Those Pricey Thakur Girls (30 page)

‘I think those people are looking for you.’

Dylan doesn’t turn around. Instead, he leans in, eyeballs Noronha, and says in a clear, level voice: ‘Daisy Duck.’

Debjani gasps. Anjini looks mystified.

Donny flushes a dull red.

‘You really are a very odd boy,’ he says with dignity. Then he looks at the girls. ‘My dears, your glasses are empty! Let me replenish them, like.’

Saying which, he plucks their glasses out of their hands and scurries away, leaving a grimly satisfied Dylan glowering at the table, in clear possession of the field.

‘
That
was
rude
!’ Debjani exclaims.

‘No no,’ says Dylan coolly. ‘He’s used to it.’

Very quietly, Anjini gets up and walks away too.

There is silence, well, except for the band, now performing a soulful rendition of Cutting Crew’s ‘I Just Died in Your Arms Tonight’.

‘Was he
the
Donny Noronha?’ Debjani asks finally. ‘The one your mother told us about? Heart-breaker, hymen-breaker?’

‘Yeah,’ Dylan replies, smiling faintly. ‘
The.
’

She giggles.

He grins.

‘So what were the two of you discussing so animatedly, anyway?’

This is Dabbu’s chance to show off just a little.

‘Oh, just the HDW submarine deal scandal,’ she replies airily. ‘And if the government really is as blameless as it’s making itself out to be. And then we talked about the Bofors gun scam.’

He was nodding, his eyes on the dance floor, giving the over-all in-charge ones, like he has drinks to refill and aunties to kiss, but at this his eyes come around to lock into hers. Debjani’s heart gives a weird little bump.

‘Excuse me?’ His eyebrows rise.

She nods, doggedly maintaining eye contact. ‘You heard me.’

‘So you’ve been reading the newspapers,’ he says witheringly. ‘How sweet. But a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. Remember that.’

Which is a pretty D for devastating remark, but Debjani is a full-blooded Rajput. No wimpy Mangalorean blood thins
her
veins.

She raises her chin.

‘You’re
such
a pseudo,’ she tells him sweetly. ‘I’m pretty, so I must be stupid. Thank god I didn’t marry you.’

Dylan immediately wants to marry her on the spot. Father Charlie and Father Vaz can perform the ceremony – they’re sitting right there, eating prawn-pao and payasam.

He crosses his arms across his chest.

‘So now you
know
you’re pretty,’ he notes regretfully. ‘There goes your nicest quality.’

‘Only a complete MCP would like a girl because she has no self-confidence,’ Debjani flashes. ‘But I guess that’s a perfect description of
you.
’

Dylan stares at her uncomprehendingly. She got male chauvinism out of his behaviour? What
is
this girl? And why can’t he get her out of his head?

‘Look, Dabbu, I don’t want to perform a post-mortem here. What’s past is past. I was foolish enough to let my parents brainwash me. They gabbed on and on about grandchildren and how well they know your family, etc. And you are, as you have just stated, pretty. Quite pretty, actually. It was a lethal combination of emotional blackmail plus a gun to the groin. Today I thank you for saying no to what would clearly have been a hugely incompatible match.’

It is a prepared speech and it sounds like one – any impartial observer would suss that out immediately. But Debjani isn’t impartial.

‘Don’t call me Dabbu!’

‘What? Okay.’ Suddenly, he winces. ‘Damn, the Mangys have got hold of the mic.’

Debjani looks over his shoulder. A large contingent of old Mangalorean uncles have mounted the stage and are now thanking everybody who has flown in from out-of-town for the function. The list is a very, very long one, since Mangys take wedding anniversaries extremely seriously. Then they start talking in slow quavering voices about the dreadful things the Shekhawat boys got up to in their grandmother’s house in Mangalore when they were little. This goes on for so long that the Rajus, out of sheer self-defence, start heckling them rudely on another mic. Which, of course, goads the Mangys to debate the ancient historical question regarding the origin of the Rajputs, right there on the stage, into the microphones.

Rajput,

Tu maha choot,

Tu kahan se aaya re?

‘Get up there before they hit the second verse,’ Juliet Bai hisses into Ethan’s ear. But

Golkund

Meri ma-ki-bhund

Mein wahan se aaya re!

has already been belted out triumphantly before he can clamber onto the stage, strap on a base guitar and hit some mean chords. ‘Sing, Ethan, sing!’ scream the girls in the crowd, immediately diverted. Ethan grins and proceeds to give the people what they want, which is the UB40 version of ‘I Can’t Help Falling in Love with You’.

‘Wise men say!’ exclaims old Donny Noronha, materializing suddenly at Dabbu’s elbow. ‘Would you like to
rush in
with me, my dear?’

He leans forward, hand outstretched.

