The First Sin

                                                     Chapter 1

                                                           -DANIEL-

Do you think a positive attitude is the only thing required to become an optimist? If you think so then Jansie was surely one. Anybody who knows her would say that she was an optimist. Her friends say so. Her parents agree with what her friends say. Other relatives say she was a saint. You must have heard that during the funeral. My dear, that brings another question to my mind. Do you think all optimists can be saints? I don’t know whether she was an optimist or a saint or both. All I know is that she was a miracle who touched my decaying life and changed it before I knew what was happening. I know what you are thinking. That I’m talking like your Grandpa…miracles, saints and angels… And I know what you would say… “Please, Daniel, don’t bring in spirituality into everything. Can’t you talk of other things? I can tolerate such talk only from Grandpa. Don’t think you can take his place in my heart by talking like him.” Yes, my dear! That’s what you would say. You think I don’t understand you? You think I don’t care? I know I can never prove it, but I do. Jansie and you are the only people I love without any compulsions. But, I’m never going to tell you. Let’s get back to Jansie. Yes, she was a miracle. I was a rotten pessimist sinking in my insecurity when I met her for the first time…

          It was the day we had shifted to Madurai permanently. I was in my room, looking at the unfamiliar things around me and wondering how I would adapt to the new environment. Not that I had left behind many friends at Pondicherry. To be frank I had no friends at all. All my acquaintances at Pondicherry were Gabriel’s friends. I was lost in my thoughts when I heard the shrill noise of the calling bell. Mom opened the door and welcomed the guests with a loud, “What a pleasant surprise!” (I still don’t understand why people say that when they actually don’t mean it.)Relatives! How I hated them all! I didn’t wish to meet anyone. I wanted to remain secure in my untidy room. I was about to close the door, when Mom called me.

“Daniel, come down. See who has come to see you…”

I walked down reluctantly. I saw a not-so-old couple and a young girl with them. I knew the lady. She was Stella, Dad’s sister. Dad had often told me about her…about their conspiracies against your mom, the youngest and thus helpless child…about how they used to taunt her and later get punished by Paati… Stella Athai had changed, but she still looked pretty. Her husband looked grim and unfriendly. I smiled at them and looked away from their daughter as I wasn’t sure whether I should smile or not.

“Meet my daughter.” Stella Athai said, beaming with pride.

“Hello, I’m Jansie.” She said. I noticed that she had a very sweet voice.

I looked away from her. I didn’t wish to talk to stupid girls. I thought she was stupid because she was beautiful. What did I feel that day? Love? Lust? Both? Did I long to enclose her in my arms? Did I pine to kiss those rosy lips and possess that enchanting smile? Did I try to find my image in her fish-shaped eyes? To be frank, I didn’t feel anything, my dear. A person with a negative attitude cannot admire beauty. If I had been an ordinary fifteen-year old I would have felt all those. But all I could feel that day was contempt…

                          I met her a few days later in my new school. She was my classmate. Her presence in the class was a nuisance to me. She would talk loudly and twitter around, inviting admiring glances from the boys. I wasn’t one of the admirers. I was too absorbed in my problems. Teachers had labeled me ‘below-average’ and my parents kept reminding me that am not as good as Gabriel…I wouldn’t have tried to come out of the cocoon of insecurity if she hadn’t dared to break into it…if she hadn’t spoken to me that day when I was sitting alone in the classroom cursing myself for not being someone like Gabriel…if she hadn’t insisted that I speak out…if she had believed me when I said I was alright…

“Liar!” she said, contempt dripping with the syllables.

I was shocked. I didn’t know how to react. I was accustomed to comments like “you are good-for �"nothing”, “loser”, “arrogant, unlike your brother”…statements which were light years away from the truth. But this girl who knew nothing about me was accusing me of being a liar. I was hurt, because deep in my heart, I knew she was right.

“You are always sad.” She continued. “Daniel, what’s your problem?”

“Why do you want to know? Do you think you can solve them all?”

“No.” she replied, confidently. “We can’t solve everything, but we should never give up without trying.”

I stared at her blankly. What was she trying to say?

“Victories and failures are predestined, but happiness depends entirely on our actions.” She explained.

“How is that possible?” I protested. “If everything in life is decided by fate, how can happiness be an exception?”

