When I got back from the village, after Sunita's sister's wedding, I had to fly out almost immediately to Chennai on work. Before I left, I spoke to Bahadur and Sunita and let them know that they could extend their break by another week if they chose; both of them were happy to do so.
On reaching the Chennai office, I realised it was a fruitless trip because the problem which brought me there had in fact been resolved without my presence. I stayed on a day anyway, and then flew to the Mumbai office for another day and got back to Delhi by the middle of the week. I took the first flight out on Thursday morning and got to Delhi around 10:00. In Bahadur's absence, the office had sent another car to pick me up. I had the driver take me directly to the office where I spent a couple of hours before heading home.
When I got to the apartment, the door was unlocked. Surprised, but not unduly worried, I pushed open the door and entered my house, feeling a welcome sense of relief and comfort in the familiar surroundings. I dragged my luggage into the spare bedroom before walking into the large bathroom to relieve myself and generally freshen up. I had grabbed a sandwich at the office and had no pressing matters to occupy me now that I was home. I was planning to take a warm shower and relax for the rest of the afternoon.
As I pushed the bathroom door open, it met a soft obstruction and rebounded on its hinges. I heard a scream from behind the door which caused me some alarm but I instinctively held the door steady as I peered around it into the bathroom. There was a girl with her hand clamped against her mouth, eyes wide open and startled as she looked at me. Not knowing who she was, I apologised and walked back though the master bedroom into the living room.
I reached for the cordless phone and hit the button for my office. I spoke to my assistant in a rushed and hurried manner, asking who the hell was in my house and why had the keys been given to some stranger, and whether she knew anything about it. She listened silently, letting me vet. Then, softly and with considerable deliberation, she told me that the landlady had informed the office of her intention to send her housemaid every other day to keep the apartment clean since neither I nor Sunita were in town. I felt rather foolish but still berated the secretary for not letting me know when I was at the office earlier. She apologised but reminded me that she had been out during my short two-hour visit.
Putting the phone down I turned to go back and apologise again to the housemaid for my behaviour. She was standing in the doorway between my bedroom and the living room, holding a broom in one hand and wiping her brow with the other, using a fold of her saree. I walked towards her rather gingerly, but stopped a good ten feet away. I couldn't quite tell what her age was but I would have guessed around 30. She had on a maroon coloured blouse and a patterned pink saree. Under the hem of her saree, I saw the scalloped edge of a petticoat the same colour as her blouse.
"Tumara naam kya hai?" I asked. She whispered her reply which I couldn't hear and made a gesture with my hand cupping my ear towards her, signifying that I hadn't heard. "Anita", she said, and I smiled at her in an attempt to make her a little more comfortable. Another Anita, I thought. "Tum ghar ka safai ke liye aaye ho?" I asked, desperately trying to use what little Hindi I had mastered over the years.
Anita nodded her head and said "Jee, main naukrani hoon". I said sorry again, using the English word, and then turned around to walk out on to the terrace. "Aap kyon sorry bol rahe ho; aap ka koi galti nahin." I smiled back at her again but continued towards the plants on my terrace. It was still January and the weather was almost perfect today; cerulean blue sky, the sun radiated a comfortable warmth, and there was a touch of chill in the shade. Perfect afternoon. I got myself a beer and settled on the chaise lounge outside.
When I went back in to get another can of beer, I didn't see the maid so I assumed she had finished her work and left for the day. The rest of the afternoon went by without incident; for dinner I went out to the hotel which housed my office, and retired fairly early. The next day was a holiday for some reason, thus allowing all schools and offices a long 3-day weekend.
I had woken up early and jogged to the nearby market to grab a street breakfast of omelette and bread, along with a steaming hot glass of tea; something I did occasionally on Sundays but hadn't for some time after Sunita's arrival. I walked back home by about 8 o'clock; the winter fog was beginning to lift as the early morning sun rays penetrated through the night chill. Stripping off the sweat soaked tracksuit, I wrapped a towel around my waist while I brushed my teeth and readied for a shave in the heated bathroom.
As I rinsed my mouth and wiped it with the hand towel hanging on a rack, I heard the door bell ring. Not sure whether I should go to the door with a towel around me, I decided to ignore the summons and see whether the visitor was going to be persistent. I wasn't expecting anyone this morning, and wasn't keen to meet anybody. Splashing my face with warm water, I extracted shaving gel on to my palm and began to evenly spread it cross my stubble. With the running water now turned off, I heard the door open - it had been locked - and I immediately realised it was probably the maidservant who was cleaning the house in Sunita's absence. What was her name, again?
Anita...I remembered. I decided to ignore her and let her go about her chores. I had almost completed shaving when the bathroom door behind me opened softly and I saw Anita's face in the mirror, peering in with hesitant trepidation. As soon as she saw me, she said "maaf karna, maalik" and began to pull the door shut again. I called out to her, "Anita" but she either didn't hear me or was too embarrassed to come back in. I wasn't wearing anything other than the towel wrapped around my middle. I called again, "Anita", not sure why I was doing so.
Using the warm water to clean the remaining streaks of lather from my face, I pictured the woman and realised that she was quite beautiful in a rustic way. I wasn't sure why, but her looks were so obviously from rural India. Was I stereotyping? Probably. But I saw her as an innocent village girl working her way through the dirty urban society; uneducated and hence reduced to working as a naukrani in Delhi's elite upper class homes.
I hadn't seen her in the mirror for more than four or five seconds, but I found myself recalling the picture. It was a pretty picture. She had a dark complexion, large eyes, fairly thick eyebrows, smooth skin on her face, and a sharp noticeable jawline. On the previous afternoon during our brief encounter, I had noticed a scar on her neck and had briefly wondered what had caused it. Was it a knife cut that had healed over time? Was it just an eruption, like a boil, than had burst and then healed without medication?
This morning, she was wearing the same clothes she had on the previous day: maroon coloured blouse and a pink saree. She walked around the house barefoot, her slippers neatly placed just beside the main entrance door. Her hair was jet black; it may have been oiled but didn't look sticky or gooey. Her ears were delicate, and although half covered by hair drawn over them, small golden ear studs punctured the lobes, and an even smaller one in her nose.
I was getting mildly aroused as my mind recollected the servant's various features. Standing as I was in front of the mirror, contemplating her, I felt a gentle erection begin to push against the towel and rub against the wash basin. I stared into my eyes reflected in the mirror, then strayed across my chest and biceps, I looked at my face and the hair on my head. But I couldn't get the girl out of my inner vision. I tried to recall the swell of her breasts, firm and round, encased snugly in the tight fitting blouse. But I wasn't sure if I had actually observed her or was just adding fantasy to my feelings.
And then the door opened again. I looked into the mirror and saw her standing there, framed in the doorway, the bright lights of the bathroom illuminating her face and front; her curves cast in deep shadow. And she was staring back at me. I wondered if she could see my slight hard-on tenting the towel, but figured it wasn't in her field of vision. "Tum bahut sundar ho", I said, not knowing how or why I uttered those words. She looked bashful and bent her neck, staring at her feet silently. I watched her reflection and let my eyes wander over her body, knowing that she was not looking at me now.
Yes, her breasts were perfectly shaped behind the brownish-red colour of her blouse. I couldn't see the outline of a brassiere and assumed she wasn't wearing one. The pallu of her saree was thrown across one shoulder and the end tucked into the waist. The blouse was a short one, with barely a centimetre below the underside of her breasts. She wore her saree a little lower than Sunita so that a large swathe of midriff was visible. Smooth dark skin that I now desperately wanted to touch.