The problem was that the movie outing hadn’t solved my loneliness. I’d watched Romancing the Stone alone, picking at my popcorn. By the time Kesiree and Waafiq emerged fifteen minutes after I did, my sister-in-law’s heart-shaped face was alight, her dark eyes glistening and her hand still firmly clamped in his.
It had been ages since Raj held my hand that way.
And hanging out with Kesiree wasn’t the same as seeing Annie. Though I did catch up with her now and then, she was slipping away from me. She spent her time partying in Observatory, going to the odd lecture and sunning herself on Llandudno Beach. I’m not saying she wasn’t supportive. She’d even secured me a cot from a neighbour she used to babysit for; it was wedged firmly between our bed and the cupboard. But things weren’t the same. Our lives were taking different paths, and though I swore to myself I wouldn’t regret it – regret my husband and my baby – I wondered sometimes what would have happened if things had been different.
If I hadn’t been sitting here in this foreign place, spooning dhal over my rice to neutralise the spices.
I gulped down water and thought longingly about the strawberry yoghurt in our little fridge.
“So, how was today?” I asked Rajit.
“Lectures,” he said dismissively. “Ma,” he said looking at Asmita, “can you teach Thea how to cook?”
I just about spat out my dhal as Asmita beamed at me.
“I can cook,” I said.
“Not our way,” Rajit replied.
“Amoy Ayaa taught me. It could be fun to cook together,” Asmita said, looking at her mother hunched on the other side of the table. Rajit’s grandmother wafted in and out of reality so I wasn’t sure if she’d even heard she’d been mentioned.
I looked at Asmita hugging Raj, who crumpled into her like a custom-made glove.
“Could you?” Rajit said in a little-boy voice I suspected would someday be used on me. “I can’t eat anything she makes.”
I felt the heat racing up my cheeks.
“You need to give Thea a chance,” his father said. Just when I was giving him a grateful smile, Kandasamy continued: “She’s young. She can’t help it if she doesn’t yet know how to be a proper wife.” Kandasamy dipped his hand in his dinner, the food disappearing between his greased-up lips.
“And you’re getting thin, Rajit.” Amoy Ayaa looked up from her meal. “Eat. Eat.”
It was like everyone ganging up against you on the playground; even Kesiree, my new best friend, whose secrets I was guarding so closely, didn’t defend me. Mentioning Waafiq would have changed the conversation, and I was sorely tempted.
“You need to start by buying some proper ingredients,” Asmita told me.
Proper ingredients, as she termed it, required money, which we rather lacked.
“I’ll get a job then, shall I?” I said.
“Every wife needs to add value,” Kandasamy said. “That’s the first lesson.”
“No one’s going to hire you with that belly,” Asmita commented. “And no qualifications. We’ll shop together.”
“And then cook together,” said Raj.
“Great.” My voice said otherwise.
“Eat, Raju, eat,” said Amoy Ayaa. “You’re wasting away. Asmita, why aren’t you cooking for your son?”
I leant forward to say something, but Rajit shook his head. Nevertheless the movement must have caught Amoy Ayaa’s attention.
“Now who are you, dear? I don’t think we’ve met,” she said to me. “Asmita, you should have mentioned that we have a visitor. And look, Asmita, our guest is having a baby!”
And that’s actually how I felt, like a guest. Just then I was missing the aromas of basil and garlic wafting from Mother’s kitchen. Nothing about living in this house, with this family, was familiar to me. Here the overwhelming scents were of coriander, garam masala, onions and frying fat. My mother’s home had an understated elegance, everything placed exactly so; Asmita’s home was all overstuffed pillows, loud fabrics and religious statues and images everywhere, the meanings of which I hadn’t yet untangled. And no privacy. At Asmita’s, neighbours were constantly arriving – and then leaving with food parcels of sugar beans curry and basmati rice.
“I don’t understand it,” I said to Rajit. “Surely just feeding us is enough?”
“It’s our way,” Raj said. “We’ll go down the road for a meal if you like. Selvie Ayaa makes a delicious potato curry and roti.”
Great. More strangers. More curry.
I’d liked the feeling at first; it was a bit like living in another country. But after a few weeks I wanted someone to speak my language.
Back in our little room outside, Raj transformed into the man I thought I’d married. We played gin rummy, lay on the bed and read to each other, and Raj gave me foot rubs as my feet started swelling. We debated names for our child, though it wasn’t much of a debate since Raj had already decided.
And I liked the name Sanusha for a girl. It sounded like music. Boys’ names would follow Rajit’s family tradition. If it was a boy, our son would be named for his grandfather – not my dad, Stuart, but Rajit’s dad, Kandasamy.
I didn’t mind. I loved Rajit and what he wanted mattered to me more than what I wanted. I guess I wasn’t much of a feminist, and my ambitions were limited. I wanted a happy home, a new foundation for my dreams.
But as the pregnancy advanced, and I began to nest, Rajit grew restless. He was on a fully paid sponsorship but he earned extra cash tutoring statistics. I didn’t resent those after-hour activities, but I began to suspect he wasn’t always telling me the truth.
“But why do you have to tutor so late?” I would ask.
“That’s the time she asked for,” Rajit would answer. “Don’t you want me to go? How are we going to pay for the car seat?”
When he rocked up near midnight, he was usually in a good mood. A bit too good.
“You’ve been drinking,” I said.
“One glass of wine, Thea. Do you want me to look like a wuss?”
But it wasn’t just the wine. It was the way, when he took me to Pick ’n Pay, he’d have one arm around me and his eyes on any beautiful woman that passed him. He didn’t try to hide it either.
“So what?” he said. “Looking is free.”
“I’m pregnant, Raj. I’m not feeling my best.”
“Well, Thea, you’re not exactly looking your best either. It’s a phase. Get over it.”
I tried to look better. I spent hours blow drying my hair and touching up my face with make-up I bought on special at Clicks. I exercised religiously and ate very little, especially in front Rajit.
“You’re ballooning,” he said watching me climb out of the shower.
Fighting back tears, I wrapped myself in a towel and tried not to hate the little being who was taking over my body.
I tried to find pretty Punjabis to wear – I always thought Indian women looked so elegant pregnant. Asmita came with me, even nodding at my colour choice.
“Turquoise looks good on you,” she said.
But I never felt that I ever looked good enough, even when Annie bounced in for a quick visit while Raj was out.
“T, you look gorgeous. You can’t even tell