Translated from Tamil by Prof. S. Thillainayagam. Cover art: Photograph of Il Grande Cretto, courtesy of Modio Media.
It was her smile that fascinated you most. A smile that didn’t bloom fully but was always there, that always began with a slight curl of her lips. It was there while Ruby was reading newspapers, attending to house work, walking, sitting, or doing makeup. You wondered if she also smiled in the dark. Six months after marrying her, you began to understand that smiling was the natural state of her face.
On your wedding night, for the first time, her face tightened and showed signs of uneasiness for a brief moment. Even then, her smile did not vanish completely. You asked her, ‘Are you upset about something?’ She said, ‘Only fifteen people attended our wedding. All of them were your friends and relatives. I had none.’ Her self-pity troubled you slightly. You said, ‘Why, I’m there for you.’ She stood bowing her head, and her mouth opened into a distinct smile while her wet eyes shone. When you realized she had come trusting you and had no one else in the world, your heart melted for her. You hugged her and said a few comforting words. She said, ‘I need to talk to you. Do you have the time?’ You replied, ‘From now on, all my time is yours.’ You expressed your love by enveloping her in a tight, warm embrace. She murmured somewhat mysteriously, ‘Do not worry, I’m not dangerous.’ That’s all she would say.
From the very beginning she was weird. She used to do her makeup by applying Dead Sea mud on her face and placing cucumber pieces on her eyes. After that her face acquired a new glow, and you stroked it saying, ‘Your cheeks now look like a mirror.’ At once she would rush to the nearest mirror to look at her face. Very often, she watched the reflection of her face on the TV screen, wet floor, fridge door, and whatever reflected her image. If water had stagnated on the road, she would stop for a while and view her face as if for the first time. Even while cooking, she would peer at her curved face on the back of the spoon. One day you spoke to her image. ‘Why are you so fascinated with your own face?’ She was perplexed. She waved her hands up and down as if driving away some bad smell and answered, ‘It’s nothing of the sort.’ You left it at that.
Curious incidents such as this began to happen more and more. Sometimes her questions seemed intelligent and at other times they left you baffled. One morning when you were getting ready for the office, Ruby stood patiently in front of you, holding her night dress bunched up to her stomach. ‘What’s the capital of Canada?’ she asked. When you said ‘Ottawa’, her face darkened. ‘Isn’t it Toronto?’ You repeated, ‘No, it’s Ottawa’, and she asked, ‘Why?’ For the first time you began to wonder whether you had married a dunce.
‘Is it a matter to be decided by you and me? Queen Victoria made this decision 150 years ago.’ Ruby was still not satisfied.
Then she asked, ‘Why did she decide like that?’ You patiently answered, ‘If America were to declare war on Canada, facing it from Ottawa would be more convenient. That’s the reason’. You were surprised to see her face shrink. ‘Oh, is it so? Teach me. I must improve my knowledge. Don’t stop,’ she said in a beseeching tone.
You never knew in advance what Ruby would do in any given circumstance. At times she would behave absurdly. If someone asked her for an address, she would reply in this manner: ‘In Scarborough, on the eastern side of Eglinton Avenue after passing Victoria, stands a yellow and green building bearing the number 1717. You must sign the register kept by the sentry and go up to the third floor. Above that is the fourth floor. And the fifth floor is one level higher and you will see the number 514.’ You would laugh and think of saying something sarcastic. But you would not.
It was also a puzzle that the temperature of her body rose slowly in the night. Before retiring, her body would be chilly. As time passed, her body temperature would escalate slowly, as mercury rises in a thermometer. After midnight, the hot air emanating from her body would become almost unbearable. You wondered how so much heat could be generated from such a small body. By then she would be fast asleep.
In the first months of your marriage, you asked her to read you a poem. She got the book from the shelf and placed it on the table. She turned the book on the right side as if she was examining a painting and again looked at it after turning it left. You asked her, ‘Aren’t you going to read the poem?’ For about two minutes she read the poem, pronouncing the words one by one. ‘Should I read it all today?’ ‘Yeah.’ ‘Now?’ ‘Yeah.’ ‘Up to the last line?’ ‘Why, what’s the problem?’ She said, ‘The entire page is filled with words.’ After this you didn’t bring up poetry.
Drinking coffee was also something she did in a very strange way. She would take the cup in her hand, and you would expect her to raise the cup to her lips and drink. But that wouldn’t happen. She would bend down, keep her lips on the rim of the cup, and sip. Unable to watch in silence, you asked her one day, ‘Why do you drink coffee like that? There is an easier method—lifting the cup with your hand and bringing it to your lips.’ Ruby abruptly got up and left the room.
Ruby liked to watch only two types of TV programmes. One was opera in which a woman would cover half the TV screen and produce a powerful and resonant sound that filled the house. The storyline would appear below. When you asked her, ‘What story is it?’ she would say, ‘The letters ran away before I could read them.’ Cartoons were different. She would watch the same programme again and again and laugh at the same scenes.
Her questions continued to throw you off guard. One day she asked, ‘What’s the colour of leaves in darkness?’ Without thinking you answered, ‘Green.’ ‘How do you know?’ ‘Aren’t leaves green? They are green in daylight. So they must be green in darkness too.’ ‘How can you be so sure about it?’ You were unable to convince her. So you said curtly, ‘Light a lamp, and you’ll know.’ She said, ‘If I light a lamp, darkness will disappear.’ Again, you were left speechless.
