Last Man in Tower - Aravind Adiga [37]
The ocean breaking below your window; a lizard on the ceiling staring at you with fat envious eyes; and in the next room, a woman, twenty-six years younger, brushing her freshly washed hair and sending waves of strawberry and aloe towards your nostrils.
Dharmen Shah yawned. He saw no reason to get out of his bed.
“Woke up?” Rosie called from her room. “Come and see what I’ve bought for you, Uncle. A surprise.”
“Let me sleep, Rosie.”
“Come.”
She took him by the hand and led him into the living room; there it lay propped against the sofa; a framed three-part poster that showed the Eiffel Tower being erected in stages.
“For you, Mr. Builder. To put up in your office.”
“Very sweet of you, Rosie,” Shah said, and put his hand on his heart. He was truly touched, even though the money was his.
“Eiffel,” he said, seated at the laminated dining table outside the kitchen, “was the same fellow who built the Statue of Liberty. What would we do with him in India? Ask: What is your caste, what is your family, what is your background? Sorry, go away.”
The fat man stretched his hands and flexed his toes. Rosie turned from the kitchen to see him yawning indulgently.
“Rosie,” he said. “Did I ever tell you that I was my father’s first wife’s son?”
“No, Uncle. You never tell me about yourself.”
“They pulled my mother out of a well one day. That is the very first memory I have.”
She came out of the kitchen and wiped her hands.
“I was four years old. She jumped into the well in our house in Krishnapur.”
“Why did she do it?”
He shrugged.
“A year later I had a stepmother. She had four sons. They got all my father’s love. He would not even look at me with kindness. The worst part was this: he made me feel ashamed, Rosie. It was as if my mother’s suicide were my fault. He would glare at me if anyone ever mentioned it.”
“And then?”
Then came the day he went to his father’s grocery store and asked: “May I have a bicycle, Father? It’s my sixteenth birthday,” to be told, “No,” even though a younger half-brother had received one. Understanding then that being second-best was what was expected of the sons of a first wife, he left home the next morning with twelve rupees and eighty paise that he had saved up. He walked, took the bus, took the train, ran out of money and walked again, till the sandals had fallen off his feet and he had to tie plantain leaves around them. Reached Bombay. He had never once returned to Krishnapur.
“Not once?”
“Why go back? In the village, a man lives as a social animal, Rosie: pleasing his father, grandfather, brothers, cousins. His caste. His community. A man is free here. In the city.”
Rosie waited for more, but he had gone silent; she got up from the table.
“I’ll bring you the toast in a second, Uncle.”
“Butter. Lots of it.”
“Don’t I know? That’s the only thing on earth you love: fresh butter.”
In a little while he was licking butter off triangular pieces of toast at the table. Wiping her hands down the sides of her blue jeans, she watched from the kitchen.
“Did something happen today, Uncle? You’re very talkative.”
“Satish is in trouble. The second time this year.”
“What kind of trouble, Uncle?”
“Go get me more toast.”
Rosie returned with fresh bread, which she flicked with the back of her fingers onto his plate.
“The Shanghai, Rosie. Did I tell you that’s the name of my new project?”
“What happened to Satish, Uncle?”
“I want to forget about him. I want to talk about my Shanghai.”
“Bo-ring, Uncle. You know I don’t like construction talk. Some marmalade?”
“Every man wants to be remembered, Rosie. I’m no different. Once you fall ill, you think about these things. I began as a contractor, then did slum redevelopments because the big developers did not want to get their hands dirty. If I had to kiss this politician