Piyali was done with her classes. She led Mukundo to her favourite hideout – the spinney.

“Why did it fall apart, Mukundo Babu?” she asked on their way, “Did your wife find out… about us?”

“Probably.”

“Probably?”

“Even if she did, it wasn’t her problem.”

“Huh?”

“Because according to her promiscuity was a given with the artists. ‘I don’t care who you sleep with,’ she had said.”

Piyali looked uncertain on how to react to that.

“Do you also think so?” he asked, “That because I am an artist, I go around sleeping with women.”

“No,” she said, “The way you beat yourself up over one, I can’t imagine you would survive sleeping with many women.”

He smiled sadly. “Apparently she had grown up seeing her father’s rather colourful love life. She doesn’t see him with the same lens as I do. Had I been blind with my respect for my guru?”

“That’s possible, right? She was his daughter. She would know more.”

“Hmm…”

“And probably Pandit ji knew that you weren’t like him. And that’s why he had wanted his daughter to be married to you – to a good man. Carrying the legacy was just… an alibi?”

“Hmm… Why couldn’t you learn from Pandit ji, Piyali? What was the problem?”

She gulped, “I… I don’t know.”

“Was it the money? Because he won’t take a student for lower or no fee?”

“Why are you asking that?”

“I just want to know.”

“I don’t know for sure. But that might be the case. When Gayatri Ma had mentioned me going to you, I was hesitant. I told her, I couldn’t afford the fees. She had said that you weren’t like Pandit ji in that regard.”

Mukundo sighed, “He hadn’t started with a silver spoon in his mouth. He can’t be blamed, can he?”

“Not at all. I don’t blame him. If my Baba was half as practical as him, our lives would have been different. I would have performed much earlier. With you…”

“Why didn’t you perform?”

“Don’t judge her for this, Mukundo Babu, but Ma hated the idea. The penury Baba had left us in, she couldn’t trust music to be the source of our livelihoods any more. ‘Even if the money comes,’ she would say, ‘It lasts as long as the fame does. And that can disappear any time.’”

“Can’t blame her. She is right.”

“Yes.”

“But she doesn’t mind now?”

“This job has helped, Mukundo Babu. It has turned things around. She feels much more secure now. Even if I had earned ten-times as much by performing, she wouldn’t have been at peace.”

They stayed silent for a while and then she picked up the original thread again. “It couldn’t have been your decision to end the marriage. What was her problem then, if not me? Your wife’s?”

“That I had stopped performing and was becoming a nobody.”

“Really?”

“Not exactly her words. But that’s what it had come down to ultimately.”

“And she left Sumedha behind?”

He nodded and they grew silent again.

He looked around when they reached the spinney and asked with a smile, “So, this is your favourite place in all of Darjeeling?”

“Yes.”

“And what do you do here?”

“I come here. And think about things, people, who are supposedly not a part of my life any longer.”

“I see. Like?”

“Like I thought about you. Training your students. Enchanting your audience with your performances. Preparing your daughter to carry forward your legacy.”

Mukundo averted his eyes. He had failed her.

“I was so angry at you, Mukundo Babu, when I saw Sumedha here and spoke to her. There was one thing I didn’t want to be responsible for. Taking her father away from her. And you made me guilty of that. I am sorry that your marriage broke down, but did you stop being a father? How could you send her away?”

“I failed you, I failed her, Piyali. But it wasn’t your doing. Why should you feel guilty?”

“You think that is satisfactory enough? Why had you stopped performing?”

“Piyali!”

“Last time it was one week that you didn’t talk to me and put me through hell. This time it has been five years that you didn’t talk to me and put everyone through hell. Why, Mukundo Babu?”

He took a few moments to start answering that, “I also thought about you, Piyali. A lot. I also imagined what your life was like. And I imagined you… Falling in love… With someone your age, suitable for you, who made you laugh, who made you happy, who didn’t rudely turn you away for being late by two minutes, someone whom your family approved. I imagined you as a bride, turning over a new leaf. I couldn’t imagine gate crashing this beautiful party and spoiling it all.”

