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‘Who cares about caste these days? What you really want is to sell me in the market,’ she sobbed with indignant emotion. ‘Sell me and be done with it. What are you waiting for?’

Her mother slapped her, although the girl was too old for this to be of any use.

Night and day, day and night the issue of Nisha’s marriage was canvassed. Why did she do it, couldn’t she see what a prize catch she was? So pretty, and from a family rising in the world. Nisha, dear daughter, leave all thoughts of this dirty low-caste man, what can he give you compared to what we can arrange for you? Marriage into a family that will enable you and your children to live comfortably for the rest of your life. We have rejected many proposals in our search for you, the least of them better than this nobody of a man.

How could she listen to them? She had allowed Suresh to touch her in the belief they would get married. As they lay in the room in Vijay Nagar their hearts had been pure and filled with love; without the idea of marriage to Suresh she felt tainted. Anybody could accuse her of immoral behaviour.

But her family was ignorant of the issue they really had to address. They went on, he is not of our caste, our status, his family is poor, how can you stoop to his level? Look what happened to Vicky’s mother, and your choice is worse than hers. At least that had Baba’s blessings.

She became the injured party. Either I marry him or nobody.

‘What will convince you?’ they asked the stubborn wall of her back. ‘Don’t you realise how foolish you are being? You are throwing away your life.’

Silence met them. Silence spoke. Nothing will convince, do what you like.

All day she remained in the house, a prisoner of her deed, a prisoner of their words. She was distrusted too much to be allowed to put a foot outside. A padlock was put on the phone, only incoming calls could be received without the key.

She noticed and said nothing. She did not care what happened to her. She ate less, she spoke less, what was there to say? Have pity, said Rupa to Nisha’s mother, have pity, can’t you see the girl is wasting away? But the scenario was too polarised for pity to play a part.

Her exams were coming and her books flapped listlessly in her hand, the mere appearance of activity. What was the use of doing well, it made no difference in the long run, and the short run only lasted a day or two. Studies were an unimportant speck on a distant horizon; she didn’t care if she lived or died. Besides, he was not there to help her with tutorials bought from the pavements of Daryaganj.

Contrary to her belief it was hard for the family to see her suffer like this. After a few covert visits to Suresh’s family it was decided that if she wants to meet him, she should meet him, then she will come to her senses. Some people learn the hard way.

The meeting was arranged at four o’clock in Moti Mahal. For the first time in weeks Nisha stepped outside her house, accompanied by Raju and Prem Nath. It was the beginning of March: small opening leaves of tender pale green dotted the branches of trees around the park. She looked at them and felt hopeless, the freshness of a new beginning would never come her way. Though dressed in a starched, light-blue chikan kurta with embroidered blue and white flowers, the presence of her gaolers made her feel soiled and dirty.

‘How many people coming from his side?’ she asked bitterly.

‘We have told him he can bring whomever he likes, we have no objections,’ said her uncle, not looking at her. She had disappointed him as well. He had taught her to achieve and she had used her opportunities to run around with some boy.

‘Uncle,
you
don’t think I am wrong, do you? If the boy is good what harm is there?’

‘You know you can’t go behind everybody’s back in something like this,’ said the educationist, in turn disappointing his niece. ‘His family should have met your family.’

‘Uncle, this is the modern age.’

The uncle looked in sorrow at his niece.

‘What harm is there if first we got to know each other? How can I tell him to send his family to talk to my family if I don’t know him first?’

Where had the girl learned to argue, wondered Prem Nath.

‘I’ll tell Mummy you are talking like this,’ said Raju viciously.

‘Run back and tell her
right now
,’ snapped Nisha. ‘You think I care?’

‘If we do not know what Nisha is thinking, how will we help her?’ reproved the uncle, feeling the family’s intransigence.

Raju scowled tyrannically, torn between contempt for his uncle and annoyance with his sister. The uncle was too soft, no wonder Nisha had turned out the way she had.

‘If you have already made up your mind about Suresh, what is the point of going to meet him?’ demanded Nisha suddenly. By now they had turned on to the main road.

‘It is you who wanted to meet him, Madam, not us,’ pointed out Raju.

