Rising Heat, page 13
Murali gave him a look and said, as if he was advising him, ‘That doesn’t happen to everyone, da. That’s just your fear. Why are you psyching yourself up thinking about such things? Am I not going to do it before you? We are doing this just for fun. At this age, how long are you going to be on my side, listening to my experiences? Tell me. If you go once, you will find out for yourself. “Chi . . . is this it?” you will say, and be able to concentrate on your work from then on. Otherwise you will find yourself wondering about it all the time. Sex is very important for your body, da. Most importantly, it will help with lowering your stress.’
‘. . .’
‘How long are we going to keep checking out the ladies on the streets and talking about wanting more of their midriffs? Only ones who don’t have this sort of opportunity will talk like that. But why do we need to? All this is mere fun at this age.’
‘. . .’
‘Are we trying to grab the arm of another man’s wife? Are we going to waylay a lady on the streets and carry her away? Those are unequivocally wrong. We are going to pay for this service. So, who is committing a mistake here? Take it easy, da. Don’t overthink it. In matters like this, you shouldn’t think so much. You want to do it now, you just do it. You should only think about this minute as real. You think this is immoral? Nothing is funnier than that . . .’
‘. . .’
‘Kadhir too was afraid like this at first. Now he invites me to join him when he goes! We aren’t doing anything that hasn’t been done already. And who really is that scrupulous, tell me? Everyone only needs an opportunity to present itself to not be so. Until such a time, they will talk as if they are the keepers of morality.’
The more elaborately Murali talked about this, the more confused the boy got. He thought Murali was alluding to too many things as he made his case and was contradicting himself. And that many things that he said were incorrect. But on the other hand, it seemed right too. So he unloaded his fears and began to walk with them.
The lake was behind the colony, and there were stagnant puddles all around. They walked carefully around the dugouts created for harvesting sand and soil. Murali led the group, Kadhir and Gopal were in the middle, and the boy trailed behind them. Piles and marshy puddles lay spread beyond the lake. There were little mounds in all directions. The dense unja trees looked melancholic in the dark.
‘Why isn’t anyone here, da?’ asked Kadhir, pale-faced.
‘Just wait, let’s see.’
Hearing their voices, a figure emerged from hiding. It took a little while to distinguish them from the surrounding darkness.
‘Oh, is it not the officer’s son? Why dear, you are all so tender still. Yet, you want a lady every other week? All right, come on then. May your sins be added to mine.’
‘Right . . . and you still haven’t stopped your constant nagging.’
He felt an unbearable pain, as if his chest was being split open. Whose voice was that? A voice that felt like a sharp slap. A voice that had stroked him with comfort and protection. A voice that had embraced him, soaking in love. He took a step backward and began to walk away. Releasing himself from the grasp of that voice. Leaving them behind.
A centipede crawled all over his body, clawing him as it moved. On his face, his hands, his back, his hips . . . He wanted to grab it and hurl it away and kept reaching out with his hands. How big that centipede was! Where was it? It didn’t get caught at all. He wanted to chop every body part off and throw it away. Not only this centipede, he wanted to lose everything around him. Not a single thought should still remain within. All he wanted to do was keep walking alone in the light of the moon on the long tar road.
The moon shone quietly. Boy! What was I just about to do? Does nothing else matter in front of bodily desires? Does lust have a quality of making one act as if possessed? Can I not overcome that? In this moment of the night, they must be destroying Ramayi. How did I let myself be a part of that group? If it was not her, would I too have stayed? How she used to be! And now, she is driven to sell her body surreptitiously to make ends meet. Who is responsible for this? Is it the government who snatched our lands? Or us who shook them off our backs and left them behind? Is she doing this because she is unable to find another job? And Kuppan has accepted all this quietly and justified it? Was it because of her imbecile husband who left her? Was it the need of her children’s stomachs? Why did she become this?
Far away, a knoll glistened in the darkness. Behind it was the light from the rising moon. The lamps looked like a meandering snake. The bald rock glowed like a halo. He wanted to put his hands together in prayer right then. At the same time, he felt embarrassed to turn towards that direction too. He felt a sense of awareness dawn on him as the moon slowly rose up in the sky and the light around him grew brighter. The moon that rose to expel the darkness that had settled within him. Couldn’t this have happened earlier?
He sat on the mound at the well. In the light of the moon, the well looked lazy. The water that rippled gently with the breeze seemed to stretch its arms and invite him to it. In a corner a little fish sprung up and down in a flash. Somewhere from a distance came the sound of a lone dog barking. The neem tree by the well nodded with its branches, beckoning him. He wondered if he should get in. Could this cool water help him unload the burden in his chest, the heat from his body and the centipede?
Little waves crashed and splattered along the edges incessantly. Yet the water seemed emotionless. Why is the water in the well so agitated at this hour? Everyone is peacefully asleep somewhere, why is there so much excitement here? A cheer that can be heard only within the ear. Waves that crash only within the chest. I should get in.
He took off his shirt and lungi and threw them on a rock nearby. The underwear irritated him too. Were his clothes the ‘centipede’ that had crawled all over him? He needed to embrace the water without anything on him. To hold his breath and sink slowly into it. Become one with the fish that were swimming around. He removed his underwear and tossed that aside too. An inexplicable peace seemed to envelop him. Everything vanished and his mind floated along, naked.
