Bim made everyone sit down in the living room so that he could make sense of what was going on. Yamuna tried to untangle her emotions. Sahan’s parents would be furious. What was he thinking?
Yamuna glared at him. ‘But… how? How did this happen? You were supposed to be studying. And—’ She shook her head. ‘This is ridiculous, Sahan. You can’t run off with the servant girl. It’s madness.’
‘She’s not just a servant girl. You trusted her with your son!’
‘I pay her to look after my son. I suppose I might have expected it of her, but you… I expected better from you. Your parents didn’t send you all the way here so that you could mess up your future.’ Her voice was rising. She couldn’t believe he would do this. Someone as intelligent and well-heeled as Sahan needed a wife in the same league. Not some girl who could barely speak English. It was so idiotic. And what would his parents say? They would blame her. She was supposed to have been looking after him.
Bim laid a hand on her arm. ‘Let’s look at this calmly,’ he said. ‘Sahan, start from the beginning. Tell us the whole story.’
Yamuna sat back, her arms folded. Sahan told them the story – of meetings in the park, of English lessons, of isolation and homesickness and of love, blossoming in whispered snippets. Yamuna watched her cousin’s face as he talked. She had always seen him as the teenager but she realised now how much he had changed. He had been a shy and anxious boy in those first days. She remembered the time she’d met up with him a few weeks after he’d moved from her house to student digs. He had looked so ill that she’d offered for him to come and live in her house. He’d recovered, but remained nervy.
Since Louie’s birth, she had stopped noticing anything else, and that included Sahan. Now that she was looking at him again, she saw that he was calmer; still serious, but somehow less wired. When he spoke about Soma, his face softened, a smile tugging lightly on his mouth as he spoke. There was something beautiful about the effect it had on him.
She stole a glance at Bim, who was listening to Sahan, his face impassive. She had seen that face before. It was Bim’s business face, the one he used when he was absorbing information, reserving judgement for later. He nodded at something and said, ‘I see.’
Yamuna realised she’d missed the last few minutes of conversation. She hurriedly focused.
‘We’ll be married then, which will make all the difference,’ Sahan said, his attention on Bim.
‘If you were planning to elope, why are you telling us this?’ said Bim. ‘Why not just go?’
‘You guys are important to Soma. And to me.’ Sahan looked from one to the other. ‘And we didn’t want you to worry.’
‘Or call the police?’ said Yamuna.
Sahan acknowledged that with a nod. ‘That too. But mainly, it would be nice to have you on our side. My parents are going to be angry, for a while…’
‘Angry? They’re going to be furious,’ said Yamuna. ‘With you and with me for letting you do it.’ She threw her hands up. ‘Surely, you can see this is madness? She’s poor, uneducated and just a nanny. How will you ever be able to take her for a meal at your parents’ table?’
‘I am not my parents,’ he said firmly. ‘All of what you’re saying is true, but I have thought about this and I’m sure.’ He raised his eyes to her. His jaw was set. Yamuna had never seen that look on his face before. This was not a whim. He really was serious.
She looked across at Bim, who said, ‘Ask Soma to come in.’
Sahan sprang to his feet and disappeared.
‘What do you think?’ said Yamuna, her voice low so that Sahan didn’t hear.
‘I think he’s serious,’ said Bim.
‘Can we stop them?’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘The question is, should we?’
Taken aback, she didn’t respond.
‘This means several things,’ said Bim. ‘Firstly, the man you thought she was seeing was Sahan, not the driver guy. This suggests that that man did attack Soma. Whatever he said or did to the poor girl must have been pretty horrific if she couldn’t tell us. Secondly, Sahan knows what happened. That must have been fairly difficult for him too, yet he’s here, telling us he wants to be with her, which means he must care for her – it’s not a casual affair.’
Yamuna opened her mouth to argue, then shut it again. He had a point. If Sahan was unsure about how he felt, he would have had a good excuse to break things off when he was told that Soma was seeing someone else. The fact that he’d not jumped to any conclusions and given everything so much thought suggested that his feelings for Soma were genuine.
‘But how can we know she’s not using him? After all, she’s come from nowhere. She couldn’t hope to marry a boy like Sahan if she were back home.’
Bim gave her a long look. ‘When I came to this country,’ he said. ‘I had very little. I cleared up glasses and washed up in pubs to make ends meet. I’m just an accounts clerk who has a good eye for investment. Perhaps we shouldn’t judge people by their beginnings.’
‘Sorry.’ Yamuna looked away. She had forgotten that Bim’s wealth was hard-won. Just because she’d been able to get a job in England after a few months of trying, she’d forgotten how hard it could be. Was she being too hard on Soma? Was she letting her insecurities colour her perception of the girl?
There were footsteps and Sahan returned, towing Soma by the hand. The girl looked petrified, not triumphant. So perhaps she wasn’t a gold digger. Yamuna realised with a start that she’d never actually believed that of Soma. You lived with a person for so long and you learned something about them. She’d always felt that Soma’s meek subservience was because she was hiding something, but she had never thought that Soma was capable of malice. If what she had been hiding was falling in love with someone forbidden… then it all made sense.
‘Sit down,’ said Bim, kindly.
Soma glanced at Yamuna, then perched nervously on edge of the chair. Sahan sat on the arm of the chair, his hand on her shoulder.