Debjani, moving without any thought, puts out her hand – and finds it, not in Donny Noronha’s clammy grip but in an entirely different, cool, firm grasp.

‘Shall we?’

She looks up at Dylan. His eyes are intense, not at all like the eyes of somebody who claims to be entirely indifferent. But that’s probably just the fairy lights, she thinks bitterly. After all, emotional blackmail and a gun to the groin are what got him to propose to me. She tries to pull her hand away. He doesn’t let go.

‘This song’s too slow,’ she mutters.

He holds fast to her hand, tilts his head and smiles. It’s not a very nice smile. ‘So we’ll take it slow.’

He pulls her to him with a sharp tug and soon they are whirling around on the dance floor. One hand grips the small of her back while the other holds fast to her right hand. It’s the closest they’ve ever been physically. Thank god the music is so loud, she thinks. Nobody but I can hear my stupid heartbeat.

‘So how’s the kot-piece?’ Dylan, clearly used to such close proximities, asks lightly. ‘Do you guys still play?’

Why is he making pc? she thinks darkly, not bothering to answer. Like he gives a damn – he only ever came to play because there was a
gun
to his
groin.

‘Are you sulking?’ He sounds amused. ‘You know, most people would consider me the wronged party here.’

Up comes her head. ‘Oh, yeah? Everybody on the Raju circuit thinks
you
turned me down.’

‘But you’re so famous and all,’ he points out reasonably. ‘How could they think so?’

‘Well they
do
,’ she says. ‘I’m a girl. You’re a guy. So.’

He tilts his head.

‘Now who’s talking like an MCP?’

‘My father still isn’t speaking to me,’ she says, her eyes almost welling over with tears.

‘Debjani.’ He sounds a little bored. ‘Get over it. Worse things happen in this world every day. I’ve just met a girl whose mother was raped and murdered in the anti-Sikh riots. She saw it happen but her father made her promise never to go to the police about it.
Thos
e are real father-daughter issues.’

‘There you go again, giving the big picture ones,’ Debjani says crossly. ‘Three thousand people died in a riot, so it’s silly to weep over one puny street mongrel! Typical!’

‘Are you calling yourself a street mongrel?’

‘Shut up,’ she snaps, tossing her hair. ‘I
hate
you.’

It’s that hair, he decides, staring down at her. Angel hair. And those collarbones… and that crunchy little grin. They combine to create an illusion, and that’s all it is – an illusion. In reality, she is both vain and self-centred. His arms tighten around her, drawing her closer.

‘Suppose I kissed you now?’ he says, his voice husky. ‘Would that make them think I was hopelessly in love with you, and it was you who did the dumping?’

‘I guess so,’ she replies with credible nonchalance, even though her cheeks are flaming. ‘It would work even better if I slapped you afterwards.’

‘You might not
want
to slap me afterwards,’ he murmurs, his spikily lashed eyes glittering.

Debjani gives a hollow laugh.

‘Ha.’

‘Ha or haan?’

She looks around the Jasmine Garden. The dance floor is full of gently twirling couples, the lawn is dotted with people conversing, eating, laughing. Anjini is a few feet away from her, dancing with a smitten uncleji. Just looking at her stiffens Debjani’s spine. She turns her eyes to Dylan.

‘I don’t want to kiss you,’ she tells him politely, like he is a waiter and she’s declining an offer of Rasna orange.

This clear, categorical statement and the look of rebuking scorn that accompanies it make him feel suddenly cheap. He flushes.

‘You still don’t know how to flirt.’

‘Oh, I do,’ she assures him. ‘I’ve learnt. I just don’t want to flirt with
you
.’

‘You really hate my guts, don’t you. But why? Just because of that one article?’

‘Yes,’ she replies tightly. ‘And also because, though you profess to be all concerned about human tragedy, you’re just a cold professional hack, chasing a big fat story. You don’t have any
feelings
.’

‘What crap!’

‘Because if you
did
,’ she continues passionately, ‘you would have told me about the article yourself, you would have explained – you wouldn’t have tried to brush it under the carpet and then tried to bribe me with a big fat bottle of expensive perfume.’

Dylan stares at her uncomprehendingly.

‘What perfume?’

‘The Anais Anais, obviously,’ she says crossly.

‘Debjani, I didn’t give you any perfume.’

She looks up. ‘What?’

He nods. ‘I wrote you a letter. And put it in your letter box. This androgynous-looking little kid on a tricycle with very short, spiky hair and gold stud earrings…?’

‘Bonu,’ Debjani supplies automatically.

‘Yeah, Bonu then, this kid Bonu saw me do it.’

Debjani looks up at him doubtfully. Behind them, on the bandstand, Ethan winds up the song. The music stops.

‘Then who gave me the perfume?’

