Madras on Rainy Days: A Novel Read online

  “What if we don’t give him anything?”

  “Ar’re!” He was surprised, even offended, as though he had cut himself a deal with the alim. A commission he would receive from our sale. Abu Uncle had done things like that in the past. “He’s got to run this house,” he said. “You can’t just take his advice and leave. It doesn’t look good.”

  “But I thought you said he’s free?”

  “He is.”

  Amme clucked. “What can we do now?” she asked, shaking her head. She looked disappointed in me. Then she sighed and said more tenderly, “Don’t be worried about money, Layla. What matters is that he cures you. My money is not worth more than your well-being.”

  Money, as far as I could see, was all Amme had left, just dollars and the little freedom they offered her. Hearing her say this, I felt guilty and ashamed about what I had done in Minneapolis, and how it was causing my mother such misery. If Abu Uncle wasn’t in the room, I would have confessed everything to her right then and willingly accepted her judgment of me. But he was there, as someone always seemed to be in India. Hardly any privacy. So I had no time to tell Amme the truth.

  Noor pulled open the curtain, and I felt her against my back. For a moment, I didn’t move. What if we just left? I wondered. If the alim was a fake, as I imagined him to be, then why spend the money when I already knew what ailed me? And, if by chance, he was authentic, why take the risk that he might detect the truth and give me away?

  “Follow me,” Noor said, talking over my shoulder. She placed her veiny hand on my waist to push me aside, but I resisted.

  “Layla,” Amme said, “move away and let Noor in. Why are you being so rude? She’ll think I didn’t raise you properly.”

  I didn’t budge.

  Amme gripped my arm and pulled me aside. Abu Uncle walked out. My mother followed.

  “Amme,” I called.

  “Stop being such a child, Layla,” she said.

  “I’m no longer a child, Amme.”

  She stopped and looked strangely at me, the chador making her body formless and unrecognizable.

  “If you have something to tell me, child, tell me now,” she whispered. “I have been wondering. But I’ve been waiting for you to tell me yourself.”

  Amme always knew when I kept something hidden.

  “Layla, what is it?” she asked.

  She was shorter than me, and though enveloped in that monstrous chador, the way her eyes stared up at mine, she seemed entirely exposed. Her shoulders had tensed as she prepared herself to hear my perverse confession. It took all her strength.

  In my family, the only things revealed and discussed were those things that didn’t matter. This way, none of us got hurt by what another did. We hadn’t always lived like this. It had only become this way in the past ten years, since Dad took on a second wife and Amme finally came out of the bedroom, skinnier, dried out, and no longer able to endure losing faith.

  “Apa,” Abu Uncle called. “The alim is waiting.”

  “Do you think I’m possessed, Amme?” I asked.

  She shrugged. “I think there must be something over you. Otherwise you wouldn’t behave the way you do.”

  “Apa,” my uncle said again, extending his hand to her.

  I pressed the veil against my face. The polyester smelled of sweat.

  “Chalu,” I said to Amme, let’s go. We walked in a single line, Abu Uncle, Amme, me, then Noor. Light, she had said her name meant, Light. Why had she told me that? It meant nothing. None of these people could offer me anything useful now. If the alim wanted to slice lemons over my head, let him. If he wanted me to cover my face, hide my skin, not go out of the house, nor speak to any man other than a close relative, that was fine with me. After all, what did it matter in the end? There were many ways to harvest a woman’s body. Eventually, she must learn to liberate herself.

  Amme knew that. It was why, despite how hard it must have been for her, she had gathered herself together and held her breath as she waited for my confession. The truth was, I was no longer the girl others imagined me to be. I was not going to my future husband as a virgin. And the bleeding, it was not demonic. It was a dying baby. Nate’s. I had gotten pregnant. An accident, conceived in haste … or in good times. Either way, I couldn’t be caught this way now, not two days before the wedding, not unless I wanted to be banished from my family and everything I knew. So I went on taking the pill, silently killing this life inside me.

  I was possessed, then, by this innocent, dying child.

