Stories of Hope and Wonder, in Support of UK Healthcare Workers by Ian Whates

Author:Ian Whates
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fantasy, Science Fiction
Publisher: NewCon Press
Published: 2020-04-19T23:00:00+00:00

The lazy crescent moon lolls low above the out-flarings of Tughluk’s thousand stacks; a cradle to rock an infant nation. Around its rippling reflection in the infinity pool bob mango-leaf diyas. No polo grounds and country clubs for Begum Jaitly. This is 2045, not 1945. Modern style for a modern nation, that is philosophy of the Jaitly Shaadi Agency. But gossip and want are eternal and in the mood lighting of the penthouse the men are blacker-than black shadows against greater Delhi’s galaxy of lights and traffic.

‘Eyebrows!’ Kishore greets Jasbir with TV-host pistol-fingers two-shot bam bam. ‘No seriously, what did you do to them?’ Then his own eyes widen as he scans down from the eyebrows to the total product. His mouth opens, just a crack, but wide enough for Jasbir to savour an inner fist-clench of triumph.

He’d felt self-conscious taking Ram Tarun Das to the mall. He had no difficulty accepting that the figure in its stubbornly atavistic costume was invisible to everyone but him (though he did marvel at how the aeai avoided colliding with any other shopper in thronged Centrestage Mall). He did feel stupid talking to thin air.

‘What is this delicacy?’ Ram Tarun Das said in Jasbir’s inner ear. ‘People talk to thin air on the cellphone all the time. Now this suit, sir.’

It was bright, it was brocade, it was a fashionable retro cut that Jasbir would have gone naked rather than worn.

‘It’s very…bold.’

‘It’s very you. Try it. Buy it. You will seem confident and stylish without being flashy. Women cannot bear flashy.’

The robot cutters and stitchers were at work even as Jasbir completed the card transaction. It was expensive. Not as expensive as all the shaadi memberships, he consoled himself. And something to top it off. But Ram Tarun Das manifested himself right in the jeweller’s window over the display.

‘Never jewellery on a man. One small brooch at the shirt collar to hold it together, that is permissible. Do you want the lovely girls to think you are a Mumbai pimp? No, sir, you do not. No to jewels. Yes to shoes. Come.’

He had paraded his finery before a slightly embarrassed Sujay.

‘You look, er, good. Very dashing. Yes.’

Ram Tarun Das, leaning on his cane and peering intensely, said, ‘You move like a buffalo. Ugh, sir. Here is what I prescribe for you. Tango lessons. Passion and discpline. Latin fire, yet the strictest of tempos. Do not argue, it is the tango for you. There is nothing like it for deportment.’

The tango, the manicures, the pedicures, the briefings in popular culture and Delhi gossip (‘soap opera insults the both the intelligence and imagination, I should know, sir’), the conversational ploys, the body language games of when to turn so, when to make or break eye contact, when to dare the lightest, engaging touch. Sujay mooched around the house, even more lumbering and lost than usual, as Jasbir chatted with air and practised Latin turns and drops with invisible partner. Last of all, on the morning of the Jaitly shaadi,

‘Eyebrows sir.

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