‘Let us see what the boy has to say. He has not been entirely open,’ equivocated Prem Nath, who knew nothing of the visits to Suresh’s family. ‘Calling himself Kumar, so that nobody knows where he is from.’

Nisha was silent. What was the use in addressing prejudiced minds?

They hailed a scooter, haggled with the driver, persuaded him to take three passengers instead of the customary two, and roared off, the noise making further conversation impossible, to the relief of all concerned.

At Moti Mahal they were a little early. As they waited at a table for four next to the window, the waiter bustled by, plonking glasses of water before them. They ordered tea, samosas, and paneer pakoras, while Nisha began to feel sick. Why was Suresh late when it was their first opportunity to see each other after so long?

Finally there he was. He stood alone, looking blankly around the restaurant, blinded by the darkness after the glare outside. He looked more like a hero than ever: true, a little on the dark side, but tall, thin, romantic, his hair curling around the nape of his neck, his nose straight, his mouth pink and full.

Nisha stood up to attract his attention. Raju pulled her down. ‘If he can’t see you in an empty restaurant, he is blind,’ he hissed.

Suresh waved and started towards them. He seemed ill at ease. He nodded at Raju and the uncle before glancing furtively at the girl.

She smiled at him. ‘They only agreed to let me meet you in their company, Suresh. But I am glad everything is going to be made clear.’

The child has grown up, thought the uncle with a pang. He looked at Suresh, trying to see him through the girl’s eyes. He had flashy good looks, but his kind of appeal would not last long. His poor niece was gazing at Suresh earnestly, feeding her starving eyes; it was clear they had been meeting more than Nisha let on. He suppressed a spasm of disgust at the implications of this.

Abruptly Suresh started, ‘We cannot get married, if your family does not approve. I will be standing in the way of your happiness.’

‘You are my happiness.’

‘Your family doesn’t think so. I cannot come between you and them.’

‘What has happened, Suresh? Have they said anything to you?’

‘Your friend has a great deal of sense, Nisha, more than you,’ interrupted Raju, overflowing with heartiness. ‘He knows you can never be happy.’

Nisha’s misery by now was so great she could barely swallow. This meeting was not taking place the way she had imagined. In a dry voice she asked, ‘Suresh, I haven’t changed my mind, but if you have, tell me.’

The look he gave her was such a little one she barely caught it.

‘After her BA, her parents are thinking of getting her married,’ put in Prem Nath.

This was the time, thought Nisha, for her lover to declare his undying love. To defy prejudice and authority. To declare theirs a simple happiness that harmed no one. And when his words fell on deaf ears, they would make plans to run away. She gazed into her cup of tea and waited.

Suresh looked up, his eyes swishing like brooms around the room.

‘That is good,’ he said, swish, swish.

‘So you understand, beta,’ continued the uncle, half his attention on the belch he was about to produce, ‘there must be no misunderstanding about any connection with you. She has got some mistaken notions we wish to clear up. That way everybody will know where they stand.’

There was a silence. No words were said, though many were uttered in Nisha’s head as neighbouring jaws worked around samosas and paneer pakoras.

Nisha pushed her plate away with a little clatter and stared out of the window, her head turned so no one could see her tears. She wanted to run out of the restaurant, never see Suresh again, never see that lean face with its stubble, never touch the hair soft and curling against the neck, or see the white teeth framed by full lips.

Suresh cleared his throat. ‘I will do whatever is best for everyone. I can have nothing to do with Nisha against her family’s wishes, no matter what my personal inclinations may be.’

Raju stared at him. Suresh elaborated: ‘My family feels the same.’

Nisha got up. She walked through the dining room, into the evening sun. She could hardly see where she was going. This had been a farce put up for her benefit; she was a fool not to have seen it earlier. What force, money, and threats had they used to make him behave the way he was now behaving? She would never know.

But it didn’t matter. They could not have done so much if Suresh had not been willing.

Her brother was following her as she walked along the pavements, looking for a rickshaw to take her home. Her uncle, she supposed, had remained behind to complete the business with Suresh. If only her brother weren’t there, she could fall and slip under the wheels of one of the many buses on Netaji Subhash Marg. Such accidents were common. Her death would be common too.

