| Rijuta Pandey| April 2025 | Short Story |
The utensils of my kitchen know everything about me.
I can’t remember when I’d started talking to them –mostly the ones I had brought with me from my maternal house into my husband’s house. Most of them were made of steel. Deep enough to hold any secret. Tough enough to soak all my tears. When I told my mother that my husband, Neeraj, hit me, my mother said, “Why make a fuss over it? Two utensils always make noises when kept together.” I wanted to say that I was a person, not a ladle. I realized that the saying was more for women than for men. After twenty two years of marriage, I felt I’d turned into one of them. It’s the woman who gradually turns into a steely ghost of the kitchen, not the man. Deep enough to hold any secret. Tough enough to soak all the tears. And I was never alone. No kitchen can work with only one utensil, after all. I had all the women of my life, standing next to me. All the other steely ghosts. Guiding, taunting, and watching me fail. “All your fault. Neelesh is your failure. Who’ll marry your daughters if they’ve such a disgrace of a brother? What kind of mother are you?” No one asked what kind of father Neeraj was.
***
It was six in the evening when I stepped out of the house—a windy evening with a brooding and low-hanging sky. As soon as I began to walk, the sky grumbled, gusts of wind surrounded me, pushing me back, tousling my hair, and throwing dust particles into my eyes. I tightened the palla of my saree around my shoulders and kept walking with a grocery bag rolled under my arm.
A group of elderly ladies were coming from the opposite end of the lane. I lowered my gaze. Holding a small saffron-coloured flag, it seemed the ladies were returning from a satsang. I didn’t look at them, but one of them chimed in anyway. It was Asha Chachi clad in a Banarasi saree with the biggest bindi in the neighbourhood on her forehead. I knew if she saw me, Asha Chachi wouldn’t miss an opportunity to pass a remark. Anything was worth gossiping about for the septuagenarian. “Are, Asha, Neeraj shouldn’t have done this. After all, the boy is only twenty. He will learn. What was the point of all that? Letter in the newspaper of all things! You can still change Neelesh! You are his mother!” I felt my face getting hot. I nodded but didn’t stop. I didn’t want to know what the other ladies had to say about Chachi’s remarks.
I stepped onto the main road and went straight inside the vegetable market. The trampled vegetables along the sidewalk, the tire imprints on the muck, the fetid smell of rotten potatoes, crushed radish leaves, rancid squashed tomatoes mixed with the aroma of freshly unloaded onions, cabbages, bottle gourds, ginger, and coriander; the screams and calls of the vendors– “a kilo for thirty, a kilo for fifty”; the shouts of the bargains; the cries of the toddlers; and the anticipation of sudden downpour calmed me for a while. I preferred it that way. Its cacophonous chaos overpowered all the voices in my head.
I unrolled the bag, and a newspaper fell out of it. I had hidden it there 8 days ago. I tossed it in a pile of garbage. “You are his mother! You can still change him. He is only twenty!” echoed in my mind sucking all the wind out of my throat. Leaving sharp ringing in my ears and my head dizzy. I steadied myself against a wet cart full of tomatoes. “Be careful!”, warned the vendor standing behind the cart. The market seemed to spin a little. I looked at the vendor and asked for some water. My voice croaking, I said, “Bhaiya, water. Please, some water.” The vendor, looking alarmed, passed me a water bottle. I splashed some water on my eyes and gulped some down my throat. It tasted like a wet gunny bag.
I thanked the vendor and bought 2 kgs of tomatoes from him. Soon, I filled my bag with a lot of potatoes, onions, ginger, garlic, arbi (taro root), tomatoes, and two kilos of curd. I bought a 2 kg packet of Basmati rice and 20 gm saffron. I had eaten Basmati rice and saffron only once in my life before. On the day of my wedding. My daughters, Shina and Rima, hadn’t had the privilege yet. When I looked into my purse, only a five rupee coin was left. A different voice echoed this time. It was my voice, livid yet terrified, scolding Neelesh. “Have I taught you stealing? And you are stealing from me now? There were 2000 rupees and now I only have five left.” My blouse had dampened with cold sweat, and my chest was heaving.
