Content Warning (CW): death
The Sisterhood with Radio
Rashmi Agrawal
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The first year after Gunjaa left, Maa never braided my hair right. She’d fumble with the red ribbons, drop them, leave them with brutal knots. Or knock off our radio from her bed’s headboard while turning the volume dial. She wouldn’t hum along with the old Hindi songs playing in the background. Whenever I urged her to switch to the station that aired a detective drama, she’d turn the radio off and send me to bed early.
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If Gunjaa were here, we would listen to the show together. Why didn’t they look for my sister anymore? Maa would cook her favorites: kheer, sheera, and laddoo. But one question about Gunjaa’s whereabouts and she’d fume like a simmering cauldron of milk. On calmer days, she’d oblige me with warped replies. Gunjaa’s gone to a city college; she’s at Nani’s place; why don’t you focus on the music lessons? And the worst: Gunjaa who? If I asked Baba, he’d answer in a stern voice: focus on school; you’re doing poorly in math for grade five; don’t listen to people outside.
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The second year after Gunjaa vanished, Maa stopped playing songs on the radio. She would never help me find the channel that aired Vaishali ki Nagarvadhu. Said, it’s raffish, could spoil young girls. Last year, it wasn’t spoiling any of us. Was this the same serial that we had listened to with Gunjaa?
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At Nani’s in summer, I looked for Gunjaa in that mini mansion, rooms nested inside rooms; they called it the granary. My trickster sister could be hiding anywhere. I asked Nani about my sister. She smiled, baring her betel-stained gums, and pressed my face to her bosom, which smelt of pickles and masala. Not that I eavesdropped, but I heard Nani asking Maa later if my sister had phoned them. Maa hushed her, whispered something, and it remained a secret if Gunjaa had ever called.
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The third year after Gunjaa eloped, Maa decided to give the radio away. When I shoved it behind my back, not ready to part from it, Maa screamed, called it the seed of all problems, a spoiler of girls, a pimp. It had been a gift from Baba and Maa on Gunjaa’s fifteenth birthday. Maa twisted my hand, and the radio dropped. Its steel cover cracked open, exposing the circuit—a mishmash of red, green, and blue wires, tiny metallic balls hanging loose. And out fell a piece of crumpled paper, folded many times. It had Gunjaa written on it.
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Maa snatched it from my hands and rushed inside her room. However many times I promised to never touch the radio, to learn classical music as Maa did, and to study well in return for that letter, she never budged.
But I knew someone resourceful, a school senior. All I had to do was steal the history question paper from the staffroom for her. With shaking hands and rampant heartbeats that evening, I listened to Gunjaa’s scandal—one that only the elders in our village knew.
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The fourth year, the year Gunjaa returned, I slept by her side all night, unbothered by the frequent interruptions. But Maa stopped cooking, washing, and doing other chores. She’d constantly lock herself in her bedroom. All I could hear were her sobs and the curses directed at the radio, and Baba’s answering yells from the other end of the house. It was the only time Baba spoke.
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Gunjaa would tune in her new sleek radio to stations I’d never heard before. And would remain busy cooing, feeding, and burping her baby. Maa never touched the baby, nor did Baba. The boy often looked at me with eager eyes, as if saying, pick me up, hug me, take me to the swing outside. But I couldn’t; I had to finish Maa’s chores. Baba hadn’t talked to me in ages, had stopped asking about my grades. No one discussed the music classes that I was no longer skipping. I was happy to have Gunjaa back, but I wasn’t happy to be with her anymore.
The fifth year, the year Gunjaa was found dead, Maa sent the baby away. His father—I’d seen him in our school years ago—came after they’d found Gunjaa floating in the lake when the grey monsoon pelted the outcroppings at its banks. Her kurta was stuck to her skin, and her salwar was puffed like the sleeves of Maa’s pink blouse. When they pulled her out, Maa wailed, and Baba screamed her name over and over. They were sad when she wasn’t here. They were sad again when she returned. Why were they sad now that she was gone forever?
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Not long after the baby and his father had left, when Maa was frying fritters—my favorite, spicy, not sweet—Baba asked me about my slippers. I ignored him. I was listening to my new prized possession, the one that Gunjaa had never let me touch. I hummed a classical raga while the radio played a murder mystery. Baba shook me and pointed at the shoe—it had dried mud underneath and a broken strap. Before his father took him away, I went with the baby to the swing and broke the strap on the slippery grass, I said.
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That night, I wrapped the useless slipper in newspaper and threw it into the gorge at the village’s periphery. The same place where I’d dumped my wet, muddy clothes, torn at the rocks by the lake, the night Gunjaa had taken me for a walk.
Rashmi Agrawal lives in India and sits across a big window to write, enjoying the diverse seasons. While a constant urge to edit her novel nudges her, she steals small pockets of time to weave stories and flash fiction. She is a staunch NaNoWriMo supporter and runs sprints for early risers in India. Her words are available in Bending Genres, Full House Literary, Alien Buddha, Door is a Jar, 101 Words, and others. When she isn’t writing, she listens to audiobooks and irritates her daughter. She tweets @thrivingwordss.