BUTTERFLY JAR — an extract

Samir and I preserved our virginity until marriage. God was watching us, or so I was told. Things changed the day after niqah. We had now lost what we had preserved, and it was like losing a butterfly from a butterfly jar, fully and forever. I was then told to look out for special​       ​ signs from above​ ​, nausea, distaste for my favourite foods, untimely urge to urinate, occasional nightmares, so on and so forth. Tibbi Mausi put her hand on my belly, smiled at me as if my heart was keeping her alive and said, “soon someone will come knocking on the door.” Ammi​        ​ was against the marriage, so all the motherly advice I got was from Samir’s mother, Ammi’s younger sister, Tibbi Mausi. For a long time, however, nobody “knocked on the door”. Mausi was most disappointed in me, and then in God, but since God wasn’t around to listen, I had to take earfuls for both of us. 

For five whole years, every month, a pink strip would make a headlong dive into the pot of urine and come out dry. I wish the strip had a mouth of its own, so it could tell the world I was doing everything in my power to give them a child. Doctor Laxmi, the gynec, had a mouth of her own, but that didn’t help. “Nothing wrong with you,” she said and her words, like her needles, were laced with professional consolation. Samir’s family doctor, Doctor Jain, dropped the pile of reports on his desk and strangled them under the weight of his stethoscope, “Samir is fine,” he said, “you’re just one of those unlucky couples.” 

Tibbi Mausi passed away six years into the marriage. Her last rites were hysterical, and her last words were such that they left me agasp. “Dear child,” her toothless lips chewed on my earlobe, “do not hide from your grandmother,” she said.

She intended to speak through me, to my unborn children, who in her delusional mind, were playing a game of ‘hide and seek’. But no children inside me answered her call. They were too busy playing hide- or from what it felt like- they may have strangled each other to death. I meant to apologize but Mausi’s eyes rolled up too soon. 

The evening breeze curled under the swell of each moist eye while we squealed perfunctorily. The little ones of the extended family did not make a sound, they sat oblivious, stiff like Stonehenge, praying five times a day, three days straight. Men weren’t allowed to see a woman’s last rites according to the tradition, at least where we were from. While Tibbi Mausi was being bathed before the ‘janazah’ carried her away, Samir stole me from the mourning and led me to the bed where his mother took her last breath. Its covers were withdrawn and so there was only a bright white mattress staring at me. A blink of an eye later it was me who was staring at the ceiling, and it looked like a mirror image of the bright white mattress which was now against my back. Samir had his pants lowered half-way to his thighs, and I had my salwar taken off completely. 

*

For the first time in fifteen years we decided to throw a party on our marriage anniversary. We sent out formal invitations and in that followed the latest trends, “NO GIFTS, PLEASE” we wrote in big bold letters. The next-door neighbours followed the instructions very well, but they also arrived two hours earlier than the rest. Their elder one, Jay, had been coughing since the day before,  and so on the eve of our anniversary, he simply lazed around the house looking for things to wipe his nose with. The younger one was rather fine, he’d had his meals through the day and did not cry more than his usual quota. Mr. Adenwala from 42 arrived fairly early by his standards as well, and so did the charming daughters of Joseph from 51, luckily they managed to slip in without getting eve-teased by Mr. Adenwala’s eyes. The tallest family around, Jicksons, and their even taller children, had to duck their way into the house; greeting ‘Namaste’ or ‘Adaab’ came very naturally to them with their heads already bowed. Cousins were the last to arrive, with their pet dog ‘Billi’, of course. They went nowhere without Billi. It was only later that we noticed the old widow from ‘01’ sitting in the corner, but no one bothered to wonder if she was invited. 

