Happy Birthday! And Other Stories Part 7

*Time for tea, Bhanu.'

Thoughts flood Bhanu's mind like a cold stream of water and she sits up, wide awake.

Genevive? What is she doing here?

Turning on the lamp next to her bed, the first thing that Bhanu sees is Genevive's swollen belly. Inside that belly is a baby, warmer than the air around it.

Sick to her bones, Bhanu turns her head towards the window, from where she and Genevive used to pelt unsuspecting pa.s.sers-by with water balloons every Holi. The panes are streaked and sooty now, a crust of dirt on their edges.

*Bhanu?' Genevive says. Her voice wavers gently, like a tiny sparrow hopeful for a speck of food.

Bhanu doesn't respond, looking instead at her own face, hazy and undefined in the window's reflection.

The clamour from the street below, the peak-time traffic, reaches Bhanu's ears with all the ferocity of Mumbai on a Friday evening. This noise has been there all her life and she doesn't even hear it any more, except in moments of anger or irritation. Which one is she feeling now?

Genevive continues, *I've made masala chai for you, exactly the way you like it. Without sugar, just a teaspoon of milk.'

*I take my tea sweet, and black now,' Bhanu says, flatly lying.

*Oh-' Genevive says slowly, as if pulling her voice out of a deep well.

Her breath smells sour, of the sweets she eats all day, the sugar that should have rotted her teeth by now.

Taking a white-and-red packet out of a polythene bag, Genevive adds quickly, *I bought your favourite pudina wafers from Camy. Should I get a bowl or do you want to eat from the packet?'

*I'm not hungry,' Bhanu replies curtly. She really has no appet.i.te.

Genevive starts shaking her right leg, as if she doesn't know what else to do with herself. It is rare for her to be the one making up.

Bhanu sees this and bites down on her lip to stop herself from saying something more, something compa.s.sionate. It's an old habit; difficult to break.

Genevive shoves the packet back into the bag, pulls it out again, and then plonks it clumsily on the edge of her chair. It falls to the ground. She doesn't pick it up.

*Bhanu, why are you still refusing to see me? I can't bear it any more. I miss you.'

Her leg shakes harder.

A sharp pinp.r.i.c.k of guilt pierces Bhanu. Then she looks at Genevive's belly, which has grown since the last time she saw her. The loathing comes back.

Bhanu and Genevive are childhood friends. They attended the same school, studied in the same section in eighth grade and lived in the same building in Dadar. Initially it had seemed unlikely that the girls would get along. Lanky and dark-skinned, with a gentle voice, Bhanu lived in the five-bedroom apartment on the fourth floor, where her conservative Marwari joint family had resided for three generations. Genevive, meanwhile, was a gregarious Anglo-Indian girl with radish skin, light tan hair and wheat-coloured eyes. She had recently moved into a studio apartment on the *underground' floor that no one in the building had seen. To add to her notoriety, she lived with only her mother, Carla, and their two cats. In the absence of a credible *Man of the House', mother and daughter were much spoken about. So Bhanu, in the way she ignored the spit stains on stairway walls, pretended not to notice them.

Then one evening, uninvited, Genevive showed up at Bhanu's house to borrow her textbooks. She had missed school that day-she had a fever that was still running. Seeing her watery eyes, her flushed cheeks and polite manner, Bhanu's mother welcomed her into their house, and their lives. Over the next few days, Bhanu's family worried about Genevive's health and her mother's absence, making Bhanu carry bajra khichdi for her to school. By the end of that week, they were encouraging Bhanu to do homework with Genevive, on the condition that Bhanu didn't ever visit *that Anglo-Indian house'.

So the girls became friends, and their friends.h.i.+p, like sea gla.s.s, grew more attractive with the sands of time, smooth with a happy sheen. They'd walk back from school together, go to Bhanu's house, eat snacks served by Shardabai, do homework, and play till dinnertime-at which point Genevive would quickly pack her things and leave, saying, *Carla will be home soon.'

Through all of this, Bhanu found it easy to keep her promise of not visiting Genevive's house, since her friend never invited her home anyway.