He jumped from the top of the mound. He heard the water part and surround him. The moonbeams splattered with the ripples. The coolness of the water freed him from all the dreadful hands of the night. He circled his arms gently in the water and swam around the well. This was how memories involving Ramayi swam around in his mind. Memories of him holding on to her skirt and running about in the forests, running after the goats, playing anjaankal, a game with five pebbles, and hopscotch . . . He used to think he couldn’t do anything without her.
She, too, kept him safe in the palm of her hand as if she had borne him in her womb and given birth to him. As soon as she arrived with her two braids and an overtly oily face, she would pick him up and place him on her hip. He would go to sleep resting his head on her breasts. He used to curl himself to fit into her lap and be buried deep in there. Once, he got chicken pox and had sores all over his body. ‘The goddess has seen him,’ they said and didn’t let him out at all. He lay inside on the cot the entire time. Amma collected neem leaves, made a paste of them and applied it with a chicken feather. That spread coolness on the otherwise itchy sores. Ramayi belonged to the labour class and wasn’t allowed to see him in that state. She wasn’t allowed to receive any food or drink from his house during that time. She was considered a defilement. That wouldn’t be acceptable for curing chicken pox.
‘Let the little Saami get better. May the goddess let him go. I will make an offering to the same goddess; I will circumambulate around her on foot. I am fine, I can live even on just water. I will bring some starch water from home and have that during the day. Let the little Saami get up.’
Until the sores waned and he was given his first shower after the sickness, Ramayi didn’t come by the house even by mistake. She went directly to the pen in the farms to let the goats graze, put them back in the pen and went home. After he got better, she touched every scar from the sores on his body and kissed them. When he thought about that love and about how he was going to tear apart with lust the same lips that had been filled with affection towards him . . . he felt lesser than a worm.
Even the water in the well had turned tepid, or so it seemed. His body was burning with heat. In a corner, an avri fish slapped the water hard with its tail, spattered the water and disappeared. He lay on his back and looked up at the sky. He saw in the twinkling stars the tear-stained eyes of Ramayi.
Ramayi, what all you were for me. If you had noticed me in the darkness, what would you have thought? That your fate was driving you to sleep with your son? Or, that you were getting an opportunity to sleep with the little Saami, and would derive joy from that? Would you have bugged me for more money? Would you have invited me to visit you more often? Your poverty can make you think in whatever way it wants. And I am audacious.
He must have been ten years old then. His fever had not subsided at all. His body had become so hot it could have toasted sesame seeds. Amma had gone to visit Maama. Somebody in Thenur had been known to cure any illness with sacred ash. Ramayi had heard that if anyone was possessed or had spells cast on them, receiving the sacred ash would help expel all evil. She carried him to Thenur. He couldn’t walk; his head was spinning and he had no strength in his legs or his body. If they took the bus, he was sure to throw up from his gut. He was adamant about not taking one. Ramayi gave him a piggyback ride, bearing his weight the whole way, four miles to go there and four to come back. The body that had borne the burden of a ten-year-old was now lying over sand and stones bearing the burden of unknown men.
Are you the leaf that the bottom-feeders lick the leftovers from? Are you in so much poverty? But I know. I can despise this water, but I can never despise you. When he felt tickled by the little fish nibbling on some wounds in his feet, he was reminded of her palmyra-sprout-like fingers tickling him. Could you not have gone as a maid to assist someone? But then, who would hire you to assist them? Did you really not get any job? And here I am, helpless and unable to protect you. Even here, you are the one at the bottom. A labourer. The same slave that you were in the farm. You had to bear it all when my mother hit you over and over again. What do you like more? The life then that was filled with love and affection even though you were a slave? Or the life now where you part ways after you get your money for giving your body and do what you want? Or don’t you like either? What are your wishes? Do you ever think about all that?
The water was getting too cold. His body began to shiver. Like he was going to get sick. Still, he continued to lie there even though he thought it was foolish of him to do so.
The moon slowly hid behind the swirls of clouds. The well was completely dark, and the darkness felt safe. There was no need to fear anything. No one knew, except the knoll that stood proudly at a distance and the hidden moon. He had escaped from humanity.
He smashed the water hard. His hand hurt. He sat on the mound and wept. And wept some more. There were no lips to console him. No hands to wipe his tears. He cried as much as he wanted. The moon came out again. At the same moment, the knoll shone brightly in a golden-haloed hue.
Chapter 9
That was the best time to study. The time when silence was broken into pieces and dispersed by the cawing crows across the sky like light. The sun had not yet risen. It would take some time for it just to cross Karattucchi. During that time, the mind was flat, unflustered and undisturbed. Like the still, clear water in a well. Anything he studied at that hour rushed into his memory and fought for a spot.
