Dinner for Eight? Metallic Aftertaste
“You’ll come join us, no? We’re going to make some really good food, dude”, said Anant Dayanidhi.
The invitation ricocheted off Vasily Alexeyev’s blank face, only his lazy-eyed gaze moved, from his laptop screen, cycling through the clothing aisle of the internet in search of a diamond in the rough, to Anant figure hunched over the bottom drawer of his cupboard sorting out ingredients from his library of spices and seasoning. Vasily was sluggish to respond, and less than enthusiastic.
“No, thanks. I’ll have my own dinner. I follow a strict diet”, said Vasily.
Nonsense, came the dismissal from Anant, and then a short polemical about how Vasily could make an exception this once for his diet, how it was a special festival for Anant’s people, and how he wanted Vasily (his roommate) to join them. He ran through the expected attendees and ran through the fact that there would be drinks, good company and humour on a Saturday evening. Vasily gave him a tentative “Yes, I’ll drop by”, even though he was in no particular mood for a drink, and nor did he care much for food, so the company and humour remained.
Weekends at the dormitory entailed excitement, noticeable notches more than weekdays; one could say the excitement was especially pronounced in the evenings, and especially so if it were a weekend. People would be ready to ride the sunset to the night, into town, or perhaps just to the dormitory bar – La Fakap – or the neighbourhood bar and restaurant, Nad Aleji. Or they could just meet up to walk around the pastoral suburb of the neighbourhood, go to the monastery grounds, or Obora Hvezda forest with its massive star-shaped villa in the centre. Or one could go to Ladronka Park, standing diagonal across the intersecting roads with their tramlines and bus stops. Twilight would still allow one to see people all around, walking themselves, and their dogs, flying kites, skateboarding, roller skating, idling by the benches, drinking beer, eating sandwiches, or hotdogs by a pond, or feeding the ducks. As nightfall approached, the leisure would move indoors, to establishments, or move towards the cobbled stoned, crowded streets of the inner city. But even then, the pastoral suburb would find ambling pedestrians, or the lone person out, enjoying the street’s cold and expansive air.
The dormitory entailed excitement, within the halls, kitchens, and rooms where people would gather. There were some older working people, doctoral researchers and even families in the residence, but most of the dorm crowd were people a hop and skip beyond the juvenile, most of them were brimming with energy and affability, even the more introverted ones had their own posse, notwithstanding true odd loners lurking around their room, the hall and kitchen, being statistically insignificant.
This evening entailed excitement for Anant Dayanidhi, for it had been quite a while since he’d hosted a dinner; the common kitchens, the cramped rooms were all fair game for people throwing such dorm room dinner parties, and if it were a little more elaborately organized ‘international dinner’, they could even take over the whole hall and the balcony. This was a more intimate affair, but very much important, felt Anant; the menu was set, the motley clique was set to roll in, and the occasion was apt. It had been a while, so there was a resurgent novelty about it all. He was excited about the menu – jeera rice, dal makhani, and raita, with gulab jamun for dessert – he was excited about cooking with Dhruv Raut, and Dhruv was an ace cook, he was a chef. They were going to make some delicious grub for people to chow down on.
Anant prattled up and down from his room, on the third floor of the third block of the dorm, to the kitchen on the far side of the wing, colonizing the counters; the other residents of the floor, who chose to cook, heat and eat their meals in solitude knew that a party was brewing in that kitchen. Pots, pans, knives, chopping boards, and onions, tomatoes, packets of cumin seeds (jeera), cloves, cardamom, bay leaves, and large sticks of butter, spread out over the kitchen counter that ran from the electric oven and stovetop to the window.
To cook for someone, provided it’s not one’s occupation or compulsion, to cook for someone of one’s own volition is a display of affection. For Dhruv Raut, cooking was an act of passion; it’s alchemy, he thought at times, the way you can whip up unrelated ingredients into intricate tastes; it’s pure pleasure, he would opine, to see them devour that magic, the magic you create, the magic essential for life itself. It was pure pleasure especially when Valentina liked his cooking; for whenever he had her eating out of the palm of her hand, or his, he felt a tender jolt of current through his being, watching her enjoy, knowing that she enjoyed his creation. For while he cooked out of affection for his friends, he cooked out of love for Valentina. Yes, he loved the praises, he lapped it up when they said “Goddamn, this is so good Dhruv!”, but to see it with his eyes, when the bites and the mouthfuls, and the eyes and breathes could not help but display the undeniable sensual gratification elicited by his cooking, that was where the true rush lied.
Tonight, they were going to make a gorgeous meal.
“I don’t think I’ve made this for you before. Have you had dal makhani?”, asked Dhruv, holding a large pot of soaked urad dal (black lentils) in his arms.
“I think I’ve had in Bombay Express maybe.”, said Valentina. She locked the door of the first room of the ground floor of the second block, and put the keys in her man’s breast pocket.
“Hmm… you’ll see what real dal makhani tastes like. It’s really a treat when you do it right”, purred Dhruv.
Indeed, it was going to be a treat for Valentina Kobza, all food aside. She had been cooped up like a stowaway in room no.1, Block 2, for more than a fortnight, ever since they had decided on the second lockdown, and she had decided not to return to Brno, shacking up in Dhruv’s room instead. It had been cosy, it had been a whirlwind, and then it had been stuffy and stale; for the dorm authorities had become strict on movements, gatherings and happening in the premises, nobody from outside was allowed in; for Dhruv had had a falling out with some of his friends in the dorm and it had been isolating; and primarily because eventually the precarious nature of her alien status in the dorm became evident to both of them.
