The Plunge Read online

  “Arae baba, what’s wrong with you? I am staying, OK? Let’s go for a drive down the hill. Or let’s go to Chail, spend a night there in the same guesthouse we stayed in when you first came here,” he said.

  She felt better. At least he wasn’t rushing back into the bitch’s trap. Could it be true or was it her insecurity acting up?

  The drive to Chail proved rewarding. They were laughing and chatting by the time they reached the golf course.

  “Why don’t we stay at the log hut tonight? It would be fun,” he suggested.

  She agreed, wondering at his sudden change of plans.

  From the hut, through its beautifully crafted window, Anjali sat watching the tired horses tied to the deodars outside. She felt sorry for them. Some of the tourists from the plains were disgustingly overweight.

  Picnickers left the hillock at sunset. The only people who remained were the few who had booked the log huts for the night.

  Anjali was not hungry. She waited for him to make the first move. Why did he not hug her even once? She felt desperate. Why did he not turn towards her? Did he not like her anymore?

  The trust factor in their relationship was withering away, she knew.

  She knew that he had a wife and hence did not technically belong to her. There was no commitment from him for a formal relationship. She only hoped that he was committed at an emotional level. That was a must in any close relationship.

  The dripping tap in the bathroom was racing with her heartbeats. Water dropped into the bucket in a preset rhythm, which helped engage her mind briefly. She heard him breathe softly, just a whisper away, fast asleep.

  What did she want from the relationship? Was it really just an emotional connection? She saw her perfect partner in him, a soft-spoken romantic she felt comfortable with.

  But now there was something that was harming their relationship. What was it?

  Siddharth was a gentleman to the world, the perfect father to his children, and a caring husband to his wife.

  “You must appreciate what I am risking to be with you,” he had said when they had an argument during a phone call a week ago.

  He was probably right. They had to be careful, at least for his sake. She was unmarried and away from her people. She did not have to fear much, even if their affair became public. It would be different for him. He had a lot at stake, most of all his family.

  Anjali moved closer to him and hugged him. She felt his body heat filtering through her skin. She closed her eyes and cherished the comfort of the moment.

  It was always the same. He aroused craving in her every time and left a lonely feeling in her at the end of his visits. A strange attachment made her want to be near him all the time. Maybe the stress they experienced was normal in any intimate relationship.

  He drew her towards him in half-wakefulness. She kissed him on his neck. She felt complete, the way she felt each time they made love.

  “We are such a lusty pair,” Anjali whispered.

  How was he when he made love to his wife? Siddharth had shown her a family photograph. Chandni was fair and chubby, in her early forties. Perhaps he felt excited just lying naked near her voluptuous body. The thought made Anjali jealous.

  What if Chandni suddenly died of some terrible disease or an accident? He could marry her, maybe after a couple of years. Would he say that society, and his children, would be against a second marriage? What a nasty thought. Not right.

  Besides, what if Chandni’s death gave ideas to other women? He might simply become available, to colleagues, neighbours, and relatives; to just anyone. Oh no, it was dangerous.

  Let her not die, let her live, she prayed as she drifted into sleep in his arms

  .

  20

  CHAPTER

  Touching Base

  Swapna felt exhausted by the time the train reached Coimbatore station. She had not expected the South Indian town in Tamil Nadu to be that cold on an October morning.

  Rishi was fast asleep, his head resting on the folded arm of aai. Her mother had her other arm around her grandson, who was snuggled to her. Swapna did not feel like waking him up.

  “He’s very tired,” aai said, moving her hand over Rishi’s face to brush off strands of hair.

  “It’s only 5:30 a.m.,” Swapna said.

  Aai shook Rishi softly. He woke up after a mild protest. They walked in the dark towards the rickshaw stand.

  “I am hungry,” said Rishi.

  Swapna was also feeling famished after the two-day journey.

