Lakshmi Puja

Sonal Sher

Illustration by Riley Stratton

I don't have any illusions about the future. It’s why the children must remember they are loved, like when Maa would feed my brother and me from the same plate every day after school with her hands. Familiarity can be powerful. It's why I decided to make rice Kheer for tonight's puja. Maa's recipe was a faithful play of rice, sugar, and heat that could swallow any sadness it touched.

White rice. Just three bowls. But most chatbots at the food websites were useless. They can't just sell rice to anyone. How about some Quonio rice? 

The ingredients were hard to find, but it’s possible to find almost anything for sale on the dark web. It took a bit of suffering, nothing out of the ordinary.

I am not sure what exactly happened with the rice. Was it the rising temperatures that reduced the yields or was it the severe pest outbreak? They have been saying that it's the Rice blast bug, a new pest-strain that destroys paddy. Some say that it had evolved during interaction with the cows, who had begun to see paddy as competition for water in regions where water is scarce.

When I first heard of this, I remember mentioning the mosquitoes at home and how they had stopped responding to the repellents a while back. It doesn't matter. White rice has been banned for a decade now. The lack of rice is unfortunate, of course, but it must be nothing more than a problem with the irrigation system; because didn't it just flood so many times? Our swimming pool was filled with rainwater for two months straight. 

I couldn't stop crying as I washed the rice with water. I placed washed rice and the three times drinking water inside a pressure cooker and turned the heat up. As the cooker whistled angrily for the first time, I lowered the heat, and as it continued to hiss stubbornly, a starchy steam infiltrated my filtered air-conditioned kitchen. I breathed in to coat all the darkness inside with the scent. I used to eat rice whenever I was sad, a long time ago. It was my comfort food.

I cut the heat after the second whistle from the cooker, and after waiting for it to cool for twenty minutes, I opened the cooker's lid. A steaming cloud unfogged a memory. I craved a bowl of steamed rice, turnips, and curd. It used to be my favorite meal for so many winter afternoons. 

It all wouldn't have been so bad, except that cow milk had become undependable. All milk solids produce toxic effects on interaction with human saliva, leading to confusion, drowsiness, mania, and violent outbursts. That's what the children had been told at the school, and it was a bit much. It scares them, and you know how it is with their imagination. With milk, it probably is a case of adulteration.

After all, the greedy dairies had been mixing detergent and who knows what else in it for years; I had seen it on the news. They must have been drugging it, but I keep reminding myself that progress only comes out of adversity, at least now that everything is under regulation, and M1LK that we consume must pass rigorous tests before reaching us. But how does one explain all those years we drank milk to the children? 

The sugar was the hardest to find. The reason for its disappearance was not mentioned explicitly; it was suggested as a matter of fact that it was cancerous. The centre had begun classes to educate us in the art of sugar-free desserts, but it was never the same again. The children took it hard and began to feel something was wrong. (I believe that's when the bunker talk first started). 

But I don't think that there is anything terribly wrong. Papa had seen many terrible times, rations, curfews. He would tell a story of stealing a crate of raw eggs to eat after being stuck in a village for weeks. There is no war going on, no military sirens going off, and no riots. And it's not like the fish fall from the sky every day. And the weather agencies have been so good at predicting those times. We all had, in fact, been doing so well for the last few years. The children would play with the dogs, feeding them leftovers and anything they didn't want to eat, making paper boats all summer and waiting eagerly for the rains, getting drenched and sneezing till I would finally haul them inside for a hot antiseptic bath. 

We weren't even supposed to have this new house in this community. But we couldn't say no once uncle shifted here and expressed his desire to spend his last days with Maa, his sister. Unfortunately, the family home was flooded that same year and was under renovation. So we moved, to this apartment, on the 50th floor, thankfully, so there would be no mosquitoes. 

Six cups of M1LK, lots of white sugar, and some more heat came next till they vanished into each other. Slowly the steam began to sweeten the air around me. For an hour, I kept stirring, and scraping the sides, till it thickened into bubbles of gooey goodness dancing on the surface. I cut the heat and scraped the sides with the ladle again with an air of completion, and as I was about to return to the simmering concoction, I had the urge to lick the ladle. I aggressively moved the ladle through the viscous concoction to release the heat. It took me a moment to notice a small, childlike figure gliding inside the house. She wore a green skirt with her hair braided into two ponytails and was wearing rollerblades. I hesitated because they were the kinds I bought in the eighth grade after saving up for a whole year. 

She glided towards me, falling into my arms. 

I was scared, she said and hugged me tightly. I thought I might not see you again. 

I hesitated, but the hug was unexpectedly warm. 

Awww. I am sorry, I said and hugged her back. I know it's hard, but I will always find a way to see you. Then, we kissed each other, and I asked her if she wanted to eat some Kheer.  

