Cornucopia
Ashwin Mudigonda
As a child, Neeta wanted to pull teeth and as she grew older, against the express wishes of her family to marry and settle down, she left for the City to study the art of handling teeth, bracing them, and tunneling through their roots. She left as Neeta with her salwars, cotton saris, her long tresses oiled and plaited, and with modest leather chappals, and returned in half-blouses, chiffon saris, pointy heels, and a bob-cut, as Doctor Neeta, Dentist.
Doctor Neeta now held a dual distinction: she was not only the only dentist in town, but also the only lady doctor. She was instantly in demand, for the other doctors only paid perfunctory attention to the teeth. Neeta extracted teeth and replaced them with wisdom – don’t smoke; it’ll damage your lungs and even your mouth, don’t drink; it’ll cause liver issues. But she herself smoked Gold Flakes and poured a neat peg of blended whiskey at the end of each day.
As teeth turned into cash, Neeta grew comfortable in her white coat and the well-worn leather seat from which she consulted. While the other doctors filled their offices and waiting rooms were stuffy with old editions of Reader’s Digest, she filled hers with cheer. The walls were bright orange and filled with large (imported) posters about good oral hygiene, flossing, and other teeth-related information. Her assistant, who ushered in the patients, was a young, cheery woman who smiled often and offered her own suggestions as the patients exited the doctor’s office. ‘Take a cotton, put some clove oil, and place it over the cavity,’ she’d say or, ‘sometimes, it’s the sinuses. Make sure you do steam inhalation with a dollop of Vicks Vaporub.’
Over time, the townsfolk began going to Doctor Neeta not only for their teeth, but even their general health. For, they said, isn’t she a doctor first and dentist only second? Much to the chagrin of the other doctors, she happily wrote prescriptions for gas, itchy skin, and chest congestion. On occasion, she even performed simple surgeries in her office with the patient reclined in the dentist’s chair.
“Keep your attention on that bouquet,” she’d say before jabbing them with a local anesthetic. And she’d give them the same information in her soothing voice. “You know I go to the flower market each morning before office. And I always pick the roses myself… This will hurt a bit… There… All done!”
She’d push back on the stool with wheels to pick up her instruments before wheeling back. “The florist knows me now. Normally I get yellow or the pink rose. Open wide. Wider. Good. One time, he reached under the table and pulled out a bunch of black roses. Black? I was surprised. He said it was rare and that if I was patient – like you are! Haha! – he’d even get me a bunch of half-red half-white roses. Can you imagine? Roses with two colors? Now, you’ll feel a poke… But no pain… Good.”
She believed the black roses to be the secret of her success. Some said they were a bad omen. No, she’d scoff. She was a woman of Science and there were no gods or demons; simply happy and sad teeth that needed some attention. Yes, even the good teeth needed regular brushing and flossing and cleaning, or they’d turn sour and would have to be extracted. Still, the bouquet of black roses became her grounding rod in life, and she would gaze at it for a minute or so between patients to reset.
When she heard about the curious case of Vishwanath, Neeta was intrigued. Was this one of the many local absurdities like that one boy who claimed to cure any disease with his mere hug? Town was filled with such nutcases and their outlandish claims.
His wife, Yemuna, had just narrated to her his story.
◆◆◆
As one of the few electricians in town, Vishwanath had a steady career. He was called when breakers tripped, bulbs malfunctioned, or, of late, if people wanted to fix the bore pump in their backyards. When he was not out with his assistant, Anwar, he sat in his store tinkering with the innards of mixies, wet grinders, cassette players and other sundry that people brought to him to get repaired.
Becoming an electrician was not Vishwanath’s dream. He’d wanted to build rockets and send satellites, maybe even men, to outer space. He’d first set his sights on the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) before raising them to NASA. But on the day before his maths board exam – the most important one for one trying to prove their aptitude for lobbing rockets into space – young Vishwanath, on his way back home from his tuition class, followed his nose and ended up in the kitchen of a wedding reception.
The smell of the biryani had proved overpowering. He had sauntered into the dining hall and, carefully picking out the mutton pieces – He was a Brahmin, after all – he’d had his fill of the spiced rice. After three mounds, he’d begun to draw questioning looks from the guests and had slipped out before anyone decided to turn looks into words. Back home, a great lethargy overcame him and he settled into bed to sleep it off.
