The air was abuzz with rumours of rain as they walked hand in hand. So much earth clung longingly to their feet with every step that she began to feel heavy and had to stop. “You should get some beanbags for the flat,” said Thomas. She laughed. She looked again at the crude, hand-drawn advertisement on the wall behind her (“BEANBAGS,” proclaimed the writing, followed by a phone number) and said, “You haven’t noticed these ads before? They’re not selling beanbags; it’s street-speak for hookers. That, my friend, is the phone number of a certified, anything-goes, Bandra pimp.”
Thomas seemed unconvinced and prodded her forward.
“Have you ever been with a hooker?” asked Sonya as they proceeded homeward. “Have you ever had to pay for it, Writer-man?”
“I’ve had my share of dry spells,” said Thomas, carefully, “but I’ve always managed to stop just short of paying for it.”
They walked in silence for a bit, till they turned the corner towards Sonya’s flat. “Remember that NGO I told you I volunteer at?” said Sonya. “They work with little girls. Daughters of sex workers. A lot of them missed school or were never enrolled in one till the organisation picked them up. I help them make up at school with a little extra tutoring. It’s almost maddening how positive those kids are, despite everything they’ve seen.”
Thomas seemed content to follow her up the stairs in silence. “Anyway,” she said as they went in, “I’m supposed to be putting together some flyers for them to raise funds at an event. Can you help?”
Sonya watched Thomas take a long gulp of water and distribute what was left in the bottle neatly between the two glasses of whisky he had laid out on the kitchen counter. As he offered her one and sipped from the other, Sonya wondered if she was imposing.
This was the first time she had asked him to be involved in her life; it was the first time she had asked him for anything.
“I’m not nearly qualified to save the world,” he said and that should have been that but she thought she detected a touch of arrogance in his voice. It wasn’t surprising in that Sonya already knew that Thomas functioned almost entirely on the back of a brittle but significant ego; she also thought that she had figured out a system to manoeuvre around it without crushing his spirit.
“It’s just a couple of catchy headlines and some straightforward copy,” she persevered. “I’ll get somebody from our marketing team to slap on a couple of images. You won’t believe what typing in ‘poor happy Indian children’ on Shutterstock will throw up. And you wouldn’t be doing it for free. My firm is sponsoring the event, and I’ll just be paying you what we would otherwise pay an ad agency. You said you were looking for some freelance work, right?”
Thomas nodded and mumbled something about finding the time as he lit up a cigarette. Sonya lowered herself onto the bed, balanced her glass on her stomach, and closed her eyes. She could feel the drink being lifted off her body as she slipped gratefully into sleep.
Watching her, Thomas wished he could think as clearly as Sonya, that he were less prone to abstractions and more – he searched for the right word – capable; capable of the nitty- gritty that made all the difference between a life lived and a life led. He wished he were in ownership of a thought process that led simply from A to B, and didn’t go missing for a few days on a euphoric binge with E or a doomed romance with K.
When Sonya decided to do something, she did it.
No amount of rumination or digression or consequential ping pong could stand in her way. He had observed her like a scientist these past few weeks, run tests, made notes on her humanity. She clenched her fists when she wanted to make a point, he had noticed; her jaw would set in defiance, her upper lip curl down in a pronounced droop that made him want to kiss the clefts under it and drove him mad with desire.
He wondered if she knew that he admired her almost as much he adored her. He wanted to tell her that her body wasn’t always enough, that sometimes he wanted to kiss her indomitable spirit and make love to her mind. He decided instead to finish the rest of their drinks and try and come up with something clever to drum up resources for the progeny of the eternally persecuted.
Sonya woke him up the next morning in established fashion, smelling of last night and tasting of coffee. “Thank you for the flyer,” she said. “I’ve sent it to the designer.”
“I didn’t mean to impose,” she added as Didi burst into view in the hallway, efficiently and unobtrusively going about her business. Thomas nodded at her as he followed Sonya into the kitchen for no real reason other than the ineffable joy of trailing in her wake. “I’ve been thinking,” she said, “there’s actually a shitload of content-writing work we outsource to some agency or the other. A lot of it is just proof-checking, editing, drafting a couple of whitepapers here and there. I could just route them all through you. You’d have almost-steady work and I’d save the firm a lot of money. What do you think?”
Thomas tried to muffle his response in the nape of her neck, and, feeling her stiffen, knew she deserved better. “I really appreciate what you’re trying to do,” he said. “I promise I’ll think about it. Now what plans have we?”
Sonya was already laying the breakfast table when Thomas returned from his liquor run. “We’ve got eggs, toast, and news,” she announced testily. Thomas took his seat, mentally resigning himself to whatever fresh hell lay in wait for him. “So I texted Anjali last night, saying the two of you should hang out, etcetera,” Sonya started, “and well, she invited a few more people and I invited a few more people, and now it’s blown out of all proportion into a party.”
Thomas dug into his toast, maintaining his trademark – if steadily growing uncomfortable – silence. “The party will be here,” continued Sonya. “This is where we usually throw parties, and it’s been my turn for like, well, since you got here, really. But it will be a mess, you know? Everybody will just crash here, and somebody or the other will throw up somewhere, and...”
Thomas didn’t have the heart to look up, but he could tell he was giving her a hard time. He made up his mind.
“I’m sorry I’ve been old-manning you,” he said. “Let’s do this. Party sounds great.” Sonya clearly expected more reluctance and seemed for once to be at a loss for words. “You want me to be there, yes?” he said, and she nodded. “Was there something else?” he asked.
In that instant, Sonya knew what it was to be committed, caged, to be in an adult relationship; even if – as she would point out to Anjali later – she was the only one living a lifestyle resembling anything like that of an adult, as far as she could see. She was the one with the regular income, the flat, the one responsible for the bills, and lately, even the cigarettes and alcohol. So why did she feel so guilty?
Excerpted with permission from Mornings After, Tharun James Jimani, Bloomsbury.
