I laze on a low chair, my arms dangling and just grazing the floor. My legs lie about askew like a wooden mannequin thrown carelessly in a pile. The summer night's air is stifling and seems thicker than it usually is. Beads of sweat form on my forehead and roll in careful paths to the point of my jaw. When they get there they decide that it's too much of an effort to roll down my neck and just stay poised there till they evaporate. I decide to get a haircut in the near future. The ceiling fan has a hypnotic effect. The blades form a fuzzy blur on the ceiling and push some air onto my face in an apologetic manner. It's either the effort of looking straight up or making my eyes go in a circle that's making me dizzy. Round and round again and again, till my eyes threaten to jump out of their sockets and hail a passing cab. There's a television running somewhere, a commercial on a radio and the sound of passing cars. If I listen really hard I can hear the neighbors arguing. I can picture him sitting idly on the porch pretending to read the sports section and her shifting from foot to foot agonizing over an imagined insult. I pick up the book I'm reading and idly turn the pages with my nose. It's too hot for squiggles on recycled paper. The floor feels cold against the soles of my feet and I watch my foot as it slowly starts to go numb in the initial stages of falling asleep. My mother bustles in a few minutes later and fixes me with a stare that gets me out of the chair and into the shower. I toy with the idea of faking jet lag and getting out of dinner at my aunt's house. I decide that coming up with a cure for rabies with a toothbrush, a bottle of ink and an absent-minded iguana is more in the realm of possibility. I still haven't unpacked my clothes and everything is in suitcases under the bed. I pick out a worn t-shirt from my anti-establishment gear and throw it back into the suitcase after a few seconds. My mother is yet to appreciate the finer points of wearing clothes with holes in them and with socially unacceptable words emblazoned on the front. I eventually borrow a shirt from my dad. I walk to the kitchen to fill the dog bowl with water before we leave for the evening and then realize that he hasn't lapped noisily at the bowl for a couple of years now. The backyard is crowded in with plants and a stunted mango tree. The mango tree took a couple of years to get about 4 feet tall and stayed that way since to my mother's eternal puzzlement. The amount of fertilizer that was lavished on that tree could have nourished an entire forest. My mom is a very determined person but she met her match in that mango tree. I find the water bowl behind a couple of pots. It's muddy and faded from lying about outside for a couple of years. I can still remember him refusing to drink from the bowl on hot days until I threw in a couple of ice-cubes. Him chasing an ice-cube across the kitchen floor and bumping his head on the door is still one the funniest things I've seen. By the time he'd finished looking embarrassed and stupid the ice-cube melted. I wonder if he ever realized that he'd licked his adversary off the kitchen floor that night.

My aunt lives in a house where tasteful pieces of furniture are strategically placed to give an impression of ostentation and decidedly bad taste. Cheery, fleshy faces on thick necks bob in unison to tastefully bad music. Hands with a mind of their own move mechanically from plate to mouth and trace the reverse path. A steady hum of conversation hangs above the air. Here and there a peal of laughter breaks out of the steady drone and hangs in mid air for a couple of seconds before falling back to the ground with a tinkle. Carefully draped saris hover a couple of inches above the wet grass. Men in expensive shirts laugh raucously at jokes that would have merited a shooting squad in a less tolerant society. Pouting kids accompanied by wide-eyed ayahs stand about a clown performing conjuring tricks in a corner of the garden. The garden is dimly lit and the shadows lend a sinister look to the clown's face. He's smiling and laughing but somehow I get the impression that he was one unhappy person. Does he even like performing for rich spoiled kids? His striped clothes clash horribly with the silk laden women who stand at a distance watching him with a moue of distaste on their carefully painted faces. He pulls a coin from behind an overweight kid's ear with a flourish and a laugh. The other kids howl in laughter and form a circle around the unsuspecting volunteer. He looks bewildered for a few seconds scratching behind his year and then begins to bawl till one of the ayahs pulls him away into the house. Cars drive up to the gate and pull away with throaty roars. The garden is filling up with guests arriving late. The hum in the air increases and the laughter gets louder. The heady smell of perfume drowns out the faint fragrance of jasmine that laced the cool night air. Small lamps placed in little alcoves in the wall add to the flickering shadows. My dad pulls me over to meet some friends of his. The faces are familiar but I can't remember their names. I get by with nodding and smiling agreeably at everyone. After a while my mind settles down to almost complete and utter inactivity. Faces begin to blur around me and everything seems far away. My mother introduces me to a woman with eyes that are tinted green. The hand she thrusts out is elegant and devoid of rings. I hold on to her hand a little longer than necessary. I notice her earrings when she turns to say hello to someone passing by. The way she stands reminds me of a very bad movie I once saw when I was passing through a 'foreign-language flick' phase in grad school. The French heroine was a Parisian socialite who always looked like she was going to pounce on the person she was talking to during one pointless party after another in post World War II Venezuela. That was probably the worst movie I've seen save for the fact that since the movie didn't have sub-titles we were forced to invent our own dialogues.

A couple of minutes into the conversation she casually mentions a daughter a couple of years younger than me. The significant look my mother shoots in my direction isn't lost on my finely tuned senses. The conversation on the way home features an eminently marriageable woman whose rich father is married to a woman with green eyes. As far as the gene pool goes the girl is on the top of the pile. Her childhood is covered in a few minutes and her education takes up a few more. My dad drives with a bemused expression on his face while my mother animatedly rattles tidbits about the girl in a forcibly nonchalant voice. How was I to tell her that of the twain I was smitten by the mother? My long years growing up have firmly impressed upon me that mothers don't take this kind of talk well. At least mine doesn't.

I lie in bed denied sleep for a long time. The ceiling fan has acquired an almost sinister appeal since dusk. The bamboo fronds outside my windows swish against the windowpane. The wind changes direction and begins to blow from the seaside bearing with it a comforting salty smell. Somewhere there's a watchman blowing a whistle and thumping his stick on the ground while he does his rounds of the locality. I've always thought it counter-intuitive that watchmen give the burglar early warning of their approach by making as much noise as possible. Somewhere a dog howls at the moon and his call is taken up by a few more. One howl starts up near our house but is silenced soon enough by a thrown stone or stick. There's a yelp, a short bark and then silence.
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