“What a rotten pessimist you are! I was talking about destiny, and how conveniently you have replaced the word with fate. Now I understand why you are sad. You just don’t want to see the positive side of life.”

So, destiny and fate were two different things? Till then I had been thinking that they were synonyms and can be used interchangeably.

“Whatever.” I said. “How can happiness be an exception?”

“Because happiness is a state of being. If you have put in the best effort and then fail, you won’t be sad because you know that you aren’t responsible for the failure.”

“What do you mean, Jansie?”

“I mean, there’s nothing wrong in giving up, but don’t give up till you are sure that you have put in the maximum effort you possibly can.”

“What should I do?”

There was a pause. She looked at me, and smiled. She looked so irresistible at that moment. But I was too sad to admire the beauty of the moment.

“Speak out.” She said, gently touching my arm. “I’m ready to listen.”

Her divine beauty, her enchanting smile, her fish-shaped eyes, her gentle, reassuring touch and the concern in her sweet voice made me do something I had never dared to do before…I began to speak. I told her about how I developed an inferiority complex, about how much I hated my parents because they always compared me with Gabriel, about how much I envied Gabriel because he was everything I wanted to be…

“Nobody loves me…” I said, for the umpteenth time.

“That’s what you think, but…”

“It’s the truth.” I snapped in.

“Yes, ‘your’ truth, Daniel.”

“Truth is absolute, Jansie.”

“It’s not. If beauty is truth, how can there be an absolute truth? If beauty lies in the eye of the beholder, the same can be applied to truth.”

I didn’t understand what she was trying to say, but I understood that she wasn’t stupid.

“Think about what I said.” She said, getting up. “Whenever you are upset, you can talk to me. I’ll be there for you…always.”

“Thank, you, Jansie.” was all I could say, as she walked out of the classroom.

I had found a friend. A miracle had touched my life…

             I don’t wish to tell you how my life changed after that. It just did…like seasons. I don’t understand how someone can hold on to negative thinking after meeting Jansie. May be you just don’t want to change. Have you ever wondered why she wanted to change your attitude? Have you ever thought why she loved you when there were so many lovable cousins in Madurai? Are you still a fool to believe that she loved you unconditionally? I know you are not a fool. I know you have wondered. But I’m sure you’ll never get the answer. Do you know why? Because you underestimate your abilities. Everybody thinks she was trying to help you. If that’s true, why did she poison your mind with her eccentric thoughts? There’s one thing you don’t know about her. She was a rebel. She was against every norm set by our ancestors. She believed in God, but not in religion. She believed in culture, but not in tradition.

“Our so-called elders are so clever.” she used to say. “How conveniently they have mixed up religion and tradition…a perfect blend to make life miserable!”

That’s why she loved you. She needed you. I know it’s impossible to believe. But it’s true. She had great thoughts and you had the ability to write. She wanted to use that ability of yours scatter her ideas throughout the world. I will never reveal this secret to you. I know you’ll be hurt. Besides I don’t have to tell you because this secret isn’t a part of the promise…

                                It was my third Christmas in Madurai. Now, I wasn’t the insecure, under-average schoolboy. I was an intelligent and smart medical student. Ironically, I cleared the entrance in the first attempt and Jansie didn’t. When the results were announced, everybody thought Jansie’s optimism would be crushed…that she would show signs of disappointment at least for a moment. But she didn’t. With the same enchanting smile on her face, she accepted the fact that she must try again.

“Success is not determined by how many times you succeed.” she said…

                               Well, coming back to the Christmas of 2000… I was sitting outside my house, watching the children of my street playing happily. I was waiting for her. I don’t know why but I was anxious. I was worried about how she would react. I was afraid I would lose a friend. By the time she arrived, I had lost all my confidence and decided not to tell her anything. When I saw her, I was stupefied. She looked gorgeous…draped in a deep-red silk, wearing matching bangles, fragrant jasmines and a radiant smile.

“You look beautiful, Jansie.”

She laughed.

“I know.”

We chatted for some time, about my course, about her work with an NGO, about Mom’s craze with serials…almost everything, except my feelings for her.

“I have to go now.” she said, looking at my wristwatch.

