Who Will Catch Us As We Fall Read online

  Pooja Kohli stands in her sun-soaked living room and watches a bee settle on the white hibiscus tree under which Kidha, the gardener, crouches in his overalls, pulling weeds from the grass. The sleeves of his uniform have been deliberately shorn off, revealing ball-like muscles which stretch and compress in compliance with his movements. Luna, the family’s German shepherd, sniffs around his sandaled feet, her heavy tail thwacking Kidha’s thighs as she buries her face in his chest with a delighted whimper. He pauses. Strokes her just-washed fur.

  There is a voice behind her. ‘They should be here soon.’

  ‘Does the rock garden look dead to you?’ She doesn’t turn around as her husband puts his arms around her and rests his chin on her head.

  ‘You told Kidha to water it just yesterday.’

  She holds onto Raj’s forearms, so wide that her ringed fingers span only a part of them. ‘She’s angry with us.’

  ‘It’ll be okay,’ he says and she wonders why she always believes him.

  Kidha is trimming the impressive bougainvillea tree, a bright magenta bush that has outgrown the clay pot Pooja planted it in, causing small fissures to run out like mean, little rivers – traveling so deep that they’ve broken off a piece of the urn. It has been sitting sadly on the water drain for days now and she must remind Kidha to fix it before the whole thing comes apart.

  Staring out, she wonders how big a part she had to play in her daughter’s childishness, her seemingly stubborn refusal to grow up fully. Pooja also knows that there are other reasons. Certain events can stunt growth, especially at crucial points in one’s development. She had read it in a recently purchased book from Text Book Center; plucked it from one of the shelves entitled ‘Self-Help’ and hidden it under her cardigan as she sped to the cashier. It had been risky to go to Sarit Center, the main shopping mall in Westlands, where she was bound to run into someone she knew and she had left without waiting for her change. We live in the past because we are afraid of our future. Trauma and Recovery – the first title she had spotted.

  A few days later, she had walked in on Jai in her room, holding the book and shaking his head at her.

  ‘Don’t look at your mother that way.’

  ‘Better hide it before she comes home, Ma.’

  She had fussed with her pillow. ‘Well, if you weren’t so busy-busy and taught me how to use the Google, I could just erase the history.’

  And he had put the book down and come to hug her – ‘It’s Google, Ma, not “the” Google and it’s going to be okay,’ sounding exactly like his father.

  Now, leaning against the pristinely polished Yamaha piano in which she can see a vague and shimmering reflection of herself, they hear the grumble of their son’s car, almost three hours since he left that morning. Pooja knocks on the glass door to catch Kidha’s attention. When he doesn’t turn around, she slides it open to shout.

  ‘Kidha! Gate!’

  He drops the garden shears and clicks his tongue at Luna. Pooja watches as the two of them trot around the garden to the front of the house.

  Her husband’s soft laughter tickles her earlobe. He kisses her cheek in a rare display of affection. Taps her lightly on the backside. Says in his best Amitabh Bachchan voice, ‘It’s show time, baby.’

  They are the first thing she sees, full of impatient excitement, holding up a hastily drawn WELCOME HOME LEENA banner, and her chest tightens.

  ‘Come here, don’t stroll!’ Her mother is reaching out in a hug. ‘I can’t wait to get my arms around you.’

  When Pooja embraces her, Leena doesn’t cry or sigh with relief the way she hoped she would. Her mother’s arms have always been a source of great comfort, the kind that soothed and placated all of Leena’s childhood demons, but today they are not enough. They cannot subdue the growing, panicked resentment hardening her gut, the longing she feels for another place. If anything, they intensify it. Leena thinks of her small, boxy apartment on the Edgware Road, tucked within its own Middle Eastern pocket of London, the twenty-four-hour kebab shops, shisha cafés and Arabic-themed nightclubs. She used to marvel at the busyness of it all, especially in the summertime when there would be people packed tightly on every patio, leaning against street walls and spending their time appeasing a temperamental sun.

