Half a Rupee: Stories by Gulzar Read Free Book Online Page B

staggered on to the hillock near the highway into kholi number 109 of shanty-town Sawant Nagar. Tulsibai, like every other day, filled the shining bowl with water from the kalsi and thrust it into his hands, saying, ‘Tired? Here, have this.’
    He propped himself up on his elbows and drank the water in one swoop, washing it down his throat.
    Tulsi came and sat by him on the bed and, pressing his aching feet, narrated the happenings of the day.
    Laxmi had come from her sasural … her in-laws had gone to Nasik.
    Maruti closed his eyes. A moment passed. Tulsi said once again, ‘Chotti has become wicked … imagine, she called me Nani! And she was calling you by your name, asking you when you are going to come … lisping, stuttering and all, “When will Maluti come? When?”’
    A smile broke across Maruti’s careworn face, the tiredness on his features rearranged itself into a smile.
    ‘She speaks in Hindi!’
    ‘Oh yes!’
    ‘Hasn’t learnt Marathi!’
    ‘She will! There’s still time.’
    The tiredness of the day began to creep away. He rested his head on his folded arms.
    ‘How did she go back?’
    ‘She didn’t … they have gone to see a film.’
    ‘Chotti also?’
    ‘The little devil does not let go of her mother for even a moment. What was she to do? So they took her along.’
    Maruti grunted and took a deep breath.
    ‘And Karthik? Where’s he?’
    ‘Today he again fought with someone at school!’
    ‘Mother of …!’
    Maruti turned on his side and abruptly got up.
    ‘Bloody idiot, every day he gets beaten up at school and comes … bloody coward. Ghati. He is a disgrace to the Marathas!’
    Tulsi also got up.
    ‘Go … freshen up … I’ve made some poha … have a little.’
    Maruti pulled down a towel and lowered himself into a corner to have a bath. ‘Take out my dhoti-kurta,’ he said.
    The stove was lit. The lamp too was switched on. Maruti folded his hands in front of the idols kept there, murmured some words of prayer and put on his fresh dhoti-kurta.
    Karthik walked in. Maruti jumped on Karthik, put a hand between his legs and threw him against the bed and pressed him under himself.
    ‘Come, you idiot. Come wrestle with me!’
    It tickled Karthik.
    Maruti said, ‘From tomorrow get yourself massaged with mustard oil, go to the
akhara
and train yourself to wrestle. You will achieve nothing by reading books and being a Gyandev!’
    Karthik kept laughing. Despite the gushing noise of the kerosene stove, Tulsi could hear everything and said, ‘Why are you teaching him stupid stuff …?’
    ‘I’m teaching him the right stuff. A Maratha’s son has to be a brilliant Maratha!’
    Babu arrived now outside the door and called for him to come outside the kholi.
    ‘What say, Maruti? Want to come along for Patkar’s meeting?’
    Maruti said from inside the kholi, ‘Holy shit, do you have any idea why people go for that meeting? My wife says that all you do there is scratch your balls.’
    From inside the kitchen Tulsi cussed at the two. ‘Woe be upon you, bastards!’
    Maruti moved out.
    ‘You heard what my bai said?’
    After the meeting at the local brewery, they argued. From Baba Ambedkar to Medha Patkar, from Chavan to Pawar, they discussed everyone and analysed everything threadbare.
    In the middle of the night when a couple of drunks shattered the silence of the alley, Tulsi got up from the cot. She lit the stove and began to warm the food again. Her son-in-law was sleeping on a cot in the alley. Maruti’s cot too was laid next to him. Maruti stepped inside laughing. Karthik was sleeping on the wooden bed. Laxmi too wasasleep, the little one cradled next to her. Maruti put his hand over the child’s head and pinched her cheeks and tried to mimic her lisp: ‘Maluti’s come.’
    Tulsi scolded him, ‘Let her be. Don’t you wake her up now.’
    Laxmi woke up. She hugged the father. Chotti also woke up. Karthik turned on his side and muttered: ‘Bapu!’ The son-in-law bent down