The next morning – the morning of his maths board exam – he could not be roused from his slumber. His mother shook his shoulders and slapped her head before squatting beside him and wailing in despair. The neighbors came and sat around his snoring body, whispering. Someone had asked if they should fetch a priest, and his mother threw her chappal at him.
When he woke up on the afternoon of the morning of his maths board exam, groggy and with a sticky tongue, his life had changed for good. The math and biryani tanks had spontaneously combusted on the launchpad, exploding the rocket of his dreams. Instead of gaining admission into a prestigious engineering college in the City, he enrolled in a vocational school to study electrical work.
After he had felt he had learned enough about electrical wiring, fuse repairs, insulation, soldering and so on, he opened his shop on the Main Road of the Town. He named the store Vishwanaut Space Research Organization (VSRO) at first. Then he decided that Vishwanath, the ruler of the universe, shouldn’t settle for satellites and renamed the shop VASA. Given the local business for launching rockets and fixing orbiting satellites was practically nonexistent, he later added 'We undertake electrical and electronics repair' just to make it clear that he, Vishwanath, while a competent rocket scientist, was also skilled in fixing broken wet grinders and other miscellaneous household items.
The rocket-ship painted on the rolling shutters of the shop was clumsily drawn and would never have physically left the earth’s gravity, given that its thrusters pointed sideward. Still, the sight of it taking off each day as he rolled up the shutters brought him immense joy. He would see the mixies and geysers in his hands as the complicated components of a spaceship. He would worry what he’d tell mission control if the mixie exploded mid take-off, or if the geyser’s coils induced a back current during the second stage.
A man from the City once brought him a VCR that wouldn’t turn on. A thrilled Vishwanath asked Anwar to watch as he carefully opened the Japanese model. Together, they oohed and aahed at the tiny electronic boards, LEDs, and motors. Having no idea how a VCR worked, nor the cables needed to connect it to the only TV he had lying around, he was stumped at the issue. He pressed the little red LEDs with his precision screwdriver, jiggled the capacitor and used his multimeter to measure the resistance of the resistors. It was only when he saw the frayed wire of the power cable did it occur to him that the problem was more prosaic – the cable was broken. After a quick soldering job, the machine whirred alive, displaying crisp white digits on its tiny screen. The owner of the device was overjoyed and paid him more than the twenty rupees that he had asked for. Vishwanath gave Anwar five rupees and asked him to take the day off. He spent the rest of the day in his swivel chair, gazing at the poster of a rocket hurtling through space, the whole mission powered by his VCR and his soldered power cable. All thanks to the important role of Vishwanaut.
Between doing little repair jobs, addressing bore-well issues, and home visits, his hair grew out and fell, Vishwanath’s bicycle tires got new inner tubes, he bought a modest cottage with a banana grove in the backyard. Vishwanath, too, got married to a sweet girl who, within a couple of years, turned into a harridan. Just after their marriage, Yemuna would sing upbeat songs all the time, especially when she cooked. Classically trained, she’d spend an hour each morning and evening, practicing her scales and the songs that she knew. If he came home then, he’d carefully remove his footwear and stand behind the curtain and relish it. As time went on, she started singing drearier songs in depressing ragas, until, eventually, she simply stopped singing. Like a songbird that had lost its will to sing, Yemuna’s mellifluous notes had gone dry, trapped in the wire cage of her languid marriage.
Now, childless and discontent with their life, Yemuna would nag him about his salary, their lack of a scooter, her meagre jewelry, their infrequency of going to the cinema, and other things. He could not explain they needed to be frugal because he was squirreling away money to build a rocket one day, so her demands only grew larger over time. Most recently, her eyes had fallen on the earrings her neighbor’s husband had gifted her – golden peacocks with blue gems for eyes. Vishwanath tried to placate her by saying that he was going to get full-time into installing bore wells – not just wire them. Then they would be rich enough to own a secondhand Vespa, go to the matinée once a month, and eat a full-course thali at the air-conditioned restaurant – Parasurama Mess Hall – on the Main Road. No word on the peacock-shaped ornament.
