Schizophrenic

That had to be the longest day in the world! Twelve hours of sitting in a cubicle could really make one claustrophobic, and to top it all, today they were asked to work a double shift! Anyhow, that was over, and she was back home. Now all she had to do was get dressed in time for the Navratri puja. Fortunately mama had already laid her clothes out, so she’d just have to wash up and get ready. Today had been excruciating, and all she wanted to do was come home and crash, but it just wasn’t possible. ‘Mama-Papa, Dadu, Dadi ko bura lagegaa’.

Sandra checked her cell-phone one last time to see if there were any calls from home. No—good! Ok, so it was time to get to work. Usually when asked what her work was like, she would say-“Oh, yeah, I was born to do this. Making phone-calls all day, which girl wouldn’t love this job!” Maybe it sounded a little sexist but hey, she was a woman, and she wasn’t complaining about the advantages that came with her sex. Her job entailed calling people who hadn’t paid their deposits on loans for car-purchases taken from a multinational investment firm in Atlanta.

It could be tough, Sandra sometimes felt like an agony aunt who really was more of a turncoat. But there were perks of the job. She got to hear some incredibly sexy voices; flirt a little, and well---that was it. Not that it could go any further anyway.

Parvati was worried. ‘Meri Shruti ko kya ho gaya hai?’ She seemed tired all the time; maybe it was that new job. At least it was better than modeling. She understood her daughter’s need for independence; after all, didn’t she get a thrill each time she made a new deal for the company during Om’s convalescence? Fortunately, that had been for a short period of time, else, how would she explain to the family any decision to stick around handling Om’s affairs once he got better? But it was good---yup, definitely better than sitting at home making rotis on the tawa. All the same, she wondered why Shruti couldn’t concentrate on revamping the office instead of working around strange men. Maybe a course in interior design wouldn’t do her any harm. She decided to talk to her daughter about this.

The first call was one big mess. It did make her feel bad, having to tell someone to pay up even as they cried over the phone, speaking of having only two cans of soup at home, and no more food, yes, it was sad, but why buy a big sedan when you can’t afford it? Sandra leaned over to Arnold, seated next to her. “Hey, wanna go for a smoke?” “Sure”. She took a drag. Ahh…bliss! It was something she started only after joining work, but lately things just seemed so stressful, what with listening to endless sob-stories, her family’s constant badgering to ‘settle down’ and this recent fear of a BPO backlash. But no, they couldn’t take her job away!

She had heard of similar units that had shut down, but these hours in her over-worked under-paid life helped keep her going. Another call to make. A man’s voice. Hmm…deep, strong, my kinda guy! “So, Steve, you promise to pay up?…yes, I see, a mistake…6 month hiking trip across the Andes? Of course I can write that down…me? Hispanic?…I’m sure they must have been beautiful, but I’m not Hispanic…where am I from? Lets call it the mysterious Orient…thank you, yeah, I have been told its quite husky…Me at a vantage position? Coz I have your number and you don’t have mine?…You’d like to make it an even trade?…Give you a call sometime? Well, maybe I will and maybe I wont…Alright, so I will make a note of the payment soon…yea, thanks, and you too…bye”. Ok, this was fun, but yeah right; like she’d ever give her number away, and like he’d ever call back!

After what seemed like hours perfecting her look, Shruti was ready. Her first office party! And mama and papa had that said she could go since the office cab was coming to pick her up, and would drop her back later. She had decided on wearing a peach camisole , but the look on mama’s face definitely said-don’t even think about it! Ok, so a peach kurta on top helped stepping out of home easier, and who knew, if the night would turn out well, well, then at least she did have the element of choice in her outfit! She knew she wouldn’t really do anything, especially after that Australian modeling fiasco! She was just glad she was back home, and had earned back the trust of her family.

But why was there this nagging feeling of being caged all the time? Why was there this unwritten rule that said she had almost no action in the events ruling her life? She always had to think about Dadu, or Papa, or some other person, but if she spent all her time concentrating on their happiness when would she make Shruti happy? Or was she just being selfish? ‘Yea, that is it. My family knows what’s right for me. After all, am I not working today, in spite of the stupid modeling incident in Australia? ’ Her family knew what was best for her. They had, albeit reluctantly, accepted her job, see they did care for her desire for independence.

‘Shruti looked so beautiful last night’, Parvati said to herself as she laid Om’s clothes out for the next day. She knew Shruti’s heart was set on the camisole but she wondered why her daughter couldn’t understand that girls from good families didn’t wear such clothes. Maybe Om was right. Maybe joining this new job wasn’t such a good idea for their daughter. Maybe it was time to search for a suitable boy for her daughter. Of course, only the best home with similar values would do for Shruti.

Hold on---wouldn’t she be letting her daughter down by following the same regressive pattern her elders had chosen for her, more than twenty years ago? ‘No, Shruti wont follow such an anachronistic code, my daughter will have the privilege of doing things I couldn’t ever do like working alongside her husband, wearing clothes that please her. Of course she has to get married soon, aakhir log kya kaheingey, beti badi ho gayi hai, but her husband will be progressive, liberal, I shall see to that.’

How did one cure hangovers this bad?

God, last night was so much fun, but why didn’t anyone tell her the consequences of so many tequila shots? Sandra felt like a truck had run over her head and then called in a steamroller to remove the tire tracks. And now she had to be little Ms Pleasant, disrupting people’s debt-filled lives with reminders to pay up. ‘Oh yeah, you love me, you really love me!’ Some one was calling her name. She turned around. It was Arnold. “Yeah, what’s up?” “Come on, every one’s going out for lunch”. She picked her bag up and looked around.

Here she was, Shruti Agarwal, calling herself Sandra, and talking to Americans in a foreign accent, more surprisingly, this was legal, even welcomed by the Indian government as it “Helped create jobs for young Indians”. They were all told to give themselves “American names” preferably ones with initials matching their original names. So Shruti became Sandra, Karan was now Kevin and Arvinder became Arnold! Sandra Atherton, that had a nice ring to it, a real Sandra from Bandra! And Arvinder bless him and his closet homosexuality (who was he kidding, they all knew) became Arnold, named after his true love, the Terminator himself.

She was sure his parents would approve of his choice, here was someone living the real Punjabi dream. An immigrant from Austria becomes a prize winning body builder, saves humanity from the bad guys and sets out to conquer the world via an entrance into holy matrimony with a Kennedy, followed by a tabloid friendly race for governorship. In a few hours she would go home and get back to being Shruti Agarwal, loving daughter, niece, oldest grandchild of the Agarwal family again. Why was it so tiring, this double life? She felt flirty, even daring, almost like a Cosmopolitan feature model at work, but at home, well, ‘Grah Shobha’ seemed more appropriate. Were they all schizophrenic? She didn’t have an answer to that. The lunch bell rang. She got up. A phone call-“Hi mama, nahi, mein ekdum theek hoon, I’ll be home on time.”