No!, she said, glided off dramatically. I want Phirni, she squealed and then jumped into the pot of Kheer cooling on the kitchen island. I smiled. 

Sure. Let's have Phirni. 

As I grew older, I realized there is so much that I didn't know. It's hard to find comfort these days, but today I figured all children must have a celebration. So I decided to make Phirni instead. It was only two steps more. I ground the cooled Kheer till it had a pudding-like consistency. Seasoned the recipe with 500 mg of anti-hallucinogenic and rose water to remove its smell. Poured it into a large heart-shaped earthen bowl, covered it tightly, and refrigerated it. The thing about Phirni is that it is always eaten cold so one has to wait to enjoy it, and I can already see the excitement on the children's faces; they have been trying to steal from it for 38 hours now. However, the gods must come first.

It's just that they have turned so morbid, the children, obsessed with death like it is a video game, always rattling on about the latest epidemic study. I get their need to fantasise, creating elaborate stories or scenarios to escape. They miss Jyoma a lot; she had been with them since they were babies. It is one thing to play make-believe, zombie apocalypse, nuclear fallout, scavenging for food, water, and medicine, but it is all so dramatic. Everything is larger than life with them, believing that school will be canceled soon and that war is coming. They have been stocking up water bottles and bean cans (though they don't tell me) for a bunker they are making in the building's fire escape. 

The first thing that I noticed in our new home was the pool. I had seen it and immediately thought the children would want to play in it. The community panel had mentioned that there was some regulation that it could be officially filled only once a month. But what was this madness about the rebels asking for pools to be banned? How could I tell the children that they couldn't swim? But some semblance of sanity must be maintained.

The worst was of course when Jyoma stumbled, fell into a pot-hole, and died during the monsoon floods. I had heard that her family had been fighting with the municipality over the accident. Some said she had been part of a crew, feeding rebels information about the amenities, the number of times the bathtubs were filled, cars washed, and gardens watered. But I don't know if it was true; she had been depressed since her daughter died two years back from the disease. However, I didn't like to think about all that, like there was some contagion. 

The news kept talking about yellow fever, covid, Zika, and hantavirus. But those areas had seen deaths for decades; maybe it was a tad more now, but not too much. Nothing so wrong that we shouldn't celebrate the holidays. It's festival time, and seems like the right thing to do. You know what I mean. We, after all, only live once. We might live a few months less, but at least our lives would have more meaning; that's what Papa would say. It's not possible to fire up the crackers outside anyway. 

It's time. I arrange the Phirni and six bowls on a table. Following the rituals, I cut a large portion into the puja thali adorned with flowers and vermillion. The children are dressed in bright new clothes, cheerful, and hand-joined in prayer. I ask for blessings from the goddess, nourishment, and protection from all sorrow. It is beautiful, almost transcendental, as we all finish the aarti together, the children run to the table and cut into the Firni. 

As I finish the aarti, I can see the excitement on the children's faces; they have been trying to steal from the kitchen all day, and I feel satisfied. I have little to offer them, but I can give them this. I serve the portion blessed by the gods to Maa. After all, she had carried the delicate recipe in her mind till the very end. She insists on eating by the window. And after taking the first spoonful, she asks me where it all had gone. The colors, the balloons, the flowers, the trees, the breeze, the birds? I say that I don't know. 

She asks if it is depressing to live without the sun, and I tell her that it is not that bad but that I did miss it. She says that she never expected to be alive for so long and that the not-remembering is bad, and I tell her that life is unexpected. She asks me if I am happy if the children are happy, and I say that happiness is abstract, a fleeting moment of peace in a sea of conundrums. She tells me she would die soon, but I tell her not to be afraid. That she is safe in her home with her family and that she has lived a long beautiful life. She asks if Papa is alive, and I tell her that he is but has gone out and will return in a few hours. She sighs and mentions that she doesn’t like him all that much. I tell her that I love her and that we are together, and that's all that matters. 

We all eat in silence, and as she finishes it, she takes the last spoonful of the milky dessert and offers it to me, bringing it closer to my lips. I eat it and then burp. She smiles and says that the Phirni tastes exactly like the one her mother used to make for her every Holi.  

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About the Author

Sonal Sher is a writer, and producer from Mumbai, who writes fiction about alternate realities and runs a podcast called 'Queerious Connections' that spotlights the intersectionality of gender, sexuality and safety. Her fiction and non-fiction have been published in Chicago Review, Scrivener Creative Review, The Conium Review, Quip Literary Review, Hash Journal, Pratham Books' StoryWeaver, The Hindu, and Emrys Journal. Her first Hindi film Chidiakhana is going to be released in May 2023.