Kaapi-au-late

                                            

The first morning in her new apartment, on her first day of work, the first thing Tara did when she entered the kitchen, was to pick up the bottle of freeze-dried Columbian coffee. One heaped spoon coffee powder, one spoon sugar, hot water and milk- that sounded right. She plugged the kettle in.

The steam from the gleaming steel glass rose, carrying with it the blended smells of the brew and the Jasmine from her mother’s hair.

‘Listen to the song.  This is Bhoopalam- the ragam to be sung in the mornings.”

Tara lifted the tumbler and sipped.

 “Yesterday we listened to Sriman Narayan, remember? That was Bhouli, another morning ragam”

Tara wrapped her tongue around the milky, sweetly bitter brew and swallowed. She felt her tongue scald, then her throat and then finally her oesophagus.

“Are you listening to what I am saying?”

Tara’s face was almost lost in the tumbler now.

“Both you sisters are the same, good singers but not interested in Music.”

Tara put the tumbler down on the reddish- pink laminated dining table. She got to her feet and disappeared into her room.

“How many times have I told you- put your dirty dishes in the sink, don’t leave them sitting on the table….”

  The kettle spouted hot steam on to Tara’s hand, jerking her back into her kitchen.

She poured the water into her coffee mug, over the powder-sugar mix. The drink smelt like coffee. She added milk until her drink began to look like coffee. She hesitated and then drank a little.  She exhaled. She looked down at the cup she was holding for a few minutes. Then, she slowly finished it.

***********************************************************************

        Taraclicked the ‘send’ button on the computer and watched the section she had been working on, leave her mailbox. She opened her Windows Media player, pulled on her head phones and hit the 
play button. This was her real first break in six months, perhaps the second in the one year she had 
been working in this soft ware programming firm.

  The distinctive voice of M S Subbulakshmi flowed out and filled her mind.

 “Okay, Tara, One last time”

Tara fidgeted on the mat.

“This is easy. You can sing it- if you want to, that is”

Tara snorted

“Well, you entered the classical music inter collegiate competition, you made it to the finals. So now you have to practice.”

Tara rolled her eyes.

“You can drop out if you want to...”

Tara glared at her. Her mother knew she hated to give up without a fight.

“One last time. For your sake.” She muttered

  “Not bad.” Her mother said when they finished the rehearsal. “If you concentrate on your singing, you should do well tomorrow. Remember- Ragam is kapi, thalam is Adi”

“They won’t ask all that”

“You must know what you are singing, anyway”

“Okay, okay.  Adi thalam. Kapi ragam. Happy?”

“Hmm”

 “Now that we are done with Kapi can I have some coffee?”

Oh god, there was the frown. Music was not just her mother’s profession or even her vocation- it was her passion, her prayer. She did not like people making jokes about it.

 A smile.  Phew!

 “Wait. I need to put my tampura away first.”

       The song ended. Tarapicked up her purse and made her way to the office pantry; the song and the words still flowing through her. She inserted some coins into the coffee machine.  She pressed a few buttons and waited for her paper cup to fill up.  A thin golden brown liquid gushed into her cup. She added the creamer and a stick of sugar.  She took a sip as she moved away for the machine. She grimaced as she eyed the cup with its weak brew and lumpy bits of un-dissolved creamer. She shrugged and poured the contents of the cup into the sink and trashed the cup.

   She walked back to her desk and her programme but it was a while before the song stopped playing in her head.

*********************************************************************

   Six months later, when it was July 12^th, she was still not ready for it. She stayed late at work, completing the tasks of the next day. By eight she had run out of reasons to linger. She wandered about the mall and she was not really surprised when she stopped where she did.

 The coffee shop had the look of an opium den:  low lights and tables peopled by individuals who were not thinking beyond their drink. Some were sipping, some swigging, and some simply inhaling 
it. Coffee was curling up and filling every available space.

Tara picked up her low fat café latte and settled into an empty table. She switched on her MP3 player and lifted her cup to sip.

Endaro Mahanubhavulu…..

Tara went still. She carefully placed the cup back on its saucer, taking care not to slosh the steaming beverage.

“Tara, Priya here”

“Hey! Amma reached?’

“That is what I am calling about. You need to come home”

The singer was repeating the lines. Tara remembered everything about this song that her mother had always wanted her to about all songs- the ragam, the talam, the composer.

 And that this had been the last song her mother had sung. . Three years should have been long 
enough to dull the pain.

“Oh god! Look... the news...” disembodied voices in the common room

“What happened?”

“The Air India flight coming back for the US to Chennai – crashed near …”

Tara turned back to the phone.

“I just heard it on the news. I am coming home”

   They never had a funeral; they never found the body. The girls had a prayer meeting for their mother.  They could not call their father- they did not know who he was.

 A few days later Tarawent back to her management school. . Priya, who then was already working, continued living in their mother’s house. Taranever went home after that. She had come to the US on her first job and had here stayed since.

Tara blinked and willed the pain to end with the song. She finished her too cold, too milky, too 
strong, too wrong coffee.  She put the cup on the counter and left the coffee shop with out a backward glance.

It was time, she knew. She let herself into her apartment and picked up the phone

 “Priya,” she said when her call was answered. “I am coming home”

“Okay” was all the reply she got but Tara could feel the smile break through the phone cables. “Anything special I can make for you?”

“Coffee-“

Tara’s flight reached at mid night. The first thing she thought about, when her eyes popped open the next morning was- coffee.

                                                                                                                              

She stumbled into her sister’s living room.  Tara could hear her in the kitchen. She went in .Priya was pottering about in her Capri’s and tank top, her short hair bobbing about.
”Ah good morning. Ready for your coffee?”

Tara nodded.

“In a few minutes”

Tara wandered off, through the living room, into the study where her mother used to have her music lessons, where she used to practise for her programmes. The air in the room used to resonate with the strums of the tampura.

 She looked around. Now a computer stood at the corner and a bright rug was spread in the middle of the room. The other corner had a rocking chair and beside it there was a book case full of books

“Where is Amma’s tampura?”

“Gave it away” came the answer from the kitchen. “To the music school- like she had wanted”

“Her books?’

“You remember Vishnu? Her favourite student?”

“Hmm”

“He asked for it. I thought she would have liked him to have it. So...”

Tara wandered back. She perched on one of the two stools that stood beside the tiny dining table. Shakira was vouchsafing the honesty of her hips from the player on the wall ledge.

    Tarawatched her sister pour out the coffee decoction from the tall brass coffee filter that had been their grandmother’s, the one that their mother had used. As she watched, Priya added hot milk from the pan on the stove.

“Sugar?”

“Like always”

“I don’t have sugar anymore”

“Oh”

Priya came up to the table and placed a steel tumbler of coffee in front of Tara. She was holding a white patterned Corel mug, Taranoticed.

“I switched to mugs a few years back” she said noticing the question in Tara’s eyes.

“In fact I hardly drink coffee. Have Earl Gray in the mornings. Decided to keep you company today”

Tara nodded and sipped her coffee. She studied the brew thoughtfully and slowly finished it.

She gently put the tumbler down on her sister’s table.

“I was wondering… there is something here I would like to take back with me…”

“Of course. What?’

Tara told her.

Six weeks later, when Tara returned to New York, the city was already beginning to wear its autumn look.

    The first thing she unpacked was the shiny polished brass coffee filter. She put it carefully on the kitchen counter. Some Indian store in Queens was bound to have South Indian coffee powder….

Here are some mentions of the award


http://www.asiawrites.org/2010/06/announcing-elle-fiction-awards-india.html