Ladies Coupe by Anita Nair Page A

shopping, they handled everything. The food he provided was not satisfactory. They craved for rare and delicate foods, which only they could afford to pay for. When Daddy produced a bottle of army rum, they ignored it for the duty-free Scotch they had brought with them.
    The house was swamped with the fragrance of airline interiors and foreign lands. And the rich sister took over their lives, handing out advice that was both self-congratulatory and insulting. Sheela was the only one Daddy could exercise his power over. And Sheela knew there was no escaping the beast’s wrath until Ammumma left or died.
    Sheela’s grandmother lost her mind. Ammumma sat up in bed, shrugging aside the thin cotton cloth that Mummy’s eldest brother and her favourite son had covered her with. She stared at the faded pink walls and began addressing the corner of the wall closest to her bed. ‘Mother,’ she said. And Sheela’s mother and aunt looked at each other in surprise. Why was their mother talking to their dead grandmother?
    Women turn to their mothers when they have no one else to turn to. Women know that a mother alone will find it possible to unearth some shred of compassion and love that in everyone else has become ashes. Sheela knew why Ammumma sought her mother.
    ‘Mother,’ Ammumma said with a note of urgency in her voice. ‘Look at that bitch striding into the bedroom with her long legs. He sees the pale skin of her inner thighs, her milk and water complexion and falls deeper in love with her. The besotted fool!’ She was referring to Sheela’s eldest
uncle’s wife; her pet hate and the target of constant venom. According to Ammumma, she was the cause of all problems, real and imaginary.
    Mummy pacified her distraught brother, ‘You shouldn’t be so upset. It is just the heat. The radiation causes unimaginable heat in her system, making her talk nonsense. Just turn the air-conditioning up.’ And later, she told her sister, ‘The heat has let loose all the demons that were slumbering inside our mother.’
    Sheela knew it had nothing to do with the heat. Ammumma had finally realized her time was up and she wasn’t going to die without having spoken her mind. But Sheela still went to the hospital canteen and ordered a tumbler of pepper rasam. The waiter there gave her a curious look. She was the only one there that day, on that hot day, asking for a fiery hot dish instead of something cold – a badaam kheer or basundi — like everyone else.
    Sheela sat there steaming, sweat running off her brow, and sipped the hot pepper rasam, trying to see if it would unleash the demons in her. Give her the courage to tell her father, ‘Why don’t you get off my back? Quit being a beast, will you? All you do these days is frown and snap at me. I didn’t make my grandmother ill. I’m not responsible. Do you understand?’
    Make her tell her grimalkin aunt, ‘Shut up fat face, go bully someone else – your husband, your children, your half-a-dozen servants, and leave my poor mother alone.’
    And make her glare at her uncles saying, ‘If you want to show your largesse, your wealth, hire a cook for my overworked mother, and a man to run between home and hospital and on your innumerable chores, instead of treating my father like your resident errand boy.’
    The flames raged but the demons stayed locked. So she ordered a double scoop of rum ‘n’ raisin and doused the fire. She knew she had been right all the time.
    Six weeks later, they brought Ammumma back home. The
brothers and sister had left after a few days. Mummy and Daddy took turns to nurse Ammumma. But the cancer wouldn’t relinquish its hold. Besides, everything that could go wrong did – her blood pressure soared, her kidneys failed and all the while the gnome in her womb kept growing. Once again, the brothers and sister were summoned to her bedside.
    Sheela stood on the balcony, watching the road, waiting for Ammumma to arrive from the hospital. Suddenly the