If there was ever a moment of tenderness between the couple, it was in the mornings when Yemua brought him his day’s tiffin. Still an excellent cook, Yemuna expended great efforts into making his meals. Every day, she packed his lunch in a five-box tiffin-carrier, and handed it to him as he left home. Vishwanath would stare at her as she walked towards him with the bag exploding with the aroma of her cooking. He’d pick up the carrier and sniff it before looking up at her with a smile. She’d blush, knowing that he thought of her cooking the entire time until he dove into it at lunch. He’d ask. “What’s for lunch today?”
She’d slap him coyly on his shoulder. “You just ate breakfast.”
He’d rub the tips of his finger and lick his lips and then grunt. “Ah! I have to wait till lunch to enjoy this.” He’d then kick the stand off his bicycle and cart it out of the verandah. And, just like that, the moment would fade into the warm morning as Vishwanath meditated on the redolent contents of his tiffin-carrier, and Yemuna hurried to the backyard to do the laundry and chat with her neighbor over a cup of tea and biscuits.
◆◆◆
After one such morning, Vishwanath and Anwar were on a house visit. Vishwanath, lost in thoughts of rockets and his tiffin, watched the junior electrician strip the ends of wires. “Hey, Anwar,” he said, “be careful, huh. The wires are live.”
“Brother,” Anwar said. “I know, brother! Don’t worry about me. I have three daughters. I’m not going to die anytime soon. Once we tape off these loose wires, put the switchboard back, and fix the fuse, we can leave for lunch.”
Vishwanath absently nodded, distracted by the heady aroma of spices being roasted in the kitchen. What he could not see or taste, he heard and smelled, and with that he painted the kitchen in his mind.
Anwar’s voice lowered now. “Brother?”
“Mmm?”
“Shall we go Parasurama?” And he quickly then added, “No need to eat in the AC room. We can eat in the regular room itself.”
But Vishwanath wasn’t paying him attention. His eyes were half-closed as the scents of ginger and garlic possessed him. Growing up in a strict Brahmin family, he had rarely tasted the alchemical mix of ginger, garlic, onions, spice and tomatoes. Now, it was his Achilles’ Heel. ‘Must be nonveg,’ he thought. Now, there was the distinct smell of mint followed by a healthy sizzle as water was added to the pan to transmute the lump of ingredients into a redolent sauce. ‘What sauce could the lady possibly be making,’ he wondered.
Only then did Anwar’s whispered plan register in his mind. He turned to smack Anwar on his head for demanding to go to Parasurama. In response, Anward held up the wires. Vishwanath clutched them as a reflex.
He took them in his bare hands as he stood, in a way unbecoming of a seasoned electrician or even a rocket scientist, on bare feet.
◆◆◆
“Brother? Brother?” Anwar’s voice came from beyond the mist as the Vishwanaut’s eyes slowly opened again. He had a déjà vu of sleeping though his twelfth standard maths exams all over again and woke up with a panic. This time, he wasn’t going to let his future slip away due to a biriyani-induced slumber. “I’m late,” he said, sitting up. “Exam…”
He looked around and saw Anwar’s concerned face, the man who had called them, his wife, and their two little children, clutching their mother’s nightgown and staring at him with big, curious eyes as if he were an alien lifeform.
“Are you okay, Vishwanath?” the man asked, his concern morphing into annoyance. “They said you were the best electrician in town.”
“Brother,” Anwar said, his voice stern. “He is best, okay? He fixed a VCR once. I saw it with my own two eyes.” He pinched his Adam’s apple. “Mother-promise.”
“Then why is he on the ground after receiving a shock?” the man grumbled. “And the switchboard is still not fixed.”
Vishwanath raised his hand. “It’s ok, sir. Just a mistake.” He glanced at Anwar. “He’s still a junior electrician. He will learn.”
Anwar nodded briskly. “I will.”
“VASA…what’s that? Vishwanaut Space Agency…” the man said and spat. “Thu! That time itself I knew something was wrong. You’re a Vishwa Nut!”
