When did Damayanti's life get limited between taking mold off the corner of the white bathroom tile, to spraying her tiny patch of a garden with pest control – mostly to avoid the giant rat that comes visiting on warm starry nights – she knows because she is sat there smelling of talcum powder and despair, sipping cheap iced lemon tea. She must tell Martin about the rat – wait, is he home? Damayanti leans forward on her rain-rotten garden chair, trying hard to peer across the common fence to catch a flicker of warm yellow light streaming through Martin's study window. He is probably sat there, grumpy as he is, looking at a patchy old album with Susan smiling back from the pages.
Why do our pedestrian lives always reek of failed ambition? Damayanti wonders, before drifting off, listening to Mark Isham on the radio. Is it a failed life really? Didn’t she write that paper on ‘changing office behaviour amongst millennials’ that had her boss turn candy apple red with what she thought was envy? (Could well have been the badly cooked seafood at the canteen). Did she not rescue that Sandpiper when they were vising the beaches near Smoo Cave with Harry? Did she not manage to plan and execute the 50th birthday party for Arnold from Finance? Why a failed life then?
‘You must spend some quality time with yourself, beyond wallowing in self-pity’ Susan would have said. Keep a journal of the nice things you have done, and the nicer things people have said. At least if they spring clean the house after you sod off, they would be able to write a decent obituary’…and they would break into laughter that travelled miles, disturbing the quiet of a leafy British neighbourhood.
It’s not a bad thing though. Damayanti thinks now. Never too late to start. She comes indoors and heads for the cupboard, trying to find a journal with empty pages, wanting to pour out stuff that were starting to form tight knots in her stomach. Knots that were dark and mossy in most places, but with intermittent bursts of sunshine on the beach. It is going to be a long evening. But it’s something Damayanti has been waiting a while for.
Comments