Samir was a popular host given that he had an open-door policy for Iftars, but his singing talents were far from popular, and to his credit, he did well to keep away from his pretend-mic and the Karaoke app on his phone. Samir’s drawing-room bar had two big bottles of Jack Daniels waiting for this very moment and my kitchen-cabinet had a bucket full of Sula Wine. I bought them in Mysore. Samir ceremoniously stood his two JD’s​      ​ on the table, where the men had their empty glasses raised for a traditional P​ ​.O​ ​.P​ ​- Party Opener Patiala (90ml, neat)​   ​. The kitchen went buzzing when I and Missus Pinto chugged one glass of wine each. Mrs. Jickson had not finished reading the back of the bottle yet, and Mrs. Yadav was still making her non-alcoholic mojito. All of it seemed part of a wide panoramic still, like I’d entered a sloppy frame of The Last Supper.​          ​ The gang of Highschool girls, Joseph’s and Jicksons, were allowed one glass of wine each (or a shot of vodka) and not-one-bit-more. The boys stole a few of their father’s cigarettes and excused themselves to the park, where they’d gone, as they said, “to play cricket”. Cyrus and Sharon from 38, in their young, newly-wed, love-filled minds thought it was an occasion worthy of heartwarming gifts (wrapped in a fancy red sheet and a yellow ribbon, it said ‘Happy Marriage Anniversary’ in Sharon’s own handwriting). A carefully chosen perfume for myself, and a home-knit sweater for Samir. A red sweater that reminded him of his grandmother, whose hand-made sweaters were always faded-maroonish in colour and second-handed to him by his sisters. Samir raised his glass to Sharon. A tear of pure gratitude formed like a pearl in his eye. I loved my new perfume. Perfect for my Delhi conference next month. This scent had a fresh citrusy vigour with a coconutty sweetness to it. It reflected the kind of person I always wanted to be, a perfect blend of soft-cover orange and hard-shell coconut.

                                                                                             *

The old widow from ‘01’ must’ve had eyes of an exorcist buttoned into her skull. So ghostly was our pain that only an an exorcist could see it. Samir’s pain was more skewed, more like a sharp end of a broken glass pressed against his eye. In the beginning at some point he must have felt emasculated, robbed of his manhood, even raped by God, but fifteen years later he looked into the mirror and saw a man who simply couldn’t spawn a child.

For me, being deprived of motherhood was like being tied to a pole in the middle of an airfield, under Kamikaze attack. Each day nothing less than a fresh brick flung from an aeroplane, bound to land in my barren womb, one after the other, until the end of life. The force of these bricks kept my chin on the ground. ‘Chin on the ground’ became a part of who I was. My dream personality, ‘soft-cover-hard-shell’, seemed at an incomprehensible distance.

Samir always needed more courage to be with or around children. He was convinced that all children, at all times, hated him. “Why would they hate you?” I asked. He hadn’t figured. We agreed that his conviction was unreasonable. Later, our shrink established it as a case of mild paedophobia. How mild? Only Samir could tell. But now it all made sense. 

That room where girls were occupied in acne-shaming themselves and the boys had just returned reeking of spearmints and deodorants, Samir entered with a big, “Hello Boys and Girls,” which wasn’t very characteristic of him. Samir had only recently quit cigarettes and so his nose picked up the damp stink of a Marlboro when one of the boys shook his hand. Samir almost asked him if he had an extra cigarette on him, but deflected the thought and decided to show the children our Butterfly Jar. Whenever guests come over, we show them the jar. It is our thing. It is an odd trend, but you go to people’s homes and they feel like showcasing their children, they ask them to sing or dance or recite a poem. I’m sure children hate it. At least we don’t kill little children with embarrassment, but deep down we’re not very different ourselves.

Indeed we feel a sense of pride when a butterfly in our jar flaps its wings. 

Samir’s love for butterflies followed his degree in botany. He had come up with the idea of a ‘butterfly-farming’ business for which he had even filled in a loan application. Meanwhile, Tibbi Mausi was losing a battle in the court, for the rights to her husband’s pension, against her stepwife. Samir had to drop the idea. He turned into a ground-level salesman for a horticulture corporation. His love for butterflies started to die the day he fixed his collar button and drew up a tie. By the time we were married, his love was long dead and buried. 

One of the children was quick to point out that in no way did it look like a jar, rather it looked like an aquarium with butterflies in it instead of fishes, and little plants instead of water. 

Samir then did what he loved doing most, pointing out to each butterfly and saying its name. People find themselves impressed with this because nobody expects a full-grown adult man to be so interested in butterflies as to remember their names. Samir and I, we decided on the names, but the process of naming someone who can’t spell out a preference is exhausting. I wonder if it is any different with a child. 

