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Rita put her cup down and reluctantly took up her bag. “I must be going now. Tarun and Somu will be coming home. they had gone to their friend’s house. You know the Batra’s? They have gone for a party there. You should really see that house, the lavish furnishings, the beautifully kept lawn.” Dreamily, she went off at a tangent again. “Such lovely furniture, such delicate curtains. Enough to open your eyes. The virtual dreamland...”
She became newly animated, as if she remembered her miserable life with Subroto. “I have been after Subroto’s life to get me new curtains; ours are so shabby. It’s a shame. Specially the ones over the settee... For the entire year I have been after him, but who is there to listen to me?”
The complaining note had crept back into her voice. “It is me who has to see the shabbiness all the time. Family folks keep dropping in now and then. What respect do you think they will have for us? It all comes down for the housewife in the end. And who is to be blamed for it? Subroto. He would notice the shabbiness if he stayed at home more often. Last time my friends came over they said why don’t I change the curtains. I nearly died of shame. Well, I am certainly not going to spend money left over from housekeeping on curtains. Why should I? That is the only money I can call my own, and I work for it. How do you think I got the new sari for pooja? Subroto didn’t buy it for me!”
“Well, Subroto has got you a new cooler this month,” I said.
Rita became coquettish. “Why do you defend Subroto so often?” she asked. “What is there between you and him?”
I shut up once again, somewhat shocked. Rita winked at me and slapped my shoulder to show me that it was meant as a joke.
But she mellowed down after that. Some tender spot for poor Subroto had apparently been touched. “I don’t say that he doesn’t care for me at all. In fact, he is very particular about taking me to the doctor for those gynec problems of mine. We have to go every fortnight. Can you believe it, that darned doctor charges hundred and fifty every time! But Subroto insists that I go to the best doctor.” She sounded happy and confident all over.
I puzzled over these subtle changes in her moods. Hysterical, I diagnosed. Or manic depressive. I tried to be objective.
“Why the other day he was going out to play cards on some flimsy excuse as usual, and I was telling him not to,” Rita continued, “Well he was insisting and I too was adamant. Finally I said to him meri kasam jo tum aaj gaye, and he didn’t go after that.” She looked blissful at this reminiscence and started studying her fingernails.
Women! I thought to myself despairingly, throwing objectivity to the winds.
Suddenly Rita seemed to remember her original theme. She became decisive and angry. “I have decided that I won’t let things go on as they are. Subroto will have to mend his ways, even if only for the children’s sake. I’ll talk to him...”
“But try to avoid making a scene, please,” I broke on.
“I don’t make scene, he does,” she snapped.
“Anyway, he will have to stay at home more often,” she continued. “And he must take me out more regularly. I’ll crack up if it goes on like this. You won’t believe it, but I feel like killing him at times. I’m not a servant, just to cook and wash for him and his kids, and sleep with him whenever he wants it.”
I could almost feel the rebelliousness mounting in her. Her voice became bitter, resigned and tense. I felt myself suffering with her.
“Even now he must be with the Singh’s or the Moorti’s, playing cards,” she said angrily but more or less resignedly.
I protested feebly that he could very well be in the office, earning his daily bread by the honest sweat of his brow. She retorted that I need not defend him, she knew him too well. “And no one can say when he is going to return home. nine or ten in the evening, if not later. I should walk out on him. I can’t bear this any more."
