The Benefit Season Read online

  As I dithered she threw off her stilettos and placed a talon paw on my thigh and said she was tired, so tired.

  ‘What are you looking at- show me the fingers’, she said, as I gawked.

  Taking that as a cue to commence kneading the toes, mounds and heels of her comely feet; always the gentleman, I began in right earnest. There we were; Monal curled up like a baby in my sofa with her skirt pulled nearly up to her naked fanny, with a leg tucked into my crotch, and me stoking lovingly the soles of her unshod foot. One thing would have led to another, had not somebody walked into my office at that very minute. And another followed him and shrieked in horror.

  The first visitor was Khosla, the incorrigible father-in-law, and the second his inevitable progeny and my sweet betrothed, Aarti.

  Monal coolly remained where she was, I remained frozen to the spot with my mouth a tad open, Khosla stood his ground, turning hot tomato red; all the wine he’d drunk these years fell-in for duty at the bastions of his Rottweiler jowls. Only Aarti let out an ear-bleeding screech and leaped behind her father-soldier, covering her peepers as if a black mamba had bitten her.

  ‘Well hello,’ Monal said pleasantly,’ don’t you knock?’

  Khosla flung his regimental scarf at her legs and in a commanding tone said, ’cover ‘em lovely things up, lady’!

  And to me he spake, ‘ ‘shun! And what might you be up to, soldier? Undressing a fine young woman like that! Is that what you do on parade?’

  I remember faintly I made quite an eloquent speech in my defense at that moment;’ umm…uh…err…sir’.

  ‘Do you even know these people?’ Monal said, thankfully removing her foot from my bulging lap.

  ‘Yeah…Monal…my boss…my father-in-law… and Aarti- I’m marrying her’.

  ‘Nice to meet you’, Khosla came forward and gripped her hand and kissed it softly. ‘ A pleasure to make your acquaintance’, he said, sitting by her side.

  ‘Equally’, Monal said, offering up the other hand as well. ‘ And that must be Asha’, she said, thumping the sofa, beckoning Aarti to sit. Aarti simply glanced at her svelte legs and glared at me.

  ‘She’s Aarti, my daughter- not Asha- though that’s a nice name too’, Khosla clarified, still holding onto her hand, in a voice so loaded with honey that it sent me into a tizzy.

  ‘Of course I’ve seen her somewhere… she looked… fresher then. Office work hasn’t agreed well with her it seems. She would be better off keeping house I guess’.

  ‘So true! Her mother always said that was the only job for a woman. In fact that’s why we are here; to seek your blessings for the couple!’

  Monal raised her hands in mock blessings.

  ‘ We thought we’d bring Arjun along but he wasn’t taking any calls, so we decided to step in and surprise him. And obviously, surprise him we did!’ And then Khosla added a little sternly to me,’ what was going on here boy?’

  ‘My feet were killing me dad’, Monal interjected.

  “Dad”! She’s a cunning wench, that one!

  ‘I begged Arjun to help me- he’s a sportsman who knows all about injuries, you know?’ She continued, ‘ it was a life and death situation! What a fine man you’ve got for your daughter- any woman would kill for him’.

  ‘Yes, yes, a little hard to believe that though, don’t you think.’ He said looking not a little unfavorably at me. ‘But under your wings, I’m sure something will become of that boy yet’.

  ‘I’ll be there at the wedding popsy, for him and for you, even if you tried stopping me with your military gun’, Monal said, folding a thumb and pointing a mock forefinger gun at him.

  ‘Thank you, and don’t forget to send him’, Khosla said, mockingly raising his arms. After respectfully laying down the sweets and cards at the table he excused himself and his glowering daughter. I escorted them to their car; there was stony silence on the way. I tugged at Aarti’s sleeve and tried to smile at her, but she gave me a look that nipped in the bud any further conciliatory misadventures I might have thought of bumbling into.

  ϖ

  That was that and I haven’t heard from anyone answering to the name of the Khosla clan ever since. That I have power over Aarti, and that I’m a saved man after the confession to my mother, banishes the gloom from the wintery skies and it is indeed with a spring in my step that I board The Dubai on the starry Friday night for a sea-faring jaunt to Diu.