“Fuck these guys! Always, fucking always creating so much noise, bringing the police over, every fucking night”, Dhruv would scowl, at nights when the patrol would pull up to Block 2, to respond to noise complaints, to pressure the receptionist to break up all gatherings and partying, for it was a violation of lockdown rules. It was always Block 2, the most raucous and riotous, it was where the Erasmus exchange kids were mostly placed, and they had no consideration for others she’d hear him say, that they were jeopardizing their position, for you never really know – they had kicked out a couple of people for flagrant violations.
It all had an unnerving effect on the stowaway couple.
“It’ll be over soon”, she would say stoically, knowing Dhruv’s concern and care, knowing his worry that she was feeling trapped in the small single-bed dorm room. They both dawned a quiet and patient resolve, for yes, the lockdown would be lifted soon; and in any case, she had been slowly and carefully normalizing her presence in the background, going out together for odd walks, or a grocery haul.
Now it was almost getting over, almost; they said the grilled door connecting blocks two and three was opened again, they had become laxer with people from outside visiting, and there was a slow unravelling of restrictions all around the city, restaurants and parks became increasingly packed, pubs and clubs resurrected themselves back to chaos. Now, they were on their way for a dorm dinner party to block three.
“We’re gonna go out and stay out”, they’d told each other, anticipating imminent emancipation. They would dress up and dandy their lives again.
And they walked all decked up; Dhruv in a crisp blue kurta, pressed black trousers, and his handlebar moustache twirled, and Valentina in her knee-length teal dress, hair all tressed and done, stockings and shoes to boot. They walked along the meandering hall of Block 2 to cross the grilled gate into the wing of Block 3, the sensory lights in the hall shutting off as their footsteps receded in the motion.
On the terrace of Block 3, jutting out of the building’s belly from the first floor, with all the other floors towering over it, stood three figures in the dark November cold passing a joint around. Their attires were what one could call hostel chic; Jishnu Bose with a big buff jacket and shorts, Emir Karimov clad in his trademark long black jacket adorning hazardous symbols of radioactivity, toxicity, and skull & bones and his grey cargo pants, and Kurin Antonov’s big brown trench coat under the Slavic-core blue tracksuit underneath.
Hostel chic, anything goes in that aesthetic.
Jishnu contemplated his dinner on the horizon, glad he didn’t have to cook or spend for it. He had even been looking forward to hanging out with the crowd there, but successive puffs of cannabis had slowly smoked the extroversion out of his brain and replaced it with an introspective loop of thoughts, trivialized with each lap between long stretches of blankness. In short, he was on his way to becoming blazed.
“Oh…Hi Mark!”, said Emir
“Huh? Wha…?”, started Jishnu.
“You’ve seen that movie?”, asked Emir, “The Room? You know the movie so bad that it’s good?”
“You know, Seth Rogan and James Franco made a movie about the movie, The Disaster Artist.”, added Kurin.
“Oh, yeah! Of course. ‘Oh…Hi Mark.’ Ahahaaaa. That Tommy Wiseau guy. And he says it with such…like… you know seriousness, delivers his line like in a school play. ‘Oh…Hi Mark.’ Ahahaha.”, Jishnu laughed out smoke.
“Oh…Hi Mark.”, cackled Emir again.
“Yeah, but no, I ain’t seen the movie, only clips online.”, said Jishnu passing the joint to Kurin.
“Yeah. We saw The Disaster Artist recently. I have not seen the original.”, said Kurin.
“Yeah. These days it’s all about the meme. You don’t need the original. You just need the meme, and you’ll get it.”, remarked Jishnu. And then he fell down a pit of contemplation over the words he just said.
There was silence, they zoned out gazing into the ether. It was interrupted with Kurin murmuring to Emir to take the joint and let it continue its circuit, and then asking Jishnu if he wanted to play cards with them later in the night.
“I can’t tonight, boys. I have got to go for a dinner thing upstairs. You know with Anant and all. It’s a special festival for us, so Anant wanted to cook and have a scene, you know.”
“Oh! What festival is this?”, asked Kurin.
“Diwali. Actually, I’m not really sure whether it’s today, or it’s already happened. It’s on the lunar calendar…”,
“Werewolf shit.”, interjected Emir, giggling.
“Ahahaha, yeahh!!! Werewolf timing. Anyway, back home we celebrate it by lighting up all our houses and all, and bursting a tonne of firecrackers”, finished Jishnu
“Happy Diwali.”, smiled Kurin.
“Oh yeaah, man. Happy Diwali.”, added Emir.
“Why thanks, guys! Happy Diwali to you too!”, Anant puffed.
“What…is the…eh…festival about?”, asked Kurin.
Anant took another puff, he passed the joint on to Kurin, and he readied himself to give his audience a mythological crash course on the Ramayana, the SparkNotes version (naturally).
“Stick to wine. It goes better with dinner”, said Viktor. Beer signified more energy, it signified a deferment and prolongation of revelry, but wine, for Victor Novak, was for a more soporific affect, something more definite. Viktor wanted to crash; he was beat, and he was grateful for having his dinner taken care of, although he could’ve very easily ordered in and crashed; still, he thought, some socializing on a Saturday night, Anant’s spicy, greasy food, and wine would be alright. But he was beat. Still, it was a free and fancy dinner, and it had been a while since he’d done anything but run around volunteering to test people for the virus, and cram for his upcoming exams. He was beat.