I couldn’t stop her. As she turned to leave, I noticed a tiny mole on the back of her neck. My dear, I’m not a poet like you. Otherwise I could’ve compared it to a raven’s feather on a mountain of snow…a tiny bee hovering over a field of mustard… But I’m not a poet. I was tempted to touch her and this time I couldn’t resist. I placed my hand on her shoulder.

“What?” she asked, her unsuspecting gaze fixed on me.

I felt guilty.

“Where are you going?”

“To the Church.” she replied. “Mom lights a hundred candles every Christmas. She isn’t well, so I volunteered to do it for her… Not that I believe in all this…”

 “Will you come back?” I asked.

“Do you want me to?”

I nodded.

“Why?”

“Jansie, I have something to tell you.”

She smiled and nodded. She didn’t ask me what I wanted to tell her. That’s something I really liked about her. She never nagged. The Church wasn’t very far and I knew it would take hardly an hour. So, I didn’t get into the house. I waited.

“Daniel.” I heard Gabriel calling me from the kitchen. “Dinner is ready.”

“I have no appetite.” I shouted back.

“What’s wrong with you?” he said, coming out and sitting down next to me.

It was evident that he cared for me. It wasn’t his fault that I had seen him as a rival and failed to see his love.

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

He was staring at me. I was moved by the concern in his eyes. I decided to tell him.

“I’m in love.”

“Wow!” was his response. “Who’s the girl?”

“Jansie.”

“Daniel, are you out of your mind? Jansie, of all the girls!”

“What’s wrong with her?” I protested.

“She’s a beauty queen….there are guys who are ready to lick her shoe-lace. She’s never going to fall for you. And even if she does, Mom is never going to accept her.”

I was quiet.

“Leave it.” he said, trying to distract me from the topic. “Let’s go for dinner.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Then starve yourself to death.” he said, and left.

“Mom!” I heard him exclaim at the drawing room. Mom was quiet and it meant she had heard everything. I got nervous. I was sure she would get mad at me.

“Don’t worry, Mom.” he assured her. “He’s dreaming. He’ll get back to his senses soon.”

“Gabriel, I want to tell you something.” It was Mom’s stern voice. “I think you have forgotten what your brother was. You have forgotten that he was a coward who was afraid of trying anything new…afraid of new challenges…in short, afraid of life. Can you find even a trace of that coward in our Daniel now? It was Jansie who made it happen. If my son is dreaming, please don’t wake him.”

I was surprised. I rushed in and expressed my gratitude with a hug. She smiled. But before I could interpret the smile, the telephone rang. Gabriel answered it. Suddenly he became serious. After a series of ‘yes’s and ‘ok’s, he put down the receiver.

“Jansie had an accident.” he informed us. “She was lighting candles in the Church and her sari caught fire.”

                        An hour later we reached the hospital. Stella Athai was calm enough to tell us that Jansie had lost her eyesight and that doctors were not very optimistic. I wasn’t ready to accept it. I had to wait for three days and three sleepless nights to hear her sweet voice once again…for the last time…

“Who’s  Daniel?” asked a nurse.

I stood up.

“The patient wants to see you. But don’t stay in there too long.”

As I stepped into the ICU, I heard her sweet voice.

“Daniel…”

“Jansie…”

“You had something to tell me…”

I didn’t know what to say. I never thought I would express my love in such a situation.

“Jansie, I…I love you.”

“But, the fire has consumed my beauty.”

“It doesn’t matter. It was you who taught me that beauty lies in the purity of the heart.”

“If I survive, I’ll be blind. Will you still love me?”

“Yes.”

“Daniel, let me reveal a secret…I love you too…”

There was a pause.

“I need to tell you a few things.” she resumed. “I know you have always wondered why I love Rachel so much. Daniel, I love her because she’s like me…a black sheep.”

I didn’t know what to say. I was irritated by her obsession with you.

“Please take care of her and tell her that I love her…” she said in a hurry as the nurse came to send me out.

I went out and waited along with the others, only to hear a few hours later that my Jansie was no more.