The first time Bhanu broke the rule was eleven years later-only six years ago-when, without prelude, Genevive didn't visit Bhanu or answer her calls for four days (the longest they'd gone without talking). Bhanu had no choice. Both the girls were working: Genevive as an a.s.sistant to an ad-film director and Bhanu as an interior designer. Despite clas.h.i.+ng schedules, they met every other evening at Bhanu's house (which was now vertically split in half as Bhanu's father and his brother battled in court over property). So Bhanu lied to her family about having to meet a client and took the lift to the ground floor, below which lay Genevive's apartment. Slowly she walked down to the dreaded underground level, one rickety step at a time, her feet heavy on the creaking wood, the invisible crawl of cobwebs over her skin. On reaching the only door in the unlit pa.s.sage, she rang a dusty bell. My Favourite Things played, twice, three times, after which Genevive opened the door. Her face was bloated with crying. She hugged Bhanu tightly and ushered her in.

Genevive's apartment was smaller than Bhanu's bedroom.

Bhanu followed her past a multicoloured bead curtain into a cluttered room, where Agatha Christie and Mills & Boon novels lay strewn around a three-legged wooden chair. Next to that stood a plastic Christmas tree decorated with sad-looking baubles and drooping angels. In a small corner on a tiny bed, Genevive's mother lay under a cascade of blankets, her feet sticking out from beneath them. Her fine hair, which she kept in a 1940s'-style wave, was thin and unkempt. Her rose lips had turned purple. Underneath the bed was a bedpan filled with brownish liquid that one of the cats was sniffing. Carla was whiter than the cuticles on her nails, her eyes firmly shut, deep hollows in her cheeks-she looked completely dead.

*She is sleeping,' Genevive said, and led Bhanu by the hand to a small enclosure that looked like a bathroom, but which turned out to be a kitchen with a single stove and a few utensils. Genevive sat down on the edge of a stool, beaten down, weary, and said, *Carla has breast cancer. She didn't tell me because she says we don't have money for the treatment. I told her I'd get the money from somewhere, somehow, but Doctor Uncle came home a few days ago and told me ... he said that it's too late for her now.'

Bhanu had run into Carla a few times in the lobby of the building. She was a pale-skinned woman with a tired face, reedy arms and a pointy chin, dressed in paisleypatterned dresses, red lipstick and high heels. She'd pat Bhanu lightly on the head, as if she was one of her adopted stray cats, before vanis.h.i.+ng into the pa.s.sage or the street. If she knew of Genevive's deep friends.h.i.+p with Bhanu, or that her daughter spent half the day in Bhanu's house, she didn't let on. She neither came to Bhanu's house-even on the rare days when Genevive stayed late-nor thanked Bhanu's family for taking care of her daughter while she was away.

And over time, while most of the neighbours became friendly with Genevive, Carla continued to arouse wariness. When asked about Genevive's father, she'd announce that he was dead without the slightest inflection of sorrow or helplessness, smoking in her decollete dresses.. What the neighbours disliked even more was that Carla never knocked on their door to borrow curd or sugar, nor did she ever give the building watchman a little something for Diwali. And she never enquired after their health or children.

It was sinful for a woman in her situation to behave so unrepentantly.

So the neighbours gossiped about the men who came to Carla's house. Someone saw Carla kissing a bald man in a taxi; someone else saw her holding hands with a hairy man in a movie hall, while she was also spotted outside an infamous *clinic' with a fat man.

Carla, on her part, appeared unaffected by her infamy, which only worsened it.

Bhanu had never found the courage to ask Genevive about her father. But one evening, after school, Shardabai did. Genevive stuttered in her broken Hindi, *My Papa is a big banker in London. He really loves me. And he is coming very soon to take me away with him. Very soon.' Then she burst into tears. It was the only time Bhanu remembered scolding Shardabai.

Three months after Carla's death, Bhanu s.h.i.+fted Genevive into her house, moving her bed next to her own. Bhanu's family was pleased to have Genevive around, especially once Bhanu's marriage was fixed with a young Marwari man, Mohan. A helping hand in a wedding household was always welcome. Bhanu's marriage didn't stop the two friends from meeting; since Mohan lived just four buildings away, Bhanu would often visit Genevive-who had moved back to her own house-bringing her food, praying with her for her mother's soul.

Soon after, Genevive met an Iranian man, Afs.h.i.+n, a model in one of the shampoo ads that she was helping direct. He moved in with her and within a few months they got married.

But it was not to be. Afs.h.i.+n was a gold smuggler, Genevive learnt, when the police came to her house to arrest him. She was not spared either; they hounded her and hara.s.sed her until they were convinced that she was not an accomplice to her husband. Genevive didn't see Afs.h.i.+n again, despite her repeated visits to Arthur Road Jail, where he was imprisoned. It was the police who informed her that Afs.h.i.+n had been deported back to his country and that she'd probably never hear from him again.

