Just as I was leaving, I saw Zubeida and Dada look at each other and smile.
‘Did you see the baby bump?’ asked Maa in the auto back home.
‘I did.’
‘It’s like a little fruit right now, like a pineapple, my grandchild,’ she said almost to herself. ‘It’s going to be a girl, I’m telling you.’
‘Are you going to name her Mina?’
‘No, of course not. I will name her Meenakshi.’
‘You’re so creative, Maa!’ I said and saw that the sarcasm was lost on her.
Baba was already home when we got back. He had made tea for himself and left the kitchen drain blocked. Maa tried to unblock it with a plunger. When her hands started to tire she called me to help. Over the gurgling sounds of water in the drain, I heard Maa tell Baba that Dada had settled down, Zubeida seemed well, and that they seemed to like the flat.
‘When will you go there?’ asked Maa.
‘I will when I feel like it,’ said Baba and that was the end of the discussion.
3 October 1999
The way she said it, it seemed like the most natural thing to do.
‘Of course we have to see them!’
So yesterday we went to meet Dada and Boudi at 1 a.m.
‘You think they will be awake?’ she asked.
As it turned out, they were awake and duly surprised to see us there. Brahmi and Boudi hugged each other as if they were friends from a lost time. They sat holding hands which felt weird because she was my Boudi, not hers. I felt strangely possessive about both Boudi and Brahmi, and oddly happy to see them mingle.
Dada expressed appreciation and anger at our behaviour. He gave me a token be-careful-the-nights-aren’t-safe-in-Delhi lecture, and then asked me about all the places I had been to.
‘What do you want?’ asked Brahmi.
‘We both want a girl,’ she said. ‘Do you want to eat something?’
‘No, Bhabhi. You rest.’
‘Hey, I’m not crippled, just pregnant,’ said Boudi laughing.
Brahmi laughed too.
Boudi offered to make tea and pakodas but Dada and Brahmi suggested we all go out and eat. Boudi joked that Dada was already sick of her cooking and insisted to cook himself every day. Which was strange, because Dada had not lifted a finger all these years in the Ganguly home.
Dada and Brahmi took a taxi, Brahmi and I drove alongside on Brahmi’s scooter, and we went to an all-night kadhi–chawal place in Connaught Place. Dada was impressed to see how well I knew the city.
Dada and I ate like hungry wolves while Brahmi and Boudi talked non-stop. Seeing them get along so well sprouted the possibility of an alternate reality in my imagination. Brahmi could shift to Dada–Boudi’s place, Dada could pay Brahmi’s school fees for the next two years, and she could go to a college which would waive off her tuition fee on account of her being such a brilliant student. It was a win-win. Of course, there was the issue of Maa thinking Brahmi and I were having sex—which was absolutely ridiculous—and Brahmi not wanting to depend on anyone. I kept the imaginary scenarios to myself.
When it was time for us to leave, Boudi exacted a promise out of Brahmi to meet them soon. Brahmi nodded. Neither of us told her or Dada that she would be moving to Gurgaon sooner than later.
‘You’re such a stud,’ Dada told me before leaving.
‘And I?’ asked Brahmi.
‘You’re responsible for making him one,’ said Dada and waved us goodbye.
On the way back to her house on her scooter, she shouted over the wind, ‘I love your Dada–Boudi.’