I came back to my house by 7:30 pm. I put the bag on the table and lay down on the bed. “eight days”, I muttered to myself. It had been eight days since Neeraj had had a letter published in the local newspaper: A letter telling the world that he had officially cut ties with his son, Neelesh. That Neelesh was a fraudster, a thief, and if he came in any kind of contact with any relative or friend of Neeraj’s, Neeraj wouldn’t be responsible for their loss. The entire neighbourhood had come to my house that morning with all kinds of condolences, pieces of advice, taunts, and disapproving silences. Mostly for and against me.
Neeraj had blamed me for our son’s failure. “Had you been a good mother, he wouldn’t have drowned our family’s name in the gutter. Did you use to steal in your village, too?” Then he beat me. It wasn’t the first time, though. Neelesh’s every misdeed was followed by me receiving a blow on my face, on my back, on my stomach, and on my head. “You should die of shame”, he’d said.
I pulled myself out of the bed. Rubbing my eyes, I went out to the balcony and fetched a mug of water from the drum. I washed my face, feet, and hands, seeking a moment of clarity in the ritual. In the stillness of my home, I cleaned the kitchen table. The quiet was a gentle companion, soothing the relentless echoes of blame and regret that had plagued me for months. Everyone would be back tomorrow from the village except Neelesh.
I took out all the big utensils I had. I took around 1 kg of rice and washed it. The first time, the water turned white and turbid. I drained it. Washed it again. I rubbed the long grains of rice against my coarse palms. It reminded me of the night I was watching my caterer uncles washing rice for my wedding the next day. A jittery night. My mother had reminded me of everything about being a good wife that night. “People would call me a bad mother if you fail”, she’d said. Always prepare fresh food. Do everything you are asked to. Never go out without covering your head. Always support your husband no matter what. And most importantly, never argue. She did not tell me what would make Neeraj a good husband. Apparently, his being a husband was enough. I drained the dirty white water. And again, rinsed the rice with fresh water. This time, the water was clear. As I left the rice to soak, I took a deep breath and said, “I did everything I could, Amma.”
I took out the arbi from the bag and washed it too. I rubbed the dirt away, put the washed arbi into a pressure cooker, and covered it with water. “This is for you, Shinu,” I mumbled. A tear leaked from the corner of my left eye and disappeared in the cooker. I put the cooker on the stove for arbi to boil.
I took out the curd into a big bowl and whisked it with a wooden churner. “And Rima, my beautiful girl, for you.” With every churn, I heard Rima, who’d turned 11 this year, squeaking and giggling when I had suggested that she would have Kadhi waiting for her when she’d be back from the village.
The curd solids were dissolving with every churn. The handle of the wooden whisker felt cold against my palm. I saw myself running after Neelesh with this churner. It was the second time he’d been caught stealing. He’d stolen a mobile phone from his aunt. She’d said, “I’d warned Neeraj not to marry a poor girl, look how Neelesh turned out. A thief!” I wished I could wash away every inch of poverty flowing in my blood. But she was right, wasn’t she? I failed.
When I asked Neeraj to talk to Neelesh, he slapped me and left for work. Another drop of tear leaked from my right eye and disappeared in the bowl. I added four cups of besan and two tablespoons of turmeric to the batter and whisked it.
I put another bowl on the stove and filled it with water. I dropped five star anises. Boiling made them come together in the centre, like five dark brown flowers. I had knitted a cream-colored sweater for Neelesh with five brown-coloured flowers in the centre. He was fourteen. One night in December, he came home and told me he pawned that sweater for money. His grin took all my words away. My silence was my first failure. “As if a sweater meant anything,” I had told myself. When I shared this with Neeraj, he’d given a derisive chuckle. He was right, wasn’t he?
