‘Bitch!’ That word infuriated Niharika so much that she made me end all correspondence with Suzanne forever, then and there.
I was very sad. Then I thought, so be it, it’s all right, I am with Niharika. My melancholy evaporated quickly.
Niharika was an intelligent girl. Being an actor herself meant that she knew and understood my struggle for work. Sure, my life was better but I was still running around from office to office, showing my face, talking, asking for roles, giving auditions. I spent all day hopping around like this. She would call me in frequent spurts throughout the day demanding to know of my whereabouts. She insisted that I tell her all the spots I would be at on that particular day. I was very touched with how much she cared for me. Soon enough though, the romance of the concern faded. The regularity of the questions felt like being nagged non-stop, and I began to get rather annoyed. She, on the other hand, did not have to run all over the place like me. She was being serenaded by several offers; she had the luxury of choice. I did not. So I expected compassion, I expected empathy.
There was another piece to this puzzle. Like all girls, Niharika obviously expected some of the sweet conversations that lovers have, to take place between us. But I was quite a selfish bastard. I had a plain aim: go to her house, make out and leave. I could not talk lovey-dovey too much. It finally struck her that I was a rascal who cared only for himself. (Actually, all the girls I have ever been with have had this same complaint about me. I would only come to them for my own needs. Otherwise, I might not even take their calls.)
When I went to her place next, she was wearing a silk robe. I ran my hand over its coolness around her waist, grabbing her but she pushed me away. ‘No, Nawaz!’ she said. ‘I won’t meet you again. This is enough.’ I pleaded, I cried, I apologized. I said I wouldn’t repeat my mistakes again. I would be more thoughtful, a better lover. But she remained adamant. She had had enough. She had been hurt too many times. So that was that, we broke up cutting off all contact.
Two months later, another girl came into my life in a most mysterious way. I did not know then that years later, I would marry her.
15Shamas, My Guardian Angel
When my youngest brother was born, my parents were stupefied. He was the spitting image of Shamsuddin. It was as if their first child, whom they had known only as a newborn, had suddenly decided to visit them again. Once they got over the many feelings that paranormal miracles bring, they decided to honour our ghost brother and give this boy a name to match the physical resemblance between the two. The closest name they could find to Shams(uddin) was Shamas. And so, that’s what they called him. As he grew up a bit, Ammi often held him on her hip and pointed to a photo of our dead oldest brother to show him whose carbon copy he was.
When it came to Shamas, I obeyed all of the unsaid rules about older brothers torturing their youngest siblings. He was a very cute and chubby little kid. So chubby that you could not see his neck. Ammi lovingly called him Koyetee Gardan, meaning the Small-necked One. I used to also call him that, but in ridicule. (To make things even though, Shamas and the rest, including Ammi herself, used to call me Boodgoom because I used to eat up words in the middle of speaking, well until NSD finally cured me of it.) One of my favourite things was to turn him into a ‘pillow’ and sit on him, no matter how hard he resisted. Then, I’d rag him. If Ammi had sent Shamas on errands like getting mithai, etc. from the market, he was bound to encounter me. I was perpetually hanging out with my friends at various corners, like, by the barber’s shop, which was on the way home. I’d accost him, inspect the wares, rag him, eat up two or three pieces of the mithai or other goodies and only once I was done would I let him go. It was up to him to give whatever explanation he could, to Ammi for the missing pieces.
To Shamas and my younger siblings, I was everything that Ammi was to me. This included complete freedom, of course—like, to choose whatever streams they wanted to study later on in life (arts, commerce, science), whatever paths they wanted to follow, etc., which was extremely rare in those days—when it was common for parents and elders to pressurize their children and impose their ways on them. But most importantly, it included military-like discipline and a massive emphasis on education—inevitable beatings would follow if these were not abided by. Once, Shamas had just returned home after taking his seventh-standard exams. Without allowing him to relax, I snatched the question paper from his hand and instantly examined him, asking what answers he had given to each question. During his tenth-standard exams, I was away studying in Haridwar. He had no idea that I had come home for holidays. So again, he walked in and was shocked to find me there. He knew the ordeal that would follow. I too was astounded to
