just because you’ve turned into an old fuddy-duddy who hates travelling,’ Shweta said, leaning over and giving her father an affectionate hug.

Nikhil’s eyes widened. Shweta hadn’t been lying when she’d said her relationship with her father had changed—right now it seemed as if Dr Mathur was the one in danger of being bossed around by a controlling daughter. He was even keeping his much talked-about opinions to himself.

‘What do you think, Nikhil? Would they like to come?’ Shweta asked. ‘Diwali’s more fun in a proper house than in a flat.’

The words were light, but there was an unspoken question in her eyes and he tried hard to reassure her.

‘I’m sure they’d love to come—I’ll call them and confirm.’

‘Diwali’s the day after tomorrow,’ Dr Mathur said, getting to his feet. ‘Better call them now and start booking tickets. Airfares will be sky-high.’

‘You’ve started speaking to your parents again?’ Shweta asked, once her father and aunt had gone indoors, tactfully leaving the two of them alone in the garden.

Nikhil nodded. ‘Amma called me, but she broke down halfway through the conversation—when I told her that we’d split up. Well, from something she said I gathered that I’ve probably got the wrong idea about my dad, and when he took the phone I didn’t start lashing into him right away.’

Shweta raised her eyebrows. ‘Well, that’s what’s been happening the last few times we spoke,’ he said.

‘I’m sure he sees it as an improvement,’ she said dryly. ‘What did he tell you?’

‘Not much, really—just that there’s a reason why Amma feels she’s ruining my life. And that you know what it is.’ He looked Shweta squarely in the eyes. ‘That’s when I realised what a self-centred, bigoted idiot I’ve been. Even Amma confided in you rather than telling
me
what the real story is.’

‘That’s understandable,’ Shweta said gently, and she went on to tell him what Veena had told her in Mumbai.

She kept the details of what had happened to a bare minimum, trying to focus on Nikhil’s father and how he’d been if not blameless, then at least acting for what he thought was the best. Nikhil’s lips tightened when she started speaking, but soon his eyes were moist.

‘Don’t blame Veena Aunty,’ Shweta urged. ‘It must have been traumatic. She’s a very private, conventional person, and the thought of you or anyone else knowing would have been unthinkable. It was only when she realised the extent of the harm she’d done you that she spoke to me.’

Nikhil shook his head. ‘I’m done with blaming people,’ he said. ‘Poor Amma—to have carried this around with her all her life... And my poor parents too. They were trying to protect her, and into the bargain I turned against them.’

‘But now you know,’ Shweta said. ‘And you can make it up to them.’

Nikhil’s parents forgave him readily, and they were ecstatic to hear that he was about to get married. Air tickets at ‘sky-high’ fares were duly bought, and they along with Veena were on their way to Mumbai the next morning.

‘I’ve hired a car to get them down to Pune,’ Nikhil told Shweta. ‘I could have gone and picked them up, of course, but I can’t bear to let you out of my sight—I’m so worried you’ll change your mind.’

‘And you’re even more worried you’ll miss out on all the sweets Anita Bua’s making,’ Shweta said. ‘She’s spoiling you rotten—I need to speak to her.’

Nikhil shrugged and nicked a cashew from the bowl of dry fruits and nuts Shweta was chopping. ‘What can I say? Women can’t resist me.’

‘Wait till she hears you. She’ll chase you around the house with a broomstick,’ Shweta said, slapping his hand away. ‘Come and help me do the
rangoli
.’

Nikhil trailed out behind her, but he was more of a hindrance than a help as Shweta used powdered colours to make the elaborate
rangoli
designs on the floor of the front veranda.

‘You’ve got that line crooked,’ he pointed out helpfully, after kissing her on the nape of the neck just as she began on the most complicated part of the design.

Shweta glared at him. ‘Why don’t you ask Anita Bua if she needs any help? Go and buy some more sweets or firecrackers or something.’

‘Firecrackers—that’s a good idea,’ Nikhil said. ‘I don’t think anyone’s bought any yet.’

He came back just as his parents arrived. His father shook hands with him formally, but both Veena and Ranjini burst into tears and threw themselves into his arms. He stood stock-still for a few seconds, then he hugged them back before pulling away.

‘Shh, you’ll frighten my brand-new fiancée away,’ he said, smiling into their faces. It was the perfect distraction, and both women turned to exclaim over Shweta. Nikhil gave his father a wry look. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said softly. ‘I wish you’d told me.’

Mr Nair’s eyes were suspiciously damp as he clapped his son on the shoulder. ‘If you’d known you’d have probably become a boring small-time builder like me,’ he said. ‘Look at you now—you’re a hundred times more successful than you would have been if you hadn’t rebelled so thoroughly.’

Later in the evening, when the older women were busy making plans for the wedding, Shweta wandered over to the corner of the porch where Nikhil had piled up the firecrackers. Because it was Diwali, and because she’d just got engaged, she’d allowed Anita Bua to bully her into wearing a sari. The lovely pale-gold brocade
benarasi
was draped around her slim curves in graceful folds, and the colour set off her rather elfin looks to perfection.

Nikhil watched her as she carefully opened one of the packets of firecrackers. His father and future father-in-law were discussing a rather intricate twist in state politics. Normally he would have been interested, but now he couldn’t take his eyes off Shweta. The front of the house was lit up with strings of fairylights, and after she’d completed her
puja
Anita had lit the little oil
diyas
that were placed in the
rangoli
patterns on the porch. Shweta had now taken a candle out of one of the packets, and was lighting it at one of the
diyas.

‘Careful!’ Nikhil exclaimed, getting to his feet as her
sari
pallu
brushed the ground dangerously close to the open flame.

Shweta gave him a teasingly provocative little smile. ‘Come and help,’ she said imperiously, and Nikhil went to her side without even listening to the point Dr Mathur was making about populism and regional vote banks.

Dr Mathur gave a rare smile as he watched Shweta. ‘She reminds me so much of her mother,’ he said, and Mr Nair nodded in sympathy. He’d first met Mrs Mathur during one of those trips to the movies, long before Shweta was born, and the resemblance was striking.

‘I shall light an
anaar
first,’ Shweta was announcing. ‘Actually, I shall light several. Six, I think. Line them up in the driveway, will you?’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ Nikhil said.

Shweta lit a sparkler and lightly touched it to each of the
anaars—
they went up immediately, looking like a row of fiery fountains. Shweta took out a packet of rockets next. ‘Ooh, I like these,’ she said, and lit several of them in quick succession, her eyes following them as they shot up and exploded in a shower of multi-coloured sparks against the night sky.

Shweta’s upturned face was too much of a temptation for Nikhil to resist, and he pulled her into his arms to kiss her. Shweta cast an agonised glance towards the porch, but Dr Mathur and Mr Nair were nowhere in sight. Screened from the people in the street by the rosebushes, she went willingly into Nikhil’s arms.

‘Do you think they’d notice if we slipped away for a bit?’ Nikhil asked, nodding towards the house.

‘Not until it’s dinnertime,’ Shweta whispered back. ‘Let’s light the rest of the firecrackers, and then I’ll smuggle you into my room through the back door.’

‘Why don’t we forget the firecrackers and go now?’ Nikhil muttered, bending his head to kiss her again.

Shweta gave it due consideration. ‘I suppose we can,’ she said. ‘Make up for the week we lost.’

And that was exactly what they did.