Divyasri Krishnan

Divyasri Krishnan

Selvi

The feeling comes as soon as Selvi hears the piano. First, a dulling of senses, like a door to the world has just been closed. Numbness in the fingertips. Then high heat in her face and neck, to which she presses the cool backs of her hands. She leaves her sweeping and goes to the kitchen, takes a cucumber from the crisper, holds it to her forehead. 

She stands like this long after the piano ceases. At length, she hears the gargle of the toilet, her husband’s heavy step on the stair. 

He stands at the entrance to the kitchen and looks at her, cucumber and all. “Good morning,” he says. 

She throws the cucumber at him. 

It clatters harmlessly to the floor. He watches it happen. “Don’t start.” 

“I am not starting,” Selvi says. 

Her husband does not respond. He does not even look at her meanly, so that she can be provoked. He only picks the cucumber up, crosses the kitchen to throw it into the trash, then withdraws a box of cereal from the pantry.

Morning light comes in through the window above the sink as she watches him pour cereal into his bowl. It gives his thin, straight figure its own yellow halo. Through it, she can see where his shoulders have begun to stoop. 

“When are they coming?” he asks. A little milk dribbles from his mouth. 

“Afternoon.” 

“Both?” 

“Ashwin at eleven, Yamini at five.” 

“Neither of those are afternoon.”

She can hear him chewing slowly, swallowing with a soft grunt. The older he gets, the more of these guttural noises he makes. 

“The children?” 

“Yamini is bringing the baby.” 

Just saying it gives her a happy little thrill. 

“And Ashwin?” 

“Well, I don’t know.” 

He doesn’t say anything. 

“I don’t,” she says. 

Her husband sighs.

Ashwin arrives as Selvi is making lunch. She sees his gray car pull into the drive. He’s a foot taller than her. Her face goes into his stomach when they hug.

“All alone?” she asks. She looks again into the car to be sure. 

“You could sound less happy about it,” her son says. 

“I am not happy.” 

He gives her a censuring look and steps around her with his suitcase. 

“Where’s Appa?” 

“Sleeping.” She closes the front door behind him, wipes her hands unnecessarily on her towel. “I am just finishing lunch.” 

He is not looking at her. He is fiddling with something on his suitcase. 

“You go up and get settled,” she says. “The food will be ready in five, ten minutes.”

She watches him heft the suitcase over his shoulder and head up the stairs. She wants to tell him to take it slow, he will hurt his back, but she is afraid to nag. 

Half an hour has passed by the time she sets the stew and curry on the table. “Ashwin!” she calls in Tamil, “Come down!” 

She sits at her place at the table. Picks a shaving of coconut from the curry with her fork, sets it on her tongue. This one she has done well. 

“Ashwin!” she calls again. “Ranga!” 

Now noises from upstairs. The angry rush of the bathroom faucet. The open and shut of a drawer. 

Selvi watches white steam rise from the stew, the curry, the rice. Her husband is down first. He has changed into a pressed shirt and black pants, and his thinning silver hair has been meticulously combed to one side. He sits at the head of the table. “Looks very good,” he says. 

“It’s getting cold,” she says. 

They both look at the food, still steaming. 

Ashwin comes down. His hair is wet, dripping onto the collar of his shirt. Already a dark circle has formed at the nape of his neck. 

“You should have dried it before coming down,” Selvi says. She can’t help herself. 

“I meant to, but you called.” 

“So it’s my fault?” 

“Sit,” says her husband to Ashwin. “And take food, you must be hungry.” Ashwin sits and begins ladling food onto his plate. 

“You should have more rice than that,” Selvi says.

“This is fine.” 

“How is that fine? One, two spoons?” 

“White rice is linked to diabetes,” Ashwin says, “Didn’t you know?” 

“That’s all nonsense.” 

“It’s not. There are studies—” 

“Indians have been eating white rice for longer than diabetes was discovered, don’t listen to all these studies. And don’t talk like you are some kind of doctor.” 

“Selvi,” her husband says sharply.

Ashwin turns away from her. To his father he says, “I’m meeting with the director next week to discuss extending my contract for next season.” 

“Really? I thought you were going to move orchestras.” 

“I was, but the boys have really been taking to their school, so I’d hate to move them.” Her husband shifts in his seat, straightening a little. A severity is descending on him. It makes her feel like a child.

“Staying too long at a lower tier orchestra can be detrimental to your career in the long run.” 

“It’s just one more year.” 

“One more, then two, then five. It creeps up on you, Ashwin.” 

“It’s not just me I have to think about—” 

“Of course it is. Take a year away in another contract, the boys will hardly miss you, but the impact will be enormous. You will meet all the right people.” 

Selvi sighs loudly. 

Ashwin glances at her, then away. Her husband doesn’t even look at her.