‘Sahan tells me that you two have been seeing each other for some time now,’ said Bim, leaning forward, his attention focused on Soma.
Soma nodded.
‘And you want to get married.’
She nodded again. Her eyes shifted from Bim to Yamuna. ‘I’m really sorry, Madam. I don’t want to leave baby Louie, but…’ She turned to look up at Sahan, who smiled at her. Soma’s expression changed from one of fear to something Yamuna could only describe as lovesick. It lasted only for a second or so, but it was long enough for Yamuna to feel a pang of envy. She had never felt the need to look at anyone like that. Nor had anyone looked at her the way Sahan was looking at Soma.
Soma turned back to them. ‘I promise I’ll be a good wife to Sahan,’ she said. ‘I love him. Truly.’ She looked so earnest, Yamuna almost found it funny. Almost.
Yamuna looked at Bim. A frown had appeared. What had worried him? He had been all set to shower good will on this couple a minute ago. She put a hand on his arm.
Bim’s gaze flicked from Sahan to Soma and back again. ‘There’s something else?’ he said.
Soma and Sahan exchanged glances. Sahan gave her an encouraging nod. She turned imploring eyes towards Bim. ‘I have a secret, I have to tell you.’ She lowered her eyes.
Yamuna noticed Sahan squeeze her shoulder gently. Soma reached up and put her own hand over his and began to speak. In a quiet voice, with Sahan interjecting here and there to add details, she told her story.
At first Yamuna was outraged, but before she could process how she was feeling, Soma told them her reason for running away. All anger was washed away in the flood of sorrow that followed. She didn’t need to look at Bim to know that he was affected too. The poor girl. No wonder she ran away. No wonder she took a chance to escape when she saw it, no matter the risk. Yamuna realised with sudden clarity why she’d had that feeling of discomfort about Soma. It was her subconscious telling her something was wrong. The girl looked different to the photograph she’d been sent and looked far too young to be twenty-five. Her rational mind had dismissed the thought – after all, the girl had passed two sets of passport checks, but the observation had stuck, giving her the sense of mistrust. If she had been her normal self, she would have worked that out, but being wrapped up in her own spiral of despair, she hadn’t pursued it, just as she hadn’t noticed all the telltale signs that Soma was suffering.
Bim had said, ‘perhaps home has something she’d like to forget’. He hadn’t even touched the surface of it.
‘Will you help us?’ said Sahan.
There was a tense silence. Yamuna stared at her fingers. Would she help them? Of course she would, but at what risk to her own family? What Soma had done was against the law. To help them was probably a crime too. This was not a decision she could make on her own.
Finally, Bim said, ‘It’s a big thing you’ve just told us. We need a bit of time to think about it.’
Sahan and Soma looked at each other. Soma bowed her head and stood up. As they reached the door, hand in hand, Yamuna said, ‘Wait in the kitchen.’
When they had gone, she turned to Bim. ‘His parents are going to kill me,’ she said.
‘They need not know about all of it,’ said Bim. ‘In fact, if we tell them, we’d be putting them in a very awkward position.’
‘She took a huge risk telling us, she must really want to be with him... And he with her.’
‘When I look at them, I see a young couple in love. I may not know a lot of about love, but I recognize passion and determination when I see it. They are both determined to make this work. If they were a company, I’d invest in them.’
Yamuna let this sink in. Bim, as always, saw the world in terms of his business sense. She tried to look at the situation objectively. If she didn’t have to answer to Sahan’s parents, if Soma wasn’t her employee, would she see the situation differently? Probably. ‘So you think we should help them?’
‘Just look at them!’ said Bim. ‘The way they look at each other. They are in love.’
She thought so too. Just because she herself had never been in love, didn’t mean she didn’t recognize it in other people. She thought of the times when Soma and Sahan had been in the same room. How had she not noticed? How had she been in the same room with that much intensity of feeling and not spotted it? The answer to her own question made her ashamed. She had assumed Soma was irrelevant, a face and a pair of hands with very little personality. She had known Soma was intelligent because of how fast she picked up reading to Louie in English, and she had been more than aware of Soma being pretty, yet she hadn’t seen anything between the girl and Sahan because it hadn’t occurred to her that to think about Soma the real person, she’d only seen Soma the idea. This knowledge made her ashamed. And being ashamed made her angry.
This whole situation was about more than Soma, a girl who took a job and got a break. Even in the confused fug of her feelings, Yamuna had to recognize that the girl hadn’t had it easy. Soma had suffered so much at the hands of her stepfather and been effectively abandoned by her mother. She’d had the determination to make a new life for herself and now, with one phone call, someone, Yamuna, could take it all away from her again. No one deserved that. And everyone deserved a chance for happiness.
And Sahan. This Sahan, who hovered protectively around the girl. Who looked at Soma with such intensity. Who was willing to stand up to the parents who had always controlled him. This Sahan was almost a different person to the boy she knew. He was stronger, more solid than before. He had lost that hunted look that he’d worn throughout his time at university. He had found someone to make him happy.
‘Everyone deserves a chance to be happy,’ she said.
Bim smiled. A big, wide, open smile that made her smile back. ‘Exactly,’ he said.
Yamuna nodded. ‘Okay.’ She frowned. ‘What she did was illegal. How can we fix it?’
‘We’re going to have to come up with a plan.’