  The restaurant near the bus stand served set breakfasts, idli-sambhar-chutni. The steamed idlis were very soft. The diced vegetables in the spicy sambhar curry took a different character after being mixed with the pressure-cooked lentils.

  Swapna smiled noticing Rishi’s face lit up. The masala tea had refreshed him.

  She wrapped a shawl around him and sat him between her and aai in the rickshaw to protect him from the cold wind. It was a short drive to the bus station. The bus to Pollachi was about to leave when they reached the station.

  It was a pleasant journey along the quiet road that ran parallel to the green hills. The cool breeze and the greenery around breathed life into her. There were only a few passengers in the bus besides them.

  Aai looked very tired. Still, the excitement of being able to finally meet her guru, Maharishi Brahmaguru, brought a glow to aai’s tired eyes.

  Aai was also looking forward to seeing Anjali. She was very fond of her, Swapna knew.

  Anjali had actually met aai during their college days. Though she had seen aai from a distance many times in the boarding school, they had never met or talked.

  Aparna had spent her childhood in Mumbai, where she picked up the word aai, which meant mother in the Marathi language. She loved the word and insisted that her children call her aai, instead of amma.

  Anjali visited aai over a weekend. Though she had known that aai was beautiful, when she finally met her, Anjali was speechless.

  Aai had glowing pink skin. Her hair flowed to her knees, dense and lustrous. She had a perfect forehead, large shapely eyes, a sharp nose, and luscious lips.

  “You are so pretty. You are so flawless.” Anjali’s awe provoked laughter from the rest of those present, including aai. “No wonder you were crowned Miss Kochi.”

  “That’s enough,” aai had said, still laughing, as she hugged Anjali.

  “How can you be so perfect?” Anjali kept asking throughout her stay, as if it were a crime to be extremely attractive.

  It was their discussion on life and men that bound the two. Anjali told her life story to aai within half an hour after they had met. But Anjali was like that. She opened her life to people easily.

  Aai had a kind of divinity about her, Swapna mused now, watching her mother asleep on the seat opposite her. She was glad to have Aparna as her mother.

  Aai had gotten weak over the past two years. It began as a mild depression, when Swapna’s marriage ran into trouble. While Swapna bore it stoically, aai had started to unravel. She was sentimental about people and relationships. Aai was affected even by tragedies of strangers. It was only natural for her to be devastated by her own daughter’s heartbreak.

  There was no denying that Vinod’s suicide had made aai ill. Medicines had helped control the symptoms of depression, and the panic attacks were also fewer lately. But she still experienced acute fatigue some days. She woke up feeling exhausted at least a couple of days a week. She would stay in bed the entire day, hovering between sleep and wakefulness. Aai was unable to do anything those days because she was drained of all energy. She was a stranger to life during those wasted days.

  Swapna was glad that aai was much better now. In those difficult early days, they had thought she would never travel again.

  The bus moved unhurriedly along the narrow road leading to the ashram.

  Swapna looked at aai, who was sitting with Rishi, both fast sleep. She looked calm and happy.

  She could see hill
ranges all along the road to Aliyar. The hills on the Western Ghats were evergreen. That could be the reason for the recuperating powers of the place. She spotted tiny springs every now and then along the route, which made the journey exciting.

  When the bus finally stopped near the ashram, an hour and a half later, Rishi woke up without protest.

  The one-hour journey changed Swapna’s mood for the better. The bus reached the village near Pollachi a little after daybreak.

  As the bus moved on, leaving them behind, a sense of loneliness came over Swapna. It was similar to what she felt when Vinod had left them. The ease with which he had dismissed her from his life, just as he would get rid of a fly on the shoulder with a careless shrug, made the act unforgivable. The feeling often revisited her, whenever she was in a new place or situation, in the midst of the unknown.

  Anjali had seconded her idea of enrolling Rishi in a special school in Bangalore. She could build her life afresh, take up a new job, and make a new beginning. Aai could also live with her more often, since Bangalore was closer to Thrissur, where her sister lived. Meera lived with her husband and three kids. Their parents had always lived with her since her first child was born.