“Complacency is death to the pianist,” her husband says. His voice has lost none of its command over the years. “Especially ones like us. My name will only go so far for you.” 

“Yeah, alright,” Ashwin says. He pushes at his rice with his spoon. “I’ll talk to Francine about it.” 

“Francine!” Selvi says. 

Their faces turn toward her now.

“It would have been so nice to see her today.” 

“Amma.” 

“And the boys. But I suppose they are all too busy.” 

Her husband says nothing. 

“Francine’s on deadline,” Ashwin says. “But even if she wasn’t, you can’t blame her and the boys for not coming. It’s not like you’ve been very hospitable to them—” 

“Hospitable? I give them beds, I give them food, what hospitable?” 

Ashwin’s eyes flash, just as her husbands’ does. Such twin angers. “You treat them like they just wandered in from the street. Your own grandchildren.” 

“They are not my grandchildren.” 

“The children of your son are your grandchildren, Amma.” 

“No, no,” Selvi says, “you can’t just fling a word like that around, you can’t just scoop babies from who knows where and call them your children, they aren’t even Indian—”

“Selvi!” her husband says. 

Her mouth clicks shut. Then she says, “Fine, of course, I’ll shut up. Who wants to hear me talk? I just make food and shut up and everyone else goes on doing what they like.” 

“Amma, please, don’t say that.” 

“Why not? It’s true. You all just want me to keep quiet.”

“You know that’s not what we mean,” her husband says. 

“You are another thing,” she says to him angrily. “You keep mum on all of this and leave me to be the bad guy.” 

Her husband sighs. He is always sighing, her husband. He is always so tired. And old. Enough of your yelling, Selvi. No fighting today, Selvi. Leave me alone please, Selvi. You know that’s not what we mean. 

It is her habit now to sleep away the early hours of the afternoon. She lies alone in the king bed, keeping carefully to her side. 

Yamini will be here soon. And the baby. A little girl, a perfect little girl, with all her fingers and toes. Now the scales will tip toward her. It will almost make the years of wifehood worth it. 

Like this she lies. The day goes on. She is almost asleep, halfway dreaming about the baby, when the feeling—the numbness, the heat—comes again. 

There is an overpracticed quality to the piano playing that tells her it is Ashwin. He is good. Not prodigal. Secretly she’s happy for it, because the feeling is never so bad when he is playing. It would be terrible if Ashwin was as good as her husband. She would never forgive him. 

She knows the piece, too. One of Satie’s Gymnopedies. She can’t remember the number, but she does remember young days spent sitting by her husband’s knee on the floor as he practiced, humming the notes to herself and trying to commit it to memory. 

Once, she was proud of this recall. 

The sweet music grinds away at her. She lies very still, unblinking. It’s too early to move—Yamini won’t be here for hours still.

Then the music stops. Changes. 

The grinding becomes a sharp, direct pain. Heat begins in her neck, a stiffness settling in her limbs. The music has become smoother, cleaner, with flourishes here and there indicating a sophistication Ashwin has yet to reach. Her husband has taken the seat. 

His voice, decades younger, echoes in her head.

Consider what I’m saying . . . consider my feelings . . . 

Her body shudders at the memory. The horror of it, how easily he asked.

We’ll try again, I promise . . .

Selvi is out of the bed. Her blood beats dully somewhere in her. She is sweating, feverish. The baby. She has to get ready for the baby. 

She makes the bed, goes to splash some water on her face. In the mirror, her face looks older than it is, than it should be. Puffy, just beginning to grow lines at the forehead and around the eyes. 

The feeling crawls through her. She goes to the landing. The music rises up to meet her.  

“Ranga!” 

It stops. Silence rushes into the vacuum, blissful silence, like a cool cloth laid against her forehead. 

“I am,” Selvi says, “trying to sleep.” 

Her husband emerges from the living room, rubbing a hand across his chest. From up here, she can see the bald patches on his scalp. 

“It’s the afternoon,” he says. 

“I’m taking a nap.” 

“Ashwin needs to stay in shape.” 

“Then let him play.”

Her husband only looks at her. So many years later, he’s well aware of how little she can stand his playing. 

“I’m demonstrating,” he says. 

“You’re showing off.” 

He laughs. It makes her angry, that laugh. 

“You are,” she says. 

He smiles at her. Says nothing. 

Selvi is on the porch when Yamini arrives. A taxi labors into the drive, idles. A thin woman steps out. Young still, black hair loose around her shoulders. Takes after her father in looks, but Selvi has always believed they share something in the set of their jaws, their thick eyebrows, their stubbornness. 

They hug. Selvi feels the bird bones of her daughter’s back under her fingers. Then Yamini turns away, toward the taxi, and opens the back door. 

There lies the baby. Strapped into her car seat, sound asleep, cheek pillowed against the black padding. 

