The Toss of a Lemon (59 page)

She thinks Goli has done something wrong, but has he, and what, exactly? The man Bharati thought was her father sounds honourable, and Bharati made it sound as though his second family might not even be a secret from his first. Sivakami must not know about it. But maybe the only thing Goli did wrong was not paying. Janaki feels as though she is banging weak fists against her own unyielding head. Who can help her to understand this?

Once she sees Muchami at work in the shed, however, she is unable to talk to him either. He is a servant, she tells herself, even as she feels an ancient urge to climb into his lap and put her arms around his neck. He is not part of the family.
If he
doesn’t know, I can’t be the one to tell him,
and
if he does know, it would be
improper for
me to discuss it with him. She backs out of the shed without saying anything, and goes slowly toward the house. She doesn’t feel like crying; she feels as though a black wind whirls dryly at her centre, obscuring something essential from her view.

Muchami had heard her come in. He turns and sees the hem of her paavaadai disappearing into the house. He guesses she wanted to talk. Perhaps it’s about Goli, perhaps...

Of course: her school friend. She must have said something to Janaki about Goli owing her mother money. Nothing can be proven; he hopes neither girl has heard the rumours that the devadasi’s daughter is his. It’s not a subject he can raise with Janaki, though. Hopefully, she’ll just let it go.

FIVE MONTHS LATER, Thangam gives birth to another baby boy. The child is lusty and red, and when his sisters see him, they gasp at his beauty: he alone among them has inherited Thangam’s golden eyes. Thangam, though, is exhausted, and lies with her eyes closed, until Sivakami says, “Thangam? Thangam, kanna, do you want anything?”

Thangam raises her head and Sivakami freezes: Thangam’s eyes are now stone cold blue. She shakes her head, no, and lies back down to sleep.

IT’s THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL. Janaki and Bharati hold hands up to the schoolyard gate, then uncouple while their servants, Mari and Draupadi, wait to escort each of them, and their younger sisters, home. They are both nearly five feet, and wear uniforms of a half-sari—a long cotton paavaadai in navy blue, with white blouse and white davani, a cloth piece wrapped once about the hips, across the chest, and over the shoulder—indicating they are now more women than girls. They both came of age this year—Janaki is nearly fifteen, Bharati has commenced her sixteenth year—and will not continue in school, since all higher levels are coeducational.

“Well, see you later,” Janaki says, at a loss. They know it’s not likely they will cross paths again.

“Bye,” Bharati rejoins, with a sweet smile. “Good luck, with marriage and all.”

Janaki reciprocates, open and genuine. “And good luck to you—whatever comes next.”

Bharati raises her eyebrows, amused and practical, but then Janaki is alarmed to see Bharati gulp as her eyes brim slightly and she blinks. “Yes, whatever comes next. G’bye, little sister.”

It has become one of their private jokes, to call each other little sister and big sister, thangachi and
akka,
though Bharati started the joke. Hearing the reference now returns to Janaki her guilty relief at this parting. Ever since she learned of their blood relationship, she has felt mildly cool toward Bharati, in spite of their greater closeness. She both dislikes this feeling and feels it is justified. She doesn’t think it shows; Bharati, she thinks, might not even have picked up on it.

Back when Bharati was uncertain of who her father was, Janaki and she remarked innocently on the coincidence that they both lived with their maternal grandmothers. Now that they share a father, Janaki frequently tells herself that she and Bharati really have nothing in common, because otherwise she would have to admit she identifies more with Bharati now than before. They both feel ashamed of their father, though he disappoints them in different ways.

Their slight estrangement had been facilitated by Vani’s absence, since Bharati no longer had a reason to come and sit behind their house. They continued to spend all their time together at school but no longer had an after-school relationship.

When they had outgrown their first veena teacher, Bharati’s mother had engaged a music tutor who came, once a week, all the way from Thiruchi. Bharati invited Janaki to come and participate in the lessons. It was tempting: Janaki had had to work hard to keep up with her music since Vani and Vairum moved to Madras. She practises at least an hour or two every day on the veena Vani left, which has, de facto, become hers. Once a week, there is an educational music program broadcast on the radio, and Janaki goes to Gayatri’s to take it in; occasionally, she goes to weddings, where she makes a point of learning some new songs from whoever is the best musician in attendance. The few times Vani has come back to visit them in Cholapatti, Janaki, in her desperation to learn, has been persistent to the point of rudeness, but Vani is ever patient and indulgent with her: playing, listening to Janaki play, wordlessly making corrections and modelling improvements.

When Bharati asked again if Janaki would be coming over for veena lessons, Janaki shook her head. “My grandmother says I’m too old to be going to others’ houses for lessons, that I should just practise at home.”

Bharati tossed her head a little, lifting her chin as though something were flying past it, and said coolly, “Very conservative, your grandmother.”

Janaki felt herself get hot: she had always understood “conservative” to be a compliment—why didn’t it sound that way coming from Bharati? But then Bharati appeared to correct herself. “So’s mine, in her own way,” she told Janaki with a return of the intimate joviality that Janaki now shrank from. “Too bad. It would have been fun.”

In fact, Janaki had never asked her grandmother. She wouldn’t have wanted to admit to having a devadasi as a friend, though she knows that, were it not for their other connection, she would have found a way to attend the special lessons.

