Mother, at 40, I live with my 3 monkeys that call me Mamma and my in laws (grandmother, grandfather and father of my monkeys) in a house having a reasonably well known and coveted address in Calcutta.
We have a 24 hour house help aged about 26-27 who helps me with everything I need
This is the story of a Sunday.
One Sunday.
One bloody Sunday.
Am breaking the chronology here but I don't want to miss out on my memories if I write this a few months from now.
Sundays I keep exclusively for myself, almost right after I came to stay here in this house.
My home runs on my planning now and since I take pains to see that everyone's needs get priority over mine, no one generally asks me for anything on a Sunday and am free to do whatever I like to with my time.
Some Sundays I just relax as long as I can, enjoying my two bed teas, four to five cigarettes and breakfast between my naps, spending another sleepy hour with my massage girl, picking up a book, fiddling with the to remote, spend an hour in the bath tub and in general doing nothing but forgetting my daily world, fully.
Other Sundays, I drive to the local grocery supermarket to order whatever I need for the month and ask home delivery or go to Gariahat market to choose and buy whatever vegetables, meat and fish we need for the week.
This was a one Gariahat market Sunday, few weeks back.
I had, not sure why, dressed a bit more than usual that day, wearing a random printed black brown red yellow green on white base very low gsm crepe sari over a low cut yellow sleeveless blouse. I decided, undecided and finally chose not to wear bra or panties but since the sari had every chance to fall off from the shoulder, I rounded it over my back and tucked it in my petticoat, to avoid the possibility of being an undesired eye candy, should the sari slip.
I just added 6 pieces of gold bangles to my 24 hour wear sankha(**) (white bangle made of conch shells) and pola(**) ( red bangle made of coral), loha (iron bangle), dark Brown Matt lipstick, diamond nose and ear pins and my mangalsutra(gold and black bead necklace with gold locket worn by married Indian women) dangling in front, kohl in eyes, tiny brown bindi (coloured dot on forehead), a fine width cm of sindur(vermillion - red powder worn by married women in India) in the hair parting and I was ready.
I had finished my fish meat routine, leaving my shopping bag and was checking the fare offered by vegetable market vendors when I suddenly noticed him.
Ramenkaku (Ramen Uncle) is someone whom I met in that very market about 8 or 9 years ago. He was a tall, fair handsome man of about 45 then, always in white kurta pajama, leisurely doing his shopping and during one of those days, taught me how to choose the best fish and meat. He lived just behind the market in one of those old buildings with his wife and two children. His children since then have completed their studies and shifted out of town to their workplace and his wife passed away suddenly about six months ago. Since then, he lived alone in his home, tending to his business, more as a means to pass time than anything else.
Every time we met, he used to carry my bag to my car and then we used to stand in a small tea stall and chit chat over nothings. A few days, he had taken me to his home and we had tea there and I relaxed there for a few minutes and then came back home.
That day, when I looked at him from a distance and smiled, he did not smile back but winced. I gathered that something was wrong and rushed near him and asked "Ki hoyeche kaku (what happened uncle)?"
He didn't reply but just used his right hand to hold me on the open skin between my breasts and waist and just pointed towards his home.
I took the bag from his hand and we slowly started walking towards his home. While walking, I felt his fingers sometimes touching my breasts for a few seconds but I ignored that. I was sure he was not purposely feeling my breasts and it was unintentional.
We slowly reached his home, opened the lock and walked to the drawing room where I made him sit on the sofa and found him quite distraught and shivering and brought him a glass of water from his kitchen. He slowly drank half the water and I stood waiting in that bent position to take the glass back. But while handing over the glass back to me, he inadvertently missed my hand with his shaking hands and the water spilled on my sari.