“Anant told me, he’s also got a bottle. He’s also got some Bozkov and whiskey, I know.”, Jozef Bolan, had rolled up and lit a cigarette for them to smoke on the walk back. They walk past the apartment blocks, across the road, and past the hair salon, and kindergarten, into the expansive parking lot of a brutalist communist-era building that was their dormitory. Jozef raked up the fact that his friend was looking dead tired and low energy, he counselled his friend unsolicited, about finding a balance between his breakneck schedule of volunteer work, exam prep., his still ongoing classes, and his rest and recreation.
“Oh…and your schedule this end semester looks free, does it? Ty vole…”, retorted Viktor. He took the rolled cigarette from his Jozef and told him to take it easy and not go up taking other people’s exams and fill up his free time, lest he get tired too. “Ty vole!”, exclaimed Jozef, half laughing, half frowning; for he knew the allusion was about him writing Jozefina’s exams last season, and he knew that he had been swayed by her charms this season too; in fact, they had just made up, in the course of their hot and cold relationship, it was the winter months, they needed warmth. He gracefully overlooked the dig; he slyly turned it around and said “Ty vole! You could try being a little nicer to her”, and told Viktor that it had been a stressful time for her, and they had fought a while back, and now they had made up, and this time it was going to be good. They’d be good to each other; they’d be sensible and sensitive.
“Hezky!”, said Viktor, not convinced an ounce, returning the cigarette to him, and assuring him that he would be nicer to his darling, as long as she was nice to him; and Jozef let it be known that she was treating him just fine, that he was over the moon, and everything was alright, everything was just fine. Fine.
They stood by the ashtray outside, by the stairs leading up to the glass doors of the dormitory, the glass doors of Block 3. They stood and turned their discussions to the imminent opening of the things, the relaxing of restrictions, and their conjectures about whether the whole thing would blow over. Viktor baulked at the thought of an easy respite, thinking of his beleaguered time at the testing centre, but perhaps, he felt, he was getting it all muddled with his heavy schedule of studies and exams, seeing Jozef’s cavalier confidence that everything would blow over; he was even rattling off percentages and numbers of cases, that Viktor, despite his volunteering, was completely oblivious about. In any case, they agreed that all the colour was returning, and it was great they could dine in large company tonight.
The piping hot shower did not alleviate Jishnu’s inebriation; in fact, it got him further stoned, the hot water only dilated his capillaries, making the cannabinoids swim around his brain with a more Olympic vigour. He had hoped a shower would make him feel fresh, he had hoped against science. He did feel clean and spruced up (with a crumpled green kurta and navy-blue trousers), but he felt more like an ape put through a wash and then in human clothing; he felt animalistically egocentric, he felt lethargic.
“Bhai udd rahe ho…”, laughed Anant also spruced up in a long maroon kurta and jeans, greeting him at the stairwell of the third floor (of Block 3), feeling locked-in, driven and high spirited at the party commencing, “Smoked one, didn’t you? Come, bro, help me get a few more things from the room.”
They went to Anant’s room to pick up some more spatulas, an extra knife, more onions, cucumbers and curd. Vasily was putting on his heavy-duty boots, with their metallic-looking platformed sole and duckbill platypus make. He told them he was going for a walk, and upon Jishnu’s question about whether he would join them and Anant’s reminder for him, to join them, he grumbled some platitudes and walked out.
Back in the kitchen, Dhruv had gotten busy preparing tomato puree on the pan, two large pots – one with the soaked urad dal, and the other with rice – stood anticipatorily on the metal counter by the electric oven and stovetop. The counter that ran against the wall towards the window where Valentina sat perched, in quiet conversation with Jozefina, who was wearing a faded hoodie and slacks. By the counter running along the opposite wall, attached to the kitchen sink, leaned Jozef and Viktor, also in quiet conversation, also contrasting their casual hostel couture, of hoodies and track pants, to the others more slicked up in their attire.
Although, nobody cared, it was all kosher, it was all come as you are.
“Hey, everybody. What’s up?”, said Jishnu, mustering all the affability from the insular, addled haze of his mind. He went on a greeting spree; he asked Dhruv when he was going to come play football on the monastery grounds with the rest of them again, told him lockdown restrictions “didn’t do nothing” to stop their games; he asked Valentina how “hide and seek” with the authorities was going, and mentioned claustrophobia in passing; he said a brief “Hi…hello. How’s studying to save the environment?” to Jozefina, bereft of any other ideas for topics to broach; and then he dapped Viktor, and then Jozef, and took position beside them, vaguely entering the chat.
Anant announced that dinner would be ready in half an hour.
A brief while later, as the chatter ambled on, Jozef found himself a liaison to what, for others (especially Jishnu), appeared to be a cryptic concern of Jozefina, parlayed to Anant. Anant sombrely consulted Dhruv by the stove, their gaze lost in the sauce of the ripening puree on the pan; they talked as if the pan and the puree were also in on the discussion. The conclusion was relayed back to Jozef in an exchange that looked diplomatic, under breaths that looked bated; and Jozef relayed it back to Jozefina with eyes that looked apologetic.
Jishnu was well aware that he could be imagining things, blowing them out of proportion – that he could be tripping. But there was always an uncanny hypersensitivity to subtexts and undercurrents, real or imagined, when under the influence. Jozef leaned staring blankly at the ground, while Jozefina pouted and stared into the vacant parking lot out the window. Valentina and Victor appeared to be having a great time deepening their acquaintance; she was in the thick of telling him about how she got into studying music, how it was studying at the conservatory, and how she wished they would start physical classes, although at the moment she did not see any encouragement.
“Otherwise, it’s more fun being here, if no classes are happening, you know”, she said.