‘I have no idea,’ Dylan says, his arms dropping away from around her body, making her realize how chilly the night air has grown. ‘Ask Bonu. What a foul name, by the way.
Bonu
.’

‘They were expecting just Monu,’ Debjani explains, her mind spinning crazily, trying to internalize what he has just told her. ‘So when they had twins, they said she was a bonus and named her Bonu.’

But Dylan isn’t interested in the story of how-Bonu-was-named-Bonu.

‘So now you’re telling me you never got the letter I wrote you the day before we came over for tea? How do I know you’re not lying?’

‘I’m
not
lying! I didn’t get it! Why would I lie?’

The lean dimples flash in a rueful smile. ‘Maybe because you’re regretting letting me go, now that I’m so famous and all.’

‘I’m famous too,’ she snaps. ‘Anyway, I don’t believe there ever
was
such a letter. I think you’re lying. Like you lied about the cat.’

‘I lied about the
cat
?’

‘Well, I’ve never seen a cat in that sand pile.
Ever.
’

Dylan stands back and says, ‘Look, I don’t have to prove anything to you. Ask Bonu about it if you like – and if you
don’t
like, don’t.’

Then, as she stares up at him, all doubt and confusion, he leans in and flicks the tip of her nose with one careless finger.

‘One caveat, though. The sentiments expressed in the letter are a bit dated.
Quite
dated, actually. Remember that. And now, goodnight. Thank you for the dance.’

11

‘B
onu Singh?’

She is crouching in the verandah, an aluminium paper clamp clipped to her chin, a Natraj pencil clenched between her nose and upper lip, Mrs Mamta Thakur’s floral nightgown wound about her head like a turban.

‘I’m a Sardar,’ she whispers, spraying spit and promptly dropping the moustache-pencil. ‘It’s a disguise, so Samar can’t find me.’

Debjani unclips the paper clamp. ‘You’ll cut your chin with that, silly girl,’ she says, massaging the reddened skin. ‘And why are you hiding from Samar?’

Bony wrinkles her forehead. ‘I teased him about his crush on Eshu. What do you want, Dabbu mausi?’

‘How d’you know I want anything?’ Debjani counters.

‘Arrey, you never talk to me any more. Mummy says it’s because you’ve become famous.’

‘It’s because I’ve become
stupid
,’ Debjani says, hugging Bonu’s thin body hard. ‘Uff, look at your cheeks. You should put cream – winter’s coming, you’ll get all scaly.’

‘Only if you give me your Nivea cream, from the blue tin. I don’t like Mummy’s Charmis. It’s sticky.’

‘Listen, Bones, you’re right, I do want something. Well, actually, I wanted to ask you something.’

Bonu’s eyes, large and long-lashed under her absurd floral turban, gaze up at Debjani’s face trustingly. ‘What?’

‘Did you see that Dylan bhaiyya – the one I was going to marry – did you see him put a letter in our mailbox the day before he came here with his family?’

Bonu’s eyes skitter away. She starts to play with the nightgown wound around her head. ‘N-nooo,’ she says slowly.

Debjani’s heart plummets with absurd disappointment. ‘You didn’t?’

‘Noooyess.’

‘Noooyess?’

Bonu’s thin fingers pluck at Debjani’s shirt. Her words come out in a rush. ‘Dabbu mausi, that Dylan bhaiyya is a
Christian
– one of those people who go to church every Sunday and stick their tongues out at the priest.’

‘So what, baba?’ Debjani pats the rapidly unravelling turban.

‘If you marry him, you won’t have a hissa in the house. Because of Hindu Undivided Family Law. And I want you to have a hissa in the house. You’re my favourite mausi!’

‘Who told you that, Bones?’

Bonu yanks down her grandmother’s nightgown till her face and body are completely covered in floral cloth. Her voice drops so low, Debjani has to strain to hear it. ‘Papa. I heard him. On the night all the adults were discussing who you should marry, I fought with the boys and hid in the passage. Papa’s lawyer phoned him and told him – and then Papa called Mummy out and told her.’

Debjani stares at the small veiled figure before her, feeling sick. So
that’s
why Binni had done such a volte-face in favour of Dylan that night… and I had been so pathetically touched. But she’s my sister, how could she? It’s that bloody Vickyji, she concludes fiercely. Creep. He’s got her completely under his thumb.

Aloud she says, ‘Did you hide the letter?’

The veiled figure nods.

‘Could you give it to me?’

The floral nightgown tumbles off. Bonu’s eyes are all concern. ‘But your
hissa
, Dabbu mausi!’

‘Never mind my freaking hissa.’ Debjani gives her a little shake. ‘Life is not about hissas. Earn your own money when you grow up, instead of waiting around for your parents to die. Mercenary little ghoul! Now go get my letter – and
where
did you get that expensive bottle of perfume?’

