DNA-OUT OF PRINT Short Fiction Content 2017 3rd runner-up

And if that Looking Glass breaks...
by Sohini Basak

You feel naked under his gaze, but that’s not the worst you feel around him

In my ten years with the doctor, I have never seen his hands shake like that. He looks around the cubicle again, as if seeing it for the first time, taking in all the surfaces: walls, table tops, the floor. He walks over to the other side of the slit-lamp, sits on the stool and checks the height of the chin-rest. ‘I don’t understand,’ he mutters. ‘I don’t understand why they need to be back this soon.’ He glances at his watch, sighs and then looking at me, says, ‘You want to take that off. You don’t want them to know about your life, not more than they do anyway.’

Trying not to feel superstitious, I take my wedding ring off. I wrap it carefully in a handkerchief, switch off my phone and put both inside my bag. I hand it to the ward-boy who is standing silently by the door. I can never tell how much he knows because he never asks questions. While leaving, he looks at the computer screen and says, ‘Dr S, isn’t that your granddaughter’s photo?’ 

Dr Sarkar looks at the screen in horror and then at the ward-boy with gratitude. He fumbles as he changes the desktop background into a default waterfall scenery. He then pumps out hand sanitizer and rubbing his palms mutters, ‘Now, I think, we are clean.’ On cue, the lights in the cubicle flicker a little. Blinking gracelessly, the Snellen’s chart looks like a sign outside a squalid bar. Dr Sarkar parts the blinds and taps on the glass to scare away the pigeon resting on top of the AC. ‘They’re here,’ he says.

Nothing ever prepares you for their visit. Even after ten years of going through the procedure, ten years of the meticulous clean-up act, ten years of suspending disbelief, my heart still picks up its pace and my palms sweat as soon as I hear those words. Perhaps it’s the smell that triggers deep disgust and fear. The reek that wafts in before they do. The reek so hard to describe – a sickly-sweet kitchen waste odour mixed with something like damp metal, like blood. Already, I want to throw up, but then, the two stand before your eyes and that vision overtakes everything else.

As always, BB’s mother walks ahead of BB. She cannot see very well, not after the terrible self-inflicted injuries which she always talks about, but she doesn’t trip over or fumble. She glides in, holding the umbilical cord wrapped delicately around her wrist, like zamindars held their shawls or a string of jasmine in old Bengali movies. You can never see her face underneath the veil which has changed from lace to wool, from black to white over the years, and as always, she announces her entry with a cough. BB trails behind her, obedient like a dog, his pace and radius of movement determined by the length of the umbilical cord that is his mother’s to control. 

‘Welcome, welcome,’ Dr Sarkar says, getting up from his chair. BB’s mother coughs again and on this cue, BB steps closer to the doctor. 

‘So, how are we? I was not expecting you back so soon,’ Dr Sarkar continues, trying to cover his nervousness with small talk. 

The first time I saw BB, my brain went into a delirium and I was reminded, of all things, of the old aquarium of my childhood and the little plastic boy that it housed, standing on pebbles, forever pissing to entertain our fishes. That description stayed. There’s something nostalgic about the way BB’s ever pre-pubescent body shimmers. Not skin, not plastic, not even membrane, as if that outer layer of his body has not caught up with the times. His limbs, his torso, his flabby neck, the big bald baby head, all out of proportion, rippling distortedly, as if seen through water and glass. 

As always, BB swivels his head to my direction, and stares. You feel naked under his gaze, but that’s not the worst you feel around him. I make eye contact as I have learnt that it’s the only way he may look away, but today, the leer in his look seems mild. Gone almost, replaced with a sad helplessness. Of the seven, four of his eyes bulge out of their sockets rather unpleasantly, more than their orbits should. The wires that emerge from around his ever-throbbing fontanelle and connect to his eyes seem more numerous than the last visit, they form a strange electric umbrella around his head. If there were an opposite word for halo, this would be it. 

What is the language of our thoughts? BB smirks as if I had uttered the last thought aloud. Can he read my mind? I have no idea. The doctor and I never discuss BB or his mother after they leave. We are bound by a contract which was never signed, but I know no paperwork will keep BB’s mother from destroying anyone who disobeys her. BB’s smirk turns into a sneer. His mouth is dribbling around the corners. You don’t need to read minds when you can see everything, I realise. One of the eyes suddenly fix on my hands and I can feel the searing gaze linger on my finger where the ring has left a tan mark. BB lets out a moan of surprise and his mother finally speaks, ‘A lot seems to have happened in the last six months, dear?’ 

I wring my hands foolishly, but Dr Sarkar is quick to react. ‘So tell me, are the tear plugs not working?’ he asks in a kindly clinical voice. 

BB’s mother cradles the umbilical cord close to her chest and stroking it says, ‘BB is not doing so well, Doctor.’ BB lets out a long groan to support his mother’s statement and moves his head close to the doctor’s face, looking at him unblinkingly. ‘The drops and plugs you prescribed aren’t very effective, we have to say. Always in such pain, my poor boy.’ 

Dr Sarkar looks at BB, gestures him to sit on the stool, and brings out his ophthalmoscope from the drawer. ‘A bit of focussed light, nothing to fear, we do this every time, don’t we?’ he says the gentle voice he uses with his child 
patients. 

‘Is he spending more time than usual with the screens?’ Dr Sarkar asks as he shifts his attention from one eye to another. 

‘Oh yes, screens, yes, he has to,’ BB’s mother says. She points at the wires around BB’s head and adds, ‘All the time, my poor boy. They’re making him, feeding him screens after screens constantly, you see. He works at least one million times harder these days. And then, on top of it all, BB has trouble sleeping. So, he puts something on to watch, you know, something soothing, after a hard day’s work.’ She laughs and turning to me, she says, in a voice so tender that it gives me goosebumps, ‘Do you know what his favourite bedtime watch is? Kittens! BB just watches them do such funny things, for hours and hours, till he falls asleep. My BB, such a softie at heart.’

About the author:

Sohini Basak’s debut poetry collection We Live in the Newness of Small Differences received the Beverly series manuscript prize and will be out in early 2018 from Eyewear Publishing. She occasionally writes fiction, some of which has appeared in journals such as 3: A.M. Magazine, Litro, Ambit, Aainanagar and Out of Print. Most recently, she is the recipient of a Toto Funds the Arts (TFA)Awards (2017), and a Malcolm Bradbury continuation grant for poetry from the University of East Anglia (2015). She currently works as an editor in a publishing house in New Delhi.