“Please, sir,” Vishwanath said, standing up, placing a hand against the wall for support. “I’m fine.” His stomach rumbled. “I…I’ll finish this myself and we’ll be on our way.” He waved his hands. “No charge…this time.”
The man grumbled and shepherded his family out of the room. “Make it quick. It’s almost time for my afternoon prayers.”
Vishwanath nodded. Brushing Anwar aside, he quickly got to work, and patched up the switchboard and replaced the fuse.
“Brother,” Anwar said, scratching the side of his neck in absent wonder. “No wonder you’re an electrician…”
“Ey! Electronics expert.”
“…and electronics expert, brother. I want to be quick with my fingers like you some day. Take me to Los Anjalis when you get rich.”
Vishwanath picked up his toolkit and stepped out. “Hurry, Anwar. I’m famished. I must feed.”
◆◆◆
As usual, they stopped under the sprawling banyan tree near their shop. Vishwanath hopped off his bicycle and unpacked his tiffin-carrier with the urgency of someone who had just gained access to a toilet after an agonizingly long wait. With mechanical efficiency, he unfurled the checkered napkin, unlatched the carrier, and separated the various containers. Without waiting for Anwar or washing his hands, he tore apart the chapatis, scooped up the lentils and stuffed them in his mouth.
“Brother?” Anwar said, disappointed. He placed his own two-tier carrier on the ground. “Hungry or what? I’m just about to sit.”
“Mmm?” Vishwanath glugged water before attacking the food again.
Anwar’s jaw dropped at Vishwanath’s pace. “Eat…eat a bit slowly. You’ll get hiccups.”
Then Vishwanath opened the container of sambar and drank straight from it.
“Aiyo! Brother!” Anwar exclaimed. “The rice is in the bottom dabba.”
Vishwanath grunted and waved him aside. Sambar smeared all over his shirt, he opened the fourth box and ate the rice by the fistful. In three raids, he invaded and looted the container of every grain. He opened the fifth container and slurped the yogurt and bit into the raw green chilis. He looked at Anwar who stared back at him with his mouth agape. Vishwanath’s stomach grumbled. “What did you bring?”
Anwar clutched his lunchbox protectively. “Chicken curry. Why?”
Vishwanath reached towards Anwar. “Give.”
“Brother? Aiyo! It’s meat!”
Anwar weakly protested, primarily out of confusion, as Vishwanath snatched the two-box carrier from him and snapped it open. Vishwanath’s head filled with the smell of chicken and coconut gravy. His nostrils flared as he wolfed down the tender meat before opening the second container and emptying it of rice. He drank some of the water, swished it about, and spat. “Anwar,” he said with a growl. “Sleep is coming. I’ll take a nap here. Afterwards, let’s go to that push-cart fellow for tiffin.”
Anwar sat speechless. Not only was his lunch gone, but his boss had morphed into a scary food-demon of sorts. “Vishwanath sir,” he said, his voice trembling. “I think you should go home and take rest. I’ll… I’ll go to the shop and take care of business and shut it down later.”
“Good idea,” Vishwanath said, and stood up. “I’ll see you in the store tomorrow. Lock up properly, okay?”
Anwar nodded meekly and watched his boss pedal away towards Town.
◆◆◆
That evening, Yemuna was plucking flowers from their jasmine tree when she saw him askance. “What?” she said. “Came home early?”
Vishwanath hopped off his bicycle, wheeled it inside, kicked off his chappals and clutched his stomach. “I’m famished.”
His wife walked slowly towards the house, clutching the steel bowl brimming with flowers. “Why? You didn’t eat the lunch?” Her voice turned sour. “I packed it until the brim. Sambar, chapati…”
Vishwanath raised his hand and shook his head. “Not like that. I ate. I ate everything. Fully I ate. I even ate Anwar’s lunch. And then I went to Chamath’s pushcart and ate two dozen idlis and twenty-three dosas.”
Yemuna dropped the bowl and covered her mouth in horror. “Twenty-three dosas?”
Vishwanath waved it away. “I’m still hungry. Is there something to eat?”
“No… I haven’t started cooking yet. You don’t return home until eight or so.” Yemuna hurried after him into the house. Vishwanath was already in the kitchen, rummaging through the containers. He reached for a big steel one and pried open the lid. “That’s rice flour,” Yemuna said.
