A new beginning?( A short story)

 There was a huge din as Alex entered “Casa’s.” Music mixed up with the sounds of people laughing and a crash as someone dropped a glass.

      He made his way to the C-shaped bar counter and glanced perfunctionarily at the wine list.  He looked up to place his order and caught his breath. There was the most amazing looking girl of about nineteen who seemed to be concentrating on, what seemed for her, to be the extremely difficult task of making a pinacolada.

     “How was it done? Yes! Pineapple syrup,cream of coconut and finally white rum, blended with lots of ice”

        It was Mary’s second day at work. But she was learning the ropes fairly quickly.

She set the glass down expertly in front of the customer and turned to him with a questioning smile. Her oval shaped face was framed by soft curls which hung below her shoulder. She had on, a slightly low cut blouse revealing just the hint of a cleavage. But her voluptuous figure just added to the effect that her freshly scrubbed innocent looking face had on people –that of protecting her and of taking care of her.

    

“Casa's” was one of the hottest night spots in Goa . Located on the crowded “Baga” beach, the place started filling in, around eleven p.m. and reached a peak crowd around two p.m. People hung around till the wee hours of the morning and some of them walked straight from there, to the edge of the beach for an early morning swim in the sea.

    The main attraction, other than the ambience was the karaoke nights organized twice a week. Bathroom singers of all hues and sizes did their professional, albeit drunken best to hold tunes.

    Alex added his name to the growing list of singers. After a particularly terrible rendition of “Red,Red Wine”, he got his chance to sing “wonderful tonight” .All the while staring at Mary. She pretended not to notice and in truth, she was kept busy enough by a continuous stream of orders. Nevertheless she could feel his gaze upon her. Every time she peeked a glance at him, she was forced to drop her gaze, embarrassed. She was flattered though a little annoyed.

   Alex stayed till morning though he was more circumspect. But his unabashed admiration was evident.

    Mary got off duty early morning. She tied a scarf on her hair, mounted her Kinetic Honda and sped home.

   She opened the gate leading into a quaint Portuguese style cottage with Mangalore tiles on the roof. As she closed the gate, she admired the unusual creeper winding its way around the gate post. It had huge red flowers budding from the leaves. These flowers bloomed only at night . As the morning sun had already cast its orange glow in the Eastern Hemisphere , It  had started closing its petals, ”shy of the sun’s glance.”

    Mary unlocked the front door. She was ravenous. Just two months back, her grandmother would have woken her up with piping hot coffee and then would have forced her to eat boiled eggs sprinkled with salt and freshly ground pepper. After which, late as usual, she would have rushed around trying to reach class on time. She usually bathed at night She liked to smell fresh as she got between the sheets. The sultry climate of Goa made it impossible to feel clean even if one had showered in the morning. Morning showers, though always included in her resolutions, rarely if ever happened, mainly because it took her, forever to get out of bed. She had declared passionately once that ”there should be a central law banning classes before eight in the morning”

Now all that seemed so trivial. She’d have gladly gotten up everyday at five thirty if it only meant that she had some family that she could call her own.

    She shrugged. There was no point dwelling on all this. “She had to move on”

She buttered a toast, drank some coffee and then turned in, drawing the curtains tightly in an attempt to simulate night.

  The alarm woke her. She reached out her hand groggily to switch it off and promptly buried her head back into the pillows for another ten minutes. Finally she managed to gather enough strength to get out of bed.

     The realtor had called the previous day to tell her, he’d be coming in with some clients at around four pm .

 She went down to the kitchen, steamed some rice and heated a two day old fish curry. 
Seated in the large dining room, the enormousness of the house was brought home yet again. The house was too large for a solitary individual. ”There was no point clinging on to memories. It made more sense to move to a smaller place and rent this place out. It’d supplement her income as well.”

  She only hoped that her home would go to some family with children who would climb the mango tree at the back yard, just as she had. ”Maybe they would dangle a rope from the branch and place a pillow on the pillow. Then they could sit on it and swing for hours together without their butt hurting. The lady of the house would call them for lunch and they would troop in raucously and sit on the table without even washing their hand; At which she would soundly scold them. There would always be wild flowers plucked from the hedge which would decorate the vase on the dining table.
"Oh Lord! Please let this house be occupied by nice people, people who will cherish this place just as I do” Tears streamed unbidden down her cheeks.

        The realtor brought two dour looking people with him. They looked around critically, and even opened some of the wardrobes.

“Where had good manners and decency gone?”

“We’ll get back to you” they said and left.

   She showered and finished some cooking and then got ready for her night job. It paid decently well and she got good tips as well.

“Thank god for small mercies” If that opening hadn’t come up, she’s have been in a sorry state—huge house to live in, but no food to eat.

         Alex turned up again. He said nothing for a while. Since it was still early in the evening there wasn’t too much rush or noise. He walked up to her after sometime and said, “I’m sorry if I acted weird yesterday—it was just incongruous to see a person like you in a night club. You look very young, not even old enough to be allowed entry without an I.D proof and to see you behind the bar counter just confused me. Thats why I kept staring at you, to try and match the picture to the reality”

 It was such a guile-less though long winded apology that Mary had to smile.Alex smiled back and held her eyes for a minute before he looked away.

   “Do you mind if I sit around the bar counter? That way if someone acts fresh with you I can help you out.” She nodded and went back to her work. They didn’t talk that much but after that Alex became a fixture at the club. He’d come every night and sit at the same spot and quietly but firmly herd away anybody who tried to make a nuisance of himself.

He was clearly infatuated and she also found her thoughts straying to the polite young man who was so assiduously courting her.

   After a week he gathered enough courage to ask her out. To his delight and surprise, she agreed. He picked her up from her place on his rented bike and they climbed up fort Aguada . They sat on the broken walls of the fort and stared at the sea down below. After sometime he held her hand and said quietly and with a lot of dignity “I’m very happy today”

 There was no need for any words to be spoken. It was very natural-he wanted her, and she needed him.

 They walked back down ,hand in hand to the bike and rode back to her home. He waited for her in the drawing room while she went up to her room to get ready for her duty.

When she came down, she saw him pacing up and down nervously. Surprised, she stood still and waited.

 He pulled her down to the rug and said, “I have to go back to Bombay in two days. Will you come with me?” very simply, she nodded her head.

She handed in her notice that night.

Alex said he’d get a friend to attend to the house, so that was one more problem solved.

   They caught a bus to Bombay or rather Mumbai, as it was now called. It was Mary’s first visit to the city and she was excited. She was repelled a little, however, by the smell and the crowd she encountered there. Used to the fresh cleanliness of Goa this was a far cry from what she had expected. Alex seemed to be taking her through some seedy locality as well. When she expressed her fears to him, he laughed and reassured her that every part of Bombay was like this”

There is no such thing as a clean place in Bombay . People here are so used to seeing “others’ squatting on the beaches that they didn’t even notice dirt anymore.”

   The plan was that he’d put her into a lodge owned by a family friend till arrangements for marriage could be made. She walked along happily, while they entered the foyer of a run down looking place. It was a dingy looking establishment with several posters put up, in an apparent attempt to make it more welcoming. But the effect was to make it seem even more squalid. There were several room leadings off the corridor as they walked up to the front desk. No one was there. Alex rang the bell on the desk impatiently. A sleepy looking boy came grumpily. Alex murmured something to him, he nodded and came back with a humungous woman in a printed Kaftan.

“Tujha sathe,ek Mulgi aandlo aahe”-I’ve got a girl for you, he said. Then counted a pile of notes that she handed over to him and walked off without a backward glance.