And now Bharati is turning toward the rest of her life and Janaki, toward hers. Janaki knows her own near future, but not the far. She will stay home, but will receive a tutor, young Kesavan, who will help her maintain her Sanskrit and other basic academic skills. Next year, her grandmother will start to solicit potential grooms. Beyond that, she cannot see.

Janaki, Radhai and Kamalam, all of whom have come home from school together, wash their hands, face and feet, and change into everyday clothes. Radhai goes to play with Krishnan next door at Rukmini’s house, where he spends every day, the first of Thangam’s pre-school children not to pass his afternoons with Muchami. Though Muchami missed having a child with him, he had no means or desire to override Rukmini’s proffered affection for the little boy.

Kamalam and Janaki take their embroidery and go to sit on the veranda, where they will be met by Ecchemu, a Brahmin girl of about Janaki’s age, with whom Janaki has become friendly. Ecchemu is a dull, silly girl, but, by virtue of caste and age, is an appropriate companion for Janaki. Where Bharati has always made Janaki feel frumpy, Ecchemu causes her to feel her own attributes keenly. She has always known she was smart, but now she may have become pretty She is of average build, unlike Kamalam, who, at five feet and five inches, is by far the tallest of the sisters. Janaki has inherited something of her father’s square jaw and forehead, but her demure, perceptive gaze is hers alone, as are her creative talents, which always exceed available outlets.

Since Sita left for her husband’s house, Janaki has taken over the drawing of the kolam every morning, the rice flour design that ornaments every threshold. Where their house used to display no more than a perfunctory few lines and dots of the required symmetry, it is now daily decorated with a kolam no less than three feet across, often embellished with birds and flowers. Janaki admires her latest—a cobra wriggled across the threshold in perfect diagonals—as she takes her seat on the veranda and smiles condescendingly at Ecchemu, who is just arriving.

As they work together, Ecchemu chatters vapidly about her sister’s recent marriage. Janaki doesn’t listen, but instead reflects on the academic career she has just ended. She performed well—better than any of her sisters did, and likely better than Kamalam or Radhai will. None of them have her desire for knowledge, her determination and application. She knew full well she would have no more than an elementary education, though, and it doesn’t occur to her to be discontent at not going further. Rather, she is grateful to Sivakami for continuing to give her tutoring, more than most girls receive. Now she is looking forward to marriage and to raising a family, as much as she can look forward to events both inevitable and essentially unknown.

SEVERAL MONTHS LATER, Navaratri approaches—festival of dolls. It’s Janaki’s favourite, not surprisingly, since it offers chances for imaginative play, and because it includes several days of tribute to Saraswati, goddess of music and education, the deity Janaki feels most personally inclined to worship. Gayatri, when she comes for her morning coffee, tells Janaki stories, innocent and repetitive, of how the holiday used to be Thangam’s favourite, too.

It feels like a strange coincidence, then, when the day’s mail contains a letter from Thangam, the first Janaki has seen. It is written in pencil, in Thangam’s own hand. In places, the writing is so light that it disappears. In others, Thangam has pressed so hard that the thick, nubbly paper has torn, as though she were leaning on the pencil for strength.

“Amma,”
it begins, after the usual
“Safe”
in the upper right corner, and the date, in the left.

It finishes with her name, laboriously inscribed at the bottom.

Janaki is in the middle of her veena practice. Sivakami shows her the letter. “You’ll go, Janaki? Muchami will take you.”

“Yes, Amma,” she responds rapidly. Why is Thangam asking Sivakami not to worry? What does her grandmother have to worry about?

Sivakami smiles, looking wan. “Good girl. Maybe you can be ready to leave day after tomorrow?”

It’s a pleasant nine-hour journey northwest. Janaki has brought a slate, to pass the time, and gives Muchami a few Sanskrit lessons. He is too shy to work aloud in so public a setting, but she writes out lines for him to copy. He has continued to sit in on Janaki’s Sanskrit tutorials, though young Kesavan practically ignores him. Once in a while, though, Janaki, in a didactic mood, will take it upon herself to quiz Muchami on the basics. He has grasped these, though his pronunciation continues to be atrocious and Janaki doesn’t try to hide her impatience as she corrects him.

When they are done with Sanskrit, they watch the landscape shift outside the barred windows of the train. The greens and browns of the Kaveri delta give way to pinkish rocks and sparser settlements as they climb into the hills. It’s the monsoon season, and the air smells of rain. Twice, they ride through cloudbursts.

They chat, but not much. There is a distance between them now, which both feel it proper to observe. Janaki is glad for it, because it indicates the difference in their stations—she is growing up and happily anticipating the small powers that will fall to her as a matron. Muchami, for his part, still feels the weight of the child she was on his hip. If she tends to boss him, if she is short with him over his Sanskrit, he indulges her. She is still his favourite and he is proud of her.

Once in the town, Muchami, carrying her bag, hurries ahead and drops behind, inquiring repeatedly. They find the house. Two-year-old Raghavan gallops out of the house. When they stoop to caress him, he whinnies and ducks and continues past them, into the neighbour’s house. The neighbour emerges carrying him. She is a tall, thin woman with severe looks. Tics in either side of her face pull her mouth down in clownish grimaces. Raghavan seems to think she is making faces to amuse him, and to Janaki’s mortification, imitates her and laughs, clapping his hands.