“But I hear you’ve had to stay real lowkey”, said Viktor
“Yeah, but now that’s slowly changing…hopefully.”, she thought out aloud.
Jishnu ventured on the sly, towards Anant and Dhruv, brought up the conspicuous interaction he thought he just witnessed. Dhruv snorted and snarked, and told Anant to tell him, going back to peering over the puree.
“I told him to tell me if they wanted another dish, I told them what the menu was gonna be. They didn’t confirm they were coming till the last minute, and they didn’t say anything about the menu, and now he’s asking if there will be anything else.”, hissed Anant.
“Ahaha…I see”, smiled Jishnu, entertained and intrigued.
“It’s not even Jozef, he’s perfectly fine with it. He loves it. It’s her. He told me that she can’t handle too much spice, but he’s just being nice. She actually can’t handle butter and greasy food. But you know, that’s embarrassing to say”, spat Anant.
He battled a putrid smile from usurping his face.
Dhruv told him that the tomato puree was ready, that they could set the rice and the dal. Jishnu reluctantly asked, out of politeness, if he could be of any help. Anant told him to just relax and then told him to go get glasses from his room and open a bottle of wine. Jishnu went off, relieved at the easy task given to him. Anant announced to the crowd, “We’re setting the dal makhani and the jeera rice, guys. Half an hour, it’ll be ready.”
They finally got around to opening a bottle, it was about time they opened a bottle; it was about time some substance entered the chat, if not for the buzz and the light-headed levity it would inspire then just for the sake of having something to hold in their hands apart from their phones and something to take in between breaths apart from the thick greasy kitchen air.
The corkscrew jammed at the bottle’s mouth. Anant tried to open it, Jozef tried to open it, then Viktor tried, and then Anant again. The corkscrew broke in two, the helical screw remaining stuck at the cork, and for a good five minutes laughter reined the room. And then they tried, clawing at it, taking a knife to it, before setting the bottle aside and breaking into islands of chatter.
“Ne, ne. Praci ted nehledam”, thank you but no thank you, Jozefina Simonova told Viktor, who’d asked her if she was still looking for a gig, who told her that the environmental group his cousin worked for was looking for someone to do some remote writing work. No, she did not have the bandwidth, she was now just focused on getting done with her programme, and then she’d see. She was just focused on getting through dinner tonight, and then she’d see. She didn’t like Indian food, she didn’t care much for food in any case; for yes, hunger can make you enjoy it, but apart from that people’s obsession with grease, cheese, and bread she could not understand, everyone had an underlying glutton in them, she thought. Jozef didn’t even hide it - he could have told her earlier that this was their dinner plan, perhaps she’d have had more time to brace herself for it. She wished he’d told her that others were dressing up, she wished she’d dress up, and maybe be somewhere else, maybe in Naplavka by the banks of the Vltava, or at Stare Mesto. But Jozef would never think of things like dressing up, much less for a dormitory event; she was fond of him, because who wouldn’t be, fundamentally good-natured that he was. He was easy to sway and adorable when he swayed. She never could figure out whether she liked that their names were so alike or not, they could have been Gemini, but they were quite different, but they kept each other warm in the winter. In any case, he seemed to be enjoying himself in all the banter, even though, she knew they weren’t the fondest of her, she couldn’t be more indifferent to them either. In any case, he was enjoying himself.
“Hey-Yo!”, Vasily’s head emerged, severed at the kitchen doorway, “How’s everybody?!”
They were mildly and pleasantly surprised, they told him to come in, they told him to join them. Jozefina continued staring out the window at the cold, vacant parking lot, she was just further vexed. She wished that wine would be served already.
“Ahahahaha!”, laughed Vasily, “You guys are brilliant. Whose genius work is this? This your work, Jozef?”, he brandished the bottle of wine up in the air. He couldn’t care about the food but he could care for the company, and finding the situation as it was when he walked in gave him the impression that he was entering an entertaining scene.
“You guys are cork-blocked!”, he laughed.
“Nobody has another corkscrew?”, asked Viktor.
“Maybe ask people in the other rooms”, suggested Valentina.
“I am sure we’ve got one more bottle opener”, said Anant. He shuffled off to his room in search of it, and he returned defeated.
Everybody fell into a languor of chatting aimlessly, once more. Dhruv, with both the dal and the rice set, took a break, and positioned himself by Valentina, her arms surrounded him as he gazed zoning out, she continued unperturbed in her conversation with Valentina in a Slavic dialect and a pace he could not really follow. Anant, Jozef and Vasily continued their flippancy about the bottle; for Vasily thought it was Jozef, to which Jozef defended himself, throwing Anant under the bus, to which Vasily concluded both were incompetent, Jozef concluded Vasily to be an ogre who’d probably have broken the bottle if he had been handling it, and Anant seconded the remark.
It had been a good hour and a half into the gathering in the kitchen, and in the thick of the crowd, they saw others come in and ready their dinner, and go off with it. The stout, spectacled lady had prepared her pasta on the stove, and taken off to season, and a guy came and used the microwave to heat some ready-made rice bowl. They hadn’t consumed anything yet, and it was the most testing for Viktor and Jishnu, both drained and tired in different ways, they propped each other up talking about how tired they were, Viktor bitching about his schedule, Jishnu about his advanced macroeconomics course and online zoom classes, for he was certain it was that diabolical course that was ruining his life, making him cope with other distractions.
