Family Planning by Karan Mahajan

Author:Karan Mahajan [Mahajan, Karan]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, General
ISBN: 9780061980220
Google: 8H2Olgg7iF8C
Amazon: B001KDQ4L0
Publisher: Harper Collins
Published: 2008-11-05T05:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 14

DIWAAN-E-KHAAS

MR. AHUJA STOOD in the Super Prime Minister’s drawing room—still hot and smoky from a religious ceremony—and carefully studied Rupa Bhalla’s body language as she signaled him into an uncomfortable cane chair with a swish of her saffron dupatta. She was shaped like one of those rolled mattresses you saw people resting on at railway stations—highly unstable, giving, when she walked, the general impression of being pushed—and she sat down on a maroon chair with a palpable sense of relief. Then, without pause, she commanded him to drink a lassi, asked him what type of lassi he liked, shouted for the servant, said she knew he liked namkeen from the wedding they’d been to—what did Rakesh think, had she planned the wedding well?—but right now the type of lassi escaped her, it was namkeen, was it not?

Rakesh was immediately on guard. He told her the wedding was corrupt, ostentatious, theatrical.

She laughed and said, “Thank you.”

Still, she was being formal, distant. She’d not once asked him about his family—as was her habit—and now she was pretending to forget what type of lassi he liked.

This was absurd. The whole country knew he drank kesar.

“I’d like namkeen, yes, you’re right,” demurred Rakesh. “So, ji, I’ve come to explain my letter—”

Rupa looked relieved. “I’m so glad,” she said, slapping her forehead theatrically. “I thought you had also come to resign!”

He protested, “Rupa-ji, but I am already resigned. I came to talk about that only.”

“Resigned?” she said, practically sneezing the word. “Oh yes! Quite right.” She tapped her head. “Rohini told me there was an e-mail from you. How was I to know it was a resignation? If she had told me, I would have seen first thing, baba. But e-mail otherwise is just e-mail. These days even I am getting so much spam. Do you know how to get rid of this spam?”

Her mouth a nest of baby sparrows, her voice was that of a schoolgirl. Her large red bindi—that all-knowing dot—had today been replaced by an oily tilak. She leaned across the table for a silver napkin holder, pushing in the yellow triangular fins of paper so they didn’t crackle in the fan blast. She talked to people as if their faces were the receivers on a phone apparatus, keeping you so close that you could smell the soft ticking of supari in her mouth, her wicked smile dripping from the corners of her lips like a retired comedian’s, eyes nosed so far apart you couldn’t look her in both at once.

Rakesh was grateful for the table separating them.

“You said you thought I had come to resign also, ji,” he said, crossing his legs and rocking the shell of the white cane chair around him. “Who else has resigned?”

“Well,” said Rupa, snaking her head from side to side. “A wonderful question! A timely one!”

“Yes?”

“Everyone in our dear party! Except you,” she said, clapping her hands for the servant.

“But, ji—that is what I am saying—I am resigned also!”

They had a hearty laugh about this.

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