Boys Don't Cry , livre ebook
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English
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2022
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128
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English
Ebook
2022
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Obtenez un accès à la bibliothèque pour le consulter en ligne En savoir plus
Publié par
Date de parution
17 janvier 2022
Nombre de lectures
0
EAN13
9789354924279
Langue
English
Publié par
Date de parution
17 janvier 2022
Nombre de lectures
0
EAN13
9789354924279
Langue
English
MEGHNA PANT
BOYS DON T CRY
A True Story, Almost
PENGUIN BOOKS
PENGUIN BOOKS
Contents
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Acknowledgements
Follow Penguin
Copyright
EBURY PRESS
BOYS DON T CRY
Meghna Pant is an award-winning author, journalist, feminist and speaker.
Her books- The Terrible, Horrible, Very Bad Good News , How to Get Published in India , Feminist Rani , The Trouble with Women , Happy Birthday and One and a Half Wife -have been published to commercial and critical acclaim.
Pant has been felicitated with various honours and her works have been shortlisted for distinguished contribution to literature, gender issues and journalism. She has won the Bharat Nirman Award, Laadli Media Award, FICCI Young Achiever s Award, The Lifestyle Journalist Women Achievers Award, FON South Asia Short Story Award, Muse India Young Writer Award, Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, Frank O Connor International Award and the Commonwealth Short Story Prize.
Pant has been invited as a speaker for the nation s biggest literary festivals and conferences, and has appeared as a panellist on prime-time news and international channels to discuss gender issues. She has written articles for and been quoted in leading national and international media.
She has worked as a business news anchor for Times Now, NDTV and Bloomberg-UTV in New York and Mumbai.
Pant currently lives in Mumbai with her husband and two daughters.
Stay away from men who peel the skin of other women, forcing you to wear them. -Ijeoma Umebinyuo
P.S. Thanks for the scars. They helped me bloom.
S.K. Everyone else is the journey, you are the destination.
TODAY IS the day. The day that he will finally kill me. I hear the doorknob turning. I push my hand under the pillow. I feel the edge of the kitchen knife I ve begun keeping under my pillow in case he attacks me. I tell myself to use it. To not be afraid. To kill him before he kills me. He enters the room.
CHAPTER ONE
THEN THERE S the business of flowers. I ve been told that all the darkness in our lives can be extinguished by the bloom of a single petal. And isn t this what today is about? So, I walk to the florist near my building and tell an attendant: Bhaiya, I need flowers for a party. What do you recommend?
A man with a single fingernail, long and curved like the stem of a rose, asks, What s the occasion, Madam? Engagement, birthday, havan?
He doesn t meet my eyes.
It s for a divorce party, I say.
I hear a short, clean sound, like the stem of a flower being snapped. The attendant looks up from the hibiscus he s trimming and sniggers, You mean you want flowers for a daphanana ?
Daphanana? I stare at him. Burial?
Well, I guess, a man in a flower shop will always think of a corpse first.
No, I mean divorce . . . talaq, I say. The opposite of a daphanana.
He blinks in confusion.
I am throwing a divorce party this evening, and I want flowers for it, I say. It has to be said bluntly. After all, the worst mistake a woman can make is to wait for a man to grow up.
Divorce party? the attendant chuckles. He looks at another attendant, whose attention is drawn by our conversation. They exchange a smile.
So, Madam, you are divorced? he asks me with a smile, his teeth showing.
Yes, I say, not showing mine.
Madam, we do not have special flowers for all this . . . you know, things ?
I take a deep breath. So much for India s modernity.
Everything else for the party-the food, the cake, the alcohol-has been ordered on the phone. These are things that require no human interaction. That s how I make my way around the world now. But flowers demand to be touched and felt, like clothes, before showing their worth. I will have to see this through.
Well, if you want to make money, you must keep such flowers, I say flatly, with the tone of a woman who is divorced but not broken. It s 2013. Divorces are rising by thirty per cent each year. Imagine how many new clients you ll get!
I speak business. It s the language that Mumbai most understands.
Maybe you should try another shop, he says. God, he s a fool!
I place my hands firmly on the display rack. It s scratchy as though made of a thousand thorns. I don t pull away. Because even the moon doesn t have to be whole in order to shine.
It s then that-finally-I see the blinkers from his eyes disappear. His eyes meet mine. He nods. A man tending to flowers knows that rain is better than thunder.
Okay, Madam, he says, his eyes now squinting effortfully. You might like the yellow carnations.
