A Temporary Matter
The light gradually extends from left to right. One can see a typical living room of a working couple. There is a sofa and two adjacent settees on both the sides. There is a small tipoy with stray magazines and newspapers. The cloth-cover on sofa is also not well kept. On the right wall one can see a curtain. The colors of curtain and paint of wall do not match. The flower-vase on the tipoy looks ignored. Plastic flowers and their stems look more like ruffled fair of a disheveled urchin.
Enters Shukumar, thirtyish, tall, healthy and�� fair. It is clear that he has just got up from the bed. In an old T-shirt and colorful Bermuda short he looks totally unpresentable. He looks at the watch and gives an expression of a painful realization that it's morning again. He has a news paper in the hand. He goes inside the room on right and comes out with a cupful of self-prepared coffee. Spectacles on his face have also not been put properly. All his actions are children of ignorance. He is ignorant of 'what to do?' He sits on the sofa and starts reading newspaper with a lifeless yawn.
Enters Shoba from left. A bit plump. She looks somewhere in late twenties or early thirties. She is in the phase wherein for a woman make-up ceases to be an accessory and starts becoming necessary. Yet, she is fair and beautiful, for any woman of her age. She has put on formal officewear - a blazer, shirt and a trouser. With well-combed short hair she looks all set to leave for office. She looks at Shukumar but does not take notice of his presence. She looks inside the mailbox hanging on the wall and while taking out a letter from it, she says?
Shoba: good morning! Takes a letter from the letter bag. Did you read this notice? They say it's a temporary matter.
Shukumar: what's it? I wasn't home last noon. I missed it.
Shoba: it seems there is some problem in the main sub-station. For four days there will not be any electricity in the evenings. 8.00 to 9.00.
Shukumar: can't they do this during daytime?
Shoba: probably the office fellows might object to it. Well, I'll push off. Some juice and sandwiches are there. Have it if you feel like.
(Both of them nod to each other - as a ritual.)
Scene - II
To create a scene of night,  the white lights from two top corners will be switched off. Only saffron lights will pervade across the stage.
Shukumar seems to be doing something with some empty plates. He is actually confused as to what to cook. He starts looking at some of the plates. He brings some bread out and starts preparing some sandwiches.
Shoba enters. With unruffled hair and fatigued face. Throws herself on the sofa. Than looks at Shukumar.
Shoba: Are you preparing something? I have brought some stuff. On the way, I thought let me take some pizzas and other stuff.
Shukumar: I will make some sandwiches and orange juice.
Shoba: oh! That's fine. How was your day?
Shukumar: well, fine. I met Prof. Richardson today. He says if I submit the thesis by end of November than I can expect doctorate to be awarded, in this academic year itself. It will improve my chances of getting a job faster.
(Meanwhile Shukumar will place some pots on the table in the centre)
Meanwhile Shoba does not respond. She stands up and goes to right corner. She takes some plates out. Simply comes with some plates and puts them on the table. And takes a seat on the left settee.
Shoba: (suddenly as if she remembers something) well, today they are going to do the repairing. Lights will be off by 8.00. It's already 7.50. Do we have some candles?
Shukumar: all I could find was these birthday candles.
Shoba: doesn't matter it looks lovely.
(She stands up,  goes up to Shukumar and takes the candles. Comes back and sits on the left settee. All of a sudden all lights will be off. Now light will be only on the table in the center. She will light up the candles.)
Shoba: wow! What a perfect sense of timing!
(Shukumar comes and sits on the settee on the right. they start eating)
Shukumar (continues): I am fed up with this PhD. I want to finish it now. It has been overstretched, I believe.
Shoba: anyways take care of your being fed up later. Feed your stomach now.
They eat for a while.
Shoba: had we not lost our kid. (Stops! as if she might cry) we would have been living a fuller life.
Shukumar: (holds her hand) you still repent my absence that day!
Shoba: no no, how can I? It was I who wanted you to attend the seminar. But mumma still remembers. Today she had called up in the office.