Genevive was broken.

Once again Bhanu came to her best friend's rescue, helping her weather a meltdown, alcohol binges, visiting her at all times, throwing out her liquor. Eventually, Genevive healed, and with a new job as an ad-film director, she was back to her old self.

Genevive is still watching her. She says, *Your tea is getting cold.'

*I don't want tea,' Bhanu snaps. *Why don't you have it?'

*I'm not allowed to drink tea, remember,' Genevive replies. Of course Bhanu remembers, for despite herself she had taped a list of dos and don'ts on Genevive's fridge so she wouldn't brush aside her pregnancy, like she did all serious things. Yet, apart from her bulging stomach, it's difficult to tell that Genevive is eight months pregnant. She's lost weight, though her neck seems bloated and her hair has thinned from frizzy to straight.

Bhanu looks at her own stomach, ghastly in its flatness. After having to abort her first baby due to a positive CVS test, she had gone to three specialists and they'd all told her that her uterus wasn't strong enough to carry a fullterm pregnancy. She couldn't try again and if she did, as she'd insisted she would, then the chances of her bleeding to death were high. Why, even her Mohan sided with the doctors and refused to give it another go.

Bhanu can never be a mother.

And then there is Genevive.

Bhanu had asked her a few years ago: how do you feel about having children? And Genevive had said that since her apartment was located directly below the lift shaft, she heard the lift make all sorts of unearthly sounds, day and night. She lived in fear that at any moment its creaky chains would snap and the lift would come cras.h.i.+ng down, crus.h.i.+ng her house, and the life out of her. This, she had said, was how she felt about children.

In the seventeen years that she's lived in the building, Genevive has never used the lift.

Now Genevive gives a weak smile and says, *The baby, she is so heavy that I can't walk up the stairs any more. I have to take the lift to get here.' She hugs her elbows as if a tremor has run through her.

Bhanu almost admires her tenacity.

*Bhanu, I came here to talk to you about something important,' Genevive continues. She looks down at the floor purposefully, as if about to do something foolishly heroic, like jump in front of a bus to save a kitten. *I don't know how to start this conversation so I'll say it right out. Bhanu, I want you to take my baby and raise her as your own.'

*What?' Bhanu says. Her heart starts beating so loudly that she wonders if there's nothing else inside her. *What?' she says again at the top of her voice, so she doesn't have to listen to her heart.

*Please, let me finish or I'll lose my nerve. I've thought about this a lot. You want a child more than I ever have. You'll be a better mother than I will. Bhanu, we are dearer to each other than sisters, so I know that you will treat my daughter as your own. All these are good reasons, I think, for you to keep my baby.'

Bhanu is so angry that she starts laughing.

*I cannot believe what you're saying,' she says, her hands mimicking her feelings in furious gestures. *It never fails to amaze me how you take it for granted that I'll solve all your problems. You get yourself knocked up by G.o.d knows who, you decide to keep this child against my advice, and now that you're scared you come running to me to cover up for your mistakes!'

On becoming pregnant, Genevive had refused to tell Bhanu who the father was. This hurt Bhanu, who'd never kept anything from Genevive, and the sting of the betrayal grew as the baby did.

*You're misunderstanding me.'

*I am not misunderstanding you. I know you for exactly what you are: irresponsible, selfish and weak.'

*Bhanu!'

*Fine, if you want me to raise your child, then at least tell me who the father is? How do I know that it's not another smuggler? Do you want me to bring bad blood into my family?'

*I can explain ... the doctor-'

Bhanu notices that Genevive's round eyes are drooping and she has dark circles the size of horseshoes. Is she not taking care of herself because she is pregnant, like the last time? This infuriates Bhanu further and she interrupts Genevive, *I don't care for your excuses, Genevive. I am not going to look after your unwanted child again.'

Genevive was nineteen when her college boyfriend Vikram got her pregnant. She didn't tell anyone except Bhanu, because she bravely thought that no one would find out; she would have an abortion. But it was a futile proposition, for what could they do? They didn't know any other pregnant girls, the doctors they knew were acquainted with their families, and it was illegal to walk into a clinic and ask for an abortion. Worse still, neither of them had any money.

It was Bhanu who came up with an idea; an idea so bold for her that she blushed thinking about it even now. Her brother had written a dissertation on the s.e.x trade for his Sociology major, and Bhanu remembered him saying that the s.e.x workers he encountered had unwanted pregnancies, for which they didn't have the money to go to a clinic. Surely, Genevive and she could go to Kamathipura, where her brother used to go for his research, and ask one of the s.e.x workers for help.