  HE DID HAVE blind eyes, and I could see them. He wore no glasses. A thick white film covered the entire eyeballs, and each stared off in a different direction.

  Behind him, the three walls of the living room were covered almost entirely with rectangular mirrors, some older than others, but identical in dimension. Each one was the size of a poster board. All the frames were a simple two-inch-thick dull brass. The mirrors were hung in such a way as to reflect others. Mirrors inside mirrors, multiple reflections, refractions, and the original became lost, impossible to discern. Along the walls, in a few places, the turquoise paint revealed itself. Inside the mirrors, however, these bare spots were completely concealed.

  Abu Uncle sat next to the alim, on the takat, while Amme and I sat on the tiled floor, facing the two men, just as I had seen the women before us do. The courtyard was behind me, and I heard the rain falling through branches and leaves, splattering on the ground. Noor stood next to her husband, her hands clutched before her, her head bowed. She was so quiet and reverent during our session that I soon forgot she was there.

  When I sneaked a peek at the old man, I saw inside his nose and noticed long hair reaching out to curve around each nostril. Inch-long hair also poked out from behind the low-cut kurta and from below the wide pajama bottoms. I lowered my gaze, somehow feeling I had been improper to notice these things. Segregation between women and men had that effect on me. Since I was a child, my mother had tried to teach me correct behavior and I followed her wishes when she was watching—covering my hair, hiding my legs, draping a scarf over kurtas to conceal the curve of my breasts, muffling my laughter, whispering, averting my eyes. I always knew I had to do these things because man, as Islam said, was the weaker sex, so it was my responsibility to keep him from becoming aroused. All these precautions were taken to prevent intercourse or, as Amme would say, so I would not fall prey to a man’s desires. Naturally, then, when I encountered any man, young or old, in the theater, on the bus, passing by our car, rather than feeling chaste, I felt more desire wrapped in the chador, more aware that I was a woman, and he, simply by the fate of his being a man, wanted me. So I sometimes met their curious gaze, sometimes let them brush against me as they walked by, and sometimes even followed them with my eyes, admiring their rounded shoulders, their rigid chins, their hairy chests and forearms, their hands. From what better place to notice a man’s body than from behind a chador?

  “You have come about the girl,” the alim said to us. He kept his voice near a whisper, as though to create a confidence.

  “Yes,” Amme said. Neither of us looked directly at the alim. It was considered improper for men and women to look into each other’s eyes, unless they were married. “My daughter.”

  “What is your relationship to the man sitting next to me?” he asked.

  “He is my sister’s husband.”

  The old man nodded. He smelled of sweat and betel nut. “Now,” he said, “what is wrong with the girl?”

  “The girl has been bleeding … like menses,” Abu Uncle said, also quietly, “but longer, much much longer. And with it, she is having bad dreams.” When the alim only nodded, he added, “My sister-in-law and her daughter have just arrived from America, where they live.”

  “I see,” the alim said and rocked a while in silence.

  I saw from his thoughtful expression that he was considering tactful ways to say what he believed. His eyes hovered just above my head and I could not help but stare into them,
wanting to peel away the top coating with a pair of tweezers. Would they look normal beneath? And would he then be able to see?

  “Umrika is not the best place to raise a daughter, my sister,” he finally said to Amme.

  “What can we do? The times are such. You know how difficult it is for Muslims in India. And her father and I are very strict with her.” Amme said this to most anyone who raised doubts about her and Dad leaving their homeland.

  “No matter. Children go there and get lost,” he said.

  Amme shrugged.

  The alim continued his sermon, his eyes blindly staring over our heads, watching the rain. Amme grew more annoyed and gestured angrily at Abu Uncle, pointing at various times toward the old man. She didn’t think it was necessary for my uncle to have revealed where we lived, especially since the alim’s reaction was predictable, and worse, despite his preaching, he would now expect more rupees from us, dollar rupees.

