The Blue Notebook (13 page)

He spoke to the back of my head, “Now what do you say to your uncle Gahil?” I said nothing. The master repeated his question, “I said, what do you say to me?” This time he did not wait for a reply. With his left hand he grasped my hair and pulled my head off the bed. With his right hand he slapped my face so hard, I thought I would black out. He slapped me again with the back of his hand (he knew not to hit me with his ringed hand). With my hair still gripped in his hand, he brought my face so close to his that I could smell his skin and feel the spit from his words land on my face. He repeated with a sneer, “Now what do you say?” I was so shocked that I failed to even contemplate resistance. I meekly whispered, “Thank you. Thank you, master.” He dropped my head and concluded our conversation, “Now that’s the spirit. You will have a lovely time, you lucky girl.” Then he left the room. My scalp ached and my face stung. I lay facedown on the bed once again, my
cheeks sore on the soft white sheets. I remembered the old fairy tale I had read as a child and imagined that I was the princess trapped on the tiny island in the middle of a storm. The waters were rising around me and I cried out for my beloved, but even with the waters about to submerge me, he did not come.

As I lay on the bed caught in memories and dreams, I sensed I was not alone. From the back of the room, a person moved toward me. I felt rope being used to tie my wrists behind my back, and, once secured, my arms were yanked from behind me so that I rose from the bed onto my legs. I had been rewired from the girl who had entered this house just two days before into a new Batuk. Sometimes your life can change in a second and sometimes it takes a lifetime. In my case it took two days.

A hand pushed the middle of my back and propelled me through the unlocked door and out of the bedroom. I was pushed along the curtained hallway, past the dining room I had been in the previous night, along the corridor Father had delivered me to, and out through the large dark oak door. Another push half plunged me down the brick stairs onto the hot streets of Mumbai. Less than a week ago I had left my village and now I was a different vessel. I had walked up the stairs governed by my father and generations of family. Now I walked down the stairs physically restrained but aware that my existence was in my hands alone.

I was half pushed and half led to the Orphanage by a man I never fully saw. I looked around several times and the only
glimpse I got was of a broad unshaven man who looked a bit like a bulldog. I was pushed through the streets for at least an hour, and no one seemed to notice or care that a girl was being led through the streets secured with rope. Eventually, after walking through a maze of tiny streets and paths, we came to a huge clearing of bamboo ropes supporting a chessboard roof of rags: the Orphanage. I was pushed through the hordes of little children to a brick house at the far end of the expanse. As I entered the main room, the bulldog announced, “One of Gahil’s here.” His voice was deep and loud. “Gahil says she is an easy one. He said to work her a couple of weeks, then Mamaki Briila will come and fetch her. No damage, he says.”

He left me standing at the entrance to a dark room dense with the smoke of cigarettes and hashish and lit by the glare of a television. The room was furnished with wooden couches, an assortment of scarred and repaired chairs and scattered tables, and was carpeted by a hodgepodge of worn carpets that resembled the patchwork of wafer-thin cloths that formed the roof of the Orphanage. Patches of yellow paint barely adhered to the walls. The architecture of the house was old and suggested an eternity, whereas the frenetic movements of the Yazaks reminded me of their temporary placement on earth.

“You!” a sharp, clipped voice called from the left side of the room. “I am your husband.” Although Shahalad was physically wiry and small, his diminutive size was in contrast to his large persona. He stood with a half-stooped stance so that his head was cocked back at all times, which not only shortened him but gave him the appearance of always sniffing at the air. His bent-back head coupled with his quick and shifting gaze made him look like a rat. Shahalad was not the highest-ranking Yazak but
was not the lowest-ranking either. He had a status among his peers that gave me a status among mine. When he announced me as his bride, there were roars of mockery, to which he responded with a large, even white grin.

If I had hoped that my nuptials would be protracted, I was to be disappointed. As soon as the roars of mockery died down, Shahalad said in a strong voice that had a slow, even rhythm and sounded completely alien to his small physique that it was time to take his new wife to her wedding feast. He grasped my wrist and led me toward the back of the room amid calls of “Does she know what gifts you have for her?” “Don’t honeymoon too long,” and, in a mocking high-pitched tone, “Darling, darling, I love you.”

In the Orphanage everything was done in haste. Shahalad led me to a back room in the building that was lit only from the main room. He pushed me up against a wall and lifted my white smock, and I felt him try to push his bhunnas into me from behind, with one hand on the back of my neck. He was fumbling and panting. He cursed. He soon realized that he could not maneuver me to couple with him in the way he envisioned. He threw me down onto a mattress on the floor covered with a threadbare blanket. He split my legs apart, lay on top of me, and pushed himself into me. He had far more strength than I had imagined, although I did not fight hard against him—perhaps this was a result of my rewiring. He had not said a word since we entered the room. He completed a
handful of thrusts before I felt his terminal pulsations. As he finished, he rolled off me onto his back. I could sense that words were percolating inside him but he did not speak. We both lay on our backs, silently looking at the dark featureless ceiling of this cell.

At that moment, the darkness was punctuated by the shouts of the Yazaks and the television noise from the main room. I could feel my identity separating from my body. When you create a painting, you apply paint to canvas; it is a mechanical process whereby a brush is dipped in paint and smeared over the canvas. As a masterpiece is painted, however, there comes a moment when the picture is no longer only a mere representation but possesses the essence of the artist. At this moment an unquantifiable element has been added to the canvas; you cannot weigh it and you cannot see it, but there it is! It is soul.