  She would go for lone walks in the height of the season, spending the extended hours exploring every part of the city, unhindered. Never once did she glance over her shoulder or feel the prick of suspicious sweat forming in the cusps of her armpits at the thought of walking down side streets alone. She moved faster, lighter over there as the color of her skin became less meaningful.

  One time, she was conned by a dreadlocked Caucasian who had followed her to an ATM and told her that he had lost his house keys and left his wallet at his apartment; that he needed money to get to a friend’s house. So different from the Europeans back home, who stuck out like shiny gods in her mind, and she had given him ten pounds, slightly bewildered but unafraid. He had been lacking the anger – the desperation – that made the thieves back home so much more dangerous. While this man on Edgware Road had been polite, courteous almost as he carried out his con, smiling and thanking her as he backed down the street, the men she held in her memory were much greedier, wanting something more than just money, seeking revenge for unknown, unspoken betrayals.

  Pooja feels her daughter’s back and arms clench up and she lets go, afraid of smothering her with desperate hope. She looks to her husband for help. He cups his daughter’s cheek in his large palm and feels her inhale against it: the faint scent of tobacco and spices. It is dry and comforting and reminds her of a simpler time.

  ‘You still haven’t quit smoking.’

  ‘I didn’t have my Leena here to boss me around,’ he teases.

  Pooja rolls her eyes and pokes her husband with her elbow. ‘Maybe he’ll listen to you, now that he’s tired of me.’

  They are being overly nice, awkwardly careful around each other as one would to a distant relative, trying to make up for time’s eroding effect on their relationships. Pooja ushers her daughter into the house.

  ‘Why don’t we have some breakfast? You must be hungry.’

  The marble tiles are cold under Leena’s feet – she has slid off her shoes, released her swollen toes. The curtains are drawn and block out the morning heat, making her shiver pleasantly.

  After the incident four years ago, she had kept them open for days, had been comforted by the expansive view of the garden and gate it had allowed her. Even at night, the outside lights had been kept on at her insistence, bathing the house in a cheap, citron glow so that everyone except for herself had had trouble sleeping. ‘You just never know what sorts of things fill the darkness,’ she had said to her family, feeling far away from them for the first time. Now, that sense of isolation is no longer strange to her.

  From the corner of her eye, she sees her parents glance at each other and she steps away from the window, sighing in annoyance. ‘You know that I’m okay, right?’

  ‘Yes, we know.’

  ‘So please, no tiptoeing. It makes everything worse.’

  ‘You must be tired,’ Pooja says. ‘Why don’t you go and freshen up? Come down whenever you’re ready, I’m here all day.’

  Leena walks up the winding staircase, the laminate wood slippery under her feet, craning her neck back to see the three of them standing at the bottom, side by side. She wonders if they feel guilty for being relieved, watching her go.

  ‌

  3

  Raj Kohli, or Mzee Kohli as he is known by his employees at Artisan Furniture Wholesalers Inc., the furniture store he owns, sits on the cold ceramic toilet and lights up a cigarette. His wife has forbidden him to smoke anywhere else in the house, thinking that this will serve as a deterrent, but he enjoys the solitude.

  There is a long window to his right, the sill extending downward to the toilet and he leaves it open, exhaling curls of smoke into the rose bushes below. Ever since he has been relegated to th
e downstairs bathroom, those flowers have been in constant bloom – playful pinks and yellows with a smell that encompasses every other beautiful smell.

  He spreads the Daily Nation on his lap and leans back, careful to avoid the poking edge of the flush lever. He shifts and settles, trying to locate the exact flat spot of the seat before starting to read, flipping over to the back page first.

  In the past month, the sports section has shrunk significantly with the election news taking precedence, but he is glad to see that they haven’t scrapped it altogether. He skims over the football – Bunch of babies – flies through the recent and expected victory of the Kenyan rugby team – Drunk hooligans – dives straight for the cricket. Fine gentlemen.