“Oh!” Selvi says, and reaches out. 

“Let’s go inside first, Amma,” Yamini says, scooping the baby up. “You have to wash your hands before you touch her.” 

“I’m not dirty.” 

“I’m not saying that.” 

Selvi, injured, says, “I didn’t do all that when you were born.” 

“Well, it’s good practice.”

“All made-up rules.” 

“Amma.” Yamini gives her a look. “Can you at least let me into the house before we fight?” 

We are not fighting, Selvi wants to say, but doesn’t. Her children have become strange to her these late years. Small things she says become evidence of some abiding mistreatment. And they are nothing, really. Just small corrections. Conversation mostly. A mother’s speech. 

Her husband is on the porch now, in his evening attire. A starched white shirt, tailored black pants. Concert attire, almost. Yamini is smiling at him, and it is the same smile as her husband’s, recognizable as soon as she was born. 

“Let me have the baby,” Selvi says to Yamini. “You can go hug Appa.” 

But Yamini and the baby are already going forward, onto the porch, and Selvi’s husband wraps the both of them in his arms. He kisses the top of Yamini’s head. Then the baby’s. Ashwin comes out, holds open the door. The three of them go in. Selvi turns, watches the lights of the taxi fade down the road. Then she goes in. 

Everyone takes dinner separately. Yamini eats with the baby in her room. Ashwin and Selvi’s husband remain in the living room, stooped over the piano. And Selvi eats in the kitchen. The baby upstairs is her own private phantom, hovering just outside her vision. She wants with her whole trembling self to hold her. 

A distant music floats through the house. Ashwin again. It’s Badinerie, Bach. Traditionally on flute, she knows. But fun on piano, lively.

Selvi rises, puts her plate in the sink and runs a little water over it. She soaps her hands and scrubs them vigorously. She has no germs, no matter what Yamini says. She isn’t the danger to worry about. 

The music grows louder as she leaves the kitchen, then fainter as she climbs the stairs. Yamini is sitting by the crib, murmuring something to the baby, who kicks her fat little legs in the air.

“She is so lovely,” Selvi says. The words sound strange in her mouth, although the meaning is entirely sincere. “She looks just like you.” 

This is not quite true, but it is what she has to say. 

“Thank you,” Yamini says. “Did you wash?” 

“Yes,” Selvi says. 

“Then come sit here.” 

Selvi comes forward. It is odd to take orders from her daughter. Motherhood has given her an authority she did not have before, that she does not really have now. But to bring it up would be to fight again, and Selvi is tired of unpleasantness. 

The baby coos softly. Little pigeon. Her hair is so fine, laid over her scalp like long grass in a field. Selvi touches her small nose with exaggerated care. See how soft I’m being. See how you worry for nothing. 

“It’s odd,” Yamini says. She pushes a stray lock of hair from her face. “I felt so young before giving birth, and I feel so old now. I thought I was too young for it. And then I wasn’t.”

Selvi could cry. “Yes,” she says, “Yes, this happens. It happened to me, too.”

Yamini nods. “With Ashwin.” 

No, Selvi almost says, before him. She catches herself in time. 

“Yes.”

“I’ve never been so worried for someone or something like this. Like, all my love is just fear. So much could go wrong.” 

Selvi touches her daughter’s arm. “The fear is good. It keeps you sharp. It makes you a good mother.” 

“You were afraid too?” 

“Yes. So afraid.” 

“What about?” 

Selvi hesitates. “I had dreams. Nightmares. That someone comes into my room and steals the baby from my arms, snap, like that. That I wake up empty and not a mother.” 

Yamini blinks. “Oh. That’s terrible.” 

“You don’t dream that?” 

“No, mine is more . . . baby falling sick, baby getting hurt. Nothing like that.” Selvi feels alien again, for a second. 

“Well,” she says finally, “I suppose everyone is afraid of different things.” The door creaks. They both turn. 

Selvi’s husband stands there, tall. He is not physically large, especially with age, but his presence takes up so much space. 

A familiar dullness and heat begin to press in on her. 

“Appa,” Yamini says warmly, “Come, the baby just woke up.” 

“You should wash your hands first,” Selvi says. 

“Just came from the bathroom.” 

Yamini says, “That’s fine. Come in.” 

“No.” Selvi’s hand goes out in front of her. “No, he can’t.”

“Amma.” 

“Did you have dinner? You have to have dinner.” 

“I did,” her husband says. 

He is looking at her, his pale eyes, his calm face. She is suddenly terrified. “Have some dessert. Chai.” 

“It’s late for chai.” 

“Amma,” Yamini says, “relax. What’s gotten into you?” 

Selvi can’t say. But her husband cannot walk into this room. He cannot take the baby. That is all she knows. 

“You’re being selfish,” Yamini says. 

“No.” 