He stuffed a fistful of it into his face. “Mmm…” he said before his tongue got caked. He looked like a clown with the flour smeared all over his cheeks and chin. “This is what rice flour tastes like.”
Despite the situation, Yemuna laughed. “You look silly.” But then the seriousness returned. “What’s wrong with you? Why’re you so hungry today?”
Vishwanath replaced the flour and reached for an onion in the vegetable basket. He studied it for a moment. Yemuna’s eyes widened as he took a big bite. The quiet kitchen resonated with the sharp crunch of teeth on onion. Now, a look of disgust covered Yemuna’s face. “Chi!” she said, her face in a frown. “You’ve definitely gone mad.” She tucked the end of her sari and snapped her finger. “Get out of the kitchen! Out! Go to the grove and fetch us some banana leaves,” Yemuna said. “Go! And don’t come here for half an hour at least.”
Vishwanath grabbed another onion before reluctantly scurrying out.
◆◆◆
Doctor Neeta had her reservations. Surely, no human could eat continuously the way the stories were trickling through the grapevine. Yet, here was the patient himself, sitting in front of her, chomping through the stalks of her beloved black rose bouquet like they were spent drumsticks.
“Then?” she prodded.
◆◆◆
Vishwanath appeared at the kitchen promptly thirty minutes later, carrying two large banana leaves. He burped loudly and sighed. “Is dinner done?”
Yemuna scowled and snatched the leaves. “Sit,” she said.
Vishwanath pulled up the low wooden seats and settled on one with a groan. Yemuna sat on the other, placed a leaf in front of him and a tumbler of water on top of it. She turned to fetch the pot of beaten rice that she had scrambled up in a hurry when she heard a soft ripping noise. She turned back to catch Vishwanath with a strip of the banana leaf in his mouth, looking like a content goat out in the pasture.
“Why… why are you…” She pointed to the pot with the ladle in her hand. “I was about to serve. Couldn’t you wait another second?”
He swallowed the leaf and grinned. “I’m very hungry, Yemuna.”
She slammed the pot in front of him and emptied it onto the leaf in anger. “Eat, you fiend!” she said. “Eat! Eat all this!”
Vishwanath’s eyes lit up and he reached for the food with gusto. Yemuna sat agog, staring at her husband as he inhaled the food. She was mad with rage when she had dumped it on his leaf and did not expect him to eat it all. She had expected him to apologize and transfer some of it to her leaf but watching him shovel the food at a constant clip lulled her into a faint daze.
“You’re really hungry?” she said softly.
Vishwanath looked up briefly, grunted, and went back to it. He paused and stretched his back. “I can’t explain it,” he said, omitting the electric shock he had gotten just before lunch. He didn’t see the need to bring that up now. It had been Anwar’s fault, and that was that. “I ate your lunch, and it was so good, but I couldn’t stop after that.” Having spoken too much he resumed eating. “This is good.” He pointed at the mound of beaten rice with his finger. “Very good,” he said, his mouth brimming.
Yemuna watched him eat with such a childish glee that for a moment she forgot that her husband had morphed from a thirty-something, balding, mildly obese, bicycle-riding man into an innocent child, totally surrendering to a simple meal and relishing every mouthful. A lot of thoughts cycled through her, but they all circled around one thought that had appeared seemingly from nowhere. The neighbor’s earrings. How strange. Yemuna remembered how they danced under the ears and wished that she, too, possessed them. No, not just earrings. She wanted more. A necklace! A peacock-shaped ornament to wrap around her neck and display multicolored gems on its head feathers. Eyes of diamond, and a graceful neck was lapis. She’d wear it and step out for her chores when her neighbor would spot her and exclaim, “Arré! Yemuna! From where you got that beautiful necklace? Is it real diamond? And real lapis? Can I see it?” And Yemuna would smile radiantly and politely decline the request, for had the other not also declined to hand her the earrings?
Her reverie was interrupted with crunching sounds. Vishwanath swallowed the last of the banana leaf, the strands vanishing into his mouth. he slapped her forehead. “You ate the leaf again? What has come over you?”
