Free An Obedient Father by Akhil Sharma Page A

cricket game to the end. Again, I felt enormous. When the children dispersed, it was around five. Rajinder should have left his office.

    I bathed. I stood before the small mirror in the armoire as I dressed. Uneven brown areolae, a flat stomach, the veins in my feet like pen marks. Will this be enough? I wondered. Once he loves me, I told myself I lifted my arms to smell the plantlike odor of my perspiration. I wore a bright red cotton sari. What will I say first? Namaste, how was your day? With the informal you. How was your day? The words felt strange, for I had never before used the informal with him. I had, as a show of modesty, never even used his name, except for the night before my wedding, when I said it hundreds of times to myself to see how it sounded—like nothing. Now, standing before the mirror, when I said Rajinder, the three syllables had too many edges. Rajinder, Rajinder, I said rapidly several times, till it no longer felt strange. He will love me because it is too lonely otherwise, because I will love him so. I heard a scooter stopping outside the building, the metal door to the courtyard swinging open.
    My stomach clenched as I walked onto the roof The dark clouds had turned late evening into early night. I saw Rajinder roll the scooter into the courtyard. He parked the scooter, took off his gray helmet. He combed his hair carefully to hide the emerging bald spot. The deliberate way he tucked the comb into his back pocket overwhelmed me with tenderness. We will love each other carefully.
    I waited for him to rise out of the stairwell. My petticoat drying on the clothesline went clap, clap in the wind. How was your day? How was your day? Was your day good? I told myself. Don't be so afraid. What does it matter how you say hello? There will be tomorrow, the day after, the day after that.
    His steps sounded like a shuffle. Leather rubbing against stone. There was something forlorn to the sound. Rajinder, Rajinder, Rajinder, how are you?
    First the head: oval, high forehead, handsome eyebrows. Then the not so broad but not so narrow shoulders. The top two buttons of the cream shirt were opened, revealing some hair, a white undershirt. The two weeks since I last saw him had not changed Rajinder, yet he felt different, somehow denser.

    "How was your day?" I asked, while he was still in the stairwell.
    "All right," he said, stepping onto the roof. He smiled. His helmet was in his left hand. In his right was a plastic bag full of mangoes. "When did you get home?" The you was informal. I felt a surge of relief He will not resist, I thought.
    "A little after three."
    I followed him into the bedroom. He placed the helmet on the windowsill. The mangoes went in the refrigerator. I remained silent.
    Rajinder walked onto the roof to the sink on the outside bathroom wall. He began washing his hands, face, neck with soap. "Your father is fine?" he asked. Before putting the chunk of soap down, he rinsed it of foam. Only then did he pour water on himself He used a thin washcloth hanging on a nearby hook for drying. When I am with him, I promised myself, I will not think of Pitaji. It's much more than seven years since Pitaji touched me.
    "Yes."
    "What did the doctor say?" he asked, turning toward me. He was like a black diamond.
    "Nothing."
    I watched Rajinder hang his shirt by the collar tips on the clothesline. I suddenly became sad at the rigorous attention to details necessary to preserve love. Perhaps it is easier for other women, I thought, women who are braver, who have less to be afraid of, who have more trust. That must be a different type of love, I thought, in which one can be careless.
    "It will rain tonight," he said, looking at the sky.
    The eucalyptus trees shook their heads from side to side. "The rain always makes me feel as if I am waiting for someone," I said. Immediately I regretted saying it, for Rajinder was not paying attention. Perhaps it might have been said better. "Why don't you sit on the