The pressure cooker whistled to signal that the jeera rice was nearing being done, it had all the Europeans in the room startled and shook. “One more whistle”, laughed Anant; smiled Dhruv; grinned Jishnu. Some in the room would rather there be no other whistle, the way it hissed, as if the thing were going to explode, and the way it would build up to the hiss, exactly like a ticking time bomb. But everybody in the room was glad to see tangible progress being made.
Dhruv went back to the stove, he began mechanically stirring the dal being cooked in the open pot and added further slabs of butter. Anant, well aware of the significant delay in the crowd having consumed a morsel and a drop, began conspiratorially approaching Dhruv to figure out the ETA of things; even as he announced “Just twenty more minutes and it’s ready.”
“Aur bhai. You didn’t invite Mohtarma?”, Jishnu casually dropped the question by the cooking stove.
“Huh? Who? Which Mohtarma?”, asked Anant
“Hah! Do you see the kind of scene our chchacha got going on?”, laughed Dhruv, “Which Mohtarma, he asks.’
“Katerina, bro.”, laughed Jishnu.
Anant dawned the shade of a tomato, then burst into a sheepish smile; then into action, sending the aforementioned Katerina a text, and then telling the boys about it, scoffing at them for swaying and grinning at him, flushing at the unfolding of things.
“Oh guys, so retarded of me. I just realize I got a Swiss knife, and it’s got all kinds of bottle openers!”, Vasily ran out of the kitchen.
They toasted to a couple of things; ‘Happy Diwali’ being the first, the primary, but a more elaborate passage on friendship, on sharing more meals and drinks together found exaltation in Anant’s speech, his glass of wine was waving high. And he meant every word of it, and everybody felt every word of it because it was true, its truth being undeniable in a space like the dormitory, on stilts of the liminality between domesticity and transience, for all the warmth and shelter the infrastructure provides, the warmth and care in the cold concrete halls only to be found amongst the other bodies inhabiting the place. An undeniable truth, lodged somewhere in the subconscious, unignorable like a pebble in the shoe, or an itch in the bone; like a phantom limb, irrefutable in its presence.
“Thank you for organizing this, Anant.”, Viktor said emphatically, his eyebrows raised above his glasses, and his erstwhile drooping eyes widening earnestly.
“Yes, yes.”, seconded Valentina.
Jozefina found herself nodding in agreement, for despite her detachment from most of the crowd, she was not stupid enough to believe their existence indispensable, or her aloofness unimpregnable. And though he very much craved to be aloof and lost, given the absolute daze and lethargy of his nerves, Jishnu was washed over with the wave of sentimentalism shrouding the room, that and his long-brewing hunger had him appreciate just about everything about the situation, specifically an admiration of Anant’s energy in catalysing such affairs. Jozef too was in adamant affection, all the memories of previous such shindigs flooding his mind, the thick scent of the luxuriating dinner hyping him up.
Although Vasily only had plans to hang out and indulge in the banter, and he didn’t necessarily attend many dinners and gatherings (especially at the dorm), none of it had any bearing on him as he chugged from his bottle of diet coke (for he didn’t want to drink the wine) with an equal dollop of emotion. He was enjoying himself; he was glad to have been of help with his Swiss knife corkscrew, and in this moment’s heat all of it was true, the rejoicing, the camaraderie and the humour.
And although Dhruv had been to many such gatherings, and knew exactly the juice that could be squeezed out of it, it had been a while. It had been a while since he had the falling out with the block two crew and their rambunctious kitchen dinners and stacked and stuffed room parties. Anant remained the one link to that abandoned crew, the only one who he could still hang out with and find things to do with. It was pure appreciation at the moment.
“Na Zdravi!”, bellowed Dhruv with a paternal smile.
“NA ZDRAVI!” came the chorus
“HAPPY DIWALI!”, went the outro.
Katerina Earlova entered the room, she missed the toast by a hair split, but she entered with a state of mind echoing the same energy; she’d had a long, busy day, and the spontaneous invitation to a dinner party made her join the pack forgoing responsibility to feed themselves, the pack simply joining in the company and the humour. So, she entered vivacious and high-spirited.
“This is such a nice surprise, man! You saved me from having to think about dinner”, she said happily to Anant.
Anant bowed chivalrously and smiled. Jinshu prodded him in the back, and Dhruv sniggered from behind; he cast them a daggered look, he turned around to engage Katerina, but she’d already moved on to join the gregarious group of Vasily, Jozef and Viktor busy dissecting who the most meme-like world leader. Was it Putin, or Babis, Modi, or Biden? Although the latter was too old and sleepy, and ofc never reached the glorious heights of his predecessors, went the disputation. And hahaha! she laughed in her voice full of a Santa Claus timbre at Vasily’s insistence that nobody could outdo “Vlady Daddy” riding a bear, bare-chested through the Russian Tundra. Jishnu brought up Modi’s make-a-wish episode with Bear Grylls in Man versus Wild from across the room, to a rousing cheer from the boys behind the stove, but Jozef declared that nothing but the presidency of Donald J. Trump could take the crown, to which everyone, were they being judicious and fair, had to concede. Katerina and Viktor felt ironically let down that Babis was nowhere close in the contention.
“But guys, guys…can I just say that opening that bottle was the most Soviet thing ever, hahahaha! In Soviet Russia, you don’t open the bottle, the bottle opens you!”, bellowed Vasily.
“Or your corkscrew”, said Viktor, deadpan.
Anant, once again, announced that dinner would be ready in “fifteen minutes”, even as people polished off the bottle of wine, and Vasily, half his bottle of diet coke. The kitchen was enveloped in the thick scent of butter, lentils, garlic, onion, dried fenugreek leaves, and the rest of the esoteric seasoning that Dhruv pulled out from his sleeves. With the wine finished off, the sense of hunger and a brewing impatience appeared palpable, but the babbling and chatter continued reflexively.
