Where Earth Meets Water. Pia Padukone
if they are so stupid. No one would make such empty-headed decisions. Why would Princess Ajanta choose a man with brute strength over a man who can outwit anyone in the kingdom? It just doesn’t make sense.” At this one, Kamini had bristled. When had she ever made a decision in her life? she’d argued. Everything had been decided for her. From the clothes she wore to the schools she attended to the home she lived in to the man she married.
“Maybe I am stupid,” Kamini had spat back for the first time, “so you’ll have to help me guide these girls.”
Together they submitted hundreds of stories to children’s magazines and housewives’ digests, until eventually a magazine editor decided to publish an anthology of her short stories.
Kamini had been jolted into a harsh reality. “You can’t print my name on the cover,” she’d begged over the phone. “It has to be an alias.”
The editor had sighed heavily. “These are your stories, are they not? Come, now, aren’t you proud of your work? You’ve put years into this collection. Stand behind it. You never know what doors it will open for you.”
“As long as I am getting a paycheck, that’s all that matters to me. Please understand, Mr. Devindra.”
And so her collection had been published, with a pale blue hard cover with gold lettering: Tales of Girls and Animals by Shanta Nayak. It was most difficult for Kamini, publishing a book on her own and—save Savita—not being able to tell anyone about it. The book became her friends’ and family’s go-to bedtime bible and she would watch as some of her younger nieces and nephews would tote it about, dog-eared and stained, everywhere they went, hugging it to their chests as they sat meekly on sofas during family visits.
“This Shanta Nayak has really done a number on us all. Now on those long train rides to see my in-laws, the kids just sit and read quietly without chewing my tongue and driving me to pieces. God bless her, truly,” Kamini’s second cousin said.
“She must be from our community itself,” her sister responded. “Nayak is a Konkani name.”
“I hadn’t even thought of it,” the first second cousin said. “She should do a story hour with all the children. They’d love it.” For a moment Kamini’s blood ran cold. She’d be found out. Luckily, the editor wrote back to her cousins that Shanta Nayak was too busy for public appearances, that she was already hard at work on the sequel. And that was how Kamini was coerced into writing a second book. This time with new stories from the crevices of her mind and without the support of Savita, who was enrolled in college in America and had little time to help her mother concoct fairytales. These stories, however, were a little more biting. They were closer to home. Kamini wrote of a man who drank too much potion and tottered around in the background of the heroine’s house uselessly until the girl had to save him from the forest fire that would have otherwise consumed them all. Instead of an evil witch, there was a slave-driving auntie who would whip her young girl workers if they didn’t produce enough golden flax from the magic wheat that grew in their mystical fields.
“What are these, Kaminiji?” Pinki Devindra had demanded. “These are too bitter for children. I can’t print these.”
“They’re a bit more...realistic. We can’t have our children growing up without realizing the harsh truths of life.” The editor had harrumphed on the other end of the line but eventually printed them as they were, and Shanta Nayak’s True Stories of Make Believe landed on shelves the following month. At first, mothers were shocked at their brusqueness. They didn’t buy the books for their children, but True Stories of Make Believe became somewhat of a cult classic when children discovered it on their own, smuggling copies into their homes as though it were a trashy magazine with naked pictures of women. They read it under their covers and traded the same raggedy book among their friends. Soon parents had to admit that the stories were honest, though brutal, and began purchasing the book themselves.
Now—Kamini can hardly believe it—she has been living off her profits for the past thirty years. The books are still in high demand, and though she is still in her cramped East Delhi apartment, her books feed, clothe and keep her warm at night. She feeds Mr. Devindra—now Pinki to her—a short story from time to time, whenever she can no longer keep his ceaseless nagging for new work at bay. Savita married a man she met in college. They live in a state called Ohio—a place that Kamini thinks sounds constantly surprised to hear its own name. And though she misses her daughter, Kamini finally lives alone: with her routine, with her stories, with her ritual.
Which is why she is annoyed by Pinki’s phone call this morning. He has been hounding her for a few reasons: to purchase a computer, to learn how to use it and to write a third book. He is in his early seventies now but with skin stretched as tight as a young man’s and dark gray eyes that sparkle when he coaxes Kamini to write. He visits her from time to time, sometimes to drop off a packet of fan letters, other times a children’s magazine he thinks she will enjoy. But today he is calling to alert her that a package is on its way to her house by special courier.
“I’m sending you a laptop computer, Kaminiji. It’s one of the ones that folds, so it won’t take up any more room than is necessary in your flat. I’m also sending a boy to teach you to use it. It’s been fifteen years since True Stories of Make Believe. Leave a legacy, Kaminiji. Two books are insufficient. A trilogy is a legacy.” Kamini sighs and shifts her weight as she stands hunched over the phone in the kitchen. She is roasting chilies and the smell is starting to suffocate her. She turns toward the stove, pulling the phone cord with her, and applies a few more drops of oil to the pan, where they sizzle, thin wisps of gray smoke rising from the shiny red shards. She will dry these chilies out to make a pickle, allowing them to marinate properly for six months before her granddaughter Gita visits with her boyfriend in May. Boyfriend, Kamini muses. What an insipid word. It is so wishy-washy, so noncommittal. She has spoken to Gita about her relationship, and while Kamini agrees that there is no need to rush into anything, the word boyfriend makes her grimace.
She steps back and wipes her forehead with the tail of her sari.
“Pinki, my daughter has been out of the house for thirty years, and her children only visit occasionally. I haven’t been around children for such a long time. I don’t know how they act, interact. I don’t know their interests anymore. I’ve nothing to give.”
“Nonsense,” Pinki says, puffing on his pipe, a habit he hasn’t weaned himself off of even with the recent ever-insistent warnings of cancer. “Okay, you’ve been languishing. Maybe you’re a bit rusty. But practice on the laptop—get your fingers and your mind oiled and the words will pour out of you faster than you know it. This way you can send me stories and I can edit them as they come through. We can have a running dialogue. If you’re stuck, we can chat through the computer. It’ll be much better this way.”
Before she knows it, the doorbell is ringing and her chilies are scalding.
“Arey, you sent it now? As we were speaking?” Kamini asks, wiping her hands on a dishrag.
“The boy only left an hour ago. He made good timing. Good luck with it. I’m sure you’ll be a natural. I’ll call you later with details about deadlines, content, etc.”
Kamini hangs up the phone and answers the door. A young man stands behind it, clutching a rectangular satchel.
“Hi, auntie,” he says. “Parcel from Mr. P. L. Devindra.”
“Yes, come in,” she says, glancing at the floor.
He removes his shoes dutifully.
“Where would you like it?”
“What about there?” She points to the small round dining table, vacant unless she has company. The boy kneels down and unzips the bag.
“Please sit, auntie,” he says. “I’m Raj. I’m to teach you to use this.”
“Just a moment.” She scurries into the kitchen and puts the chilies onto a flat plate, flicking them with a few drops of vinegar. When she comes back outside, Raj is opening up the laptop like a clamshell, the black keys glittering