Page 7 of Six Days in Bombay

I hadn’t shared these thoughts with my mother, not wanting to make her feel as forlorn about our future as I did. Instinctively, I knew that were I to go, she would be left behind. I was all she had; my desertion would devastate her. Abandoned by her husband, her baby boyandher daughter? I couldn’t bear to do that to her.

When she placed the tea and my dinner in front of me, she tucked a stray hair behind my ear, her touch warm against my cool skin. She sat on the other side of the table and picked up her sewing. “Tell me about your day.”

She loved hearing stories about my patients. Private hospitalslike mine catered to those who had lived in exotic places and came from worlds my mother had never seen. Her clients were local women whose husbands worked as insurance salesmen or clerks in a local bank.

I told her about Mira Novak. She hadn’t known about the painter, so I described the paintings I’d seen in theBombay Chronicle. She asked me what Mira looked like, what she and I talked about.

“She asked for my first name, Mum. No one ever does that. Not patients anyway. Even Matron calls me Nurse Falstaff. And she’s known me for two years!”

Mum’s eyes followed the journey of my spoon to my mouth, as if she were making sure I was really swallowing. I chewed the eggplant curry, which was spiced to my taste; my mother preferred hotter chilies.

“And Dr. Stoddard. How is he? Did you win tonight’s game?”

I shook my head and ate another spoonful of cardamom rice. “His new project is to get the 999 emergency number for India. How he would have made it to the telephone with a broken leg is another question.”

My mother’s laugh was pure happiness. She found him amusing. For some reason, I didn’t tell her that Dr. Mishra had finished the backgammon game for me. Or that he had called me by name too. Some things I kept to myself, lovely secrets that were just mine, at least for a little while.

My account of Mrs. Mehta was next, followed by Mr. Hassan with the appendix and a sixteen-year-old boy with tonsils. She seemed satisfied with my school report, as she referred to it.

She took my empty plate to the sink. She would wash the dishes in the morning so as not to disturb our neighbors at night with our flat’s noisy pipes. She came back with a red chili from the plant Indira had given me. I watched her take a bite, imagining the searing heat in my gullet. It made my nose itch.

“Sona, there’s something I need to talk to you about.”

I felt a snag in my chest, like a sweater caught on a nail.

She finished the chili and used a wet cloth to wipe the table clean. “Mohan’s father came to see me today.”

“Mohan?”

She stopped scrubbing, frowned at me. “You know, the young man who works at your hospital?” She went to hang the towel from the lip of the sink.

“In the equipment room. That Mohan?”

Now she sat down across the table from me, behind her sewing machine, her most prized possession. She picked up the unfinished sleeve and slid it between the presser foot and the throat plate, lowering the back lever to keep the fabric in place. “Yes, Sona, that Mohan. Don’t act so surprised. You told me the boy has been mooning at you.” She pulled the hand wheel toward her to start sewing two seams together. “His father came to ask for your hand in marriage.”

The room spun. So when Mohan asked me to go to the pictures with him, he already thought—or hoped—I was going to be a part of his family. He’d never worked up the courage to ask me out before.

Blood was pounding in my ears, making its way to my brain, where I felt it would explode. I shook my head. “No, Mum. Definitely not.”

She blinked. “Why the face, Sona? He’s a good man. You’ve said so yourself. He makes a good salary. He’s kind. What more do you want?”

I looked at her, aghast. “What more do I want? The same thing you wanted when you met my father.”

Her body stiffened. “What does that mean?”

I sighed. “Mum, I’m tired.” We never talked about my father, and I didn’t want to start now.

She sat back in her chair, the unfinished sleeve forgotten. “I want to know, Sona.” When she was upset about something, she rubbed a spot on her chest, right above her heart. She did so now.

“I don’t want to marry Mohan and that’s that.” I got up frommy chair and slid it against the table. “I’m going to get ready for bed.” There was so much I could say. That if she hadn’t settled for someone her parents picked out for her, why should I? If she wouldn’t settle for someone with grease under their fingernails, why should I? If she had had her freedom to choose her husband, why couldn’t I? She was a good woman. She didn’t deserve my anger. She had loved a man. She’d borne him two children, and he’d left. End of!

I went to fetch my towel and toothbrush and walked into the shared privy on the landing, wondering: Was I more my mother or my father? And if I hated my father, did that mean I hated the parts of me that were him? I studied my reflection in the mirror. My chestnut hair was still pinned up from work. I took the pins out and let it tumble down. Now, for the first time, I noticed my roots sprouted in a straight line across my forehead instead of following the curve of my temples. A gift from my mother. The line of my brows, which slanted downward, gave me a look of perpetual sadness—or was it disappointment? Resignation? Did I inherit that expression from my father? I tried for a different expression, widening my eyes, which raised my brows but made me resemble a startled animal. In my almond-shaped eyes, I saw my mother again. Was the color of my skin somewhere between my father’s and my mother’s? I would never be mistaken for British, but because of my accent and light skin, I might pass for a Parsi. My lips were neither thin nor plump. Those must be my father’s. I tried a smile. It was crooked! Why had no one told me that before? Definitely not my mother’s smile.

When I’d cleaned my teeth and washed my face, I went back to our flat. I kissed my mother’s cheek, so soft and warm. She was only forty-one years old but looked older. I pressed my forehead to hers. “There will be others, Mum. Mohan isn’t the only one.” There had never been another proposal before, so the prospect seemed dim, but I was grateful that she didn’t bring that up.

She pinched my cheek, the way she used to when I was a little girl and she wanted to hear me giggle. I complied.

Outside our door, there was the clang of milk bottles. It was five o’clock in the morning now. I opened it to see Anish, ourdoodh-walla, setting two bottles on our doorstep.

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