To POV or not to POV.

I had heard the rumours, but when I saw Saaramma arrive that Sunday morning, I knew there was some truth to it.

‘Saaramma, what happened to you? You are bruised all over?’ I asked in the most nonchalant tone I could.

‘It’s nothing, Sir. Just a tumble down the stairs when I was cleaning out the attic at Theresa’s house. You know that old house down Vincent Street?’ Saaramma hurriedly said, moving past me into the front yard and entering my parent’s house.

The setup is too obvious to submit to my short story fiction workshop.

I see Saaramma disappear into the kitchen and hear the usual muffled banter between my Amma and Saaramma come in waves. I knew that women had oceans of stories flowing between them.

Derivative of dialogue in a sixties Ghatak film but might be obscure enough to skirt past an American audience.

Later that afternoon, Saaramma asked me to put my feet as I relaxed on the couch, watching a film I had watched countless times before.

‘Saaramma, has your eldest finished his graduation?’ I ask as she mops the floors. No amount of demonstration and explanation had convinced Saaramma to use the hand-held mop with the squeezer handle. She still insisted on getting down on all fours and mopping with a rectangular washcloth dipped in industrial-strength phenyl.

‘He finished last month. He is working at Lazza Ice Cream parlour across the street from Madonna Church.’

‘Ok, that is good. Some additional income for the family.’

‘Let us hope, Sir. Right now, it is only a temporary position. They will tell him if he will be made permanent after three months.’

‘If you don’t mind me asking, what exactly does he do there? And how much does he make?’

Saaramma was distinctly uncomfortable with my questions today. She rose up off the floor with a low sigh and wiped the sweat off her face with the end of her work sari.

‘Twelve hundred rupees a month, for now, Sir. If he becomes permanent, he will get paid three thousand.’

I had haggled with Amma for almost a year before she agreed to pay Saaramma eight hundred rupees every Sunday that she came and cleaned our house.

‘You keep this up, and soon, the neighbours will complain that I am responsible for the pay raise for domestic help around here. What do you care anyway, sitting across the world in America? I have to deal with all these issues once you are gone,’ Amma had argued then.

Does this section feel aware enough of class and gender positionality? Or is it too aware and gimmicky? Does it subvert the stereotype of the global south? But can’t let it become too pedantic either!

After Saaramma leaves that evening and before I need to go out and get plastered, I casually pour out her tea and ask Amma, ‘Is Saaramma ok? She looks like she is getting physically abused at home.’  

Beaten Up?

Amma, who usually is quite open about discussing any and everything about neighbours, housemaids, postmen and women, electricians, plumbers, coconut tree climbers, snake catchers, trash collectors, fish mongers, fruit sellers, village officers, rickshaw drivers, medical store workers, ambulance suppliers, gold smugglers, and drug dealers, suddenly becomes tight-lipped.

‘It’s none of your business, even if she is.’

I look at her pointedly and say, ‘So that means it is true.’

‘She is just waiting for her eldest to get a permanent job. She couldn’t leave him even if she wanted; he’s a police constable.’

‘That’s crazy. She should call the women’s helpline and get her husband arrested.’

Amma puts down her teacup with enough of a thump for me to look up at her.

‘Why do you want to stir up trouble? Everyone in the police station knows he’s a drunk and a wife-beater. Everyone in the neighbourhood knows! No one wants to rub him the wrong way.’

I start muttering, ‘There’s the anonymous police tip line…no one will ever know…’

‘Mind your own bloody business! Do you know who the police are most chummy with? Criminals. And who else? Their own. Paul could very easily find out where the tip came in from. And would you rather see a bruised Saaramma or no Saaramma at all? I have given her enough money to get looked at by our family doctor. Hopefully, one of these years, Paul will die in his line of work or be incapacitated with cirrhosis. That and her children bringing in an income soon is the best case for Saaramma.’

Has the Amma character been developed enough for readers to trust her or be invested in long monologues?

My phone starts vibrating with a text notification – it’s my alcoholic cousin.

Aishwarya Bar – Rooftop. In thirty. Can’t stay beyond 8 PM.

It’s six o’clock, so I decide to get a head start on him.

After promising Amma that I won’t have more than a couple of drinks, given my rehab and detox last year, I walk out and hail the first rickshaw and ask him to drive me to the liquor shop. I buy a quart of vodka and tell the rickshaw driver to park in the vacant plot near Aishwarya.

I ask him politely if he wants a swig or two, and he looks at me confused.

‘No mixer?’

‘Ha! This is expensive vodka; you can have it dry. See?’

I down a full ninety ml of vodka in three sips, step out of the rickshaw and light a cigarette.

The rickshaw driver fidgets and asks me how long I would take and that he had to wind down for the day.

‘Just let me finish this smoke. After that, you can drop me off at Aishwarya.’

Within the next seven minutes, I finish my smoke and the remainder of the vodka after politely offering the rickshaw driver some again. I am not buzzed yet, but I know I will be by the time I am surrounded by the glow of tens of backlit liquor bottles at the bar.

Is there enough to suggest the character is an alcoholic? Does the detox and rehab reference do enough heavy lifting?

My cousin turns up at the time he mentions in the text. Between his busy medical practice, a newborn, dodging a suspicious wife and parents, he knows exactly how much time he has for his addiction.

The moment our eyes meet as he enters the rooftop space, we both know it is going to be pointless to try to pace ourselves or pretend that we will order one drink at a time. He was getting drunk in his car in the parking lot while I was downing vodka in the rickshaw, so we both were beyond the event horizon of our drinking for the night.

Halfway through the bottle between us -

‘I want to get as high as I can, as quickly as I can,’ he smiles across from me.

‘Same’, I reply.

We talk a bit about his practice and my return dates to the US for a while. Then, to the main subject, always the same subject.

‘Something in our genes, brother. You, me, and the others in our family named after our grandfather. All addicts.’

We both know the rules of our binges – we will rue our relationship with alcohol, family, society, money. He will make a huge fuss about paying the bill because I am visiting. There will be much emotional protesting from me about him being my only true friend in the entire state, and then it will be shreds of black till the next time I meet him.

A short, squat man approaches the table and my cousin’s eyes light up.

‘Brother! Long time, where you been? Come come, we need your help in polishing off this bottle. I have to leave soon anyway.’

The man in his sweat-drenched shirt sits beside my cousin and across from me.

‘He’s my cousin – the one who lives in the US.’

The man holds out a limp hand.

‘Oh, the ones whose parents live on the large plot next to the Shiva temple?’

My drinking superpower is that I can spot other drunks when they slur their words. As I react confusedly to his question, I see the light bulb go off in my cousin’s head.

‘Oh! That’s right! Brother, his wife works at your house. Saarammachechi. This jolly man of the law is her husband, Paul.’

What the fuck now?