My Neighbour’s Wife

| 3 MIN READ | Small towns & Big hearts

The law of entropy states that things tend to move towards disorder naturally. So do I.

Last year, we got some home repair work done. I was instinctively ready to retreat into a corner and continue living in more dust and din. But my wife personifies cleanliness and competence. I go against my grain and rent another flat in the building for a few months.

The living room has black-gold-purple striped walls and white curtains with large red strawberries on them. A steel holder for an oversized television sticks out of the wall like stranded ammunition. The previous tenants were Korean. Their style more ‘Squid Game’ than ‘Parasite’.

I assume we will throw our beds on the floor, live out of suitcases and work with the gas stove and 5-10 key utensils for the next three months. We are on a higher floor now. The light pours in. The winds arrive with a whiplash. I shouldn’t get used to this.

I return a week later and my wife has installed fresh Taupe wall paper and Beige curtains, moved forty-six pieces of furniture, arranged art work, repaired fans, replaced white lights with yellow, operationalized kitchen, set-up wifi and populated the wardrobes. I feel reassured by the order but I don’t know what to say. There is something about disruption and desolate landscapes that draws me. One reason I loved Morocco so much. The desert sprawl and lack of expectation amidst it is calming.

The new neighbours ante door is always open. The cook’s year-old daughter spends her day roaming around the lobby between our homes. I peer into their kitchen. It is a constant bustle of activity. A small army of staff. Rhythmic chopping, crackle of tadka, cooker whistles, and a variety of fragrant aromas. As we grow more familiar with each other, I lean in to enquire on what’s cooking. They send me dishes that I sound enthused about. The zenith of Indian affection.

We invite our neighbours over for Dosas one Sunday morning. She arrives early with the cook’s daughter on her hip. Sits and allows her to get comfortable on her lap. She feeds the child first. The husband and son join later. They are originally from Gujarat, where the first language is enterprise. We talk about the textile business he operates out of a small town in Maharashtra. It was much larger at one time, but he has brought it down to a size that is manageable remotely with monthly visits. She runs a downtown Salon business. The son works in Private Equity but is putting the pieces together in his head to start something on his own.  

A few weeks later the cook’s assistant is engaged. Her wedding will be in the village in a few months. My neighbours’ host a dinner party at their home to celebrate. All the family and friends of the cook’s assistant are invited. The front door is wide open, there is music playing and the special party lights that transform the ambience are on. I spot my neighbour’s wife dancing in the living room, surrounded by drivers, maids, delivery boys and tailors. I am wonderstruck.

We live in a building with a set of elevators reserved for residents and a separate service elevator for staff. Class apartheid is deeply entrenched amongst the upwardly mobile and wealthy in urban India. Occasionally overt, but predominantly governed by deceptively subtle conditioning. Resident only elevators are justified as a convenience to reduce wait times, akin to Valet parking. But the carving away of daily spaces normalizes an artificial separation. Gnaws away at the more fundamental things we share that bind us. Like a glitch in the Matrix. Something feels off, but you allow yourself to get quickly distracted away from it.

When the ‘Right to Education’ act mandated that city schools must reserve a few seats for children from poor families, that the poshest schools in the city run by minority communities are excluded from this mandate was noted with relief. The elite have a sub-culture of their own. Of knowledge, discipline and hard work. Of knowing how the system works and how best to navigate it. Of preserving and protecting what they have, because the world can be brutal when you don’t.

My neighbour’s wife grew up in a small town. Immune to all of this. Every time I see her now, we hug.