                Was this untimely end predestined? How can destiny be so cruel to good people like Jansie? What’s the point of living, then? You were closer to her than I was. Surely you must have the answers… 

                                                              Chapter 2

                                                             -RACHEL-

Hatred and love, pessimism and optimism, freedom and captivity, confidence and the lack of it, beauty and its absence…nobody is born with them. Neither was I. Hatred was sown in me. Pessimism was developed. Freedom was denied. Confidence was crushed. The beauty in me was buried in obscurity. My dear, I wasn’t born this way. I too was an ordinary child once who used to think that the world around her was beautiful and that nothing can ever go wrong. Like any human, the only thing I have possessed from my birth is lust. Yes, LUST! Don’t panic, my dear. It just means a strong desire…not necessarily sexual desire. When I was a child I just had needs. Need to be fed, to be looked after…to be loved… My Grandpa made sure that my needs were never left unfulfilled, and I like a fool thought that was love. I know you won’t believe me but that’s the truth. The man who teaches about “faith, hope and love” doesn’t love me. In fact he doesn’t love anyone. Not even Grandma, the woman who has sacrificed all her desires for him. Ma never loved me because I was a disgrace to her. She doesn’t love me because I’m not beautiful. If beauty is synonymous with a fair skin, then I’m surely not beautiful. But I wasn’t aware of it when I was a child. I was content and happy with what I had. I used to tell my friends at school, proudly, that Grandpa is a pastor. Solid Ground, one of the biggest churches in Trivandrum for Born-Again Christians, was not just the Church where Grandpa was the pastor, but a place where I thought I could interact with God. The place taught me a series of moralities. I used to obey them reverently, hoping that one day I’ll be fit to preach the Gospel and serve the needy. I wanted to be a good human being, my dear. Nobody goes in the wrong path as long as they are ignorant of bitter truths. Now I understand why God forbade Man from eating the fruit of the tree of Knowledge. Knowledge results in grief. It was knowledge, the temptation which caused angels to fall, that shattered my dreams of being a good human. There comes a situation in the life of every human that reveals a truth and from the truth choices are made. It happened to me when Ma had her second child…

              It was a gloomy afternoon in the month of august. It was drizzling and we were anticipating a heavy downpour. I was a five-year old, eagerly waiting for my sibling. I had many questions to ask. Where have they taken Ma? When will I see my brother? Will it be a brother? How did they know that it would be a boy? Had anyone seen him before? How small would he be? What will he call me, “akka” or “chechi”? Where was Papa? I looked at Grandma who was sitting next to me. I opened my mouth to pour out my questions, but something stopped me. She looked anxious. She saw me staring at her.

“What happened, mole?” she asked, affectionately.

“Nothing” I replied and rested my head on her lap.

She began to run her fingers through my hair and it lulled me to sleep. My sleep was interrupted when Grandpa walked in, opening the door of the bedroom with a loud creak. I wanted to ask him whether my brother had arrived. Assuming that I was asleep, he began to talk. For the first time in my life, I decided to pretend. I didn’t open my eyes.

“It’s a girl again” he said, with a tint of disappointment in his voice.

“Praise the Lord” said Grandma, “We should be thankful to Him for His grace. It is His will that Joyce and Sam should have another daughter. Who are we to question His will? How is Joyce?”

“Joyce is fine…but the baby…”

“What happened to the baby?”

“She’s underweight, it seems. They have kept her in an incubator. Don’t worry. She’ll be alright in a day or two.”

“By His grace everything will be ok”

“She’s not like Rachel” said Grandpa and I was curious to find out what exactly he meant

“She’s fair” he informed Grandma, lighting up her weary face with a radiant smile.

“I just hope Joyce is mature enough to treat both her daughters alike” she said.  “I know she will but, what if she starts ignoring Rachel? It might develop an inferiority-complex in her…she might start feeling jealous of her sister… Let us pray that it should never happen.”

“Sarah, you are talking as if it’s Rachel’s fault that she’s dark. You know who is to be blamed. All the sesame seeds and other poisonous things that Joyce ate… Jesus has forgiven her for that evil thought…but I still can’t understand how a Born-again Christian can even think of getting rid of her child.”

“We can’t judge them,” Grandma protested “May be, they were not ready at that time. Sam didn’t have a permanent job… “

After that they kept talking about things I didn’t understand. I didn’t care either. Two shocking truths had been revealed to me. I wasn’t beautiful because I was dark. Ma had tried to get rid of me. Did she know that her daughter would be ugly? Was that the reason she wanted to get rid of me? Now that she had a beautiful daughter, Ma would never love me?