  This baby is a behemoth; over 100 meters long and can travel at a top speed of 30 knots in warm and shallow waters. A glossy white on the outside, its interiors are done in a relaxed French-empire style. It has an all-white crew of 92 except the captain who is; well, a shade of pink. There are five decks above the water line, and two below, he tells us proudly as we enter. It has a swimming pool on one of the decks, which can be raised to make a dance floor, which is where he promises we are likely to spend most of that night on. There are three choppers on board and even a small submarine to dive to the ocean floor for exploration! The boat has its own air defense system, bulletproof glass, and armor plating on the sheik’s suite! The ship is decorated with crushed bones of real dinosaurs and tiny meteorites- it gives new meaning to excess! There are other obscenities too profane to be listed for the common man here. That a yacht is manifest as the ultimate miracle of power and wealth is before us to gaze- if I had a rod and cast it before the ship it would turn into a serpent no doubt.

  Having gazed for long upon the miracle and having no rods to turn into serpents, we the faithful, with feet that make haste to run to evil, are shepherded to the upper decks and lounges to partake of refreshments, mostly of the order of live seafood and diverse forms of intoxicants. I hesitatingly ask the hostess, a shy French girl, for milk, and instead of laughing, she dips into her fridge and hands me one of the whitest and the best, a produce of Denmark.

  ‘We keep it for the sheik’s kids. The sheik himself prefers only breast milk,’ she says, adjusting her bra. ‘Do you want me to add cereal to that?’

  I shake my head and move on.

  ‘Should I put it in a milk bottle for you…’ she shouts after me as I head for the lounge to sit myself by the silvery railings to admire the view, ‘hey, come down to the parlor later if you need any breast milk.’ Her breasts are fair and balanced I am sure, but I’m done sucking up at the udders.

  We are eased out of the port by powerful tugboats, and soon after, the diesels on the boat sputter into life, taking us out into the open sea; the twinkling lights of the shore give in to the sparkling stars above.

  The DJ, needing no further convincing, flicks a couple of switches, turns the knobs, moves the sliders up and down on his mixing table, and calling out to the blokes to hit the dance floor begins to build up his music’s tempo. It’s a bit early though; people throng the bars and down the drinks, loosening up before the hip, shake, and grind. A white couple, probably high on some club stuff that you pop in with your drink, sways past and then turns back.

  ‘Hey, that thing there looks interesting’, the girl says, speaking in thick Portuguese accent, pointing to my glass of milk. ‘Mind if I have a sip?’

  ‘Sure’, I pass up the drink.

  She takes a sip, rolls her eyes, throws back her head as if she’s gagged and then tells her friend, ‘umm, interesting, try’.

  He takes a sip too, then another big one and then says, ‘wow, swear I’ve tried that somewhere- it’s so good. Where can we get one of these?’

  ‘Skinny cow by the bar? Visit her. Ask her for the fresh stuff- straight from the source’.

  ‘Hey, what do they call it by the way?’

  ‘Milk’.

  ‘Milk’, the girl repeats, and the two lapse into uncontrollable giggles and walk off.

  I roll the milk around in my glass turning it white and then finish it off. I am tempted to toss the glass overboard but am afraid of knocking a sleepy fish over her head. I decide not to have another round of mammarian secretion as it seems to attract too much attention, and I am not
one for intoxicants. So I’ll keep a glass of plain water for company from now on. I’m sure many people on board this night haven’t tasted that either, but at least it’ll pass off for vodka. I stroll around the decks, see people from all nations, mostly single, all good looking and fit, determined to get drunk and desperate to get laid before the boat docks in the morning. Females check me out brashly; males check me out too, shyly. I stand close to the dance floor and tap my foot to the rhythm. A pretty Palestinian girl walks up and asks me for a dance, I say okay and shake the leg with her. She’s something of a belly dancer, and that makes the sequins and beads on her iridescent lace skater dress flutter and shift in a kaleidoscopic pattern in the dazzling disco lights. I wish I’d brought my glares and eye drops along. She wants to get up close and personal and thrusts her crotch at me, teaching me to gyrate in sync with her. As she senses me getting hard, she grips my buttocks and pulls me close and buries her face on my chest. I can smell the Chanel No. 5 on her, which fills the air around us with its scent. I wrap my arms around her slim waist, and as one, we sway to the slow number. Being not much of a dancer, I often step on her toes, so to solve the problem; I fold her in my arms and haul her up, circling around happily with her feet up in the air. She laughs and grabs my hair and pushing my head back, looks me dreamily in the eye and asks if I’d like to go down to the lower decks where the guest rooms are. I say yes and we head for the passage to the decks below, holding hands and laughing like children.