Piyali got tears in her eyes. “Shut up,” was all she managed to say through her choked throat.

“When you turned up at the guest house yesterday, at my door, I forgot everything and hugged you. And then I felt like an idiot. How presumptuous I was being, after imagining all that through years! What if you were married? Or had someone in your life? Why was I behaving like we were professed lovers and you were waiting for me…”

She frowned at him and turned away muttering, “I hate you.”

“You should,” he came around so that they were face to face again, “Why aren’t you married yet? Engaged?”

“No. I am not,” she cried and showed him both her hands in irritation. There were no rings on any of the fingers, “What’s wrong with you? What do you want to hear?”

“I want to know. Why not? Surely your family would want you to…”

“Among other things, if you need a rational answer, it is this. I can’t get pregnant.”

“What?”

“Something, somewhere is weak and it can’t be cured,” she shrugged, trying to look nonchalant. Mukundo recalled the time when he had dropped her home and she had tried to look as nonchalant – about her poverty!

“Fine. But it doesn’t have to be the end of the deal, Piyali.”

“It is the end of the deal as far as arranged marriages are concerned. And I am not exactly going to fall in love… Again!”

“So, you won’t get married.”

“No,” she replied sounding annoyed.

“What will you do then? Become the mistress of a promiscuous artist?”

She didn’t see him smiling and reacted angrily, “I am not going to be anyone’s mistress.” Then she looked up and realized that he was teasing her. She bit her lips and started looking down.

He held her shoulder, “Piyali. I…”

She stepped back. “Don’t. Sumedha wants her mother back. She will never accept me.”

“But she wants me to propose to you.”

She looked up to find him smiling, while his eyes were moist. “You are not serious!” She was incredulous.

“She asked me if I loved you.”

She stared at him agape.

“Yes. That was my reaction too,” he chuckled slightly, “But she is old enough to understand.”

“What did she say?”

“She said that she had been stupid to expect her mother to be back. And that what she really wanted was… a family… A complete family. And she was all praises for you. More than I could ever have been. She loves you, Piyali. You have been so supportive to her. You have won her heart.”

Piyali’s eyes grew moist.

He smiled in amusement as he continued, “And she assured me that the gossip engine in the campus is strong enough for the students to know everything scandalous about the teachers. So, she was sure that you weren’t engaged, nor had a boyfriend.”

That made Piyali laugh. “This has to be the weirdest match-making possible.”

“You can’t imagine how weird it was for me. But I am not complaining. I have to be sure though. Will you marry me, Piyali Banerjee?”

“Yes,” she was laughing and crying at the same time.

“Will your mother agree?”

“She will have her issues. That’s her right. But if she came around for music, you are very eligible groom, Mukundo Babu. And anyway, when she knows…” She suddenly grew silent and thoughtful. She knew that once her mother gets to know about her problem, she would agree to any groom she could find, but…

“What happened?” Mukundo asked, worried.

“It… It was so stupid of me… That inability to get pregnant was not a joke, Mukundo Babu. Why did I assume it won’t matter to you…”

“I am curious. You had already known it when we had… That’s how you were sure that you won’t get pregnant.”

She nodded and recalled how emotionally he had reacted to the idea of their having a child. Her heart sank at the thought of his disappointment.

“That’s convenient, then, isn’t it?” he joked, “We don’t have to think about if, when, how many…”

“Mukundo Babu!”

“I am sorry. I didn’t mean to be crass. If you want a child, we will have one. Adoption, test-tube baby, surrogate whatever you want. But this isn’t the moment to be spoiled by thinking about all that, Piyali. I want you before anything else in life. Once I have you, I won’t need anything else in my life. Not even a child. I am not stuck up on carrying the legacy. It has wasted too much of my life.”

She leaned on him, hiding her face in his chest and he encircled her in his arms. He could already imagine the three of them practising together – him, Piyali and Sumedha. At five in the morning. Like old days. He smiled with satisfaction and closed his eyes.

– The End –