2004
Wrestling past the slithering web of sheets, I bolt upright in bewilderment, my cloud of hair settling about my ears as I try to breath past the hitch in my throat. Jerkily, I bring my knobby fists to my face and try to rub the confusion out of my eyes and clamber to the edge of the bed. But oh it was so dark, and there was definitely a crash outside, and the blades on the ceiling weren’t turning around and around anymore, and as I peer over the lip of the pashmina chasm, I feel the red and green eyes embedded in the slits of the wall leering at me. A mosquito whispers a haunting threat as it flits past my ears, and the evil void of child-snatchers and ogresses radiated shadows that reached out from under the bed frame and coiled around me. I blink the welling tears out of my eyes and listen. The back gate screeches shut and triggers a funny sensation under my new teeth, the accompanying voices of strangers crashing over me like the frigid waves at the Marina. All thoughts of the Rakshasas lurking beneath me fly out of my head as I barrell past the curtains I helped Amma sew, and materialize in front of the kitchen.
And stop dead in my tracks. There, looming in front of me, in the stretch of space between the bedroom entrance and the stove, was a strange and giant creature. It had four tentacle-like legs curling beneath its wooden spine, hoisting up the humongous saucer on the stump of its neck. I warily skirt it, hollering for Amma. She emerges from beyond the stove and surges forward and scoops me up, planting a kiss on my nose. Disoriented and annoyed, my chubby legs pedal through the open air that rose up to replace the floor beneath me.
“It’s a Dining Table! We can buy furniture for the house now!”
Ah yes. Farnicher. The mysterious entity that Amma refers to everytime I ask for a balloon from the vendor outside the school gate, or a slice of the crispy-cool, sweet, pink triangle on the carts next to the bus shelter. That ugly thing was what she was saving for? Squinting suspiciously at its glossy granite surface, I tug on her nightie and whine for breakfast. She smiles and presses her nose against mine, then puts me back down. Before I can blink away the specks of sunlight dancing before my eyes, she hands me My Plate. It’s a special plate, pink, with a bunny in the middle, and a fresh sandwich on top. Woah! I didn’t expect the new talons on the tiles to constitute an occasion - but alas, it was actual bread on the plate, smeared with my favorite chilli sauce. Still, I crouch on my knees at my usual spot on the ground, leaning against the wall, and skeptically mull over this newest addition to our household.
I’m still licking the tangy flavor off my lips as I clamber onto the front of Appa’s motorcycle, flicking my wrists as they clenched the handlebars in an attempt to rev it up the way I’d watched him do a hundred quintillion thousand times before. The whole beast lurches as he settles in behind me and wills it to life, each sputter sending a jolt up my spine as the vibrating of the engine crawls up from my toes to reach my chattering teeth. Amma watches with a Look on her face, the funny one she gets every time she puts me on the bike, the edges of her lips stretched ever so slightly taut, her eyes summoning creases about her brow. She huffs and plants one last kiss on my forehead - simultaneously tucking the strands of my renegade hair into the ribbons woven through it - before waving us off.
2008
The serrated plastic of my lunch basket slices into my hands as I snatch it up from the scorched hatch above the rickety bus’ overworked engine. The cheap material nips at my calves as I traipse my way down an aisle riddled with backpacks. One more traffic light, one sharp turn, and we’d pull into the school lot. Balancing precariously on the top step leading to the back door of the bus, I unclasp my fingers from the creaking railing, letting the brisk city wind kiss the red ridges on my palm, and reach up to tug on the collar of my blouse where it shackled my reedy neck.
My first equatorial summer after half a decade in the stormy English countryside, stuck in a strange school with no windows or air conditioning and such impolite- practically uncivilized - urchins for classmat--
A shockwave through my ribs. Chipped gravel. A lungfull of exhaust fumes, lightning searing the back of my eyes, the clamour of concerned girls, a bored cow’s bellow, a beetle tripping over my fingernail - and the heat, the suffocating, all-consuming heat.
A yelp of pain escapes through my clenched teeth as hands I don’t recognize clamp onto my shoulders and haul me upright, as more distorted hands reach for my uniform to slap away clouds of charred dust. Another set of disembodied fingers fasten around my wrists and yank them upwards, and in a panic I snatch them back, peering at the bloody grazes on my palms; I blink once. Glancing down, beyond the hem of the course plaid pinafore, where the soft, unmarred skin of my thighs used to be - there were nothing but gashes, with tiny rocks lodged by the knee that winked innocently up at me in the sun. I tentatively extend my foot forward, only to recoil. The skin on my shins were stripped away to reveal bare flesh, streaked with more shades of crimson then I knew to name; I blink again.
मम नाम __________| गगनमध्य ________ रज्यति |
The characters seemed to peel off the pages and pirouette along the lines cut into my palm as the blunt tip of graphite clutched in my left fist swum in and out of focus. It’s been four hours since I scrambled into the schoolhouse, yet a trickle of blood escapes my knees every time I dare to twitch. But I’m brave. I’m my mum’s daughter. The staff in this tepid concrete prison weren’t about to call my house for someone to come collect me - not that anyone would - and if I insisted that I leave, I’d fail my midterms and have to repeat a year of this brain-numbing curriculum. I blink harder. Writing in English and decoding math was manageable enough in my untrained hand, but I found Sanskrit nearly impossible on the best of days. All I needed was a passing grade - I could count on my other scores being perfect, to compensate. Oh and! Best of all, if I make it through this last dratted exam I can invoke the Crocodile Tears Routine to spirit me out of here… At least the house has one air conditioned hovel to hide in.
2010
The sky has been emptying sheets and sheets of rain on us for days now. The pounding continues incessantly - on the rooftops, against shutters, on the inside of my skull. The air explodes around us with every clap of thunder, and I watch the hairs lining my arm rise every time lightning forks across the horizon. This is the monsoon. This is what rain actually feels like. Not like a misty sheath of gray punctuated by my little brother’s froggie wellies, nor like a summer storm, where the air ripples with the kisses of a million lukewarm droplets and a balmy breeze envelops me as I haphazardly splash through puddles under a gauzy rainbow.
The cyclone is a chorus of unfiltered mourning: the visceral wail of a thousand trees entwined with the tormented shrieking of all four winds, each orb of water a cannonball launched on a tempestuous battlefield. Each swift gust and inflamed cloud was a force of Mother Nature’s unfettered rage hammering down to cleanse this sorry civilization.
The city drowned four weeks ago. The gas lines went down three days later. Schools were cancelled three weeks ago. Rat carcasses floated past our livingroom window two and a half weeks ago. The inverter and backup generator both shut down four days later. I finished reading every book and magazine in the house one week ago. Mom and dad said they were still stuck on the flooded highway in traffic when their phones died, 6 hours ago.
I draw my knees up and tuck them under my chin, willing the headlights of our car to cut through the murky water and pull into the shed as my eyelids droop heavily over my swollen eyes.