  As we weave our way through the sweaty young people and come out into a clearing, we halt in our tracks- it’s the Nagraths standing in a small circle with Tom, the greying and courteous Sheik, and other important looking officials. We pause to greet them, and there are intros all around. The girl with me is Nadia, who heads the team at Beirut. The sheik knows her well it seems, and steals her from me, leading her into his suite. She doesn’t even stop to look over her shoulder at me. A busty Moroccan girl, barely legal, hangs on Vishal’s arm while Monal just stands by and smiles coyly at me when her hubby isn’t looking. She acts aloof and ignores me after her initial greeting- a lazy wave of a limp wrist.

  On her arm hangs a small man; dark, wearing Gandhi glasses on shifty eyes that dart to and fro like marbles on a labyrinth board game.

  ‘Hi’, he says, smiling needlessly, looking away as he offers me his soft hand to shake, ‘…Arjun. Phalit Modi.’

  ‘He’s the President RCA’, Vishal chimes in, for the first time that evening acknowledging my existence.

  That’s Rajasthan Cricket Association for dummies.

  ‘I was expecting you to win unopposed… silly of them to pitch Dalip Gavaskar against you- great cricketer of his days, but administration- no sir’, Vishal says, bowing lightly.

  ‘What does a cricketer know about cricket?’ Modi replies, and giggles himself silly.

  ‘True. Who would have thought the guys at BCCI would have the bollocks to suspend the RCA. But you socked them in the nose sir- springing back after the court battle.’

  ‘ I invented the IPL. I am IPL. You can’t keep me out of it. Cricket is not a game, it’s a spectacle, and it’s opium for the masses. And I am a drug peddler’! Modi digs an elbow in Vishal’s side, and again giggles like a silly kitty, covering his mouth with a delicate hand.

  ‘You sold the IPL telecast rights for a fortune there! We salute you sir!’ Vishal raises him a crisp toast.

  ‘Yeah, and got a cool 80 crores as “facilitation fee”- for selling it to myself! ’

  ‘That’s what we do too…facilitate, but no one pays us like that. We have a lot to learn from you, show us the way sir’.

  ‘You’ll get there some day kid, as long as you show me the way to the lines! I’m crashing!’

  ‘Sure sir, follow me’, Vishal leads him away by lightly touching his elbow. ‘Are you guys coming?’ he pauses and asks us.

  ‘Not my thang, you know that’, Monal tells him, ‘enjoy yourself honey’.

  He shrugs and they go down to the lower decks.

  ‘What’s lines,’ I ask her when we are left alone.

  She takes the straw from her drink and brings it near her nostril and snorts.

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘Ah’.

  ‘Hmm’.

  ‘You look a little lonely’, she says. ‘The Lebanese isn’t going to miss you it seems’.

  ‘Nor your husband you’. It is a cheeky thing to say. Monal, who doesn’t waste time, replies with a sharp backhand across my cheeky face that nearly brings a tear to the eye. She looks at me for a long time and then hugs me. She puts her cheek against mine, which is hot and red from the crack. Then she draws back and kisses me softly, and leads me by the hand to the dance floor and there, with reckless abandon, begins to make love to me.

  She holds me close, her right hip touching mine, and her leg between mine. She twines her arm around my neck, and puts my hands on her hip. Then she thrusts against me, rotating our hips in sync, in fluid sensual moves. We take small leaning steps to the right, dragging our left feet also to the right, and away again. The melodious music and the warm touch of her body get me in a thrall. Cupping her hip I turn her towards me; spinning her. We do a right-left sway in time with the music. We stop, she twines a leg around my waist, and I support her back, grabbing her free leg as she arches back, bends her supporting leg and drops her head back. When she turns and we face the same direction, she abruptly bends over at the hips, and keeping her legs straight; with her backside thrust towards me slowly rises back to standing position, all the while grinding and rotating her hips into mine. She makes a fine dancer, and the crowd parts to clear the way for us. They cheer when the music stops. Monal turns back towards me, hot and sweaty, grabs my collar, and leads me away.

