Page 307 - DENG201_ENGLISH_II

Unit 23: Jhumpa Lahiri’s “This Blessed House”: Detailed Study

“We’re not Christian.” Notes
“So you keep reminding me.” She spat onto the rip of her finger and started to rub intently at a
particularly stubborn stain on Mary’s chin. “Do you think this is dirt, or some kind of fungus?”
He was getting nowhere with her, with this woman whom he had known for only four months and
whom he had married, this woman with whom he now shared his life. He thought with a flicker of
regret of the snapshots his mother used to send him from Calcutta, of prospective brides who could
sing and sew and season lentils without consulting a cookbook. Sanjeev had considered these women,
had even ranked them in order of preference, but then he had met Twinkle. “Twinkle, I can’t have the
people I work with see this statue on my lawn.”
“They can’t fire you for being a believer. It would be discrimination.”
“That’s not the point.!
“Why does it matter to you so much what other people think?”
“Twinkle, please.” He was tired. He let his weight rest against his rake as she began dragging the
statue toward an oval bed of myrtle, beside the lamppost that flanked the brick pathway. “Look,
Sanj. She’s so lovely.”
He returned to his pile of leaves and began to deposit them by handfuls into a plastic garbage bag.
Over his head the blue sky was cloudless. One tree on the lawn was still full of leaves, red and
orange, like the tent in which he had married Twinkle.
He did not know if he loved her. He said he did when she had first asked him, one afternoon in Palo
Alto as they sat side by side in a darkened, nearly empty movie theater. Before the film, one of her
favorites, something in German that he found extremely depressing, she had pressed the tip of her
nose to his so that he could feel the flutter of her mascara-coated eyelashes. That afternoon he had
replied, yes, he loved her, and she was delighted, and fed him a piece of popcorn, letting her finger
linger an instant between his lips, as if it were his reward for coming up with the right answer.
Though she did not say it herself, he assumed then that she loved him too, but now he was no longer
sure.
In truth, he had decided, returning to an empty carpeted condominium each night, and using only
the top fork in his cutlery drawer, and turning away politely at those weekend dinner parties when
the other men eventually put their arms around the waists of their wives and girlfriends, leaning
over every now and again to kiss their shoulders or necks. It was not sending away for classical
music CDs by mail, working his way methodically through the major composers that the catalogue
recommended, and always sending his payments in on time. In the months before meeting Twinkle,
Sanjeev had begun to realize this. ‘You have enough money in the bank to raise three families.” his
mother reminded him when they spoke at the start of each month on the phone. “You need a wife to
look after and love,” Now he had one, a pretty one, from a suitably high caste, who would soon have
a master’s degree. What was there not to love?
That evening Sanjeev poured himself a gin and tonic, drank it and most of another during one segment
of the news, and then approached Twinkle, who was taking a bubble bath, for she announced that
her limbs ached from raking the lawn, something she had never done before. He didn’t knock. She
had applied a bright blue mask to her face, was smoking and sipping some bourbon with ice and
leafing through a fat paperback book whose pages had buckled and turned gray from the water. He
glanced at the cover; the only thing written on it was the word “Sonnets” in dark red letters. He took
a breath, and then he informed her very calmly that after finishing his drink he was going to put on
his shoes and go outside and remove the Virgin from the front lawn.
“Where are you going to put it?” she asked him dreamily, her eyes closed. One of her legs emerged,
unfolding gracefully, from the layer of suds. She flexed and pointed her toes.
“For now I am going to put it in the garage. Then tomorrow morning on my way to work I am going
to take it to the dump.”
“Don’t you dare.” She stood up, letting the book fall into the water, bubbles dripping down her
thighs. “I hate you,” she informed him, her eyes narrowing at the word “hate.” She reached for her
bathrobe, tied it tightly about her waist, and padded down the winding staircase, leaving sloppy wet

LOVELY PROFESSIONAL UNIVERSITY 301