March passed, and the lead inside Nisha’s heart grew heavier. They tried painting other futures in vivid colours, but she was impervious to their appeal. Her family could be as snobbish as they liked about Suresh, his caste, his class, his status; they could monitor every step she took, but in the end they could not compel her to marry. That knowledge was her only ally in the forces arrayed against her.

Once or twice she tried conveying her point of view. Their only real objection was that he was poor, and of another caste. If they did not approve, why couldn’t they just let her go, her life was her own. Suresh and she were educated, they could both work. But anything she said was countered with her youth, her ignorance, her betrayal of them. These were not circumstances in which dialogue had a place.

Nisha blackmailed Rupa Masi into arranging a clandestine meeting with Suresh. At a restaurant in Karol Bagh, the aunt sat by herself at another table, pretending to read a magazine while peering at the couple. Having money was a curse, look what it did to your children. Nisha so unhappy, Suresh looking beautiful and romantic (no wonder Nisha hadn’t examined the Kumar in his name, incredible though it seemed). Now he was arguing with the girl, Nisha arguing back. If her sister’s family found out, they would never talk to her. She hoped her pickle business wouldn’t suffer. But she was like a mother to the child, what could she do in the face of her determined misery?

Later. ‘Well?’ asked the aunt, partner in crime.

‘I will kill myself if I can’t marry him,’ said Nisha dully.

‘How are you going to marry him, has he offered any suggestions?’ asked the aunt, a little tired of Nisha’s saying she was going to kill herself over and over again. These dramatic dialogues were only effective in films; this was life.

‘He is afraid of my family.’

‘Sensible boy,’ remarked Rupa approvingly.

‘He thinks they will harm him and his parents in some way. What can they do? We don’t live in some backward village where our family will massacre his family just because a boy and girl dare to love.’

Rupa knew that even in the city there were many ways to intimidate, but she wondered how far Yashpal would go down this road. She took a breath and tried explaining the facts of life to her niece again. ‘That man would have been a lifelong burden. Had he been suitable, I am sure your father would have considered him.’

‘Why is he not suitable? Give me one reason.’

The aunt’s eyes opened wide. As far as she was aware, Nisha had been given reason after reason. ‘You saw what happened to Vicky’s mother.’

‘Exactly. An arranged marriage.’

‘So mistakes can be made. That doesn’t mean they have to be repeated. And beti, this is worse, much worse.’

‘It’s not much worse,’ shrieked the girl, beating against an intangible difference which there was no bridging over. ‘Do we live in a village? If we do, why don’t you just throw me down a well and be done with it?’

‘Beti,’ reproved the shocked aunt, ‘is this any way to talk? Don’t you see, if he really cared he should have asked his father to talk to yours. That is what your father did when he fell in love with your mother. He took no advantage.’

‘How would I know everybody here would be so narrowminded as to object to an innocent friendship?’

‘But it led to more than friendship, didn’t it?’

‘I can’t help that.’

‘Your parents want what is best for you, beti.’

Nisha looked contemptuous. ‘They know better than I do?’

‘They know the world. They are not blinded by love.’

‘They can’t force me to marry someone I don’t want to.’

From this Rupa gathered that Suresh was weak. It was Nisha’s will that was pushing the whole thing.

XVIII

Nisha and Suresh

The third-year exams started in the second week of April. Nisha had never in her life been so unprepared. No sooner did she open a book than Suresh’s face came before her eyes. What was she to do with that face? Her family was doing its best to erode its charm.

Had Suresh tried to trick her? Use her? And she had let him, not protesting too much, allowing her shy flesh to occasionally respond to his. The room in Vijay Nagar was embedded in her mind as her grown-up secret, now veering towards grown-up sin. Were her parents to know, they would scour the city for a well to throw her into.

What had been buried all these years in the recesses of her mind now came back to haunt her. Vicky rubbing against her, Vicky with his hand under her panties, asking her to touch it, grabbing her hand and sticking his thing into it, jerking her hand up and down, Vicky pressing himself into her while she was trying to do her homework. Suresh moaning beside her, at the height of their passion, holding her hand over him, while she, uncertainly trying to please, gripped it tentatively through his underwear as he climaxed.