  She sits us in the lounge and says nothing. The breeze is cool but sticky and my lips feel salty when I run my tongue over them. Suddenly she laughs, ‘you know, actually you were right about my husband. He doesn’t miss me… it must feel good to be missed by someone’.

  ‘We can’t direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails’. Again, a useless comment that doesn’t help anybody, but Monal’s hand doesn’t stray this time. We are sailing into the wind and the dark on a vast and endless ocean and that makes my mind free and my tongue loose.

  I wonder if Aarti is missing me right now. I wonder if one day our marriage too will sail its course and wash up like broken-down timber on shore. I’ll have to keep her in good paint and powder and her sails full if I don’t want that. I have a sudden urge to call Aarti but I let it pass.

  ‘Come let’s adjust the sails’, she laughs freely, and grabbing my hand, runs me down the stairs into the suites below.

  She turns a crystal knob on the satinwood door decorated with bronze heads and ormolu veneer which opens into a dimly lit palatial suite with crushed-onyx tiles and superb vantona-damask curtains. We halt at the doorway trying to adjust to the darkness and smoke inside. A number of people are in the room, some lying on the king-size bed in a maze of arms and legs, and others lounging around on armchairs and sofas, mostly drinking and smoking from a variety of pipes and chillums. The air is heady with pot and I’m feeling high already. Vishal is seated in one corner; his shirt buttons open, doing cocaine lines with the Moroccan girl who is squatted beside him, her hand caressing his thigh. Vishal relaxes back in the sofa as Monal stomps towards him. He wraps an arm around the girl’s shoulders, cupping her breast, and leers up at Monal. Monal glares down at the Moroccan who grins at her and begins to stroke Vishal, rolling her tongue around her fat lips. Both seem pretty pleased with themselves right now.

  ‘Did you miss me?’ Monal says.

  ‘What?’ the man looks at the Moroccan and laughs. She giggles, beside herself with euphoria, and tosses her thick mane back.

  ‘Obviously not’, Monal says, casting a lethal look at the girl.

  The girl grins back and grabs Vishal’s crotch, as if daring her.

  ‘I thought it wasn’t…your thang!’ Vishal says
.

  ‘I think we should leave here now’.

  ‘Why? Otherwise you’ll get that mean guy to move me?’

  ‘Nothing like that’.

  ‘Yeah? Some balls; grinding your butt up his dick like that in front of the whole world- my world- my office, and asking me if I miss ya?’

  Monal looks stumped that her husband should find out so soon about that harmless little cha-cha that we had upstairs.

  ‘It was just ten seconds of dance.’

  ‘So what’s your problem, eh? We’re having a dance too!’ he wiggles and thrusts his crotch up at the Moroccan’s roving hand. ‘Did he give you a good time?’

  ‘Nothing of the kind’.

  ‘What kind then, eh? Tell me he got your juices flowing’.

  Monal crosses her arms across her chest, tosses her head to the side, and just stands there, taking it quietly, looking regal and hurt.

  ‘Aren’t you going to do something… let the earth part and swallow you? Or should we give you a chance first- a chance to prove your innocence?’

  ‘How do you mean?’

  Vishal leans over and whispers to his companion who raises her brows questioningly. Then she gets up and walks drunkenly towards Monal. She looks again at Vishal who gestures her to go ahead. The Moroccan girl leans down, pulls Monal’s panty down and shoves a finger up her vagina. Then she pulls it out and smells it. Then she licks it greedily. She shakes her head and tells Vishal, ‘she’s clean. And she’s tasty’.

  He laughs. ‘She likes it in the ass too. Check her out baby’.

  I feel revolted when the Moroccan chuckles and shoves a finger behind Monal, who just stands there bearing it without a murmur, as if she’s in the habit of being in bondage. The girl pulls her finger out with a jerk, making Monal wince, and smells her finger again.

  She shakes her head, ‘clean again’.

  Vishal smiles.’ And the taste?’

  Now it’s the girl’s turn to gape at Vishal. ‘I mean it’, he says menacingly and pulls out a gun and tosses it on the table, upsetting the neat rows of cocaine.