  He frowns when he sees that his team has experienced another embarrassing loss in two months of successive losses. Caught out for ninety-eight runs! Travesty! And to Canada – Ha! he cries, shaking the paper. Canada of all countries, full of toothless rednecks who smack and fight and skate, devoid of the finesse that is the foundation of his beloved sport. Raj Kohli experiences a rare burst of nostalgia, thinking back to a time when he had been a crucial member of the Kenyan cricket team – one of only two Indians – an all-rounder, opening batsman and spinner. Back then it had been about sportsmanship, teamwork and passion, focusing on making your country proud; none of this desiring after celebrity status, fighting like dogs over who deserved the highest salary. He is upset to find that corruption and match fixing have finally sneaked a chokehold around his most cherished memory. Idiots! he exclaims to himself. A bunch of chubby idiots running this country, ruining everything. As if to prove a point, he turns to the front of the paper and lands on an article. Ah! he says to no one and everyone, jabbing his finger at the page. Ah!

  ELECTORAL MISCONDUCT, the headline reads and he clucks his tongue. Who would have thought otherwise? He lets his eyes roam.

  The campaign period has begun and already it is marked by increased cases of violence targeting female candidates. The attacks, aimed at instilling fear and intimidating the candidates and their supporters, have been condemned both locally and internationally but no arrests have been made.

  Of course not, scoffs Raj and continues reading.

  Campaigns of widespread election irregularities, including the sale of voter identification cards, voter relocation and the use of state machinery in campaigns, are now staining what most Kenyans have been hoping will be a peaceful and fair pre-election period. The Kenya National Human Rights Commission released details earlier of certain instances in which state resources were used to conduct party business. Although authorities have launched investigations into such corrupt activities, the investigations have not resulted in any official reporting or prosecutions and have been tacitly accepted by the ECK and the government.

  Raj pauses to look out of the window. Luna is hunting in the daisies for a lizard, head down sniffing, her tail cutting through his wife’s strategically placed flowers. He thinks of what a magnificent country this is. Where else can you get sunny weather all year round? In what other city can you go on a safari just forty minutes from your house? To be surrounded by unspoiled ground, you were reminded of the world – you could never lose your sense of humanity here, your respect for Mother Nature and God.

  He also has everything he needs for his business: an open, willing market, cheap – albeit regularly dishonest – labor, and customers with money coming out of their ears. If only, he thinks, looking down at the newspaper with a shaking head. If only.

  In the early seventies, the Kenyan East-Indian community was thrown into turmoil following Idi Amin’s order for the expulsion of all Asians from Uganda, giving them just ninety days to pack up whatever they could and leave. The crisis had swept into the adjoining East African countries such as Kenya and Tanzania and, although they weren’t under any direct political threat, many Asians began to flee these countries as well in search of protection under Her Majesty’s Crown, either in England or Canada. This included his mother, sister, cousins and countless friends. But Raj had kept his heels in the fertile, red Kenyan soil and refused to go with them.

  ‘This is my home,’ he had told them. ‘My family is here, our business that we built from the ground up is here. I’ll be damned if I let some greedy politician take it over.’

  They had cajoled, manipulated and finally begged but he had ignored them.

  ‘I have as much a right to be here as anyone,’ he had insisted over and over again and they had put it down to the infamous Kohli pride and left him. He had been full of blind, patriotic trust in his country and the new government, heady off the numerous possibilities of their recently acquired independence. They would achieve greatness, he had been sure of it. With the right amount of dedication and the correct assignment of leadership, Kenya would thrive and his sacrifices would be richly rewarded by the knowledge that he had been a part of that process.

  But now, his certainty is beginning to wane. He thinks of the generation that came after him – ruined by an incredible ease of life and blinded by greed, lavish parties and too much drink. Spending, spending, spending – using the country as a money-well and nothing more. Boys who have grown more reckless in their adulthood than they were in their youth.

  He’d made sure that didn’t happen to his son. Had caught a whiff of something special in him early on and grabbed a hold of it. Raj was too old for fighting now – he had a family to think about, but Jai didn’t.

  ‘Countries aren’t built on ideas, son,’ he had told Jai. ‘They come from action – the actions of strong men such as yourself.’ He had taken the book from his son’s hands and said, ‘You think something is amiss? Go and fix it. What good does it do, memorizing a text book and talking to me about it?’