Vishwanath stood up and stretched again. His eyes were leaden and droopy. “I must sleep now. So… tired.”
“Wash your hands at least…”
He licked his fingers, wiped them on the back of his shirt, and shuffled towards bed, unable to stay awake anymore.
When Vishwanath woke up the next morning, he felt woozy. He searched for Yemuna and when he could not locate her next to him, sat up in the bed and slowly opened his eyes. He shook the cobwebs off his mind and stumbled out. The previous day felt like a dream. He wondered, as he squatted next to the plastic bucket and poured mugfuls of water over himself, if he had really eaten all that food. Toweling himself he stepped out.
He heard Yemuna singing from the kitchen and grinned. Hearing her sing again now gladdened Vishwanath. He combed what remained of his hair, checked himself assiduously in the mirror, and entered the kitchen. Yemuna spun around and rushed towards him. She hugged him tightly and placed her head on his shoulder. Caught off guard, Vishwanath raised his hands as if he were being frisked.
“Arré!” he said. “What’s this? What has happened?”
She mumbled into his shoulder.
“What?” he said. He gently pushed her away from him. “What did you… wait! Where did you get that?” He pointed to the exquisite necklace that hung around her neck. It was a gold chain with a peacock pendant. It had emerald eyes and a lapis body. Its ornate tail feathers were made of gold, flecked with glinting rubies and diamonds.
Yemuna hugged him again. “All that acting yesterday of being tired,” she said coyly. “And you didn’t even tell me you had gotten this. You simply placed it beside me after I had gone to sleep.” She ignored that fact that the entire banana grove had been razed to the ground at a speed that would put a locust swarm to shame.
“But…” Vishwanath sputtered. “But I didn’t. I couldn’t…”
Yemuna gently beat his chest. “Stop acting.” She gently caressed the pendant. “The neighbor is going to be so jealous when I show her this. She thought her earrings were some big deal. Hmph!” She leaned forward and kissed his cheek. “I made your favorite – ladies-finger sambar, fried yams, and fresh mango pickle laced with powdered lentils. The yogurt is fermented and just as sour as you like it.”
“Yemuna, listen,” Vishwanath said, scared that his wife had gone thieving and was trying to blame it on him. “Where did you get that?”
Yemuna’s frowned. “Why do you keep asking that? You only left it next to me last night.”
Vishwanath shook his head. “I didn’t.”
“And it was exactly what I had in mind. I didn’t even tell you.” She smiled now. “You just knew what I had in mind.”
“But I didn’t,” he repeated. “All I wanted was to eat and then sleep.”
“Which you did,” she said and clapped. “Like a monster you ate." Even the banana leaves were finished.”
“Well,” he said. “I mean, yes. I was hungry. But this necklace… I can’t explain it.” He picked up the tiffin-carrier and walked out of the kitchen.
“Wait,” Yemuna said. “Don’t you want to eat breakfast?”
Vishwanath was already on his bicycle. “I think I ate enough yesterday.”
◆◆◆
He pedaled to his shop, his mind kneading and folded the events, unable to form a cohesive dough of an explanation. From afar he noticed that the rocket on the rolling shutter had already launched for the day. As Vishwanath parked his bicycle, Anwar shot out of the store and fell at his feet. “Vishwanath sir,” he yelled, his voice croaking. “I owe my life to you.”
Vishwanath jumped back. “What’s this? Stand up, Anwar.” He glanced around. People stared at them. “People are looking, Anwar,” he growled. “Stand up!”
Still prostrated, Anwar yelled. “You’re a saint, a pir. You’ve granted my one wish and for that I’m eternally grateful.”
Vishwanath reached down and grabbed Anwar by his shirt and forced him to stand up. He walked him into the store. “What happened now?”
“Vishwanath sir,” he started and was about to dive for the other’s feet when his boss caught him.
“Tell properly first,” Vishwanath said. “Then you can touch my feet.” He wasn’t used to this kind of adoration from people around him.
