The Inheritance of Loss

Forty-two

Despite her sweet succumb to bribery, the minute Gyan left the house, his little sister who had witnessed the fight between her brother and Sai switched allegiance to an unbearable urge to gossip, and when he returned, he found the whole household was aware of what had happened, expanded to theatrical dimensions. The talk of guns had the astonishing effect of waking his grandmother up out of a stupor (in fact, the savor of battles renewed was giving new life to the aged all over the hillside), and she crept over slowly with a rolled-up newspaper. Gyan saw her coming and wondered what she was doing. Then she reached him and smacked him hard on the head. "Take control of yourself. Running around like a fool, paying no attention to your studies! Where is this going to get you? In jail, that’s where." She smacked him on his bottom as he tried to rush past. "Keep out of trouble, you understand," whacking again for good measure, "like a baby you will be crying."

"He may not have done anything," began his mother.

"Why would that girl come all the way then? For no reason? Stay away from those people," his grandmother growled, turning to Gyan. "What trouble you’ll get yourself into… and we’re a poor family… we will be at their mercy… Gone crazy with your father away and your mother too weak to control you," she glowered at her daughter-in-law, glad of an excuse to do so. Locked Gyan up with a lock and key.

That day, when his friends came for him, at the sound of a jeep, his grandmother crawled outdoors, peering about with her rheumy eyes.

"At least tell them I’m not well. You’ll ruin my reputation," Gyan screamed, his adolescent self coming to the forefront.

"He’s sick," said the grandmother. "Very sick. Can’t see you anymore."

"What’s wrong?"

"He can’t stop going to the bathroom doing tatti," she said. He groaned inside. "Must have eaten something overripe. He is like a tap turned on."

"Every family has to send a man to represent the household in our marches."

They were referring to the march the next day, a big one starting at the Mela Ground.

"The Indo-Nepal treaty is being burned tomorrow."

"If you want him doing tatti all over your march…"

They drove away and visited houses all over the hillside to remind everyone of the edict that each home must have a representative demonstrating the next day, although there were many who claimed digestive problems and heart conditions, sprained ankles, back pain… and tried to be excused with medical certificates: "Mr. Chatterjee must avoid exposure to anxiety and nervousness as he is a high-BP patient."

But they were not excused: "Then send someone else. Surely not everyone in the family is ill?"

An enormous decision removed, Gyan, after the initial protest, felt sweet peace settle on him, and though he pretended frustration, he was very relieved by this reprieve into childhood. He was young, no permanant harm had been done. Let the world carry on outside for a bit, and then when it was safe, he’d visit Sai and cajole her into being friends again. He wasn’t a bad person. He didn’t want to fight. The trouble was that he’d tried to be part of the larger questions, tried to become part of politics and history. Happiness had a smaller location, though this wasn’t something to flaunt, of course; very few would stand up and announce, "Actually I’m a coward," but his timidity might be disguised, well, in a perfectly ordinary existence situated between meek contours. Saved from one humiliation by being horrible to Sai, he could now be serendipitously saved from another by claiming respect for his grandmother. Cowardice needed its facade, its reasoning, like anything else if it was to be his life’s principle. Contentment was no easy matter. One had to situate it cannily, camouflage it, pretend it was something else.

He had a lot of time to think, and as the hours went by, he unearthed the grout from his belly button, the wax from his ears with a blunt lead pencil, listened to the radio and tested the cleanliness of the orifices against the music, tilting right, left: "Chaandni raate, pyaar ki baate. …" Then, sad to report, he picked some snot balls from his nose and fed them to a giant tiger-striped spider sitting in its web between the table and the wall. It pounced, couldn’t believe its luck, and began slowly to eat. Gyan lay on his back and did languorous bicycling exercises with his legs.

Pleasures existed in the world – intense, tiny pleasures that nevertheless created a feeling of space on all sides.

But then, the guilt came back strong: how could he have told the boys about the guns? How? How could he have put Sai in such danger? His skin began to crawl and burn. He couldn’t lie on the bed any longer. He got up and paced up and down. Could he ever be happy and innocent after what he had done?

So as Sai lay martyred in her room, and as Gyan first considered the joy of turning the wheels of a simple life and then sickened at the harm he had done to others, they missed the important protest, a defining moment of the conflict, when the Indo-Nepal treaty of 1950 was to be burned and the past consigned to the flames and destroyed.

"Someone will have to go…," the cook said to the judge after the boys had come to Cho Oyu to make their demand of attendance at the march.

"Well, you had better go, then," said the judge.