Chapter 5
Sumangali’s visits became from frequent. On a normal day, Hari would be in office until six in the evening. Returning by bus, he would reach home by seven. After a bath, he would come out of the house and sit on the steps at the front door. Within minutes, she would arrive. With him sitting there on the steps and her standing at a distance under the trees, they would talk. He told her about his day in office. He told her about Vijay, Gopi and Mohan. He told her about his father, Devaki and about Priya, his father’s pet. She laughed when he told her how he had made the first nervous trip to indigo soft for the interview. Then one day he told her about Manju.
“Is she very pretty?” Sumangali asked.
“She is ok… Vijay thinks she is very pretty.”
“What do ‘you’ think? Don’t you think, she is pretty?”
“ I do not look at her or for that matter any woman in office ‘like that’. It is a work environment. I like to keep it professional.”
“Environna… what is that?”
“ I mean a place where you work. My office is a place where I go to work. Think of it like your temple. People come there to worship. One does not go there to ogle at the women. It is same in a work place, you go there to work not look at other people. At least that is my idea of a work place.”
“You are a very decent person“, she said.
“ How can you say that?”
“ I know. You are a kind hearted, nice person. My father would like you a lot.”
“Talking about your father, when are you taking me to the temple. I have roamed around quite a bit in these forests but have never seen any temple here. Also now it your turn to tell me your story. I have told you everything about myself.”
She turned to leave. ”There is nothing worth telling about me,” she said.
“Don’t leave. Come and sit over here. Why do you always have to stand at a distance? I find that very uncomfortable.”
She stopped, turned back and said, “Unmarried girls do not sit and talk to strangers. If my father catches me talking with you he will get very angry.”
“Stranger? You know everything about me. I am not a stranger any more. By the way, just now, you said your father would be very pleased to meet me. Now you say that he would get angry. Why don’t you make up your mind? You remind me of the old Malayalam movies that I used to see, back in Devipuram! You look like one of the actors from those movies. Long curly hair neatly combed and oiled. Half sari. You need to change your wardrobe. Start by keeping your hair short. Who keeps waist length hair these days? It is such a waste of time. All that combing and oiling,” Hari said and started laughing. Sumangali laughed with him and then ran off into the trees.
“So how much progress been you made in your romance with that tribal girl?” Vijay asked.
“What progress? She still runs of after a few words.”
“ Hmmm. That is not good. You need some expert assistance,” Vijay said with a mock serious look on his face.
“Her father is a priest at the local temple. He will cast a spell on you and turn you into a mouse or something like that,” said Hari and started laughing.
“ Your sense of humor needs to improve. You know what; I see a lot of areas where you need to work upon and improve,” Vijay said mimicking Gopal. “No worries though, with me, you are in safe hands! I will starts you personality improvement program, from this weekend itself. Guess what, I am coming over to stay at your place. ”
“I know you are coming there just so that you can meet Sumangali.”
“Well I have to admit that is one of the reasons, but the main reason is that my parent are going to attend another wedding in our family. I refused to go with them, but I also do not want to spend my weekend alone. I can call you over but then you know they type of person I am…..”
“Silly & foolish?”
“No..helpful and friendly, you dummy. I am coming over this weekend. No.. no don’t thank me. Well, if you must, you can but I am doing this out of the goodness of my nature.”
That weekend, the friends took a large supply of snacks, soft drinks, novels as they made their way up the path to the house. Vijay had bought along his portable stereo, some music cassettes and an ample supply of batteries. The house where normally Hari could hear the flapping of a bird’s wing was now full of laughter, sound and very loud music.
“Now for the pièce de résistance my friend, guess what I have bought?” Vijay asked. It turned out to be a bucket of fried chicken with the logo of a popular brand pasted all over it. The two friends attacked the food with vigor. An hour later exhausted from their efforts both of them collapsed on the floor and fell asleep. That evening, it started to rain. The rains which normally hit Mumbai around the mid of June were delayed that year. When it started, the rain though seemed determined on making up for the lost time and poured day and night. For Hari, these were the first rains in the new house.
A week went by before he realized that Sumangali had stopped coming to the house. He had become dependent on her fruits and berries in the evening and had gladly skipped his evening cooking chores. Now he had to restart all of that.
‘It must be the rains. All the paths would be muddy,’ he thought. He himself was finding it difficult to make his way down the path from the house to the main roads.
Then one day the rains took a break and let the moon come out to brighten up all the shrubs and stones on the way. As Hari was treading his way back over the path, he heard the familiar sound of anklets behind him. He turned around but could not see her. He resumed his walk. Again, the sound of the anklets came and this time it was quite close.
“So now you are playing games with me, are you?” he said.
He could hear her laugh; the gentle, cool winds seemed to carry it from all directions.
“ Why did you stop bringing me fruits?”
“ You do not need it. You like to eat all those dead animals. How can you call it food? All that dead, rotting, flesh.”
“Oh, so that was the reason why you stopped coming. My friend Vijay had brought it with him. He had come to meet you as well. You never turned up that week.”
“Shouldn’t I decide who get to meet me and who doesn’t?”
“Yes mam, you can decide who can meet you and who can’t. You should have met Vijay. He is a good boy. Slightly silly but well-meaning, helpful and very funny.”
They had reached the house and as he climbed the steps, Hari looked back. In the clear moon light, he could see the house, the trees, the small clearing in front of the house, but there was no one else there.
“Arrgh .. this girl … she will drive me mad. It is late at night and she is playing hide and seek in the forest” he walked in and slammed the door shut.
After a bath in the cold rainwater a relaxed and refreshed, Hari came out of the house. The plantain leaf with the fruits was there. He smiled. She was standing under the shade of the trees in the distance at her usual spot.
“So you have pardoned me. Look, I am sorry. It is just that I have been a non-vegetarian all my life. It is not easy to stop a habit you have formed over a life time”
“I don’t like it when you eat dead animals”
“Do you know that almost ninety percent of the world eats non vegetarian food?”
“ I do not care. I just don’t want you to eat it.”
“ Wow, the way you say it is as if you are my wife”, said Hari and began laughing.
She did not answer.
“I am sorry. I just meant that as a joke,” Hari said.
“I do not mind. I do not mind it at all” she said and ran away.
“Another day of exciting conversation with the friendly, neighborhood, pretty girl ends” said Hari and went back in to the house.
The next day in office, the team was busy in a meeting when Hari’s cell began to ring. Gopal frowned, “Have I not told all of you a thousand time that cell phones have to be on mute in the ODC?”
; “ I am sorry, Gopal. Please can I take this call? It is from my home. They would not call me during office hours unless it is an emergency”
“Ok, as an exception, this time I am allowing it. Team let us take a fifteen-minute break. We will regroup at Eleven fifteen”
Hari could not attend the regroup. It was his mother on the phone. She had called to inform him that V.N.K had suffered a heart attack and was in hospital. Devaki wanted her son to come home.
Chapter 6