I put the rice into the boiling water and cooked it for ten minutes. I drained the excess water and put the lid on the pot. I picked up a marker and wrote “2-3 days” on it. The pressure cooker had released all the steam by then. I took the arbi out and peeled them. One arbi slipped from my fingers and rolled under the table. It had happened twenty one years ago too. Another kitchen and a naïve Neetu, peeling arbi, listening to her mother and grandmother. “Men never like when you ask them where they are going. Your grandfather slapped me once when I asked him to bring some sweets just when he was stepping out of the house.” I had asked, “That is weird. Was Papa there when it happened?” “Yes, Dipankar was there, shocked. I told him everything was fine,” my grandmother said. I saw how everything was always fine with the women of my house. My mother added, “Your father never hit me, but he doesn’t like to be asked either. He gets angry. Doesn’t talk to me for days.”
I lifted myself up and picked that slimy arbi up. I cut them into pieces. I placed the iron kadhai on the stove. Added mustard oil to it. Shina loved the pungent smell and taste of this oil. I never understood how a 6-year-old would know what oil had been used. I added black mustard to the hot oil. It crackled, and a few of them jumped out. With some other spices, I fried the arbi till at least one side of it was golden-brown. I knew Shina would prefer it this way. I took it out into another bowl and covered it. I embraced the warm bowl. I said, “Take care, my love”. I wrote on it, “3-4 days”. I wished with all my might that it could talk back.
I prepared Kadhi just the way Neeraj liked. Not too thick, not too sour, not with too many fenugreek seeds. “I only like the way my mother prepared Kadhi”, he had told me once. I loved Kadhi as well, but I liked it sour and a little spicy. I didn’t tell him, though. He never asked. I wrote on the pot, “2-3 days”.
Then, I took out two platefuls of flour from the flour tin. I added a glass of milk, one tablespoon of salt, and three big dollops of ghee and kneaded it into dough. I didn’t use to pant a few years ago while kneading the dough. But in the last six years, with every fold of the dough, I wheezed. After Shina was born, my body had left every ounce of youthfulness I had in me. I had undergone a lot of bleeding when she was born, but I recovered eventually. I didn’t want to recover, though. I was already a failed mother in everyone’s eyes. I didn’t want another child. What if Shina was another boy? I looked at Rima, a quiet girl, and was relieved to know it was a baby girl. If anything happened to me, Rima would look after Shina.
I felt ashamed of myself when I recovered. The idea of burdening a child with the responsibility of another child was ghastly. I survived, so only the bowls and plates have known that. Could I do that now?
I pinched small balls from the dough and rolled them into small pooris. They came out just as I wanted. Crisp. I laid out two newspapers and covered themwith a hundred pooris.
Now, only one thing remained. Kheer. Neelesh’s favourite dish. I took out the milk from the fridge, poured a small cup of water into the pot, and then poured the milk. I had saved some nuts from the last Diwali. I chopped them finely. I added rice to the boiling milk. The roaring boil took me back to the evening when Neeraj had threatened to throw a pot of boiled milk on Neelesh and me if another complaint of theft reached his ears. I had stopped talking to Neelesh after that day. I thought the absence of a caring mother would stop him from committing any more crimes, but I was wrong. So wrong. After a few days, the police took him.
I always knew it was never only about me. Yet, it was my silence that was blamed this time. “What kind of mother turns her gaze away from her son’s deeds?”
After adding nuts, I added three pinches of saffron. The first pinch, I said, “Shina”. Second pinch, “Rima”. Third pinch, “Neelesh.” I left the kheer in the pot. I picked up a piece of paper and wrote, “You always said if you were a woman, you’d have made an excellent mother. Well, this is your chance. Never let my daughters go to bed with an empty stomach. This is the only thing I want. I know they’ll forgive me one day.”
***
The next morning, Neeraj had to force open the door to get inside. The house was filled with the acrid smell of burnt milk. The fridge was packed with all the food Neetu had prepared. And she was sprawled on the bed, lifeless. The steely ghosts had witnessed everything. Silently.
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Rijuta Pandey is a budding writer based in India. Her works of fiction have appeared in the online literary magazines Verse of Silence, The Chakkar, and Active Muse, non-fiction in GOYA, and poetry in the Monograph Magazine.
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Feature image by Vera De via Unsplash
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