‘Oh, Steesh got that.’ Bonu, now that she is confessing, seems to be quite happy to make a clean breast of things. ‘For Eshu mausi. He gave it to me to give to her. I put it in the mailbox – because I know you don’t like perfume – and the next day, I just looked sad and told Steesh I dropped it and it broke.’

‘Bonu, you shouldn’t tell lies.’ Debjani looks at her, appalled. ‘It’s not right.’

‘Mummy lies,’ Bonu says blithely. ‘She says it’s okay if you’re doing it for the right reasons.’

‘It’s
never
righ – oh, never mind, just give me the letter. Where have you hidden it?’

But the little girl is looking stricken.

‘Are you going to tell everybody I hid it?’

Debjani, in a fever of impatience, scoops her up and kisses her on both cheeks. ‘No. And nobody will ever know, I promise. Now where’s my letter?
Give
it no, Bonu Singh…
Please
, Bonu Singh, it’s my
vewy fwerst
lurrrve letter, Bonu!’

Bonu giggles. ‘You’re funny!’ She jumps out of Debjani’s lap and runs from the verandah. Then she scampers back in complete panic. ‘I forgot my disguise! Samar will recognize me. Put my beard on again, quick!’

‘Why didn’t you ever tell me about the perfume?’ Eshwari demands of Satish in school the next day. ‘
Why
, Steesh?’

He shrugs, looking uncomfortable. ‘What would I have said? Hey-hey, Bihari, I got you a big-ass perfume bottle but your retarded niece broke it? What would be the point?’

‘She’s not retarded,’ Eshwari says crossly. ‘
You
are.’

They are heading down to the common hall for a meeting of the Interact Club of which Eshwari is president. They are wearing their usual blue uniform, a shade reminiscent of nightsuits or banker’s shirts, him in pleated trousers, her in a short, swingy, box-pleated skirt. Eshwari wears a pin on her dark blue blazer, proclaiming her to be Gandhi House Captain, and the scrunchie that secures her ponytail is bright red, which is against school regulations but does amazing things for her black hair and creamy skin. Satish’s attempt at being sartorial begins and ends with his blazer collar, which is turned up jauntily.

‘Sorry for not telling, but you also never told me that Dillu gifted Dabbu the very same perfume, on the very same day. I would’ve made the connection then, maybe. Anyway, now spill, ya. What did his letter say? What did
Dabbu
say?’

Eshwari draws a long, deep, heartfelt breath and turns to him. Her eyes are shining under her spiky fringe. ‘It was
so
romantic, Steesh, you’ve no idea. I think
I
have a little crush on him too, after reading his letter. And his ass toh I told you, na…’ She exhales gustily.

‘Yes, yes, his ass should be awarded the Bharat Ratna, you’ve told me that before,’ he says testily. ‘And stop banging into people, look where you’re going. So he wrote this romantic masterpiece and what did your sister say?’

‘It wasn’t just romantic,’ Eshwari muses dreamily, and draws another deep breath. ‘It was –’

‘Hello, leave some air for the rest of us,’ Satish tells her hastily, shooting dirty looks at a couple of class eleven boys who are staring mesmerized at how magically Eshwari’s chest is swelling every time she inhales.

Eshwari turns to looks at him. ‘It was
honest
,’ she says. ‘And like he thought she was, I don’t know, a
higher
thing than just a girl somehow… It was the sort of stuff I imagine Christians say in confession.’

‘Sounds kinky to me,’ Satish says sapiently. ‘And now you’re lusting after your would-be brother-in-law? You’re sick, Bihari.’

Eshwari glares at him. ‘Stupid. That’s not what I meant. You don’t know anything at all.’

‘Because you’re not telling me. What was Dabbu’s reaction?’

‘Well, she cried. And then she cried some more. And when I left home, Ma and she were blubbering over the letter together and talking about how best to bring it up with BJ.’

‘It’ll sort itself out, don’t worry,’ he tells her as they emerge on the second floor. ‘Dabbu and Dillu sound like they are made for each other. Now when do I get a treat for doing your sister’s setting?’

‘Excuse me?’ Eshwari’s eyes widen. She says, with a toss of her ponytail, ‘All you did was mess things up! If your stupid perfume bottle hadn’t replaced his romantic letter, everything would’ve been fine!’

‘But thanks to me and the retar – I mean, the little kid, there’s all this highly gratifying Romeo-Juliet action happening,’ he points out. ‘Drama, misunderstandings, reconciliations!’ He leans in really close and sniffs her thoroughly. Eshwari feels like she is being inspected for narcotics by a large hairy beast. ‘Whyn’t you wear the perfume though, Bihari? Don’t tell me Dabbu used it all up in three months?’