Serving Crazy With Curry (15 page)

Let the Past Go Fast

It was a lazy Sunday morning. Cars were being driven slower than usual and the California sun beamed down on the brown hills surrounding Silicon Valley.

Devi stood outside the New India Bazaar and felt her hands grow clammy. Saroj's neighbors’ car was parked outside and so was Vikram Uncle's. Vikram Uncle and Megha Auntie had come to see her the first week she stayed with her parents. They came for just half an hour and left, looking sad and unhappy.

Most of her parents’ friends had either visited or called and each time they'd stayed for a very short period of time, distraught that Devi had attempted suicide and confused that she refused to speak. Devi found the visits trying and the one-sided conversations immensely patronizing and condescending.

“You have to go in sometime,” Saroj said and took Devi's elbow in a firm grasp. “So what if everyone knows? So you made a mistake. You don't have to hang your head in shame all your life.”

Devi wrenched her elbow free and took a deep breath. She didn't want to face these people. Family was different, but to these people she was gossip. They probably had already talked to their friends and their friends’ friends about her.

“You know Saroj and Avi Veturi's girl… no, no, not the smart
one married to that Stanford professor, the younger one. She committed suicide.
Nahi,
she's not dead. Saroj apparently found her bleeding in her bathtub. These girls today they watch too much television and try to imitate soap operas.”

She didn't want to go in, but for once Saroj was right. How long would she hang her head in shame?

They were in the frozen food section and Saroj was piling the shopping cart with
paneer
when Megha Auntie spotted them. She wasn't alone. Her daughter, Anita, who lived in New York with her investment banker husband, was with her. Anita was seven months’ pregnant and chewing on a Mars bar.

“Hai,
Devi, Saroj.” Megha Auntie patted Devi's shoulder. “So,
beta,
how are you doing?”

Devi nodded and then smiled at Anita.

“Still not talking?” Megha Auntie asked, speaking in a low saccharine-sweet voice as if Devi were five years old and had lost her favorite Barbie.

“She is doing well, very happy,” Saroj intervened smoothly. “So, Anita, how are you feeling? You shouldn't be eating sweets,
nahi}
Megha told me you have gestational diabetes.”

“Oh, Auntie, once in a while is okay,” Anita said and shared a
we-are-being-tortured-by-each-other's-mothers
look with Devi.

Devi didn't know Anita or her younger brother Purohit very well. Even though Avi and Megha Auntie's husband, Vikram, had been in business together for years, their families were not close. Saroj and Megha were too busy competing with each other to form any kind of stable friendship.

“Arrey
Saroj, Devi.” Raina Kashyap, Saroj's neighbor, came along with her overflowing shopping cart. “Have you seen the
karela,
limp and dry, and they're charging four dollars a pound.
Kya zamana hai,
everyone is trying to swindle us.”

“The tomatoes are very cheap. Cheaper than in Safeway,” Megha Auntie said and then wriggled her eyes at Raina, inclining her head toward Devi. “Have you seen our Devi… she's looking bright and happy, no?”

“Oh yes, yes,” Raina said immediately, contrite that she hadn't
already mentioned something to soothe the suicidal girl's obvious insecurity.

Oh Lord, were these women really worried that if they didn't say something nice to her she'd do herself in again? How long would this go on? How long would it take for everyone else, besides her, to let go of her attempted suicide?

“How was the meeting with the psychiatrist?” Raina asked and Devi nodded.

“Not talking still,
beta}”
Raina asked and smiled as if Devi had lost a few screws. “You just let your mummy and daddy take care of you and everything will be all right. Okay?”

Devi nodded again, calmly, when all she wanted to do was throw the bag of spinach she was holding at the women.

“Okay then, we should go,” Saroj said as if sensing the anger in Devi.

By the time they got home, Devi was seething with rage and had a sick feeling that this anger would never end. Even if she let go of the past, others would remember and they'd never forget. This would go on and on.

“She locked herself in her room,” Saroj said, concern lacing her voice. “They wanted to ask her how she was doing and—”

“Why did you have to take her with you?” Avi demanded angrily. “Does the entire Indian population of the Bay Area have to interrogate her?”

“Avi,” Saroj protested, “she has to get out of the house sometime. How many days will you keep her locked in?”

Vasu was relieved that she decided to stay for another few weeks. As crude as she was, Shobha was right. Geeta was eighty years old, so close to death anyway. Devi was young, vibrant, depressed, needy.

She left her daughter and her husband to bicker in the living room, knocked gently on Devi's door, and then tried to open it. The door swung open easily and Vasu's heart clenched when she heard Devi's sobs muffled against the pillow, her body racked with a combination of despair and fury.

She sat down beside Devi and stroked her hair. “Come here,
beta,”
she said and Devi shifted to lie on Vasu's lap. Tears were still flowing but the sobs had quieted.

“People will not forget it for a long time,” Vasu said when the last of Devi's tears had seeped into her yellow cotton sari. “They will wonder. They will be fascinated.”

Devi shook her head and then more tears rolled down her cheeks.

“What you did is very juicy, Devi,” Vasu reminded her. “Gossip-wise, it is so interesting. If I were a lesser woman, I would want to call India and tell all my friends about it and hear them go,
No, really.”

Devi let out a watery laugh and a fresh sob went through her and fresh tears blossomed and fell on Vasu's sari.