  Three days before Jai was to start his managerial position at Artisan Furnitures, he had told his father that he had accepted a job with PeaceNet Kenya. Despite his wife’s pleading looks, her toe kicks, forceful coming from someone so delicate, Mzee Kohli had bobbed his head with pride, pumped his closed fist in the air and said, ‘Go and build yourself a country.’

  In bed that night, he had soothed his crying wife. ‘Those ideas, that boy’s head,’ she said, ‘it’s going to get him killed one day.’

  And Raj had rolled his eyes and hugged her close, patted her back. It’s okay, it’s okay, putting it down to nothing more than a mother’s worry and a woman’s tendency to over-exaggerate.

  He looks at the picture of Pio Gama Pinto which, like him, has been forcibly removed from the living room and placed in isolation in the guest bathroom. He searches the face of the man in the picture and is once again satisfied that he made the correct decision when it came to his future and his son’s.

  But Leena’s. He sighs, taps the bottom of the cigarette packet until one shakes loose. Cups a wide palm around its tip and lights it, leaning back to inhale. He is beginning to question his decision to have her come back, at least right now.

  As is the case every five years, most of his friends have taken their families abroad to avoid the possible messy outcome of a rigged election. Better to stay safe, they all reasoned. Business will still be here when we get back.

  ‘Maybe we should go and visit your mother,’ Pooja had suggested. ‘Now is as good a time as any. And then we can bring Leena back with us.’

  Raj had shaken his head. ‘What kind of Kenyan would I be if I left now? I still have to cast my vote.’ And so he had bought his daughter a plane ticket and ordered her home.

  He sees his wife outside, shooing away the dog and instructing Kidha about some or other overgrown tree and he can’t help but smile. Thinks that she is still as lovely and bossy as the day he married her. But Leena. He sighs. Too emotional. Too fragile and broken now. He turns to the mirror, is met with a strong face partially covered by a well-maintained salt-and-pepper beard. Unable to hide from himself, he throws away the cigarette and worries about his daughter.

  ‌

  4

  Grac
e walks silently into the living room, the silver-plated tray completely still in her hands despite it being overloaded with a full teapot, three sets of cups and five different kinds of House of Manji biscuits. The chocolate-layered ones are her favorite and she’d slipped one into the pocket of her apron before bringing it out to the Kohlis.

  Draped across the sectional couch with her small feet in her husband’s lap, Pooja gestures for Grace to place the tray on the table. Jai stands to take it from her and Grace blushes. He is good looking for a muhindi boy. Big and strong, more like an African.

  ‘What shall I make for dinner?’ she asks Pooja.

  ‘What’s in the freezer? I bought some meat last week.’

  ‘Chicken, beef, mince.’ Grace turns her eyes upward, searching the mental image she has of the fridge. Scratches her head, hot beneath her scarf; pounds it slightly.

  ‘We had chicken last night. How about spaghetti?’

  ‘Don’t feel like anything so heavy.’ Raj pats his stomach. ‘I’ve had too many karogas this week.’

  Pooja stifles a snap. She has never liked the fact that Raj goes to these outdoor meals with his friends, hiring out a table at the back of the restaurant, all the men gathered around huge silver pots on coal stoves, their faces steaming from the chicken masalas and fish tikkas, and drinking bottles of whiskey until midnight or sometimes later. ‘If you stayed at home with your family instead of gallivanting with your drinking buddies…’ she reprimands him as Grace waits at the edge of the carpet, wondering what it feels like to have so many choices. Too confusing.

  ‘There’s fish.’ She offers help. ‘Teelapia.’ Before she had come to work for the Kohlis, she hadn’t known that there were so many different kinds of fish. Teelapia. Red Snapper. Toona.

  Pooja nods. ‘I think Leena still likes fish.’

  Grace grunts her acknowledgment, desperate to get out of the room and rip off her scarf; the new girl at the salon had tied the braids too tight. When Pooja waves her away, Grace tiptoe-flies out in the direction of the garden. Kidha is there. She might go and share her biscuit with him.