A week later-after much deliberation-the two girls, under the pretext of attending a college function, took a bus to Grant Road. Too embarra.s.sed to get off at the actual stop, they walked to Falkland Road. There was still light outside when they reached and no women plied the streets, so they walked around aimlessly, holding each other's hands, starting at any noise in the unexpected silence. Finally, they pa.s.sed a dilapidated one-storey building with peeling paint, outside which sat a middleaged prost.i.tute wearing a blouse and petticoat, gajra in her hair.

They went up to her. The woman scowled at them, her leg up on a stool, breaking suparis with a nutcracker. The girls hesitantly told her their problem.

*What the h.e.l.l should I do about that?' she asked gruffly.

Bhanu's reply stopped in her throat, but Genevive answered, *Maybe you can give us the name of a cheap doctor?' Her voice was laced with fear.

*Don't know any,' the woman said, and tossed three suparis into her mouth.

*Please, I have nowhere else to go,' Genevive said.

Moving her paan-stained lips in slow deliberation, the woman leered at the girls, her eyes hovering over their b.r.e.a.s.t.s, as if a.s.sessing how much they'd be worth in the market. Bhanu crossed her arms over her chest, while Genevive stared brazenly back at the woman.

*How much money you have?' she finally asked.

The girls looked at each other.

*I have six hundred rupees,' Genevive said humbly. She'd been stealing money from her mother's purse over the last few weeks to pay for her abortion.

*Not enough,' said the woman.

*I have three hundred more,' Bhanu said. *And some change.'

*Where did you get the money from?' Genevive asked her.

*It's the money I was saving to buy a guitar.'

Genevive squeezed Bhanu's hand in grat.i.tude.

They emptied their purses and gave the prost.i.tute all their money. The woman shoved the notes into her lowcut blouse, next to a threadlike gold chain, and said, *Wait here.' She got up and disappeared into the building.

Genevive and Bhanu ducked behind a thin wall to avoid being seen, and waited. Thirty minutes pa.s.sed, then an hour. They came out from their hiding place and looked around the road, not daring to talk to one another. Women were stepping out, dressed in flimsy saris, garish rouge, fake moles and big red bindis already smudged by the humidity. Men pa.s.sed by on motorcycles and in cars, staring and honking at the two girls. The last of the sun's rays began to disappear.

A man with a ma.s.s of hair on his knuckles stopped his car in front of Genevive, rolled down his window and asked, *You, how much for one hour?'

*That's it,' Genevive shouted. *I'm going upstairs.'

*Are you crazy? You don't know what kind of people are in there,' Bhanu said, frightened.

*I don't care,' Genevive said. *She's taken all our money and disappeared. And it's my fault. I should've asked her name and followed her inside. Now I'll never get rid of this baby and you'll never get your guitar.'

Genevive stormed into the building and started climbing the stairs. *Stop!' Bhanu said, and used all her weight to pull Genevive back. Just then, the prost.i.tute came walking down the stairs. She was dressed up luridly, with a silver paranda coiled around her large head and body glitter gleaming from the fat rolls beneath her arms.

*Oof! I'd forgotten about you,' she said on seeing them. *Now which one of you is pregnant?' Before they could reply, she looked at Genevive and added, *You're the pretty one, so it must be you.'

Bhanu didn't know what came over her, but she said, *Me. It's me.'

*Here,' the woman said, pulling out a yellow plastic bag from her blouse that contained a few white pills. *Have two right now, and one every hour after that, till they're all finished.'

Bhanu extended her hand, but Genevive yelled, *These look like headache pills. You can't cheat us like this!'

In a huff, the prost.i.tute threw the pills on the floor and walked off.

Bhanu ran after the woman, *What will these do?'

*What you want them to do,' the woman replied. *Just don't sit down once you've taken them.'

Genevive came running behind Bhanu and shouted, *Give us back our money or I'll report you to the police.'

The prost.i.tute hopped into a car and was gone.

Genevive and Bhanu went back home, disheartened and unable to do anything for a few days. Then, Genevive vomited on three consecutive mornings and her mother asked if she'd been bringing her boyfriend home. So, the next day, while Carla was at work and Bhanu's family was taking a siesta, Genevive-following the prost.i.tute's cryptic instructions-swallowed two pills.

Nothing happened for an hour. Genevive took another pill. She kept standing, pacing Bhanu's bedroom, becoming increasingly irritable.