My City is on Fire
Imagine that you’re a young couple on holiday at an Airbnb in the town of Seven Oaks. You’re there for a month to get away from the madness of the pandemic and social distancing guidelines and the fear of getting sick. Suddenly, you’re caught in the crosshairs of a California wildfire. That’s what happened to Veer and Maya.
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Veer had made incredibly good time, mostly because he had jogged the majority of the way. Now he was sweaty and gross, despite the strong wind that kept finding him as he went. At least the run had cleared his head a bit and put him in a more positive mood. It would be lunchtime by the time he got home again. Or, at the least, a late brunch-time, but he and Maya would have something wonderful to eat and, either way, things would be okay.
What To Keep and What To Throw, When Nothing is Normal?
Arun inhales deeply, contorts his body in a suryaasan, and exhales his breath out in a rush. Memories of his father crowd into his brain like pictures on a screen.
A week ago came the earth-shattering phone call from Kakaji the manservant who had lived with his Dad for thirty years. More family than caretaker—Kakaji was lank and shriveled of limb, grizzled of hair with a crooked eagle beak, and a Hitler-like mustache, but dependable and always-present.
The funeral took place in 24 hours. “They don’t hold the body here for more than 48 hours, Arun beta,” Kakaji had croaked.
Where Do We Go Now?
Ravi Yadhav and his family of four had no desire to leave the slum colony on the outskirts of Sarita Vihar in New Delhi. Only an open sewer overflowing with rubbish separated their cluster of mud houses and bullock cows from Sarita Vihar’s gleaming skyscrapers and brand-new apartment towers that stood like fists raised triumphantly towards the Gods. The smell of the slum—of urine, the stench from the open sewer, old grease, and burning cow dung sometimes so clogged his nostrils that the naked longing to feel again the fresh scent wafting from the golden fields of wheat in his village made his stomach clench.
Dressed For A Kill
Yay!!!!
Yippeee!!!
My short story titled Dressed for a Kill was recently published in Rigorous journal. This story is excerpted from my novel (The Awakening of Meena Rawat) to be released on May 27, 2021 by Black Rose Writing press.
Click on the link below for the story:
Pandemic Life Musings . . .
At the start of the pandemic, my twenty-four-year-old nephew who’d come home from Los Angeles to check in on how my husband and I were doing (given our dangerous age bracket, he’d said) went out and bought two gallons of Arrowhead pure distilled water.
He is three months overdue for a haircut so that his hair looks like a black mop as he stands with his hands on his hips, and when he smiles, he looks almost radiant. I turn sparkling eyes on him, beaming a Tom Cruise worthy smile at his thoughtfulness. Inwardly, I cringe. My American nephew is used to purified water from a water filter pitcher. I’ve grown up with water bursting from a rusty tap in a kitchen with twenty-year-old appliances, the pictures of Guru Nanak and Pandit Nehru hanging on the wall, the remains of a cockroach that was pounded on the head still to be cleared from the gaping drain hole.
Finally, Sweet Success!!
It’s official!
I’m beyond THRILLED to announce that I have received an offer of publication for my second novel, a love story about two Dalits (Untouchables) that explores their quest for identity, and the divisions of class and culture over three decades.
An excerpt from this novel was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 2019.
The Big Fat Indian Wedding in Quarantine (I\’m a Fly on the Wall Part V)
Day 103 of Covid-19 lockdown restrictions. The sun gleams on my glassy back, the small dark garnet of my eye in its silver socket twitches as I flit from house to house. Slowly swinging myself on a whisker, I balance my little body on the ledge of a window as I peer inside.
* * * * *
It is a beautiful ceremony. The sacred fire is huge under the wedding mandap, a pergola, and Pinky feels the heat from about halfway back in the rows of seats placed six feet apart from each of the guests in the Iyengar’s backyard. She worries a little for Bhumi swath in glittering diamonds and an elaborate red and gold brocade lehenga, which splays out in multiple folds and drapes around her feet.
It does, however, seem to bring greater resonance to each of the seven steps.
Celebrating the Corona Class of 2020
How do you celebrate a daughter’s graduation from college when you’re in the middle of a corona crisis—when the world is shut down, and everyone is sheltering in place? How do you mark a milestone without the pomp and circumstance of a formal graduation ceremony?
This is what we did.
I\’m a Fly on the Wall during Lockdown (Part IV) . . .
Day 83 of Covid-19 quarantine. The sun gleams on my glassy back, the small dark garnet of my eye in its silver socket twitches as I flit from house to house. Slowly swinging myself on a whisker, I balance my little body on the ledge of a window as I peer inside.
* * * * *
Meena rolls down the window of her Camry and breathes in the fresh sun-warmed summer air. She closes her eyes briefly and remembers how she’d once breathed in all the strange thrilling scents of this new country: lavender bubblebath, fresh-cut grass, a cloud of masculine cologne in an elevator.
Once I believed America was a great country, with liberty and justice for all. The wretched thought crawls into her brain like a fat worm after rain.
It is Monday morning, and Meena is driving to a medical appointment. She switches on the radio to distract herself from thoughts that stir in her like dead leaves.
I\’m a Fly on the Wall during Lockdown (Part III) . . .
Day 74 of Covid-19 quarantine. The sun gleams on my glassy back, the small dark garnet of my eye in its silver socket twitches as I flit from house to house. Slowly swinging myself on a whisker, I balance my little body on the ledge of a window as I peer inside.
* * * * *
A lock of hair catches on her dry lips and she shoves it out of the way before rolling over and burrowing back into her duvet. Even before Pooja’s eyes open she can sense that Mohit is awake. The sound of his impatient voice floats from the kitchen where’s he’s making a business call and echoes off the walls of the broom closet. She’s been falling asleep in the overcrowded cupboard beneath the stairs almost every night, waking up cramped and tired in the tiny space.