One early morning, you were not surprised when she got ready for a training programme for long-distance runners. You had gotten used to such unforeseeable activities. Still, you were a little worried, as it seemed unlike her. She left confidently for the training and returned exhausted. When you asked her what this new training was for, she said she had signed up to participate in a marathon. You said in surprise, ‘Marathon?’ Over the next few days you pondered her explanation: ‘Man is the only animal created for running. His ankles and feet are especially structured for running. Children learn to run first; only later do they learn to walk. Standing comes much later. Man’s natural state is running.’
You asked yourself from where she could have gathered these details. ‘How does a horse overtake a man in speed?’ you asked. She replied, ‘A horse may run faster. But man can run a longer distance. If a man and a horse start at the same moment, the horse will stop midway and a man will continue to run. Only a man was chosen to announce the victory of the Greeks in the Marathon War to people in Athens twenty-six miles away. Not a horse. It would have fallen dead halfway.’ Listening to such an incredible reply you could only remain silent. You never referred to the matter again.
One night at dinner you said to her, as she took her strange mincing bites, ‘We’ve been married for five years, and we still have no child. Shall we consult a doctor?’She shook her head violently as if water had somehow gotten into her ears. As you watched, her eyes grew larger. She pushed away her chair and left the house. That day you had to wash all the plates by yourself.
One day, when you were on the phone talking to your boss, Ruby appeared from nowhere and stood before you. She had something to ask you urgently. After waiting for ten minutes, she suddenly pressed your jaws together hard with her hand. The conversation stopped. She threw you a sharp look and said, ‘Tell me the truth. Isn’t Toronto the capital of Canada?’ As soon as she removed her hand you said, ‘No, Ottawa,’ and continued the conversation with your boss. But after that you could not think clearly. You were terribly shocked. That was the day you decided to consult the doctor about her bizarre behaviour.
The first thing you told the doctor is that you had been married for five years, still with no child. The doctor did a series of tests on both of you. After two days the doctor called and said that your wife’s blood needed to be examined once more. But Ruby refused, saying, ‘How many times will he ask for my blood? Do I have to give blood again and again? And how unjust it is to insist on women giving birth to babies!’ You argued, ‘Who else can do? Is that not the natural way?’ She replied, ‘No such universal dictum. Among seahorses, only the male gives birth to babies.’
You were at your wit’s end. You start thinking about all the good times you had with her at the beginning. What is life? Isn’t it the accumulation of one’s memories? She was changing into something very different, an enigma. On top of that, her marathon timing was becoming very close to the world record, the trainer said, and that scared you. How could she have achieved that in so short a time?
You were lying flat, keeping your folded hands beneath your head. Above, on the ceiling, a fly was moving, upside down. Green body, red legs, and wings fragile like glass. You wondered why that fly was walking around. What did it want? Couldn’t it fly? Still, it crawled slowly, its head hanging down. It hadn’t realized its full potential.
Out of the blue Ruby agreed to go for a second blood test. She made all her decisions like that. Mispronouncing Ruby’s name very badly, a nurse called her into the lab for the blood test.
One evening, as usual, Ruby was watching the TV. Holding the remote in her left hand, she was changing the channels rapidly one by one. When she spotted a cartoon, she began to watch it. It was something she had seen umpteen times. Whenever her favourite scenes appeared, she laughed, raising her voice high as if she was seeing them for the first time.
When the doctor called that night, you were eager to speak with him. Ruby muted the sound lest it would disturb you and continued to watch the programme. Since she did not mute her mouth, it continued to laugh. The doctor asked you to bring your wife immediately to the lab. Ruby cried, ‘Again?’ He added, ‘This is an emergency. Two medical scientists are with me. Human blood is categorized into thirty-three groups. Your wife’s blood comes under none of these. It is not human blood at all.’
You kept listening to the doctor and at the same time turned your eyes towards Ruby. You couldn’t believe what you saw. Your heart leaped like a fish jumping out of water. Ruby’s extended hands were operating the remote. Channels changed very rapidly on the TV. The smile on her lips grew larger and larger until her two rows of teeth became visible. She slowly turned her head like a statue would and looked at you. You were stunned and lost all sense. Her body was floating a foot above the chair.
Your time starts now.
Appadurai Muttulingam was born in Sri Lanka and has published numerous books in Tamil, including novels, short story collections, interviews, and essays. Stories translated into English have been published in three collections. They have also appeared in anthologies Many Roads Through Paradise (Penguin Books 2014) and Uprooting the Pumpkin (Oxford University Press 2016). Among his honors are Sahitya Academi award 1998 (Sri Lanka) and SRM University literary award 2013 (India). One of his short stories was published in the Narrative Magazine, U.S.A (Nov 2021), and another in Asymptote, U.K (2023). A short story also selected as a finalist in the Armory Square Prize (2023) U.S.A. He lives with his wife in Toronto.
S Thillainayagam, retired from M.S.University, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu, India as Professor of English. His papers presented in national and international conferences were published as Feminist Literary Essays. He has edited Sundara Ramasamyin Thernthedutha Katturaigal for the Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi. His translations from Tamil to English include A.K. Chettiar’s In the Tracks of the Mahatma for Orient Longman, New Delhi, Kalaignar Karunanithi’s Ponnar-Sankar for Macmillan,Password and Other Stories of A.Muttulingam for Ratna Books, Delhi and Pichamurtyin Selected Short Stories for the Sahitya Akademi. The last one won for him the greatly acclaimed Nalli-Thisai-Ettum Award for the best Tamil-to-English translation of the year 2019.
