Em and the Big Hoom by Jerry Pinto

have the nerve.’
    â€˜Are you challenging me?’
    â€˜No, I’m complimenting you.’
    â€˜Well, make it a compliment then.’
    â€˜Okay. I don’t think you could be the kind of person who would go around trying to fuck someone’s life up.’
    â€˜Is that what you think Mae did?’
    â€˜I don’t know. I don’t think all those terrible women who destroy their children actually look at their babies and say, “Your life is mine. I’m going to maim it.”’
    â€˜Oh don’t,’ Em shuddered slightly. ‘Marriage is all right. At least the person you’re having a go at is an adult. But motherhood . . . You’re given something totally dependent, totally in love with you and it doesn’t seem to come with a manual. I remember when Lao-Tsu was born . . .’
    Lao-Tsu was how she referred to Susan. It came from Sue to Tsu – in some letter she had written to us of an afternoon – to Lao-Tsu.
    â€˜Â . . . the doctor showed me how to carry her, to feed her, and I thought, “I should know this stuff, shouldn’t I?” I mean, all those dolls. They were about learning the ropes, no?’
    Em lit another beedi. She contemplated the floor.
    â€˜She’s grown up now. I must confront that. I must see her as men see her. But how can I? I’m hardly the expert on the subject. I only knew three men well – my father, your father and you. And two of you I didn’t fuck so that leaves me with your Big Hoom. I’m the world expert on him but who’s asking.’
    â€˜I am.’
    â€˜You are. You are. But you want information. I want to give advice. Experts should be asked for advice. Who would need advice on him? Maybe his mistress. If he ever had one.’
    â€˜For a moment there . . .’ I began, but stopped.
    â€˜Don’t be silly,’ Em snapped. ‘Though I told him once. Mad people don’t want sex. They kick the sex drive out of you with those pills. No, even before the pills. There’s so much in your head that you can’t bear any distractions, you want to pay attention, careful attention, otherwise everything is going to explode. Or something like that. It’s like being in a dream where you can do something and every time you try to get it right, you find that the action has shifted to another place and you have to start again. There were times I didn’t want sex for months. So I told him, “Get a maid servant. One of those nice buxom girls. She might even teach your son.”’
    â€˜Me?’ I squeaked.
    She giggled, a wicked giggle.
    â€˜Of course. Fuck the maid, a game for men of middle-class families. Penalty: pissing blood in the morning, that’s all. Why should my son be deprived? But he said, “I think he’ll find a way to learn about sex without exploiting someone.” I hadn’t thought of it like that. I suppose it’s my upbringing. I thought of it as something men did all the time.’
    â€˜To the poske?’
    â€˜Yes, to their own adopted sisters, the behenchods. That is what it means, no? I can never remember whether behenchod is sister-fucker or –’
    â€˜It is.’
    â€˜Keep a mistress, I told him.’
    â€˜You didn’t mean that.’
    â€˜Didn’t I though? I don’t know. It’s very difficult to know what I mean or what I don’t mean. Afterwards. At the time, I know.’
    â€˜Then how are we supposed to know?’
    â€˜Osmosis?’
    â€˜And how was he supposed to know?’
    â€˜You’re right. How? By the kick of the cow. But he said, “No, if it’s okay by you, I’ll just stay faithful.” What to say to a man like that?’
    At the time, I remember wondering why The Big Hoom hadn’t taken her up on her offer. I was too young then to figure out the game Em was playing. Today, it seems quite