Читать книгу The Trouble with Rose - Amita Murray - Страница 10

The doorbell rings again, and Federico runs down to answer. For heaven’s sake, who is it this time? Up he comes, bringing with him the Unmarried Ones. Auntie PK, Auntie Dharma and my father’s sister Auntie Promilla enter the living room. My parents and relatives give each other sombre hugs, not unsuited to a funeral.

The three aunties hold me until I’m ready to scream. I glare at my father. Since he is the least likely to have had anything to do with this ambush, he is the one I’m most irritated at. Why didn’t you do something to stop this onslaught? my eyes ask. Why didn’t you stop it?

As if anyone ever listens to me, his shoulders answer.

The Unmarried Ones are the bogie man of the GIF. When young girls of the GIF behave badly – shriek, yell, fight, drop and break things, eat in such a messy way that they get covered head to toe in melting chocolate, point out everything their parents are doing wrong with their lives, that kind of thing – a helpful GIF member reminds them that if they carry on behaving this way, no one will marry them, and they will turn out like one of the Unmarried Ones.

It is unfair to club them together, really. Auntie Dharma, the spiritual healer, was married briefly, a long time ago, until her husband died. She doesn’t say out loud that it was the best thing that ever happened to her, but the implication is that her loss was the spiritual realm’s gain.

Auntie PK, the feminist journalist, has a ‘friend’ she lives with, who is a lawyer named Zeze. Now and again when one of the GIF invites people over for dinner, they’ll say to Auntie PK, ‘Why don’t you bring your special friend along, Parminder?’ But apparently Zeze is always busy and rarely able to attend GIF social occasions. This could be true, Zeze is a very important human rights lawyer. But it could also be that the only time she encountered the GIF some years ago, Uncle Jat tried to get her to work for him, and Auntie Pinky suggested she meet some nice Indian men who were great ‘marriage material’ and who would like that Zeze was half-white and half-black.

Auntie Promilla is single because – well, because Auntie Promilla is an animal charity. That’s right. She doesn’t work at an animal charity, she is an animal charity. She collects animals like burs. She rarely speaks to humans, she has nothing to say to us and she looks over our shoulder when compelled to say something. But with animals – the more disabled and abused the better – she is a fairy godmother.

The Unmarried Ones are all crammed into the tiny living room. And now they are all talking about me again.

‘Wait till shani has moved on,’ Auntie Dharma says. ‘Then let me set a date.’

‘Living without a man isn’t the end of the world,’ Auntie PK chips in, but no one pays any attention.

‘Her chart says she might have problems in the romance department,’ Auntie Dharma says thoughtfully.

‘I say, get a haircut.’ Auntie Menaka takes a tiny nibble of a pizza slice that she has been eyeing for a while, then places the rest down on a plate. ‘Any man problem can be solved if you get a haircut.’

‘Look, we can kill two birds with one stone—’ Uncle Jat starts.

His wife takes up the thread. ‘Yes, yes, throw a party, call everyone, her friends and supervisor and Simon and his parents!’ Her eyes are dancing at the idea.

They volley ideas back and forth. People are nodding their heads, starting to look excited. Federico actually has the grace to look a little sheepish at this fresh attack. He glances at me, but I avoid his gaze.

‘Plain talking is the best way, I find,’ Auntie PK says. ‘No games.’

‘What’s the point?’ Mum interjects. She has been sitting silently for a while, but now this question bursts from her. ‘What’s the point? Nothing can change what has happened!’

‘Mum—’

‘I knew this would happen! Didn’t I tell you, Manoj? I knew!’

‘How could you possibly know, Mum—’

‘You ruin everything! That’s how I knew!’

‘Now, Renu—’

I stand up abruptly. ‘What? What do I ruin? Go on, tell me!’

Mum’s tears are flowing now. ‘You alienate everyone. You’re selfish!’

‘And – and what else! Don’t stop there, Mum!’

‘You don’t call us, you don’t visit, you never even say thank you for anything anyone does. You – you killed that budgie Auntie Promilla gave you!’

Everyone turns to stare at me. I clench my fists at this list that my mum has come up with, the list of all the things I do wrong. I am so mad I can’t even see her properly. Mad at my mum, at my dad for letting her say these things, at all of them, sitting here in my flat, passing judgement. Even Auntie Promilla, who rarely says anything, is looking at me with sad eyes.