Dhruv: How was everything in Kosice?
Vasily: How do you think? They don’t need isolation, they don’t need social distancing, they only have like six inhabitants.
Jozef: Haha, fuck you. It was okay. Things are fine there, it’s not really a big deal. Better than the gulag Vasily comes from.
Vasily: That Gulag has still got paved roads and electricity.
Anant: Hehehehehe. Kosice still uses candles, what Jozef?
Jishnu: You know you shouldn’t talk bro. Mysore still uses elephants instead of taxis.
Anant: That’s how grand we are, bro.
Dhruv: Yes, after all, you guys are one big elephant stable, aren’t you?
Valentina: These boys, they always get into this spiral of ragging and teasing.
Jozefina: And just you watch somewhere they burn their mouth and feelings, go boohoo, suddenly feeling hurt and misunderstood. They do it to themselves.
Valentina: Ya, I know it. Somehow, they don’t seem to learn.
Katerina: Mustek doesn’t get that many cases, maybe we do fifteen to twenty tests a day. Nobody cares in the city centre, they’re all already out shopping, eating and drinking. I think I’ll stop pretty soon. It’s really done.
Viktor: Wow. We’re getting like fifty-seventy, I think. It makes a difference where you volunteer, I guess.
Katerina: Ty vole, you literally are posted in a clinic.
Jishnu: I know the elephant circus draws some crowds during Dussehra, but let’s face it we carry the economy of the whole state.
Anant: And yet you have to recycle gutter water to drink. Hah!
Jozef: Ooooooh!
Jozefina: They are children, I swear.
Valentina: Now that things are opening, we gotta go out again, okay Jozefina. Starting with that place, what was that place? We went to? The one with the car displayed in front, the one where that girl from the dorm works, your friend…
Jozefina: Aloha.
“It’ll be ready in ten minutes.”, said Anant, “by the way, if we want more drinks, there is more in the room, we’ve got one more bottle of wine, there’s some Bozkov, there’s Whiskey.”
In the interim, Vasily had gone off and returned with an assortment of his sartorial creations. Jozef and Katerina were scrutinizing a baggy black T with large patchworks of off-white Greek letters (deltas, lambdas, and phis) on both the front and back; Jishnu found himself trying on an oversized black shirt jacket with its back extended like a tailcoat, and an inbuilt belt of the same material, with Vasily elaborating on how he stitched the tails onto the jacket, displaying the seamless flow of the textile. He had in his hand another black T-shirt adorned with zippers and chains all over, he said it was the easiest to work with black and white at the moment so he could solely focus on the cuts and the designs.
“The zip and chains shirt would look good on like a red leather jacket.”, commented Jishnu. Maybe, thought Vasily, but that’s also a basic ass design, chains on a jacket, a normie design, but, ofc, these civilians wouldn’t know much about all that. On the other side of the kitchen, Valentina and Jozefina had perked up and out of their languid and undulating exchanges, intrigued at the new knick-knacks on the scene. “I’ll bring it to you guys to check it out, wait.”, said Vasily, collecting all articles from the first batch of his audience.
“It’s almost ready now.”, said Dhruv.
The fact that it came from his mouth may have been more reassuring to the crowd, were they not distracted by Vasily’s textiles. And the fact that the message by now had become a broken record for everybody. Jishnu, Jozef and Viktor were rolling cigarettes, intending to go to the stairwell to get away from the monotony.
Katerina giggled at the parroting of the platitude, the delay and the wait were tiring but oddly invigorating, she found the general gregariousness around her marvellous; it was so much better to be among people rather than dine alone, for every once in a while, a surprise chance occasion like this was just what an antidote to clear the tired haze of routine and rhythm. She chuckled at hearing Anant broadcast Dhruv’s message again, saying,
“It’s almost ready now, guys! Five minutes.”
She moved towards him to express, once again and with vehemence, her appreciation for the invitation.
“Have you guys seen The Room?”, asked Jishnu in between drags of his cigarette. Jozef and Viktor needed further clarification of what Jishnu was referring to; yes, it was a movie, oh yes, it was the movie that everybody sort of, kind of knew, yes it was the meme movie – so bad it’s good – Tommy Wiseau was the ‘disaster artist’; and yeah, they both also knew of the Seth Rogan and James Franco’s movie about the movie; yes, it was all so funny – “Oh, Hi Mark…”.
“Give me a drag, bhai.”, appeared Anant from the doorway, “Bhosedika has set up shop there, he’ll be taking measurements soon.” He took a long deep drag of the cigarette passed to him by Jishnu, and gently titled his head to the ceiling to exhale the smoke, and he did that once more. It helped kickstart the brain’s reserves, the nicotine, it allowed one to feel a flash of cerebral energy, Anant felt, and then he started, “It is almost ready guys”, and turned around to go back through the door, perhaps almost muttering, “almost ready…”.
They continued talking about something or the other, so vague and nebulous that none of them could recall with effective accuracy what their discussion had been about a minute later when Anant came barging back, all triumphalist, telling them to come in and get served. Back in the kitchen, another bottle of wine opened, Dhruv stood hands clasped behind his back, chest perhaps a little puffed up behind the pot of dal makhani, Katerina helping herself to a huge dollop of dal makhani on her plate of jeera rice with a side of raita, and Jozefina and Valentina behind her waiting to be served. It became a pale echo of a line gathering a soup kitchen in Black & White when Jozef, Viktor and Jishnu joined them, everybody finally being served the food they had been promised. Anant stood watching with a look of satisfaction, like a philanthropist observing their food truck in operation, like a mother hen observing her chicks peck at littered grain.