The boy was seated in the lap of a portia tree at the mound around the well. His book was open but his mind refused to stay still. Amma and Appa were in the farm across, distributing dirt. Appa was heaping the wicker basket with dirt. Amma tossed the basket into the air like a ball and spun it around almost a whole circle with just the tips of her fingers. The dirt from the basket spread uniformly, covering the land without a gap in a perfect circle. From afar, the tilled farmlands seemed bright red, as if they were all ablaze. Now, with the dirt, it was as if someone had covered the land with a dark blanket. It was clear by the way Appa was collecting the dirt, with his loincloth shaking, that he had forgotten himself. The boy put his book aside and kept gazing at Appa.
From the lumps of the manure out crawled tiny white worms, unable to make sense of the new environment. The crows that came seeking the worms sat with them wriggling in their beaks as they bobbled up and down. The bright white flour-like worms squirmed in the beaks of the crows. There was so much noise! The dog charged at the crows, and after shooing away a few of them, made itself a little pit and nestled in it. ‘You want to nap already?’ Amma tossed a question at the dog as she tapped its head with the basket.
Poor thing. Mani still wasn’t getting used to things. When they lived in the valavu, things were easier but it would still go to the colony. Even after they moved to the current place, it could not forget the ancestral place, and spent most of the day there, in the colony. There were two houses right next to the well adjacent to the mango forests that it liked. The people there fed it leftovers: soaked rice, something or the other. It slept under the hibiscus shrub all day and returned home right about the time when Amma left to deliver milk in the evening. All night, Mani protected them here. It wasn’t shiny and healthy like before, and it was also getting old. Still, if it ever heard its name called, it would come running wagging its tail, kneel down and not let go until it was petted.
It got up because of Amma and moved away a fair distance from her. ‘Mani!’ he called out. It ran towards him. ‘Instead of studying, you call the dog to play with it. Like the barber sat and shaved the head of a sheep instead of cutting hair . . .’ said Amma loudly as she returned to scattering dirt. He patted away the dirt that was stuck on the dog’s head. Seeing that, Amma shouted again.
‘Why are you playing with the dog instead of studying? Why don’t you come here instead? Come and scatter a few baskets. If I’m here distributing twenty to twenty-five bags of dirt, when will I cook food? We don’t have any leftovers either.’
Without saying a word in response to Amma, he left the dog, picked up his book and lay down on his stomach.
‘That’s right. All this while you sat there, watching everything as if it was some entertainment show. Look at him, the minute I called him to help, he doesn’t even look up. Apparently, children have work to do only when they are called to help.’
Amma flung the basket at Appa’s feet, annoyed. He pulled the basket that fell towards his heel in front of him. He then cleared his throat and spat into the dirt.
‘Why are you bothering him when he is studying? You don’t feel like working, you want to call him. Bend your body and do the work. Otherwise it will explode like a cucumber fruit. Do you want to go pull the cot and lie down on it? And dress up nicely and spend time in the colony? All my fate! Like a big-headed crow that ate shit. And ended up with shit all over its wings.’
Amma’s face turned dark with anger as she picked up the basket that came with Appa’s words and put it on top of her head. After she had emptied it, she removed the cloth pad she had on her head, retied it and grumbled, ‘If one has a spot to live in and a mistress’s house to be in, what difference does it make if there is any income or not. Isn’t that what I’ve become?’
‘Who are you accusing of going to a mistress? You think I am like your family? I will pull your tongue out and stitch your mouth up, be careful.’
Everything crumbled like the dirt. When had they become like a mongoose and snake? They hadn’t seemed like this before. If any of them opened their mouth, it ended in a fight. Listening to them squabble with each other was beginning to annoy him. He could not stomach this change at all. He felt like getting up from the spot and running away somewhere. Luckily, before he got up, Annan walked over. What a surprise, he was up so early!
‘Appoy . . . come home. Thalaivar is calling.’
Appa planted the short-handled hoe firmly for support and looked up.
‘M . . . what?’
‘Thalaivar is calling you, Appa.’
‘Who is Thalaivar?’
‘Why, it is our Sevathaan Maama, Appa.’
‘Oo! He has become Thalaivar these days, has he? For all the rogues on the street?’
‘Don’t say stuff like that. What do you know? The folks from the colony themselves stand with their arms folded in respect when they talk to him.’
Annan’s face turned red, as if he was personally shamed. He stepped down from the border of the farmland that he was standing on. Appa took off his towel that he had worn like a turban and dusted it as he walked over. No one knew what was on his mind when he said, ‘You go, ask him to come here.’
He then got busy again with the dispersal of the manure dirt. Amma sat down and didn’t say a word. A fear dawned on the boy that something unpleasant was going to happen. He calmed himself down a little and rubbed the dog’s back. He fixed his gaze on the spilt dirt lying on the ground.
Unable to bear the heat, the little worms displaced from the manure lay belly-up. They sparkled like pieces of bronze. But the crows went away, too tired to bend any more. The morning sun scorched him like fire. He couldn’t bear the burn and wanted to jump into the well that instant.
Sevathaan walked in the front and Annan was behind him, on one side, alone. His clean white veshti and white shirt were blindingly bright in the sun. His hair was combed flat to his head. His haircut was like that of a policeman’s. He looked better built than before. Holding the edge of his veshti up, he walked over with his belly protruding just a little. His face was full and glowing.
