Married Woman by Manju Kapur

the swollen lump, lingering long on the salty lips.
    ‘How are the children doing?’ croaked Astha.
    ‘Do not worry‚’ said Hemant, head of the household, the type of person his wife could depend on, poor little thing. ‘Mala is very reliable when you are not there. She knows she can’t try her funny business with me. Besides they love being with Mummy, she thinks they are not dressed well enough, and has bought both of them new sets of clothes.’
    After he left, ‘How good Sa’ab is‚’ said the day nurse with a sigh. ‘Coming to see you every day. Not every husband is so nice.’
    ‘Yes, he is‚’ said Astha.
    ‘Love marriage?’ asked the night nurse.
    ‘No.’
    ‘Arranged is best‚’ said the night nurse with an even larger sigh, and then proceeded to tell the story of how her husband had first seduced and then married her sister. She could hardly bear to speak to him when he came home at night, that is why she had taken up this job, otherwise she came from a respectable family where the women didn’t work, but now what else could she do, it was very bad madam, her sister looked after all the children and ran the house.
    *
    After her operation, Astha came home, waited for her headaches to go and life to become pain free. But the headaches continued, and Hemant was naturally not as attentive as he had been in the hospital.
    If that nurse could see her now, her envy would be greatly diluted, thought Astha as she fretted over absent husband, and often absent children as well.
    Where were they? Upstairs. Five days had been enough to establish this pattern. When she called them down, this was seen as objecting to their being with the grandparents. She tried talking to Hemant about this.
    ‘It upsets the children’s routine if they are up for so long‚’ she protested. ‘And if they eat so much junk, their appetite is ruined for dinner.’
    ‘You fuss too much. Besides their Dada Dadi are lonely. They complain they do not see enough of the children.’
    ‘I send them up whenever I can, Hem, you know that.’
    ‘Yes, but you know how it is with old people, they think they have little time left, all rubbish of course, but if it cheers them to have the children, why not?’
    ‘What about me? As it is when I am in school Himanshu is upstairs. When I come home I want the children. I hardly have you, I should have them.’
    Tears came to her eyes. More tears for Astha, poor thing.She was climbing a mountain, and when she reached the top her face sweating, her heart going at its fastest, all she could see was another mountain. As she gazed at the jagged edges, her head began to ache, and the blood that was pounding in her heart obliged by moving to her head and pounding there.
    Hemant rolled his eyes, and drew out a handkerchief to dry her face. ‘What rubbish‚’ he repeated. ‘It is all your imagination. When don’t you have me? You are the one who keeps wanting to stay at home with the children, or your school work, or your books when we are invited to parties, or when I want to go to the club.’
    ‘How can you say that? I always come with you.’
    ‘And hate it, don’t deny it. Half these invitations I refuse because of you. I am the one who is lonely, and without company.’
    By what sleight of hand had their problems become identical?

    She continued with her sketching, but found herself scribbling poetry, her father’s encouragement more firmly in her mind now than when it was first given. She wrote about gardens and flowers, the silent dark faces of gardeners tending plants and never getting credit. She wrote about love, rejection, desire and longing. The language was oblique, but it was her own experience endlessly replayed.
    Writing alleviated the heaviness within her, a heaviness she found hard to deal with. Discussing her feelings with Hemant usually led to argument, distance, and greater misery. In the struggle to express herself she found temporary relief.
    After Astha had written