 There were seven butterflies in total, with about a dozen eggs, most of them still dormant, not yet ready to hatch.

“Can a butterfly swim?” Jay asked. 

“Well, they are not very fond of water,” Samir said, “but if you throw them in a pond, they’ll swim out.”

“And what if you throw them in a bowl of milk?” Jay asked with a red, slurping nose.

“Then it would depend,” Samir said, acting silly with Jay, “because if it has Horlicks in it, then they may come out taller, stronger, sharper, and nobody wants that.” I remember my father being silly with me and my sister to make us laugh. I would often wonder how a man who watched nothing but ‘cricket’ on TV and talked about nothing but politics with his friend, find in his heart a place for twin six year olds who could only dress and play a barbie. I asked him on his deathbed, and replied, “a part of our soul is always thirsty for a child’s laughter.” 

“And in a glass of coke?” Jay wouldn’t stop.

“Then they come out with bad teeth,” Samir basked in Jay’s giggles.

“And in a cup of ice-cream?”

“Then they come out fat,” Samir could do this all night.

*

I always cooked Biriyani out of Ammi’s ​   ​old recipe book. A little red diary she gave me on my twenty-first birthday. Jotted down were the recipes of my favorite dishes, step by step, a little note on the side read ‘generous dollops of ghee every​ now and then​.’ Biryani smelled good, a lot like Ammi’s​    ​. The younger lot liked it too, chilli would do some good to Jay’s cough. The old widow enjoyed the softness of rice between her gums and the occasional peppercorns she’d have to pick out of her mouth. She looked at me and gave a little nod. It was a nod lighter than air, but more telling than a crescendo on a kettledrum. It came to my mind that an appropriate reply would be a reciprocal nod, but instead, I only stared at her nose-ring, completely bewildered. Mr. Jickson suddenly stood up, praised the lord and blessed our marriage union. We all chuckled with our mouths full of Biryani. Poor Mr. Jickson might have really meant it on some other day, but today it was just the whiskey talking.             

*

Everyone had gone home except the old widow. It wasn’t in our interest to send her away if she felt like sitting and rolling beads under her thumb. The less furnitured corners of the house echoed with names of male-gods, especially those known for granting fertility. They also reached out to me in the kitchen, and then got washed away with the dishes. 

Samir had changed into a loose white t-shirt and pyjama when he came to the kitchen to fill his bottle of water. The thick bruises of disappointment were still visible on his face. It was the sort of disappointment that, without fail, came to him after get-togethers like these, where he would meet people who could point their fingers to a body and say that they’ve given LIFE. Be it his mother’s mourning or his marriage anniversary, they had all reduced to the same kind of rabble to him. They only reminded him of soul-damaging-facts.

His eyes froze, shoulders dropped, and the bottle of water became too heavy for him to hold. He placed the bottle under the purifier and let the water run out its mouth till it flooded the kitchen floor. In medical terms they call it ‘Satyriasis’. Doctors had an easier way to explain it : hypersexuality in men caused by depression​     ​. He placed his right hand on my shoulder, and his left behind me. Some other day I would have stopped him, the old widow was still sitting outside, counting beads. 

He took me to the corner and sat me down by the water purifier. He went through his motions on my chest while I saw him quietly. I noticed that the colour of his eyes had become a little more transparent since his last birthday, as if another layer of brown had been sucked out of his pupils. His nose had grown bigger it seemed, or maybe it was the rest of his face that had shrunk. There were definitely more rough edges that I could count around his face now. Also his hair felt different, it was something about the way they behaved. He slid down his pyjamas and I helped him lose the knot that held my salwar​     ​. He looked into me and kissed me on the corner of my lip, then pressed my ear against his heart. He stepped closer and now there was no room between us. We were aligned, like a pair of lips ready to call out ‘ma’. I could only hear his heartbeat until the door swung shut. The old widow was gone. I looked up at Samir and saw warm tears trickle down from his eyes into mine. Perhaps, the butterfly never left the butterfly-jar.