Seeing that Sheela is starting to pout, Ravi leans close to her and slips a finger under one of her spaghetti straps, sliding it up and down the delicate fabric, grazing her skin. “He’s the one who’s always ogling you. I can’t have that. That’s why you’re not invited.”
The act is so intimate it makes me blush. Are they always like this? I shift my gaze away from the side-view mirror, wondering what their driver, the ever stoic Mathur, is thinking.
Sheela looks at her husband sideways. And smiles.
After a beat, Sheela reaches up a hand to straighten Ravi’s tie. “Abbas will have a drink with me, won’t you, Abbas? Mathur can take him home afterward.”
I turn around to object. I have a lot of work to do for Hakeem tomorrow and a tutorial with one of Manu’s engineers. It’s late, and I’d rather go to bed.
Ravi’s face has darkened. He’s staring pointedly at Sheela. She returns his stare, coolly.
He pushes his lips out as if considering the idea. “A little Sheela hospitality. Sounds like a plan.” He straightens and pats my shoulder as if the matter is settled.
My acquiescence, it seems, is neither warranted nor necessary.
* * *
At Sheela and Ravi’s home, the driver parks, then hops out of the car to open Sheela’s door. I stay where I am, hoping that the invitation for a drink was only a maneuver to make Ravi jealous.
“You don’t mind, do you, Abbas? Spending time with me?”
Quietly, I let out a sigh. She is my hostess this evening. I follow her into the house where she hands Anu, her maid, her shawl and purse. Then she leads me to the drawing room—an airy space with a high ceiling and enormous French doors that take up the entire east wall. I imagine, in the daylight, that this room is even more spectacular. It’s so quiet at this hour I can hear the hum of the air conditioner.
Two yellow damask sofas facing each other dominate the room. They’re separated by a coffee table—long, rectangular—finished in a pale birch. The room is decorated lavishly but sparingly. No clutter. Nothing out of place. My guess is that the furniture, alone, in this one room, cost more than what Dr. Jay earns in a year.
Sheela opens the drawer of a matching side table and removes a packet of Dunhills. “Ravi thinks I don’t know where he keeps his stash,” she says. When she turns to face me, she’s holding a cigarette between her jeweled fingers.
I reach into my pocket for matches, wishing I, too, could offer her a gilded lighter. The yellow matchbox is the one I picked up earlier today from Ravi’s desk.
I lean in to light her cigarette. This close, I can smell her orchid perfume, the white wine she drank over dinner, the scent of cigarette smoke on her breath. I can see the small black beauty mark, nestled in the faint lines next to her right eye. Do I think that she’s attractive? Yes. She’s self-assured, and confident. Well aware of her sexual allure. I remind myself that Sheela Singh was once a girl who wouldn’t take a second look at me—was offended, if fact, by the sight of a me—the ragged eight-year-old I was then, when she was fifteen. Has she changed? Have I? Or am I simply tempted by the possibility of something forbidden?
She offers me the pack. I take one. Then she takes a seat on one of the sofas and draws on her cigarette slowly and deeply. She tilts her head back and blows smoke rings at the ceiling, her mouth kissing the air. “One cigarette after dinner is a lovely thing,” she says. “After two kids, tennis alone won’t help me slip into this.” She points to her dress. The chiffon bodice does little to hide the fact that she’s not wearing a bra. Her breasts are high and full. The women of Nimmi’s tribe don’t wear bras. Nimmi’s breasts have stretch marks, as does her stomach. (If Sheela ever breastfed, I would be surprised.) I like that Nimmi is comfortable in her body. Even so, that low-cut dress succeeds in making Sheela look salacious.
I can’t help but stare, which is exactly what that dress is asking me to do. I notice that my cigarette is still not lit and make a show of lighting it now. I force myself to think of Nimmi—her shy smile, her cinnamon lips, inviting me to go to her. When I undress her, Nimmi counts each hook aloud, softly, as I undo her blouse.
“Ravi keeps the good scotch in the library. Feel free to help yourself.” Sheela makes a careless gesture with her cigarette in the direction of the hallway. “Never had a taste for it myself.”
I take a seat on the sofa opposite Sheela’s. “I’m fine. Thank you.”
When Sheela leans forward to tap the ash from her cigarette into the ceramic ashtray on the coffee table, she makes sure that I can see her cleavage. The triangle of shadow between her breasts is sprinkled with gold powder. Despite myself, I’m getting hard. I look away, embarrassed, and shift in my seat.
Nimmi, who at this moment is four hundred miles away, would never think of sprinkling gold dust between her breasts.
“Two months, already, you’ve been here, Abbas. And we still know nothing about you.”
“You assume there’s something to know.”
“I’m guessing that you have a family.”
I don’t know how to answer that without involving Auntie-Boss. And it’s better Lakshmi’s name isn’t mentioned in this house. Nor can I tell Sheela about Omi, or my shoeless, shirtless beginnings in the Pink City. I tap the ash from my own cigarette into the ceramic bowl. “Some.”
“Hmm.” A smile is playing about Sheela’s mouth. Her glossy lipstick catches light, competing with the shimmer of gold between her breasts. “You’ve never told me how you came to know my father-in-law.”
I’m assuming Sheela doesn’t know that Ravi had a son with Auntie-Boss’s younger sister, Radha. Or that Samir made up for Ravi’s indiscretions by paying Radha’s way through school. Why he paid for mine has always been a mystery to me.
I release a plume of smoke. “I know Samir the same way lots of people do.”
“Meaning?”
Ignoring the question, I point to the large portrait in a silver frame, hanging on one wall—a family portrait of two generation of the Singhs. “Great photo,” I say.
The original photo was taken in black and white but then hand-colored so every person’s lips and cheeks are pink, even Ravi’s. In the photo, little Rita is an infant, her eyes lined with kajal for good luck. She’s looking off to one side, gnawing on her fist. When the photo was taken, Baby hadn’t yet been born.
Sheela glances at the photo but says nothing. She adjusts the large emerald and pearl ring on one of her fingers. “Society says it’s fine for Ravi to have his women—and I use the term loosely.” She arches a shapely eyebrow. “But if I did the same, they’d be outraged.”