Why carnations?
What?
Why carnations? Why not something else?
Well, the attendant leans over and says. They symbolize rejection, I think. They will be good for a divorce party, no?
The difference between a florist and a gardener is that the florist cuts the flowers while the gardener brings them to life. This florist will never understand what it is I truly seek-a feeling that lasts a lifetime.
Divorce is not about rejection, Bhaiya, I say. It s about celebration. Freedom! Happiness! You understand?
Errr . . . he says. He has no idea what I m saying. Perhaps you d like roses? he adds.
Too blas , I want to say. Our desires, our breath, our clothes are all a necessity. Flowers are not. They are more than life. They are hope. I want that. Something extra.
No.
Lilies? They are popular.
They are. But their ovaries are superior to the male parts and this is not about female superiority. No. I shake my head.
The man looks around the shop, inspecting it like he s interrogating it for answers.
Petunia?
I look at the dainty blend of crimson and white. They speak nothing of a new life, a tough past. No.
Gladiolus?
Too clustered. I need a flower that is brave enough to stand up to its own truth. No.
Hydrangea? He presses the flowers against my nose. I feel the tickle of God s blue belly hair on my nostrils. No.
He s looking for flowers. I m looking for a story. I tell myself to be patient.
He continues searching. The flower shop can barely mask the metallic halitosis of the city. It must be tough to smell sweet inside the lungs of an alligator.
Finally, he says, Kaner is for new beginnings. I think you will like them.
The attendant looks at me expectantly. I see a bee buzzing behind his head, its feet dusted with the fragrance of a thousand flowers. Does the bee ever find something to rest upon, even for a moment, and just be?
I do like it. Thank you, I say. Kaner. Oleanders, I remember, represent leaving the past in the past and enjoying what s in front of you. Please pack thirty.
Madam, they only come in dozens. For good luck.
Greed bleeds into his eyes. He knows I haven t asked their price. It s a mistake. I don t care. My loss has always been someone else s gain.
Okay, three dozen then, I say nonchalantly.
His long fingernail quivers as he packs the oleanders. He adds some rajnigandha, though I haven t asked for them. I pay him and turn to leave.
Enjoy, Madam, he says. I hope we get more business from you.
I turn around and say, With all due respect, Bhaiya, I hope I never have to see you again.
My words are softer than their meaning. We exchange a smile.
I come out of the flower shop, with three dozen white oleanders in my hands, and squint into the sun. No matter how hot it gets in this city, I never complain. Having survived three cold winters in New York, where night bleeds into day, I love sunrays on my skin. I step on to the kerb and pause. For a moment I debate whether to look down, as if into a microscope, so I can avoid falling into Mumbai s notorious manholes or its crater-sized potholes, or to look up, as if into a telescope, to avoid being crushed by its crumbling flyovers or its faulty air-conditioners diving off crusty buildings. This is the bane of every pedestrian in this mofussil metropolis, where neither footpaths nor roads are built for the people.
It is that or suicide.
I do neither. I look straight at the oncoming traffic, cross the road and walk home.
It ll take more than a city to kill me.
*
Unlike other city parties, mine begins on time. I assume this is because people are enchanted by the idea. They want to know what happens at a divorce party. For who doesn t love the bite of scandal? I don t tell them that I don t know; that this is also my first time attending one.
The party will be at a quarter past love, I d written in the original invite. But people in Mumbai lack imagination. It s understandable. Living in this city is like drawing blood with thorns. Who has time for culture when a heavy mortgage has to be paid for a house one can cover in six long strides? Whose fingers have time to turn a book s pages when they re busy honking furiously at traffic? Creativity is reserved for bulls and bears. Thoughts are preoccupied with salacious gossip about the latest Bollywood diet.
So, I d sent another invite saying: Be there at 8 p.m.!
And, here they are.
My house has been divorce-proofed. There are quiches on the dining table that Jeet, my gay neighbour, has laid out to spell Good Riddance . My best friend Sherna, who is down from the US, has put up a banner that says: Happily Divorced . My two-tiered cake, priced at a princely Rs 8000, reads Free at Last .
The oleanders are in two vases, the fridge is filled with beer and white wine, and my bar is stocked with bottles of other alcohol and paper glasses. There s no sangria or red wine, for these are the colour of brides, of new love. Jeet has made a customized playlist-the snarkiest in music history he calls it-and one that includes everything from Rafi s Kya Hua Tera Wada to Green s F**k You . The musi