  The truth was, nothing the alim or anyone else might say would convince my parents to return to India. After twenty years abroad, my parents considered America their home. They may have been born and raised in India, but their present life existed there—Dad’s work, my schooling, other Indian friends. If caught in an honest moment, they would even admit that the quality of life in the U.S. was better because it was cleaner—the water, the air, the food, the streets. No religious riots. No military curfews. But they planned to retire here. Which is to say that for them, birth and death occurred in India, but not life.

  My uncle shifted a few inches away from the alim and gestured back to Amme. He pointed at me several times then spread his palms, as if to say, “Come on, Apa, the alim has to know. America is the source of all Layla’s problems.”

  I rolled my eyes. I had faced this all my life, the way each country held a moral stance over the other. It was as though each nation had its own uniform and I wore the shirt of one, the trousers of the other, and both sides were shooting at me. Oh, the way each culture condemned and complained. India was backward and primitive, exotic. America was morally bankrupt, a cultural colonizer. But I knew this chiding was really a flirtation. For below these criticisms, the truth was that each place held allure for the other, a fascination and curiosity, an attraction and longing. They exchanged hamburgers for chicken curry, combined Ayurvedic and modern medicine, and swapped yoga for aerobics. I had never witnessed such confused and beguiled lovers.

  “Children begin to commit sins,” the alim continued. Noor nodded in agreement, her eyes still closed. “They don’t know better and do as their Umrikan friends. Drink alcohol. Go to dirty bars and dance with the opposite sex. I have heard that some of our girls are even wearing miniskirts and bikinis. Tho-ba, tho-ba’” he said, lightly slapping his cheeks to show repentance. “No shame left at all. This is all a sign the day of judgment is coming.”

  “Our daughter is not like that,” Amme said, looking over the alim’s shoulder at the mirrors, then into the courtyard at the drizzle, then at her wristwatch. Even her voice sounded bored. “Her father is very strict with her. No phone calls from American friends, boys or girls. No going out of the house unless it is to attend classes. She’s been very … isolated.” She began to clean her toenails.

  “Is this true, Beta?” he asked me.

  “Very true,” I said, for it was, and I had always resented my parents for it. Isolation to prevent assimilation. If I happened to stay out late one night or got a call from a boy, Dad would beat me to remind me of who I was.

  “My sister-in-law brings her daughter home each summer,” Abu Uncle said, nodding at Amme. He was making up to her now, noticing, I was sure, how the alim had not proceeded to connect my bleeding with America to offer me a simple cure. “Every year Apa leaves her home in the U.S. to bring her daughter to Hyderabad. Have you ever heard of such devotion, Alim-ji?”

  Amme lowered her head and listened to my uncle’s praise.

  I heard raindrops patter into the empty steel bucket by the well and thought it strange that the doves sat in the rain.

  Abu Uncle smiled wide, showing most of his yellow teeth, as he leaned over to look into the alim’s face. Then, reminded that the old man was blind, he withdrew. But, as he talked, he leaned forward again. And withdrew again.

  The alim nodded, as though considering my uncle’s words, but his expression did not change.

  “Of course Layla isn’t like the girls you’ve heard of, Alim-ji,” my uncle was saying. “She’s a decent girl. Her parents are very strict. Very, very strict. They wouldn’t let Layla grow up American. Ar’re! What a thing to say! Apa brings Layla back every year so the girl won’t forget who she really is. Imagine the money it takes to travel back and forth every single year …”

  Amme cleared her throat at the mention of money and Abu Uncle quieted.

  “Good, good,” the alim said. “But one thing still confuses me.” He rocked silently again, his hands holding his ankles. The face of his watch peeped out and I glanced at Noor. Her head was down, eyes closed. No one seemed to notice it but me. “If all of this is true,” the alim said, “then why have you come to me? What are these dreams you speak of? And what is the cause of this flowing blood?”

  “We don’t know why she’s having these dreams,” Amme said. She stared into her palms, as though questioning her own life decisions. “We wanted your help for that.”

  “I do not mean offense, my sister, but I must ask you one thing. I beg you to be honest with me. Are you quite sure, my sister, that your daughter was as secluded as you say?”

