“That is all for this evening, yes,” Mr. Gupta said. “Thank you to everyone who attended. Frankly not enough members of this housing complex take these meetings seriously. I am considering imposing a fee on residents who do not send at least one member of the household to the meetings.”
A faint murmur of approval went through the twenty or so people who came to the meeting every week, and then the sound of scattered conversations picked up. Shatrugan came in and turned the fans off. Someone said, “Mr. Gupta, please see to those overhead fans,” and others agreed.
“I have one more thing,” Mrs. Ray said from the back row, raising her hand. Why did she raise her hand? She wasn’t a schoolgirl. And why had she waited until the fans had been turned off? Now the silence was like a spotlight on her. She sat up straight, cleared her throat, and repeated, “I have one more thing to discuss.”
Mrs. Ray knew it was her last chance to bring up the stolen yoga pants. She was fairly certain she knew who the culprit was, and her accusation was nothing more shocking than what had already been discussed, so there was really no reason for her to avoid it any longer.
But the difference between her complaint and the rest was that she was a widow. And not a widow like old Mrs. Chabbra, who hardly left her home and walked only slowly, bent over a walker, and had a few stiff white hairs that sprouted on her upper lip. Widows of that genre were the norm. But nobody knew what to do with widows like Mrs. Ray.
Not too happily married when she was nineteen years old, Mrs. Ray had never known the feeling of young flirtation, new romance, and endless possibility. She had gone from her father’s home straight to her husband’s home, and there had been minimal fun along the way. Her husband wasn’t bad—he didn’t drink, never hit her, and, as far as she knew, had never had an affair—but he had also never caused her stomach to flutter with excitement. Even at the start of their marriage, they never went dancing, they hardly ever went to watch movies, and they certainly never flirted with each other. Her marriage, and her life in general, had always felt like a transaction—she was handed certain items, and she paid in kind. She went to college until her parents found her a suitable match, and the price for that was to stop going to college. She moved to Delhi because her husband’s work needed him there, and she put Mumbai behind her and set about building a new life. They didn’t manage to have children, so she befriended the older ladies in the neighborhood and accepted a life without little toes. Her husband didn’t want her to work and she liked her husband, so she didn’t work. She followed all the rules and did everything that was expected of her and still her husband died when she was thirty-seven years old. How was that fair?
The rules had failed her, so in widowhood she decided she was not going to play the role of a widow. She liked sheets with higher thread counts than she’d ever had before, and she paid extra to buy a cream that was meant to be used only on the feet when regular Nivea cold cream would obviously work just as well. She liked the occasional cigarette and she liked to play her music on speakers even if the neighbors could hear the widow next door enjoying music. She didn’t want or need a man, but she did want to live well, even on her own. Especially on her own.
After Mr. Ray’s death, Mrs. Ray felt like a television character who moves to a big city to make it all by herself. She did indeed break her bangles and remove the vermillion from her hair when Mr. Ray died, but instead of plain white saris and daily prayers, she changed into tight gym clothes, got a yoga instructor, dyed the few gray hairs that had started to come in, and started taking prenatal vitamins. You were supposed to live for yourself, all the American afternoon talk shows always told her. So she tried. It was difficult in this housing complex where everyone watched and discussed her every move and she came home every evening to a dark and empty home that she shared with only her maid. She knew that everyone thought that her living well meant she didn’t miss her husband. But she did. She missed him almost every day, but she also wanted to install shower heads that had a massage setting.
She wished she had some company tonight. She shouldn’t have given Ganga the night off to visit her relatives in Kalkaji. The room settled into silence again as everyone turned to look at Mrs. Ray. She adjusted the dupatta that was draped around her shoulders and stood up to face everyone.
“Mr. De has stolen my yoga pants,” she said, and pointed over her shoulder in the direction of Mr. De, who was snoozing in the back row with his chin against his chest. His bald head was reflecting the tubelight above him and the second button on his shirt had come unbuttoned and wispy gray chest hairs were visible. As the newly appointed treasurer, Mr. De was required to attend these meetings.
The few people who had started to leave the room all came back in and took their seats again.
“Reema, what are you saying?” Mr. De said, spluttering awake.
“Please call me Mrs. Ray. And it is because I have been doing yoga,” Mrs. Ray said.
“You don’t need yoga pants to do yoga, you know,” Mrs. Kulkarni said. “Those tight, tight pants are not in our culture. You can do yoga just as well in a salwar kameez.”
Mrs. Baggaria, who was sitting next to Mrs. Kulkarni, wobbled her head in agreement.
Mrs. Ray inhaled, wishing again that she had had another glass of wine before coming to the meeting, and said, “Mrs. Kulkarni, that is hardly the point.”
“That is true,” Mr. Gupta said. “All foreigners are even teaching yoga these days. And you see our young Indians suddenly excited about yoga because the Americans are doing it. Bikram yoga—have you heard of it? Who needs a heated room? You can just do yoga outdoors in the summer in Delhi. And that Bikram has gone and made millions and millions of dollars.”
“I hear he has relations with plenty of American women,” someone added.
“That is exactly what yoga has become,” someone else said.
“Because of the clothes,” Mrs. Kulkarni said, and looked toward Mrs. Ray.
“Mr. Gupta, this is not about yoga. Or about what clothes to wear while doing yoga. This is about my yoga pants that have been stolen and I have every reason to believe it was Mr. De who stole them,” Mrs. Ray said.
She was certain it was him. The Des’ balcony was the only one from which you could reach Mrs. Ray’s balcony, where Ganga put out all her clothes to dry, including her yoga pants. In the past, Mrs. Ray had caught Mr. De watching her doing yoga and even though she could not imagine why he would steal her yoga pants, she was certain he had. And watching him now taking off his glasses and wiping the sweat off his face, she was even more certain he was guilty.
“Mrs. Ray, Mrs. Ray, Mrs. Ray,” Mr. De said. “What would your husband say if he were still with us? May he rest in peace. Am I right?”