  Swapna shook her head to clear her mind. She could not afford to let negative emotions linger. Aai would be disturbed if she sensed them. She looked around, wiping her face on the shawl.

  The scene was breathtaking. Never before had she seen nature in such pristine abundance. The green hills that had looked few and far off from the bus now stood close by, one hill overlapping the other. Dark clouds spread a cautious blanket over the summits, making it impossible to see their exact outline.

  It started drizzling. A very pleasant feeling came over her.

  “Mama, see…monkeys!” Rishi screamed, squeezing her arm. She noticed the flurry of movements near a bulky tree with packed branches at a distance. It was a band of langurs with their babies clinging to them. As the mothers swung about the branches, the young ones clung to their breasts. The greater the leap, the tighter the grip, Swapna guessed. “Not so fast. I am slipping. Mama…careful!” they seemed to say.

  The morning announced itself with a medley of sounds and sensations. They could hear the chirping of birds, the rush of breeze through the trees, the gurgle of some nearby stream, the bell of a passing bicycle, and monkey chatter.

  The ashram was a vast complex. The guest rooms were near the main entrance. The volunteer at the reception allotted them their rooms in no time. Swapna booked a room in Anjali’s name, next to theirs.

  On entering the room, Swapna went straight to the bathroom to freshen up. Once she was ready, she could not stay inside the room any longer. Anjali would be in any moment now. She would be meeting her after ten months. Anjali had travelled quite a bit in life during that period, along paths Swapna was unfamiliar with and would never have dared to try.

  When she had told her mother about Anjali’s life, aai was strangely calm. Aai had only asked a few questions, as if to understand the situation.

  Swapna looked at aai, who was reclining on the bed, Rishi beside her, his right arm around her. They were watching cartoons on television.

  She walked out of the room into the fresh morning breeze, feeling grateful for the beautiful morning. Birds continued to chirp excitedly, as if they were announcing a pleasant day ahead.

  The sound of the stream that gurgled along with bubbling energy just outside the ashram could be heard from their room. Monkeys, lion-tailed macaques, chattered away on treetops near the Monkey Falls outside the ashram. Just then, a figure appeared near the gate. The hesitant, slim woman stood fiddling with the latch.

  “Anjali…,” Swapna called out, unable to contain her excitement.

  Anjali waved at her at the same instant.

  The moment they met midway, Swapna hugged Anjali, both giggling in excitement. She listened to Anjali as she talked nonstop about her journey. They held hands as they bustled towards the guest rooms.

  They saw aai walking towards them, Rishi, running a little ahead of her.

  How did aai know that Anjali had already arrived? Swapna often suspected some telepathy between Anjali and aai.

  Anjali turned to Rishi and patted his neatly combed black hair before aai had walked up them.

  Aai hugged Anjali fondly.

  “You have become so weak,” Anjali said to aai.

  Swapna noticed that Anjali was avoiding eye contact with aai. She understood her apprehension. Aai did not show any displeasure, though.

  Anjali looked frail. But despite her tired eyes, there was a strange charm about her. Swapna noticed an unusual swiftness in her movements. Something about her attitude said that she was content. Maybe it was the Shimla effect, or Siddharth.

  Anjali looked at aai.

  “You must stay with Swapna for a while,” said Anjali.

  Swapna shifted her gaze to aai. She looked drained. The many grey strands on her head, the dark circles around her eyes and the worry lines on her forehead made her look much older than her age.

  “Let uncle stay with Meera. By the way, how’s Meera?”

  Aai smiled and said, “She is fine. What about you? How is your work in Shimla?”

  Anjali was about to answer when, staring afar, she screamed.

  “Snake. Look, it’s a snake!” she pointed at a black object a few metres away.

  “It’s only a fallen branch,” said Swapna.

  At that very moment, the object moved, a sudden jut forward. It seemed intentional, as if to reveal itself, to claim respect. It was a long snake, about two metres long. The movement suggested raw might.