“Yesterday,” Anwar said, his eyes glazed, “after you ate… No, no, after I offered my lunch to you…”
Vishwanath scratched the back of his neck. “Ah yes! That… I’m sorry about…”
“Aiyo!” Anwar exclaimed and collapsed. “Sir, what happened was as I watched you eat, I was thinking how much I’d have to spend for a meal. Sorry, sir. I wasn’t angry with you or anything. I was just hungry, and I didn’t have any money. And you had finished my chicken curry. So, I thought it would be nice if I had the winning lottery ticket in my pocket.”
“Lottery-aa?”
Anwar nodded. “Lottery. Then I could eat lunch. Maybe even go to Parasurama Mess.”
“And?”
“And what, sir? When I got home, I found a lottery ticket in my pocket.”
“And?”
“And what? I won the lottery!” He screamed and hugged Vishwanath tightly, his breath smelling of onions.
Vishwanath pushed him back. “How much did you win?”
Anwar grinned. He reached into his pocket and fished out a hundred rupee note. “Sir, I know you’ve been saying I want to go to Los Anjali…”
“Los Angeles.”
“Anjalis.” He placed the note in Vishwanath’s hands and carefully folded his fingers around it. “This is my gift to you, sir. Take this and see the world.”
Vishwanath looked at the note in puzzlement and then at his assistant. “Where are you going?”
“Sir, I don’t need to work anymore. Ever again.” He saluted and turned to leave. “All thanks to you.”
◆◆◆
Doctor Neeta studied him carefully. For the quantities of food his wife claimed Vishwanath was eating, he didn’t look obese. Her training kicked in and she began to notice things. His jaws moved in neat circular motions like a cow. He chewed each mouthful of the black roses before swallowing it. He had a distant stare, also like a cow.
Yemuna sat next to him, holding his hand. She had narrated the episodes of the past few weeks to Neeta. After the news spread through the Town that Vishwanath, the proprietor of VASA, had acquired magical powers to bestow whatever item a person had in mind as they offered him food, people lined up outside their house with baskets of food. At first, Yemuna was repulsed and rejected them outright by slamming the door and asking them to go away.
Then, Yemuna called the police inspector who promised her that the crowd would be kept in control, in exchange for an audience with the wish-granter. She relented and the inspector brought a busload of constables for crowd control and a jeepful of parcels from Parasurama Mess. Vishwanath diligently ate all the food and the leaves and strings it was packed in, but was not satisfied. Mortified, the inspector drove back to the market and returned with baskets of the freshest vegetables and fruits. Vishwanath vacuumed them up too before repeating that he was not satiated. Confused, and now low on his budget, the inspector descended onto a marriage function and commandeered the kitchen. It was only after Vishwanath had eaten the last grain from an enormous cauldron of cooked rice that he leaned back and said he was sleepy. The inspector inspected his pocket, and when he noticed that the item of his desire had formed there, he was ecstatic.
Days later, the Collector of the District approached Vishwanath. The Collector, a very educated man with a clean-shaven face and a pencil mustache who would refuse explicit bribes, preferring them in a suitcase abandoned on his doorstep in the dead of night. He requested that Vishwanath consider putting his newfound powers to the good of the community. This honest-in-the-sun Collector cleared his throat and explained the Town’s sewage treatment facility was not performing at its best because of the decades of accumulated muck. And since Vishwanath had two specific powers – one, to consume vast quantities of material without two, tasting what he was eating – could he consider helping out the Town by, umm, accompanying him (in an air-conditioned Ambassador car) to the sewage treatment plant and, umm, ‘consuming’ all the detritus so that a new plant wouldn’t be necessary (and the money for it could be ‘donated’ outside his doorstep instead)? Yemuna was livid, but the Collector promised them a plot of land – two good acres just outside Town. She paused and considered the offer for a while, before acquiescing.
But the plan backfired. When Vishwanath got out of the air-conditioned Ambassador at the sewage treatment plant, he gagged and retched. Though the Collector had his heart set on the sacks of money that would appear that night, he’d had no wish in his heart when he was offering Vishwanath the “food”. Vishwanath turned to the Collector and apologized that he could not do the deed. At this, the pencil-mustachioed man lit up and had his goons thrash the electrician. Yemuna decided then that she’d have to take her husband to a doctor.
