The Inconvenient Wife

Sweat began to bead on Rohan's temples as he started to take deep breaths in an attempt to contain his growing bewilderment. He looked to Sneha to see if she too was concerned but she had already closed her eyes and was nearly asleep. Rohan started to call her name but abruptly stifled his attempt when the sari masseuse turned to face him. "We do you favor. Newlywed get very special Malay Massage," she stated rather sternly. Sneha smiled in silence but Rohan questioned what it entailed.

"Bad spirit come with you. Marriage start bad. We make it go away with special oils, prayer, clean your air, special drink, bath, massage. Marriage will be good," the sari masseuse explained.

Rohan then remembered visiting his cousin Akash, whom was born the same day as he, in the countryside as a toddler for a shared birthday party. Although Rohan had a great time playing with the village children, Akash seemed irritable and refused to eat any of the wonderful dishes his mother and aunts had spent all week preparing many of which were his favorites. Rohan remembered sneaking under one of the tables to steal a glass of alcohol when one of the drunken men wasn't paying attention. It was as he was waiting there that he had heard Akash had been like this for at least a week.

The next morning, a small band of women including his mother had taken Akash and he to a local ayurvedic doctor. Rohan was in awe of the burning bush of herbs outside of the doors and the smoke that filled the little hut. What seemed like hundreds of bottles of seeds, roots and colorful powders filled the wooden shelves along the walls all the way up to the ceiling. Bones, plants and bundles of dried sticks and leaves dangled from fishing wire and thin ropes.

Rohan jumped to grab a pillowy mushroom near a pile of mats but was caught mid-air by the doctor's assistant and placed in a corner by the door. He watched as two women held down Akash and the doctor force-fed him what must have been a nasty concoction as he nearly vomited. They held him up and forced him to drink a cloudy glass of water. Then they massaged his belly and back while his mother placed wet cloths on his forehead and wiped away his sweat.

While women prayed around him, the doctor's assistant stood on a chair and swung a smoking bundle of dry, light green plants above the group huddled around Akash. Not soon before long Akash began to cry that his tummy was hurting and soon after that he began to pass horribly smelling gas. Rohan would normally have laughed out loud and taunted him but the smell was so bad that he recoiled in his quiet little corner and covered his face. Rohan's mother quickly picked up Rohan and carried him out of the hut within a few seconds. He buried his nose and mouth in his mother's shoulder and stared at the hut as they walked away.