“I don’t want this sister” I whispered that night, as my pillow was getting soaked in tears. “Let her go somewhere far away. I want to be loved by Ma and Papa. I don’t want to share them with her.”

I had cried myself to sleep before Papa returned home with the shocking news… The child had passed away. A careless nurse had kept her in the incubator without checking the oxygen cylinder. The cylinder was empty and the child died of suffocation. I was woken up the next morning. Papa asked me to give a kiss to my sister.

“She’s going away. You’ll never see her again” he told me.

Quietly, I got up from my bed, went to the drawing room which was crowded by a group of pastors and some elderly members of the Church. My sister was lying inside what looked like a wooden box, like the one I had read about in the story of Snow White. I planted a gentle kiss on her forehead. She was cold and hard. Grandpa was right. She wasn’t dark like me.

“Where is she going?” I asked Grandma.

“To Jesus,” she replied, through tears.

“I too want to go” I said.

I got a smack on my back and was ordered to go back to sleep. I didn’t attend my sister’s funeral. That day I didn’t know that in a few days’ time, I would be compelled to learn to live with guilt. It happened within a year…in a Sunday class.

“Today we are going to read Proverbs18:21” said Ria chechi, our Sunday class teacher. “Now who’s going to read it out for me?”

I raised my hand. She smiled and asked me to read.

“Death and life” I began to read “are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.”

She asked me to sit down and began to explain the verse. I couldn’t listen to her. I began to sweat. I didn’t need her explanation to understand the enormity of the crime I had committed. I had killed my sister…Ma’s beloved child. She had died, not because of the carelessness of the nurse but because of my careless words. I tried not to think about it. I tried to listen to my teacher. My vision got blurred and before I knew what was happening, I fainted. When I woke up, nobody asked me why I had fainted. I didn’t volunteer to tell them. The guilt which was born in me that day began to grow in me like a cancerous cell. I would have let it destroy me if I had not met Jansie…

      It was my first trip to Madurai, Ma’s hometown. It was somebody’s wedding which made the trip inevitable. I wasn’t excited because Grandpa had refused to come. I can’t recall anything about the journey except the fact that it was too long and tiring. We reached Madurai at the crack of the dawn. My maternal grandparents welcomed us. Ma told me that the old lady was her mother and that I should call her “paati”.

“Why shouldn’t I call her “ammuma” or “grandma”?” I asked her.

“Just do what I tell you.” Ma replied, pinching me on my shoulder. “And my father is your “taata”. Do you understand?”

I nodded.

“Tata” I murmured. Pronouncing it like the equivalent of “goodbye”.

“No” she said “It is not the “ta” as in tea…“ta” as in “Thiruvananthapuram”. “

I understood. I nodded.

Paati began to talk to Ma. Assuming that I don’t understand Tamil, she said,

“Rachel looks just like you…but she’s dark.”

The humiliating remark didn’t hurt me anymore. I was used to it. Humiliations are like culture, we get habituated to them without questioning. They lose their ability to hurt or surprise us. Yes, my dear, we never admire the things we are habituated to and neither do we get hurt by them. For instance, I have never admired the natural beauty of Kerala. And I have never complained about the bad roads. But the remark affected Ma. From the expression on her face it was difficult to tell whether she was hurt or just annoyed. She asked me to go for a shower. I obeyed. When I opened the tap I was surprised. I had always been taught that water is a colourless, odourless and tasteless liquid. The water gushing out of the tap smelt like bleaching powder. I was tempted to check whether it had a taste, but I didn’t. When I came out of the bathroom I saw that Ma was ready. She was draped in a navy-blue silk which enhanced her complexion. She was wearing a tiny chain around her throat, earrings that looked like a tiny bunch of golden grapes and a watch on her left hand (which was gifted by Papa as Grandma says). She looked like a goddess, adorned with divine simplicity. Ma is beautiful, my dear. I can’t deny the fact just because I hate her. When I saw myself in the mirror, I was disappointed. I was wearing a pink frock which resembled that of Cinderella in my story book. But the beautiful dress didn’t alter my looks. When compared to me, even the ugly step-sisters would’ve looked pretty.