“How is it?”, asked Anant.
First to Jozef; who thought it was like eating molten gold, not least because of the golden hue that arose at the edges of the reddish-brown lava splayed out on the off-white scented rice, the taste had a cavalcade of flavours, from the salty and the fatty to the greasy and spicey, and the sweet rich aftertaste of that holds the knife at the back of your throat asking for more; of course, all he could grunt was an “oh so…good man, really! So, good”, before burying himself back at it. Then to Katerina, then to Viktor and then to Jishnu, all of whom coughed up similarly impressed responses.
“Arrey bhai, bohot achcha bana hai! It’s amazing!”, Anant, having served himself a taste too, exalted Dhruv.
Indeed, the fact that it was amazing was led credence to the fact that people went for second helpings. Jozef took a helping as big as his first, Katerina took one even though she knew didn’t need it, as did Viktor, and Jishnu took one with abandon, resolved to bear the bloating that would come on account of definite overeating. And so there, they were all in around an intangible hearth of their own, eating, drinking and chatting, and murmuring and grunting satisfactorily sheltered from the November cold, fully immersed in it.
They polished off the second bottle of the wine.
In the giant pots, the dal makhani and some of the jeera rice still remained, they remained in heaps and mounds, although the raita, like wine, had been polished off. People had moved on to the dessert, and as is custom while the jamuns were annihilated off their bowls by everybody, the syrup remained, and the syrup was thrown into the sink.
Anant went around the room asking people to take more, but their limit of indulgence had been reached. No one wanted it breached. In the corner, Dhruv stood with his own plate polished listening to Valentina tell him just how wonderful the food had been, just how delicious, but also rich and heavy, and that she just would not be able to finish the plate that had by all accounts a sizeable mound of rice, dal and raita left. Besides them, Jozefina was egging Jozef to finish her plate too, very delicately with soft prods and looks, the way a cat would when trying to come and nestle on one’s lap, and Jozef stood there sweating and buckling under the pressure, and then taking upon the task to clean up the plate, despite having saturated himself.
“C’mon, c’mon. Take some. Just a little more”, Anant attempted to coax a bearish Katerina.
“No. No. I’m very full, man. I just cannot.”, she responded.
The same reaction was meted out by all the rest he tried to cajole. They washed their plates and glasses in the sink. Jishnu had sunk himself washing some of the cooking vessels hoping to speed run the process, although the voluminous dal and rice kept the two big pots at bay, something that Jishnu thought to be a shame because the food was indeed fantastic, but overestimation of the appetite and the amount of leftover left a bright glaring optic that didn’t feel to flattering.
“How was it, dude? You liked it, no?”, whispered Anant to Jishnu, who was at his wit's end as to how to convince him that, yes, it was great, and yes, the amount leftover felt a tad bit tragic, as was Anant’s fast unravelling decorum – for he had asked the same question, “You liked it, no? How did you like it? It was good?” – in cycles and in laps, to Katerina, to Valentina, and to Viktor. Jozef got a pass, for it was evident how he laboured, and Jozefina appeared too icy to ask. Dhruv stood quiet, with a little bit of a grimace, a scowl, but more dignified. The food on the plate was no longer lava, it was lukewarm, the golden hue appeared evaporated and it wore the sorry expression of being spurned.
The chatter continued in the aftermath of the eating, but on a lower pulse, drowsier in tone. How they needed to have more such nights. More gatherings. Whatever was happening with the “international dinners” of the dorm. They would resume soon, no doubt. The dormitory bar had already opened again. Neighbourhood gossip and tentative plans.
Vasily reappeared by the kitchen doorway having dropped off all the clothes designs that he displayed for the crowd, thinking now what could they possibly be up to, if they’d finished dinner whether they were going to get up to more banter, perhaps even some games, he thought. Instead, he believed he found himself amidst a brutish assault upon his agency when Anant piqued up and greeted him, practically at the doorway, with the pot of jeera rice and a plate in his hand, and that oh-so insufferable geniality that backed you into a corner of civil courtesy (ruminated Vasily).
“Ahh…Vasily! Come you gotta have some. It’s come out really nice.”, said Anant.
“No. Thanks. I’ve already had. No.”, began Vasily.
“C’mon. Just have a taste. It’s a special occasion for us. Have some dal makhani, you’ve got to. Or at least have some gulab jamun”, pursued Anant. He was certain that this was something that needed to be experienced, the very crux of the evening, this food, made with love and benevolence, made to be shared, and sanctified in the process; a little taste, to humour and to respect the evening; a little taste, so that the everyone at the scene, at the dinner party, would have partaken in that very crux, the food they came to share. A little taste or there would linger a feeling of incompleteness.
“No. No. It’s okay thanks. I already ate.”, said Vasily.
“Aw, c’mon bro…”
“Nuh…no…No….NO…NOOO! I don’t want. NOOO!”
Vasily stood there scowling, looking down at the floor, at Anant, and all around, with the demeanour of the kid being reprimanded for fighting with their classmate and now being told off that all their moral righteousness and high ground was suspect. For Anant, the outburst, felt like a dog had snapped at him at his very generous gesture of offering a treat – but dogs love treats, people love food, went his consternation.