  Anjali shrieked. She’d always had a phobia of anything that slithered.

  Rishi laughed aloud. He found the sight of the horrified Anjali funny. “Shall we go a bit closer and look?” he asked.

  Swapna agreed as Anjali pleaded with them to stop.

  Swapna ignored Anjali’s shrieks and went with Rishi. She knew Anjali was petrified of snakes. It reminded Swapna of Anjali’s reaction when they had spotted a yellow rat snake of about the same length in the hostel backyard, years ago.

  The backyard used to be her favourite spot, where they would huddle and share secrets in the evenings during college days.

  After seeing the snake, Anjali had abandoned the spot. She preferred the lawn, until the day seniors told her about the two rat snakes they had seen mating there during the previous monsoon.

  She retreated to her room from that day on. They sat there after classes and talked, watching as the world went by outside the window, over the tall compound wall.

  It was there that they saw to their horror the erect male organ for the first time, displayed by a pervert, a well-built man in his early twenties.

  Men of different ages were lined up at the wall outside, staring shamelessly at the windows of the women’s hostel while they masturbated. The small, deserted road that separated the hostel from the college had long been a favourite haunt of habitual flashers.

  Anjali shrieked the first time she saw it. “Oh no! Are they so huge?”

  Other girls laughed uncontrollably. What a sight it was. Anjali had stood paralysed, staring at the men as they kept shagging furiously, encouraged by the spectators. All the while, Anjali kept exclaiming “chi” and “horrible”, without taking her eyes off the perverts. Her palms were pressed against her cheeks, shaping her lips into a silent “oh”.

  They were barely sixteen then. And Anjali did not read erotic literature like many other girls. Neither did Swapna.

  One of the senior girls had to explain to her that men looked that way only when excited.

  “Oh my God!” Anjali had felt scandalized.

  Memories brought a smile to her face.

  Anjali had changed into a white salwar-kurta after her bath. She looked calm. Something must have changed for the better. Swapna hoped so.

  Life had left a few deep scars on her soul, too. Vinod had left a permanent scar. Still, she tried to carry on w
ith life as if the past had never existed.

  Was it possible to shrug off such a tragic experience from memory so completely? Had she actually forgotten her husband? Or was she pretending for the sake of her parents and Rishi? No point in dwelling on such thoughts.

  “So, how is your research coming?” Swapna asked Anjali.

  Anjali nodded, meaning it was going well.

  “How’s life otherwise?” She expected some amusing details. Instead, Anjali broke into sobs. Swapna felt something shatter inside her own chest. She reached for her friend’s hand.

  Anjali clung to her and wept miserably. Swapna stroked her head, trying to arrange her unruly strands.

  “I don’t understand him,” Anjali said, not waiting for her to ask. “He has become very difficult. He thinks I should not feel possessive about him. What do you think? Am I being jealous?”

  Swapna held her tongue.

  “I think it’s over for him,” Anjali went on. “Maybe he’s tired of me. Maybe he wants to blame me for the mess and end it,” she said, tears streaming.

  Swapna remained quiet for a while before responding. “What about you? Anjali, is it over for you? Will you forget him, forgive him? Will you be able to do that?”

  Anjali looked into her eyes. “What’s left in my life if I remove him? I can’t live without him. I know he has a family, which makes me the outsider, the other woman. But what can I do now?”

  Swapna did not have an answer.

  But aai did. “Anjali, you are not sure what you want,” she said.

  They had somehow assumed aai was not listening to their conversation.

  “You have to decide where you see him in your life. Not him,” said aai.

  It was the first time she had given an opinion on Siddharth.

  Anjali appeared reticent, perhaps reflecting on aai’s advice.

  The retreat to the ashram was Anjali’s opportunity to see aai again. She had regarded aai as her spiritual godmother ever since she had helped Anjali overcome the difficult times following her split with Madhav.