The Bandit Queens (33)
Matters, she assessed as she flopped back on her bed, were not ideal.
She’d awoken with a dull headache from crying herself to sleep like some love-starved teenager, but at least her shame was private. She couldn’t look at her reflection, her swollen eyes and lips neatly summarizing the duality of the previous night. She examined the events under the day’s new light: she’d shared a kiss and an argument. It was nothing to cringe over. She’d endured grosser mortifications than rejection. It would’ve been far worse if she’d flung her lips at him and he’d batted her away immediately. Still, the mere prospect of facing Karem made her want to hide under her bed with Bandit, who was romping around with such unapologetic joy that Geeta found it a bit rude.
“You,” she told Bandit, “need a bath.”
Outside, he dodged her like he sensed her agenda. By the end of it, they were both dripping and Geeta had used two days’ worth of water. All of her tubs were empty, but Bandit’s dingy paws were white again and his odor benign. He flung a welter of droplets at her as she wrung out her nightdress. It was before ten, but already very warm. She couldn’t locate a single cloud. Bandit panted, clean tail wagging. It curled up in an attractive question mark, the fur already fluffing.
“Well, look at you. Who’d have thought you’d be such a handsome devil?”
She changed and hung the wash on her clothesline. When there was still no Farah wailing over some fresh misstep, Geeta grew anxious. Either Farah had changed her mind about the entire plan, or she’d actually managed it. Each theory lent a bit of relief and a bit of terror. Unless, Geeta thought with a start, Samir had caught Farah mid-attempt and punished her.
Bandit succumbed to a happy nap in a sun-warmed corner, nose buried in his clean paws, his luxurious tail alongside him. She couldn’t concentrate at her desk, so Geeta decided to investigate under the guise of fetching more water; all important matters were discussed over the pump. Saloni had a private hand pump in her courtyard, but even she habitually drew from the communal well, lest she miss any valuable scuttlebutt.
As insurance, Geeta took a circuitous route that passed Farah’s house. A bucket in each hand, Geeta saw the mourners from meters away. A few were already in white, some cried, others comforted, some shared urgent whispers. As she approached, she did not see Farah but she did see her children, huddled in a nucleus of grief. Farah’s eldest daughter carried her baby brother, her nonexistent hip jutting to create a shelf for his small body. Her two younger sisters were crying, but she remained dry-eyed, her face a blank slate, and this was how Geeta recognized her from the playground. She wore the same vacant expression now as she had when she’d shoved Karem’s son.
After Geeta absorbed the tableau, their island of the recently fatherless, she hurried away. The empty buckets jangled against her calves, and she dropped them. She barely made it to a neem tree in time, vomiting over its dry roots, one palm against the trunk. Hinged at the waist, she stared at her sick, her breathing ragged. Vinegar and bile coated her mouth.
By the time she straightened, she’d accepted two salient truths: they were murderers, and if she herself felt this shocked, Farah must be demented. There was no way Geeta could join those mourners, feign horror at the news, face the children she’d robbed of a father.
Geeta collected her buckets with clumsy hands and stumbled home, inner ears and throat burning.
Bandit immediately sensed her distress and licked her face in comfort. She allowed it for a moment, but then pressed him away to pace, trying in vain to properly breathe—“Kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi”—until she felt dizzy when pivoting within the confines of her cell. She should get accustomed to it, she thought with climbing hysteria, this was her future. She’d been so preoccupied with finding a way for Farah to remove her nose ring that Geeta hadn’t realized how much of her own future she’d put in Farah’s inept hands. Farah was neither thorough nor cautious; she’d probably left a hundred clues that pointed back to them.
The day dragged, consuming Geeta in a maw of anxiety. Her condition was contagious; Bandit roamed underfoot, needy and dissatisfied. She flicked on the radio, tried to listen to the hyena segment of the Gyan Vani program but was too distracted. There was only one person in the world Geeta wished to see, only one who could understand her plight. The irony did not escape her; the woman she’d shooed like a pesky mosquito, she now craved like a cold drink.
Farah came that evening, bearing her usual gourd. She wore a white salwar-kameez and no jewelry. A white scarf covered her crown, but her dark hair was visible through the diaphanous cloth. She was smiling. Once inside, she pushed the scarf down to her shoulders and twirled. “Grieving widow is a good look for me, don’t ya think?” She shimmied in a dance, singing an impromptu song: “I got no nose ring, I got no nose ring.” Her spirits were high enough to tolerate Bandit. She bent to scratch his neck. “Hello, doggy woggy.” Bandit did not growl, but neither did he fall into her touch with his typical shameless solicitation. “Hey, it can see!”
When Farah registered Geeta’s stricken face, her blithe manner changed. “What is it? Is your stomach paining? Sit down, Geetaben.” She took Geeta’s hand and led her to her own bed.
“We’re screwed,” Geeta said. “We’re really screwed.” She let her hands catch her head, one heel pressed against each temple. With everyone else thinking of her as a murderess for so long, she, too, had forgotten that she wasn’t. There was no way they’d get away with this; two village women were no match for actual authorities with resources.