“You are. You can’t just pick and choose which grandchildren are yours and yours alone.” 

It is a double jab. Selvi feels it. She is being crowded out. She is being intruded upon. She stands up, too quickly, and sways. Her husband steadies her with a thin, age-spotted hand. His touch is like a brand.

“I’m tired,” she says. 

“Amma . . .” 

The feeling is here, in full form, even though no one is playing the piano. With the baby here, it sits right under her skin. She has to go. To make it through, she has to go. 

She wanders the house as night comes down. The halls steadily darken. This is their family house, but it still feels not quite hers. She has only been here seven years; before that, she and her husband moved depending on where his orchestras were located. It is odd to be somewhere without a fixed end. 

She ends in the kitchen. She opens the refrigerator, lets the cold white light cut through her. On the other side of the house, Ashwin and Yamini and her husband are together. Away from her, they lean toward one another and whisper and collude and laugh. They will be talking about her. Silly, simple Selvi. Selvi, who takes everything too seriously. Selvi, who cares too much about her children, who just wants to see them happy, who is punished for it. 

The only being who has not passed judgment on her is the baby. The feeling kicks at her skin. She feels desperate, low on time. She has lost enough children to her husband. This one has to be hers. 

From the living room, the piano sounds. This is an old ritual, an after-dinner playing. It is Ashwin playing Ravel’s Gaspard de la nuit—playing it well—and she can hear Yamini laughing, the tenor of her husband’s approval. But it is too slow a song, not fit for the evening, and presently it is exchanged for a terrible rendition of Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Ashwin is laughing now too, not even trying to keep up with the pace of the piece. Her husband says something stern. This was his party trick in the early days of their marriage. She remembers sitting in salons, folding her girlish hands primly over her skirts as he settled before the piano, lowering his own magician’s hands to the keys. 

Selvi, having circled back to the kitchen now, looks up. Directly above her is Yamini’s room. The baby. 

They will wake her if they are not careful. But when are they careful? Ashwin plays loudly, with abandon. Their voices rise to dominate the music. They laugh as if they are alone in the house. 

Selvi is the only one with care. She is always the only one.

The piano continues. Selvi leaves the kitchen, begins the slow climb up the stairs. Moonlight comes in through the high windows, pooling in patches on the landing. Her body passes through them, in and out of the dark. 

The baby lies in her crib. She is asleep, little thing. She has no fear of music, no hatred yet in her little heart. 

“You are of me,” Selvi says quietly. She touches the baby’s cheek. “I remember you. You came back to me.” 

Carefully, she lifts the baby from the crib. She stirs, turning her little head this way and that. Selvi makes soft shushing noises. It has been a long time since her days of true motherhood, but it comes back to her quickly. The nurses called her a natural when she first became pregnant, the way her body glowed with it inside her. 

She was less graceful with Ashwin and Yamini—painful pregnancies, both. Who could blame her for being distant when they were born? They were so much of her husband when they were born, so much of his decree. She felt she lost them as soon as she had them. But the first one was hers, as this one will be hers.

The night goes blue outside her window. The music has changed. At first she ignores the feeling of it, but the knowledge comes to her with the music, a presence walking itself through the house to find her. 

And the memory, her husband’s voice and her’s, that fateful, terrible conversation.

I’m not ready, Selvi. I don’t want this yet. 

But I want . . . 

Consider my career. Consider our lives! 

I will do everything. Let me keep her. Please . . .

We’ll try again. When it’s right.

Her husband at the keys again. A song whose name he never taught her, but which she remembers with a certain weight, like the weight in her arms now. She remembers it all. Leaving the house a mother, returning not. She would have wanted silence, even as it condemned her. Kindness from him whom she hated, care even. But no, none of it. 

She had been so warm, after the surgery. Dead heat of summer, imprinted on her with the loss. Long windless nights and days of loss. And worst, that it did not even feel like her loss, because she had not chosen it, had not acted upon it willingly. Even her grief, she could not call her own. And through it all, her husband at the piano, feeling nothing she was feeling, knowing nothing of her at all. The man she had given her life to, playing away another. 

Selvi stands. The baby in her hands. In the moonlight she feels very young. Her skin might be the skin of a little girl’s. Her desires, too. The baby cries, moves in her swaddles. Selvi’s hands around her tighten. 

It feels like a new life, which she might mark with any action. She holds a little world to her chest. Her family, the piano, the laughter which goes on without her—these are very far away. The baby quiets; around her, the night blues. Her hands make motions witnessed by no one but herself, belonging to no one else. A woman who has nothing will do anything to own something—any cruelty, any loss.

Yes, Selvi thinks, looking down at the baby. Her hold tightens. Anything at all.

Divyasri Krishnan is a writer from Massachusetts. Her work appears in The Yale Review, Meridian, Best New Poets 2024, and elsewhere.