Aandal

You knew Aandal was in the vicinity when the atrocious stench of her chewing tobacco (called Panneer Pugailai in Tamil) assaulted your nose. It'd normally be early in the morning, around eight, when she would turn up to perform her duties as our maid. No one really knew how she ended up in the neighbourhood. When we moved to Chennai, mom was on the lookout for a maid and she hired the services of Aandal who was already working in our grand ma's. When I first saw Aandal I was petrified. She looked like the vampire version of Miss Grundy. A million wrinkles creased her face and that nose protruded at a right angle to her face. And, her teeth, whatever little that was left of them I mean, were a deep, dark brown. The most petrifying thing about though was not her looks. She served up whiplashes when she spoke.

Now, Suren, my younger bro and I had a tacit agreement right from when we were in prep school. It was more of a mission statement than an agreement really: we would bully the shit out of the maid. Any maid. No, no, it was not a result of some traumatic experience or something. We just love bullying people. The maid was the perfect target. They wouldn't dare retaliate and even if they did, it'd be at best a complaint to mom.

When Aandal came on the scene, Suren and I were suffering from withdrawal symptoms. There had a been a long hiatus, of almost ten years since we had bullied a maid. We were not kids any longer all right. I had started working as a salesman and Suren had started college at the New College in Chennai. We let Aandal be for a while. I mean she was as old as grand ma and we were not sure if we should really be bullying her. Our apprehensions were blasted to pieces one day. [To be contd...]

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