“I hope my father sees it that way. But I’m not ready for marriage, Meena. Not yet.”
Soon Meena stretches out and just the three snuff-sniffers are awake. Philipose’s berth is the bench on which they sit; he can retire only when they do. Young Miss’s pencil flies across the creamy pages of a notebook twice the size of his. Philipose wishes Arjun would go to his berth, but he is making calculations on a racing form. Of course, if Arjun retired, Philipose would have to find the courage to talk to Young Miss. His pen flows with his glittering ink, giving voice to an inner dialogue that has perhaps always been there. It’s exciting. Why did “Ink-Boy,” as Koshy Saar calls him, come to this discovery so late? How many insights vanished in the ether because they weren’t written down?
A loose, folded foolscap paper falls out of his notebook. It is a scribbled list of possible careers he’d considered, careers that didn’t require a classroom or normal hearing. A painful memory emerges of his new classmates turning to look at him: Wake up! Isn’t that your name they’re calling? Discouraged, he puts the paper away. Besides, every career he listed there he crossed out. Yes, he’d been aware that his hearing wasn’t as acute as others’ before this, but in the insulated world of secondary school, sitting in the front and so close to the teachers that he could feel their saliva spray, he’d managed. He’d always felt the burden was on others to make sure he heard them. All his life to this point, it has been his feud with water—the Condition—that has felt like the real handicap. Never his hearing.
Young Miss leaves to wash up. Arjun climbs to the middle bunk and is soon snoring. Philipose must get his luggage off Young Miss’s bunk if she is to lie down. He removes the bulky cardboard box with the radio, setting it on his bench. Next, he grapples with the trunk full of books, sliding it to the edge, but then, when it tilts onto his hands, it threatens to topple him. A pair of strong hands—Young Miss!—comes to his aid and together they lower it to the bench. She grins, as though they’ve pulled off a superhuman feat together. She waits.
“Don’t mention,” she says, looking directly at him.
He failed to say thank you! It was because of her presence so close to him. He was caught up in the scent of her minty toothpaste, forgetting his manners, forgetting everything.
“Sorry!—I mean, thank you. And thank you for letting the porter . . .” It feels intimate to be staring into her pupils. He has never made eye contact for this long with a woman who wasn’t family. The train feels suspended in space.
“That trunk feels full of bricks,” she says matter-of-factly.
“Yes, as many books as I could afford.” Did she say books or bricks? “And more in that trunk too,” he says, pointing to the one under the seat that toppled Meena’s suitcase.
She ponders this information. “And that carton? Also books?”
“A radio. You see, I’m heading home. For reasons similar to yours,” he blurts. What happened to his plan to spin a tale? “Not nuns, but I too was sent away from college. Issues with my hearing . . . they claim. But it’s all right. It’s probably a blessing.” He’s shocked by his own confession.
She nods. “Me too. I was studying home economics.” She makes a wry face and laughs. “Which one can surely study at home. Still, I would have stayed in college. But it wasn’t up to me.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. As you said, it’s a blessing.”
“Well . . . For what I wanted to learn—literature—I didn’t need to be in Madras. I won’t let it stop me. One thing I know, I love to learn. I love literature. With these books I can sail the seven seas, chase a white whale . . .”
She glances down. “Unlike Ahab you have both legs.”
She knows his favorite book! He follows her gaze helplessly, as though to confirm that he does indeed have both legs. He laughs. “Yes,” he says, with some feeling. “I’m luckier than Ahab. I have been bent and broken but I hope into better shape.”
She digests that. “Good for you,” she says finally. “And with a radio, the world comes to you, doesn’t it?”
These are the most words he’s ever exchanged with a woman his age. His eyes are on her lips. She asked a question. He’s already invoked Ahab. And Dickens. He worries he’s sounding pompous. He should crack a joke. But what if it sounds stupid? Besides, he can’t think of one. He opens his mouth to speak, to say something . . . but God help him, she’s so beautiful, her eyes such a pale gray . . . She can see every thought of his as it bounces around his skull. His brain is overheating and seizes, when all he has to say is yes.
“Well, goodnight then,” she says softly. She moves to the ladder, one foot on the first rung, then pauses. “Was that Great Expectations?”
“Yes! Yes, it was. Estella!”
“Please can you say it again?”
“Indubitably I can.”
After a beat, she bursts out laughing. They glance guiltily at the sleeping Arjun, and she leans forward, lowering her voice. “Well, would you please say it again?”
“I have been bent and broken but I hope into better shape.”
She smiles her thanks. She nods slowly. Then her face disappears.
He watches her pale soles, so creamy and soft, float up the ladder, trailed by the hem of her cotton sari and the shimmery slip beneath. She vanishes but the image lingers—the fleeting glimpse of the ball of her foot, of the underside of her big toe, the other toes winging out in its wake, babies trailing the mother. A slow heat starts in his belly and spreads to his limbs. He slumps heavily on the bench, then raps his head on the window bars—but softly. Idiot! Why didn’t you converse more? Did you even ask her name? I didn’t want to be inquisitive. What do you mean “inquisitive”? It’s called making conversation! Belatedly he remembers a joke: What do you call a Malayali who doesn’t ask for your family name, where you live, your income, and what’s in the bag you carry? A deaf-mute. That’s you.
He settles in as best he can against his luggage, unable to stretch out. He sets aside the loose foolscap paper with its list of careers crossed out, and now his pen races back and forth in the bound journal.
She must think I’m the sort who sniffs when others sniff, eats when they eat, and speaks only when spoken to. But I’m not! Please don’t judge me, Young Miss, from my hesitation. And was it fair for him to judge her as he had, sure of herself, willing to ask about things that interested her but content also to keep her peace when someone doesn’t reply? He’s acutely aware of her lying above him, only Arjun Railways between them.