“Oh,
beta,
it is okay,” Vasu said and rocked Devi to and fro. “Life never turns out as we plan. People will talk, they always do, but you have to ignore that and live your life.

“That is what I had to do. You think if I cared I would have had those beautiful twenty-five years with Shekhar? And then when he died, I was no one to him, not even his widow. That was hard, so difficult. I gave him so much, took a lot in return, too, but in the end, he was someone else's husband. I was aware of it. The people around me were very aware of it.

“Every station I got posted to, there would be whispers and talk. When Shekhar would come for a visit, they would all gossip and make rude comments. I lived with it because I knew this was the price I had to pay for Shekhar.”

Devi looked up at her grandmother and for an instant Vasu thought that Devi would speak. She would talk, open up, the mystery of her attempted suicide would cease to be an enigma.

“Yes,
beta}”
Vasu asked hopefully, but Devi just shrugged and closed her eyes.

“You will be fine,” she said softly. “People will eventually forget, but until they do, you have to be strong and overlook them and their opinions. You are alive now, and that is all that matters.”

Death had become a friend to Vasu in the past few years. So many of her friends had passed away. Shekhar had left her, too, and now she was looking forward to dying. She was needed by Devi and that made
her feel jubilant, but she also knew she was ready. Since Shekhar had gone she had been counting the days, waiting to leave as well.

Without him the world didn't make much sense. She wished Devi had someone the way she'd had Shekhar. He had been her anchor, her life. If only Devi had an anchor, someone who would keep her rooted, this would never have happened.

Maybe it was time to look for a suitable boy for Devi. It could be done differently. It didn't have to be a conventional arranged marriage. Vasu could just introduce Devi to the boy and then let them find out if they wanted to be together. Isn't that how a lot of young Indians were getting married in the States?

As Devi lay on her lap, Vasu started to make a list of people she could call in India who would know of a suitable boy in the United States.

Vasu always liked Avi. He was a good man, an ambitious man who had come so far in his life despite losing an arm.

As she sat across from him waiting for him to make a move on the chessboard she looked at the large pictures resting on the mantel on top of the never-used fireplace. Saroj had set off the pictures in brass antique frames, which she polished regularly.

There were four pictures, four events that Saroj probably considered important ones. One was of Avi and her on their wedding day. They had married in a registrar's office without the usual fanfare. Saroj had been disappointed, there was no doubt about that, but Avi had been so averse to marrying in the conventional way that Saroj had given in. Now when Vasu looked at the past she realized that Saroj seemed to have always been giving in to Avi.

Saroj looked bright and beautiful in the picture, nothing like the dried-up bitter woman she had become. She wore a red-and-white silk sari with flowers in her hair and a ruby necklace wrapped around her neck. But her eyes shone the most. They held bright expectation of the future. Avi looked disreputable in a gray suit. He hadn't shaved that day and there was a laconic look in his eyes. But he was smiling, and looking at that picture no one would doubt how
much this couple loved each other. Now when Vasu looked at Saroj and Avi she wasn't sure if there was any love left.

Her heart constricted at that thought. No, her daughter deserved a happy marriage. After all that she had done and sacrificed to ensure a happy union, God wouldn't be so unfair as to mess up her marriage, would he?

The second picture was of Shobha and Girish's wedding. Saroj had pulled out all the stops for this one. This wedding had been the one she had wanted.

Shobha was dripping with jewelry in the picture, and it looked as if she were getting ready for third-degree Chinese torture instead of a happy future with her new husband. Girish looked uncomfortable in his south Indian wedding attire. The
panchi
was askew, his
kurta
completely wrinkled, and the red
tilakam
on his forehead seemed to be in his eyes. They both were smiling, but their eyes and smiles were empty.

Vasu remembered Shobha saying, “Thank God the ordeal is over,” when the wedding celebrations ended and she was ripping off her sari to wear something more comfortable.

How could it be that all three generations—grandmother, mother, and daughter—had been in unhappy marriages? How had fate twisted their lives to bring about this triple tragedy?

“Your move,” Avi said, leaning back and putting his pipe in his mouth.

“Hmm,” Vasu replied as she rested her chin on her hands, leaning forward toward the chessboard.

“She looks better,” Avi said with a broad smile when they both heard Devi's small laugh from the television area of the living room.

Saroj had divided the living room into three parts. There was an antique table with two chairs near the French windows where Vasu and Avi played chess. Sofas were ensconced around a large-screen television, music system, VCR, and DVD player in a separate area.

A third section, next to the kitchen and dining area, held another sofa set where the family entertained formally. It was only used rarely.

“What is she watching?” Vasu asked, looking over to see her
granddaughter dip her hands into a bowl of popcorn as her eyes glinted with humor.

“Some movie,” Avi said and smiled contently. “She'll start speaking soon.”

“Is that why you're always at home?” Vasu asked as she moved her rook so that in the next three steps she could threaten Avi's queen.

“Hmm,” Avi said, wrinkling his nose and then looking at Vasu. “What do you mean?”

“No golf, no lunches, nothing. When I first got here your social calendar was too full, now you are always at home,” Vasu explained, and when Avi shrugged she put her hand on his. “She is not going to slip away if you get back to your life. You don't have to watch her all the time.”

“The last time I stopped she almost died,” Avi said, shaking his head. “Golf can wait, and why should I eat out when I have a master chef at home?”