“Stop pretending, Mukundo Babu! You hate me, you hate my family, and I know it. There is no need to–” Piyali was screaming one moment and in the very next she fell dead silent. Mukundo hadn’t yet registered her insinuation, but he noticed the reason for her abrupt silence. Huge tear drops had formed in her eyes and she must have choked on her words. In another moment she was gone. Only after that did it dawn on him that she thought he hated her.

As hard as that blow was, Mukundo had to admit that he wasn’t surprised by it. That’s what came out of such a sharp memory. The damned girl never forgot anything. She hadn’t forgotten their first meeting either. Even though she was barely eight-years old then.

Mukundo cursed himself. He should have known. Beneath the politeness with which she had treated him all these years lay this old wound which he had let fester. Because he hadn’t had the courage to own up that he had inflicted a wound, much less apologize for it or try to remedy it.

What scared him the most now was the amount of time that had gone by. Twelve years! What could he do to disabuse her of a belief held fast for such a long time?

—

“Stinking refugees!” Piyali had never forgotten those words. Or what followed, “They destroy Kolkata. They don’t belong here.”

They still rang fresh in her ears as if they were being spoken just now. By that rakish young man whom she had eyed from afar and who had brought a smile to her face because he had resembled a handsome, local actor back home.  And then he had come within earshot and destroyed that content smile forever.

Piyali’s father, Debendra Banerjee, had been speaking to Aurbindo Thakur with as much dignity as he could summon in his dire circumstances. The young girl was hungry. But she was thankful that her father had not been reduced to tears like she had seen some other grown-ups do. And her mother was holding up too. She didn’t like crying. She hated it even more when grown-ups cried. And she would have been scared to death if her father or mother had cried. No. Thankfully that didn’t happen. She knew that they had fallen on hard times. That they had lost their home. She knew that her baby brother had died of starvation. She was bone tired from the long on-foot journey they had made across the border and then to Kolkata in a crammed local train. But it had felt like living through one of the stories she had read. Stories always ended well. She will pull through. Her parents will pull her through it.

“I know, I know, Debendra Babu. Subodh has told me,” she heard Aurbindo speak, “You and your family must be fed and rested first. And then we will figure out the rest…” One of Debendra Thakur’s cousins, Subodh, was married to an East-Bengali woman, who in turn was a distant relative of Piyali’s mother – Debangi. When in dire circumstances they had to enter India illegally, they had approached the only relative they knew on this side of the border. But Subodh’s village was close to the border, and the political situation not exactly favorable. It would have been better for the family to hide themselves in the big metropolis of Kolkata. So Subodh had sought Aurbindo’s help. His wife would vouch for the integrity of this family. Aurbindo Thakur was making a reference to this mutual relative of theirs.

She hadn’t heard anything of Aurbindo and Debendra’s conversation after that because she had been distracted by the sight of Mukundo. He was coming towards them. She had smiled to herself. Aurbindo had noticed his son and had gone towards him to fill him in.

They had spoken in low tone and Piyali hadn’t been able to hear them. But Mukundo’s voice was loud enough when he had expressed his outrage at his father’s decision to give them shelter. “Stinking refugees.”

Piyali grinded her teeth once again. She hated her strong memory in such moments. If only she could forget! Her parents must also have heard it. But they didn’t seem to remember it. They had never shown anything other than gratitude towards the entire family, including Mukundo. Even in private, they had never shown any signs of resenting Mukundo. So Piyali had followed their example in her behavior. She had been polite, grateful all along. She had acted normal. She had taken his help in her studies when his or her parents had suggested that, because getting tuitions would have been too expensive and not as effective. She had helped his mother prepare his favorite dishes which, by now, she could make as well as her. She had listened to Mohima’s despair over Mukundo not getting married – “I and your Kaku had promised him that we will not force our choice on him. We didn’t know that he would never choose himself!” She had assured Mohima that it would be all right. She had gracefully accepted his invitations to go to the classical music concerts with him. After all he came in a package. The package that included his parents. His parents who had shown nothing but kindness towards her and her family. She had to act normal.

But there were times, even after all these years, when she was filled with self-loathing. It was finally today that she acknowledged the real source of that self-loathing. It wasn’t so much because of those damaging words. But because whatever she kept telling herself, her hatred for the man who had uttered those words was not strong enough. With a sinking heart she acknowledged that she loathed herself because she could not keep her admiration for him in check.

She wanted to cry. But she wouldn’t get enough privacy in the one-room house she still lived in with her parents. The house that was located at the periphery of Thakurs’ property and where Aurbindo Thakur had allowed them to take shelter all those years ago.  The house that had felt nothing less than a palace after months of persecution in their old home and weeks of traveling to find a place that will accept them. That house was too small for her wretchedness now. She will have to take shelter in the little nook in the garden on the opposite side of the property. An ancient banyan tree behind whose thick trunk her petite form could easily hide from the world.

She rushed there and threw herself on the ground although it was still wet from yesterday’s downpour. She buried her head in her knees and started sobbing uncontrollably.

—

To be continued