In that dark little cell, I willed my soul free of my body. My soul jumped onto the spinning upper air that covers the top of the earth and there she was unconfined. I roared across the upper air and kissed Navaj goodnight, moved Mother’s favorite necklace so that she could not find it in the morning, and watched Father because he needs me to. I swirled at the feet of the great poets and rode in the manes of the swiftest horses. I filled the silent caves of the mountains and I confused the eagle as he was about to snap his talons over a field mouse (and so contravened “will”). I ignored the dying, for they will soon join me here, but helped the sick taste their pain. I laughed at the same blindness that the poor and rich share. All this, as I lay next to my silent husband.

The stillness that hung in our space was splintered by Shahalad suddenly jumping to his feet; I had thought he was
asleep. As he shot from the cell, he stopped short, spun round, and came back to where I lay. He stood over me and looked down. There was a jingle in his eyes and a smile on his face that were not altogether unattractive. He then turned away and left me.

As Shahalad entered the main room, I could hear cheers from the Yazaks. “What a man” was one. After a short while my husband returned to the cell. I half expected another round of sweet-cake but no, he bade me enter the main room with him. I did as I was asked. Once I had gotten onto my feet, my body was not in pain, but I felt his juice sliding down my thigh. As I entered the main room behind Shahalad, I was barraged with the verbiage of the mindless: “You lucky bitch, to get a man with such a small penis,” and “Are you ready girl for the main course?” I stared intently at the floor and noticed the smoothness of the bricks worn down by centuries of feet.

It was clear that my beauty served Shahalad well, as he frequently glanced at me from different points of the room as he mingled there. I saw children come and go from the main room; on each occasion they sought out their respective Yazak to presumably gain orders and collect rewards. I soon learned that everyone was taken at their word at the Orphanage. The Yazaks never verified that a task was complete and issued rewards as verbal requisitions: “Tell cook So-and-so to give you rice and meat” (a rare treat). Since disobedience was so brutally enforced, contravening a Yazak’s order carried enormous risk and necessitated stupidity. Some of the brutality was not judicial but unchecked sadism. For example, I saw a child (maybe eight) executed for threatening another child with a knife. The Yazak made the guilty child kneel and then he knelt behind
him, holding the boy tightly in his arms. The Yazak made the other child slit the restrained boy’s throat while the now-silent crowd watched. Rape was common too; an older prostitute or even a girl would be brought into the main room, tied to a table facedown, and left there stripped to pleasure any man who wanted her. I knew not to interfere and learned that obedience was unquestioned and that the value of life is a moment; that was the unspoken creed of the Yazak.

On my second day, Wolf, who was the head of the Yazaks, called across the room, “Shah, I am going to take your wife for a cup of tea to make sure she is settling in well and you are treating her right.” Wolf was not like the other Yazaks. The others, Shahalad included, were dirty and wore rags, whereas Wolf dressed tidily. Today, for example, he wore a spotless white shirt, pressed denim jeans, and brown leather shoes. Similarly, he was well groomed. He was clean shaven, wore his hair neatly combed, and had well-defined facial features. He was neither ugly nor handsome. His most remarkable physical feature was that he looked like a fourteen-year-old child when in fact he was far older. He gave an impression of innocence.

The Yazaks feared Wolf. They never spoke of him when he was not there for fear of another Yazak ratting on them. When he came into the main room, there was an utter hush, and when Wolf issued an order there was absolute obedience. I never once saw his authority questioned. Another interesting thing about Wolf was that he did not live in the Orphanage, like the Yazaks, but somewhere in the city. He would show up in the main room at odd times to speak with the most senior Yazaks or sometimes just to watch television, but then he would leave. At least once a week, he would bring his light tan briefcase,
which contained neatly apportioned sachets of white and brown powders, multicolored tablets, and brown-looking pieces of wood. Orphans, who had been organized by the Yazaks, were used to deliver the sachets throughout the city. On all the occasions I saw Wolf, he never raised his voice and always smiled. The orphans loved to see him as he always had sweets, a coin, or a kind word for them. His outward appearance of kind innocence was effective and remarkably deceptive.

Wolf beckoned me to him and I obeyed; there was a tangible power to him. “What is your name, little one?” he asked. “Batuk,” I answered, eyes downcast. “Batuk. That’s a nice name. I just want to have a cup of tea with you and make sure that scallywag Shahalad is being good to you. Master Gahil specifically asked that you have a nice time here as he has good plans for you. Let’s go somewhere a bit more private.” As Wolf led me toward the back rooms, the sea of Yazaks, orphans, and whores split apart before us. When we got to one of the larger rooms, one of the Yazaks, who had followed us, laid out a clean-looking blanket over the mattress and then left us. Wolf spoke so softly that I could just hear him over the noise from the main room: “Batuk, kneel down.” I knelt before him and he continued to speak softly to me. “I am called Wolf, and my job is to take care of everyone …” With that he removed his bhunnas from his trousers and pushed my face onto it. It was soft and doughy. I knew what I was supposed to do. He continued as I moistened and licked him, “I have to make sure, you see, that everyone … you, Shahalad, Gahil … is organized and happy. Master Gahil, for example, needs to make sure that you will work well for him so that he can take care of you.” He was responding to the warmth and wetness of my mouth. He carried
on, “You will need to work hard for Gahil if you want nice clothes and toys …” He pulled my face off him. His bhunnas was sticking straight out from his body. I watched from my knees as he took a little sachet from his pocket and sprinkled white powder along its length. “Batuk,” he continued, “here is a little treat for you. Lick the sugar off … be a good girl.” The sugar did not taste sweet at all but had a bitter taste. As he guided my head over the stretched, bitter skin, a glaring, screaming bright light came on in my head … I was going to explode but I gave myself to Wolf.