A Burning(57)

He turns to leave, his body buoyant with relief. Outside, he will glide past the men drunk on syrup from sweets, their heads big with knowledge of their new importance. He will glide past the assistants and interns, the social media youths, no longer required to remember their names. At home, no doubt over a celebratory meal, he will tell his wife. He relishes it. He is about to turn the doorknob when Bimala Pal speaks.

“One thing,” she says. “Jivan, that terrorist. She has been polling high on voters’ priorities.”

“Oh,” says PT Sir, taken aback by the turn in the conversation. He should have known.

“This issue is not going away.” Bimala Pal touches her forehead in a gesture of worry. “Something will have to be done. The public is unhappy that she is appealing for mercy and whatnot.”

“I testified—”

“That is why I am telling you,” Bimala Pal interrupts.

“And the mercy petition is her legal right, so I don’t know—”

“Legal right? You have much to learn about politics,” says Bimala Pal, smiling.

Then her smile fades, and she looks at him, unblinking, until PT Sir feels his relief vanish.

It is clear what he has to do. He draws a breath to speak, keen to crack the tension in the room. “Isn’t it always the quiet ones who turn out to have dangerous thoughts in their head?”

    “That may be so,” says Bimala Pal. “Listen, this is a result we can deliver as soon as we take power. It will be a big victory for us.”

PT Sir knows that if the terrorist is—well, if the matter of the terrorist is resolved during their tenure, this government’s approval from the public will know no limits. They will have bought themselves time to implement other campaign promises.

“The mercy petition is all that stands in the way,” says Bimala Pal. “See what you can do about it? The court gave its verdict. The people want justice. Anyway”—she smiles—“you will know best. Your student, after all.”





LOVELY


DAY OF THE AUDITION! On the road, my slippers are going flap flap, and I am praying, please slippers please not to tear today. I have tied my petticoat too low and my belly is jiggling, but no time to fix that. The guava seller is there again. For fun I am asking him the time.

“Were you showing my guava on your TV interview?” he is grumbling. “Why I am telling you the time, then?”

I am laughing and waving my hand. I am knowing what the time is, because I am planning my whole morning so I can be taking the eight fifteen local train to Tollygunge.

“This is a ladies’ compartment,” one aunty is yelling, “can’t see or what?”

“Move, madam,” I am replying respectfully. “I am just going to the other compartment.”

“Oh!” she is saying after she is seeing my face. “Aren’t you—I saw you on—”

I am squeezing past her.

In Tollygunge, I am walking under a row of trees. Under one tree, a man is ironing clothes with a coal-loaded frame. Under another tree, a sweeper is sweeping plastic from the gutter. Then I am seeing a villa, surrounded by a clean white wall over which pink flowers are spilling.

    Outside the gate, sitting on a plastic chair, there is a man. He is thin like a grasshopper, and his freshly cut hair is standing straight up on his head. He is looking at me coming closer and closer, and he is saying, “Please, ma, not today, there is an audition going on—”

“Very strange you are!” I am telling him right away. “I am coming for the audition only!”

To this the man is not knowing what to say. He is looking like his boss is going to fire him, but he is not knowing how to stop me. I am looking that good. I am feeling that confident. So what if some man is trying to put a barrier in front of me?

Inside, there is a big white building, surrounded by a tidy garden. So many flower beds, and so many nice benches. They are all empty because people are preferring the cool weather of AC.

So I am pushing open the big wooden door, and feeling the air on my skin. Inside, there is a big room with colorful sofas, on which people with stylish hair are sitting. Their perfumes are mingling and my nose is enjoying. Behind glass partitions there are other people working. Some framed film posters are on the walls. The reception is a big desk, with a vase of flowers on top, and the lady behind it is wearing Western clothes and talking on the landline.

    “One minute, please,” she is telling me softly. She is even smiling at me.

Then, in a room with floors so shiny I am feeling that I will slip and fall on my behind, Sonali Khan herself is coming to take my hand.

“Lovely,” she is saying, “I am so pleased you could come. Your video was touching me right here.” And she is putting a palm to her heart. “I see audition videos all the time, but yours? It was something special.

“For you,” she is explaining, “we are thinking about this role in my movie What Do You Know About Mother’s Love? It will be about a single parent, a hijra, stigmatized by society, who is smashing—I mean smashing—all of society’s rules by adopting a child on her own. A parent who is fierce, and ferocious, and full of love. A parent who lives life on her own terms. Blockbuster drama, mark my words. And we need a fresh face, authentic talent.”