Shukumar: as usual she might have cried on the phone.
Shoba: well, she was craving for a grand child since the day we got married.
(Suddenly, as if she wants to change the topic?.)
Shoba: this is like India. Sometimes the current disappears for hours at a stretch. I once had to attend a rice ceremony in the dark. The baby just cried and cried. It must have been so hot. (Again she stops!) Gillian told me once. Even our baby had cried. If we could have heard.
Shukumar: (as if to avoid this conversation) Gillian was a great help that day. Wasn't he?
Shoba: yeah, mumma could not rush from Arizona. And you were ??? attending the seminar.
(Silence prevails. They are eating. Some stray rustles of spoons with plates is the only element of sound. )
Shukumar: (as if he cannot bear the silence anymore) are you hot? (Pushes the ivy pot towards her)
Shoba: no no; it's delicious. Thanks.
Shukumar: how was the day at office?
Shoba: as usual. Got a good novel to proofread. It's rare to find some good literature these days.
Shukumar: I think literature itself is a rarity nowadays. (Tries to laugh in vain. Shoba does not respond)
Shoba: (looking at a distant place ( as if cherishing some old memories) I remember! During power failures at my grandmother's house, we all had to say something.
Shukumar: Say something? Like what?
Shoba: I don't know. A little poem, a joke. A fact about the world. For some reasons, my relatives always wanted me to tell them the names of my friends in America. I don't know why the information was so interesting to them. The last time I saw my aunt she asked me after four girls, I went to elementary school in Tucson. I barely remembered them.
(Again silence. None of them speak anything. They are not even eating anything now)
Shoba: let's do that!
Shukumar: Do what?
Shoba: say something to each other in dark.
Shukumar: like what? I don't know any jokes.
Shoba: no no! No jokes. (She thinks for a minute) how about telling each other something we've never told before.
Shukumar: I used to play this game, when I was in high school. When I got drunk.
Shoba: (chuckles) you're thinking of truth or dare. This is different. O.K. I will start. The first time, I was alone in your apartment, I looked in your address book to see of you'd written me in. I think we?d known each other for about two weeks.
Shukumar: where was I?
Shoba: you went to answer the phone in the other room. It was your mother. I figured it would be a long call. I wanted to know, if you'd promoted me from the margins of your newspapers.
Shukumar: Had I?
Shoba: no, but I did not give up on you. Now it's your turn.
Shukumar: (thinks?.) okay. The first time, we went out to dinner, to the Portuguese place, I forgot to tip the waiter. I went back the next morning, found out his name, left money with the manager.
Shoba: you went all the way to Somerville just to tip a waiter.
Shukumar: I took a cab.
Shoba: why did you forget to tip the waiter by the way?
Shukumar: by the end of the meal, I had a funny feeling that I might marry you some day. That distracted me perhaps!
(Both of them laugh lightly and lights fade)
Scene - III
(Once again, full saffron lights. Shukumar and Shoba are in new attires. However their dressing patterns have not changed. Shukumar is still casual and Shoba is still formal.)
Shoba: coming from left. Do we have enough candles today?
Shukumar: not probably. Well I think only two. I should have bought some today.
Shoba: well! Doesn't matter. Let's sit outside. Two candles are enough.
(Lights will fade. And after darkness for some moments, focus will be on right front corner, where they are sitting on steps. It should look like steps of the main door of the house. Both of them are sitting with plates, vessels and spoons.� They start eating.)
Shukumar: don't you want to continue your game today?
Shoba: I was thinking of what to say today?
Shukumar: what do you have to say?
Shoba: (very coldly but seriously) that time when your mother came to visit us, (pause for a while and than she resumes with a sigh) when I said one night that I had to stay late at work, I went out with Gillian and had a martini. I wanted to avoid her that night.
Shukumar: (looks surprised) oh!!!
Shoba: (with a puzzling tone) your turn!?