For the rest of the crowd, observing the happenings in the frame of the Kitchen’s doorway, it all appeared to be an exciting turn of events, unexpectedly melodramatic; for it was a little embarrassing, a little cringe, a little pitiable, but more importantly it was like a defibrillator to the breast of the dying party. Dhruv grimaced further; a trainwreck, he found himself thinking, he shouldn’t have pushed it, poor Anant, Vasily was a stubborn mule when it came to all this – it was all right after all, so, they had overestimated the margins of consumptions, the night didn’t need an ignoble outburst like that, for otherwise it had been a fine and enjoyable scene. Valentina was startled, a bit marvelled at the novel dynamics at play, although there was a touch of pity about it all.
Jozef and Jishnu looked at each other, faces dumbfounded and snarking; for both registered the same affect – that shots were fired, strays were caught, things went comically DEFCON, mischievous and amused glances exchanged. Amused though he was, Viktor who only cared to crash now could not help but cringe. And amused though she was, crash though she wanted to, Katerina felt the weight of outrage tinted by a similar second-hand embarrassment. But that’s what made it so delicious, she thought, as did almost all of the rest, the unexpected spice, the icing on the evening, a car wreck magnetic to the gaze, although, they hoped, and they all hoped nothing was truly broken beyond repair, that the elasticity of relations would allow all the bitterness and friction to be forgotten, and the splendour and humour – whatever they were to whichever member of the party – would be etched into an anecdote – for it was quite the entertaining climax, she sighed, resolving to thank everybody for the time and crash.
“Finally! Hah! Some fun”, thought Jozefina; it was unexpected, but hilarious, although she knew to temper her expression to the situation, in any case, the short fuse of the whole thing was surprising.
Jishnu returned upstairs with two tiffin boxes, by now the haze had faded, only a deep tiredness remained; he’d knocked on the Kurin’s door to find both him and Emir lounging about, he’d asked them if they wanted to “top up”, and with the plans hashed, he had the clarity of purpose and tunnel vision that added an extra spritely energy to his gait, in spite of the tiredness, the energy of a fiend, the energy of fein. Dinner had been delicious, and dare he say unexpectedly entertaining.
The kitchen on the far end of the 3rd floor of the third block was almost cleansed of all signs of the evening’s gathering, save for a knife, a chopping board, a couple of ladles, and the two (smaller) pots where the rice and the dal had been transferred. They’d washed all the vessels, wiped the counter clean and the stove to the best of their abilities; the counter looked silver and shiny but the stove still had shrapnel of oil and grime littered in tiny spots hardening to give a texture of braille on the metal. They’d cleaned to the best of their abilities; the janitors would anyway be coming to clean tomorrow anyway (or was it the weekend? For nobody could remember at this stage of consciousness. It didn’t matter, they’d clean to the best of their ability, and the kitchen was clean enough for the weekend, if it was the weekend).
Right then, Anant had no conception of calendar days or clock time, save that it was time to crash. Dhruv and Valentina were sitting in his room, Vasily had taken flight lord knows where, and all the rest had gone. A minor epilogue, he thought, with Dhruv and Valentina, before they would be off too, and then he’d wind down. Then he’d sleep.
“Khana sahi mein acchcha tha na?”, enquired Anant, serving dal makhani onto one of the tiffin boxes.
“Bhai, let me tell you. I hate eating leftovers, I hate eating food from the previous days, usually. And I’m taking all this.”, said Jishnu, “and we were all hogging, you know that. The only reason Jozef could down even Jozefina’s was because of the taste, you saw how ballooned he was.”
They laughed low in the kitchen hollowed out of the presence of others.
“Aur…baaki?”, Anant asked in the lull.
“Ahh…I’ll probably crash in a while, smoke and pass out or something.”
“Yeah, me too. Just chill for a little while with Dhruv and Valentina. Woh Bhosidka, God knows, where he’s run off to…”, scowled Anant.
“Dude, it was hilarious. He looked like a little kid throwing a tantrum, you looked so shocked too, bro. Hah!”, squeaked Jishnu.
But if only he’d just tasted it, out of courtesy, for that was the crux of it, coming together to break bread, Anant ruminated now, alone in the kitchen. Yes, they’d enjoyed it, most of them; Mohtarma too, as Jishnu pointed out before his departure, very evidently so she loved it. All in all, it was a memorable evening, but boy was it inglorious at moments, there was too much leftover, they had overestimated, and that didn’t look good. It didn’t feel good. But more so, why didn’t he just taste it, just a little bit? Good company and humour, good food and banter, it was all an equilibrium. Anant was no stranger to equilibria being thrown off course, the fallout between Dhruv and the Block 2 cabal for instance (and that was a serious, a permanent fracture, ostensibly). Anant was acquainted with equilibria being disturbed on a more minor basis too, a scowl, a scuffle, and a snap, but he could’ve just tasted a little; out of courtesy, for it was the crux of the evening. To break bread and crack jokes, there was a whole lot of the latter. But then again, there were a whole lot of leftovers too, he laughed silently. And soon enough, all of this would be a joke he supposed. It did feel like a dog had snapped at him, but it was a bark, not a bite. There was a bittersweet metallic aftertaste, but soon enough the metal would taste nice. Now he was dog tired too, and now he had to entertain (however briefly) that couple in his room, and then figure out where the equilibrium lay with Vasily. That would be strange, it would be awkward, but they would power through. And in the end, it would be fine. Because it was a universal truth in the dormitory, that people’s bonds are like sinew, elastic and plastic; they would joke, rag, fuck, and fight, fall out and make up, for warmth was only provided by other bodies in the otherwise cold concrete halls. An undeniable truth.
Really enjoyed reading this one!