         It was during the wedding that I met Jansie for the first time. Ma introduced me to her sister, Stella. I was supposed to call her “periyamma”. By this time I had learned not to question. After the awkward introduction the two sisters were lost in their talks and I was ignored. It felt awkward…alone in a strange place, among unknown people. I left Ma and Stella Periyamma alone and found a not-so-quiet corner. I sat down, took out a piece of paper and pen from my bag and began to scribble. Loneliness is the Muse who can bring out hidden talents, often surprising us.

“Rachel, why are you sitting here alone?” it was the sweetest voice I had ever heard.

I turned back and saw a girl who looked like a princess from a fairy tale. Her expressive eyes looked like fishes drawn by the hand of an artist with kohl, her dewy skin resembled a land of spotless snow tinted pink by carelessly spilt rosé and her spontaneous smile made me feel like I was the reason for it.

“How do you know my name?” I asked her.

“I just know.” she replied, still smiling. “Your mom is my aunt. So, we are sisters, by default. I’m Jansie. You can call me “akka”….Do you speak Tamil?”

I nodded, with a smile. There was something I could boast about. I could speak not just Malayalam, Tamil and English (which every other person in Kerala can), but also Hindi (thanks to the strict order of Grandpa). It was true that I was dark and ugly. But I wasn’t totally useless. I was good at something.

“What are you writing, Rachel?”

“I’m writing a poem.”

“Wow! So my Rachel is a little poet!”

“Poetess…no…I mean, I’m not a poet…ess”

“Can I see your poem?”

The expression in her eyes made it impossible for me to refuse. I handed it to her and she read it quietly. It was a silly, but sad, poem about a butterfly without a wing, fluttering in a puddle.

“It is nice.” she said, returning the poem to me.

I was too enchanted by her beauty to take the compliment. I kept staring at her. When she turned, her eyes caught mine.

“You are beautiful.” I said, before she could question me.

“I know.” she replied, laughing. “And I’m proud of it, my dear. Beauty is an asset. “A thing of beauty is a joy forever”. Do you know who said that?”

I shook my head.

“John Keats.”

 I repeated the name in my mind till I was sure it was etched in my memory. Then she said something nobody had said to me before…

“You are cute…like a doll.”

Saying that, she hugged me and I was surprised. Was I cute? Did she really think so? I didn’t ask her the questions which were hovering in my mind. I didn’t want to interrupt the tranquility of that moment. At that beautiful moment I didn’t want to remember the image of the ugly girl I had seen in the mirror that morning…

       It was the story of Snow White that came to my mind during Jansie’s funeral. I knew that the Jansie inside the coffin wasn’t the beautiful thirteen-year old who had called me cute. Periyamma told me that the fire had consumed everything…her silky hair, her flawless complexion, her rosy lips and that spontaneous smile. I knew that no handsome prince can bring her back to life with a kiss. It was Jansie who taught me that beauty is the only truth in life…that beauty can never pass into nothingness… It was hard to digest the fact that the girl who meant so much to me didn’t exist anymore. I wasn’t sad. I was angry because I felt cheated. I didn’t know how I would survive without her, but I knew that I must. I looked around for you. I knew you would be there. I spotted you near your brother. He looked worried. He was begging you to cry out, but you weren’t listening to him. You stood there like a statue.

“Daniel,” he pleaded. “Cry out…your Jansie is gone forever.”

You looked at him with disdain.

“She hasn’t gone anywhere.”  you said, without a trace of tears in your eyes. “She still lives in my heart. I don’t want to cry and accept the fact that she’s dead. Besides, she’s a saint. She doesn’t need the cheap tears of mortals like us…”

And then you broke down. Why, my dear? You weren’t crying for her. Were you crying for yourself? As I was staring at you, wondering whether I should talk to you or not, I felt a warm hand on my shoulder. I turned back. It was Periyamma.

“Rachel…” she said, unable to hold back her tears. “My daughter was a saint, not a rebel.”

I let her hold me close and cry out her grief. I didn’t say anything. What could I have said? That Jansie wasn’t a saint? Should I have revealed the secret to everyone? That Jansie’s death wasn’t an accident? My dear, she wasn’t a saint. Saints have the divine ability to forgive. Jansie didn’t. As far as I know saints don’t relate their happiness to the material world…they don’t kill themselves because of a disappointment… I stood there quietly…with the painful realization that beauty had finally passed into nothingness…