The first two doctors proved to be useless. They ordered blood tests, placed their stethoscopes on his chest, peered into his ears and down his throat, tapped him with tiny mallets, and pinched their chins and studied the reports. They could not find anything wrong with him, besides some mild gas problems for which they prescribed Gelucil, which Vishwanath promptly ate, including the aluminium packages in which they came in.
◆◆◆
Yemuna stared at the last inch of the rose stalks disappearing into Vishwanath’s mouth before sheepishly looking at Doctor Neeta. She shrugged. “He can’t control himself.”
“I understand,” Neeta said, raising her hands. She leaned back in her leather chair and adjusted her whitecoat and rearranged the stethoscope around her neck. “He looks healthy to me. His vitals are normal. So, tell me the sequence again before this grazing explodes into a feeding frenzy?”
Yemuna sighed. “He’s always nibbling at whatever is around him.” She glanced at Vishwanath who was forlornly staring at a giant colorful poster about a tooth. It showed the cross-section of a molar with the various parts of it neatly labeled.
“Please don’t eat that,” Neeta said. “It’s from Canada.”
Yemuna clasped Vishwanath’s hand and patted it gently. “When someone approaches him with a strong wish in their mind and offers him any food, then his appetite revs up. He starts devouring the food and won’t stop for hours. At some point, he will abruptly stop eating and then, typically, the object of desire is produced.”
“Interesting,” Neeta said, scribbling down notes in her prescription pad. This was easily a special case and worthy of a publication. Doctors abroad, and even in the City, were always finding curious cases like this and publishing it in the annals of medicine. Some got to name obscure diseases after themselves. Parkinson’s disease. Ewing’s tumor. Perhaps, she could study Vishwanath and call it the Neeta Disease. No, that sounded like a skin rash. She would have to produce a better name. Neeting Disorder, perhaps?
“And…does he…what’s his diet? Breakfast, lunch…dinner?”
“He eats all those meals and a dozen between. But it’s just light stuff like leaves, banana peels, scraps.”
Vishwanath laughed. “I guess we don’t have a rubbish issue in our house anymore. I eat all of it. Even the previous day’s newspaper.”
Yemuna rolled her eyes.
“Right,” Neeta said, and jotted down her thoughts. She studied him carefully and noticed his hand-painted NASA tee-shirt and smiled. How cruel it was that they both had dreams but ended up compromising as a doctor and an electrician in the small Town. And how strange that their fates were connected – she dealt with all aspects of the mouth, which is where the act of eating began, and all he wanted to do was to eat.
“Does it always have to be an object?” Neeta asked. “That is: must the person want a physical object?” She realized she herself could ask for so many things. A new refrigerator, a brand-new Kanchipuram silk sari, maybe even one of those VCR things she kept hearing about. No, no, no. She was thinking small. A stay in the five-star hotel in the City. No, she was not thinking big and that was not an object. No, something else. A ride in an aeroplane. Yes, she could want that. Ask for a flight ticket. She had stood outside her office, and when no one was watching, lit up a cigarette, and stared at the sky. The occasional jet plane zippering the sky with its contrails always caught her fascination. What would it be like to be sitting inside one, sipping on juice and looking at the world whizzing by underneath? And what would it be like on the other end of the journey? She could ask to fly to Paris or New York. Her thoughts buoyed, but she looked at her patient, and they parachuted back to terra firma.
Vishwanath sat on the stool like a sorry animal, nibbling on a brochure for dentures as he vacantly stared at her. She watched the picture of an elder woman’s whitewashed smile slowly disappear into his mouth. She looked at Yemuna, who gazed back at her with concern. This was a broken astronaut and his distraught wife. His power didn’t make them happy one bit. This, Doctor Neeta was sure of. And she had taken an oath to relieve her patients of their physical ailments to the best extent that she could.
“Would you like some snacks?” Doctor Neeta said, wishing that Vishwanath was cured of his superpower.
Ashwin Mudigonda is an Oakland-based novelist who dabbles with robots during the day. His first collection of short stories - Pleasant Days - was well-received in India. His most recent novel - The Tantric Exorcist - is a supernatural possession thriller set in Chennai and draws from the ancient Tantric traditions. When he's not writing, Ashwin is a street portrait photographer and is working towards a show of his pictures