Shukumar: I cheated on my Oriental Civilization exam in college. It was my last semester, my last set of exams. My father died a few moths before. I could see the blue book of the guy next to me. He was an American guy, a maniac. He knew Urdu and Sanskrit. I couldn't remember if the verse we had to identify was an example of a Ghazal or not. I looked at his answer and copied from it. I was so upset. I had never copied before that but I could not?
Shoba: (comes closer to him and holds his hand) you need not tell me, why you did it.
(Lights fade.
Commentary begins: somehow, without saying anything it had turned into an exchange of confessions. The darkness made the couple talk. They started confessing about little ways in which they had hurt each other or themselves. For the next two days, Shukumar spoke about the photograph of a bare woman that he had cut from one of the fashion magazines that Shoba had subscribed and carried for days in his books when she was pregnant. He also told shoba how much he detested the sweater that she had presented him on the first anniversary. He was uncomfortable with it; still he used to carry it lest she should feel hurt. On the other hand Shoba told him that once after a lecture they'd attended, she let him speak to the chairman of his department without telling him that he had a dab of p�t� on his chin. On the fourth night she said that she never liked the one poem he'd ever published in a literary magazine of Utah. However, she had told him that she found it sentimental. After four nights of such confessions, on the fifth day??)
Once again light extends. Today everything looks in order. As if, suddenly they have started taking care of the home. The curtains, the pillows, the tipoy, the settees, the flower-vase, the flowers and the stems, everything looks as if it's a part of a complete system. One can see two candles on the Tipoy. Settees are not adjacent to the sofa but to the tipoy.
Shukumar comes from right and Shoba comes from left. Both are in casual wear. Still Shukumar has combed his hair properly. He looks clean-shaved today.
Shukumar: oh! You changed! Before meal?
Shoba: oh yes! I felt like.
Shukumar: (takes a letter out of the mailbag, while Shoba sits on the settee with plates and starts arranging them) today they sent this notice.
Shoba: what is it?
Shukumar: the line has been repaired ahead of the schedule. There will not be any black-out today.
Shoba: I think our game is over.
Shukumar: (sits on the settee) can't we extend it for one more day.
Shoba: what?
Shukumar: shouldn't we keep lights off?
(Shoba nods in positive and once again the lights fade.)
Shoba: let me start today. I want you to see my face when I tell you this.
(They put one of the candles aside. Now they are leaning on the tipoy, face-to-face)
Shoba: I have been looking for an apartment and I've found one. The apartment is on Beacon Hill, so I would be able to walk to work. I signed the lease today, before coming home.
Shukumar makes some gestures to speak but does not speak at all. He does not know what to say.
Shoba: I think we were just dragging ourselves. I'm sorry, but without informing you I spent last week preparing for a life???.. A life??.. Without you. (After a pause?)
Don't you have something to say?
Shukumar: (suddenly wakes up from the silence) oh yeah! It's my turn. (After a thoughtful pause) Do you remember our baby?
Shoba: how can I? I was not even conscious. And I had asked the Doctor not to tell me the sex of the baby. At least we have been spared of that knowledge. At least we can take refuge in that mystery.
Shukumar: you can Shoba! But I can't. (He stands up)
Shoba: (looking him with a puzzled face) what do you want to say Kumar?
Shukumar: I hadn't arrived late from Baltimore. I had arrived early enough to see out baby. I had arrived early enough to hold our baby. I had arrived early enough to cremate our baby. (By this time his voice gets more and more hoarse.)
(He sits on the floor and starts weeping like a kid)
Shukumar: our baby was a boy Shobi! His skin was more red than brown. He had black hair on his head. He weighed almost five pounds. His fingers were curled shut, just like yours in the night. I had held our son Shobi! In the dark room of the hospital. I held him until a nurse knocked and took him away. That day itself I promised myself that I would never tell you this. Because this is the only thing you wanted to remain a surprise all your life. And I too wanted it to remain a surprise for you because?? because?.. I still love you. I still love you!
(Shoba comes to him. Cuddles him like a small kid. She takes his head into his arms. And both of them weep. For the things they know now.)
Curtain
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