  “Yes, yes, of course,” Amme said, but when she glanced at me, I thought I saw doubt in her eyes.

  I grew uncomfortable and slumped into my veil, trying to hide from her and the alim’s dead eyes. No one had ever thought to question this before and I felt exposed. In fact, I began to feel convinced that the alim knew everything, that he was, at that moment, conjuring up all the events of the previous month. As though on a movie screen, I visualized the images displayed on the back of his white eyes. As he watched, I, too, recalled.

  There was Nate, dark haired, gray-green eyes, his camera knocking against his jeans, following me onto a college bus after our shared photography class. And there was I, elated and afraid, having never dated, but feeling I needed to now, boarding the wrong bus, already hiding my engagement ring. There we were, getting off at the first stop, then walking across campus, to my next class, and agreeing to meet for coffee. Now there I was, skipping classes to go sailing with him. There, wearing a bikini. Now, lying in the sun—as though I needed a tan. There, drinking beer. Now, returning home on time and complaining to my parents about the difficulty of college classes. Oh God, there I was, late at night, finding a way to get him inside the house. Now we’re making love, one floor below my mother. Early in the morning, he quietly leaves, easily, through the patio door.

  No, I hadn’t the courage to sneak out of the house. But I had found someone willing to sneak in.

  “DON’T BE ASHAMED, Layla,” Amme said, poking my thigh. “He’s like a doctor. Tell him about your dreams.”

  I shook my head no. I had described my dreams to one person, my mother, and only out of fear. Since I was a child she had been saying the devil was inside me, trying to take control. So when I began having these dreams, I wondered if she might, after all, be right. Now, if Amme wanted, she could inform him herself, just as she had Abu Uncle and his wife—and who knows how many others. Besides, if it was considered improper for me to look into a strange man’s face, how then did she expect me to confide in that man about my sexual dreams?

  “Go on and tell him,” Amme urged.

  I turned away from her.

  “May I?” Abu Uncle jumped in. “In her dreams, Alim-ji,” he whispered, “a man visits her. The dreams … how can I say this?” He grew uncomfortable and laughed. “I’m not sure what you will think, Alim-ji, but the dreams are sexual in nature.”

  “I see,” the alim said. He cracked his knuckles, the noise like sm
all thunder during monsoon showers. “What does this man look like?”

  “She can’t see his face,” my uncle said.

  “How long ago did this start?”

  “She says a little over one month.”

  “What has changed in the past few weeks?”

  No one spoke.

  “Beta,” the alim said, addressing me as Daughter. “What has changed in the past month?”

  “In the past month?” I said, tracing a tile with my pinkie. “Very little has changed.”

  “But something must have happened to start these dreams.”

  “Like what?” I asked, laugling. But the other three only looked at me, even that blind alim, all their brows arched and foreheads lined. A bird flew into the mirrored living room and its black-and-red wings, its marble-sized head, were reflected over and over and over.

  “I think there is a demon in her,” Amme finally said. “When she was a child, only a year old, she would jump on the bed, screaming, ‘Mai shai-tan hoon—’” I am the devil. “All day long she jumped and screamed. I could not make her stop. And I knew then she was possessed. The moment we arrived in America it started. And now …” she shook her head and clucked in sadness. “Now that beast won’t let my child get married. I have heard, Alim-ji, that when a demon takes a liking to a woman, he won’t let her be happy with anyone else. I think this one is doing the same. He wants to keep Layla to himself.” She raised her head to address his belly. “Can you do anything to remove him?” she asked.

  “I would be happy to make the demon go away, my sister. I can see that you are very upset.”

  “She’s my only daughter,” Amme said. “My only child. I want her to be happy. Money is not an issue.”

  The alim put up a palm. “Nai, nai,” he said. “Let’s not talk about money. I am worried only about the child. She is bleeding and having nightmares. This does sound like a very serious case. But, tell me, my sister, why is it that you have not yet taken your daughter to see a lady doctor?”