‘You said the budgie flew away,’ she says, a tremor in her voice.

My mouth tightens. My dream from this morning hits me square in my chest, and suddenly I can’t breathe. I look at all of them, not daring to say what is on the tip of my tongue, yet knowing I’m going to blurt it out. I stare at Auntie Promilla, who has given the GIF various family pets over the years, some beloved and others hated. But the first pet that she ever gave us, gave me and Rose, was Gus-Gus.

‘Talking of Auntie Promilla’s pets,’ I say breathlessly, talking quickly so I can’t change my mind, ‘I’ve been meaning to ask you for years. Whatever happened to Gus-Gus?’

The silence in the room can be cut with a knife. For many moments, nothing happens. No one speaks and nothing moves. People look blankly into space, at their shoes, at the wall, at anything but each other. Jharna is the only one who has no idea something cataclysmic has been said. Jharna, and Federico, whose hair is standing on end in the face of all these arrows aimed straight at my heart by my family.

My mother looks down at her trainers, my father at the shiny laminate floor. Auntie Pinky and Uncle Jat finally look at each other, then away, then each other, then away. Auntie Menaka is looking absorbedly at her long manicured yellow fingernails.

Auntie Promilla doesn’t say anything, not one word, but she flinches. Yes, Auntie Promilla remembers the Irish wolfhound.

In the silence that follows my question about Gus-Gus, I can hear the thumping of my heart and it sounds suspiciously like a time bomb.

Uncle Jat clears his throat, finally breaking the silence. He turns to Auntie Promilla.

‘So are you doing anything important at the moment?’ Uncle Jat disapproves of Auntie Promilla’s obsession with animals. ‘I can get you a job, you know. All these animals-shanimals, they are okay as a hobby, but they are hardly a profession. We could send them to a charity—’

Auntie Promilla shakes her head, shrugs, nods her head. This covers every possible answer. She is looking nervously at me.

‘I’m so lucky I don’t have to work,’ Auntie Menaka cuts in, sitting on the arm of a sofa. ‘Or look after animals.’

‘Do you remember the hamster?’ my father asks.

Everyone laughs nervously. They avoid my eyes. They discuss various other pets that the GIF has had over the years. There’s nervous fidgeting all around.

‘I once saw a spider monkey in our back garden,’ Federico says. ‘Its long arms and legs were crossed. I tell you, it was meditating! I swear it even had its eyes closed.’ Federico thinks we are talking about pets. Jharna is looking at me, though, with a slight frown on her brow.

Everyone else is smiling and nodding now. We can move on from the awkwardness brought on by my unfortunate mention of Gus-Gus, who disappeared at the same time as my sister.

‘There was a time I thought I would take up silent meditation. For the rest of my life.’ Auntie Pinky laughs nervously.

‘You, silent!’ Uncle Jat makes a sound like upph.

‘Hard to imagine,’ Dad agrees. Apparently we can move on.

But then he glances sideways at me. Just for a fraction of a second, so that it’s hardly there at all. But I know they all remember what I’ve said. I know they can hardly breathe in case they blurt out the wrong thing. In case words are spoken that can’t be taken back.

‘This is how we’re going to play it, is it?’ I say softly.

Jharna looks up from her phone, her eyebrows raised. Everyone else is quiet.

My father rubs his face. He looks suddenly old. His face is pinched and there is so much grey in his hair. He looks shrunken. ‘This is all my fault.’

I roll my eyes. ‘Enough, okay? Enough with the drama.’

‘No, beta,’ Dad says. ‘That’s for us to say. Enough. You need to come and live at home if you can’t cope with day-to-day life like a normal adult. We’ve tried and tried with you—’

‘Damn you,’ I whisper. ‘Damn you all.’ They’ve tried and tried? When have they ever tried?

Then I find I can’t speak. There are words I want to say that I have never been allowed to say, words that even now are stuck in my throat. Words that hurt too much to say out loud.

‘Please just go,’ I say finally. I want it to come out angry but instead there is a crack in my voice and I can’t meet anyone’s eyes. I suddenly have no fight left. I can’t even look at them any more. I shake my head, holding back tears, and leave the room. I walk up the stairs to my room, close the door behind me. I slide down to the floor, squeeze my eyes shut with my hands and try not to think about anything at all. Not my family, not the mess I seem to be making of my life, not Gus-Gus. And certainly not my sister Rose.