Ah, I drank. Insatiably I drank.But I was filled up also, with too much world, and, drinking, I myself ran over. – Rainer Maria Rilke’s “World was in the face of the beloved.”
1
Richard was not the jealous type. Jealousy, he believed, was best left to those still struggling to come of age. At thirty-three, he liked to think of himself as evolved, his concerns lying with the effortless comfort that came with a long-term relationship. Yet one dreary afternoon in February, not long after Naveen had returned from Dubai, Richard couldn’t shake off the feeling that something had changed.
What was it, he wondered, as he rifled through every single moment in slow motion in his head, searching for evidence of this change. Naveen, he recalled, had arrived early that morning, kissed Richard quickly on the lips, as he was wont to do after a long transatlantic flight, and headed straight for bed. “I will be up in time for dinner,” Naveen said, leaving his travel bags scattered next to the kitchen. Richard had carefully put them away while Naveen fell into their shared queen, still in his stale clothes.
Now in these moments of solitude, Richard couldn’t pinpoint any one instance. Yet, the feeling sat like an uninvited guest in his stomach, a weight whose presence hung around like a relative he barely remembered but had to put up with despite his rising irritation.
2
Rumour had it that it was none other than the supreme lord Vishnu who had saved the day, and in the process, humanity and godhood. As the story went, the gods and the demons had collaborated on a mission together: the project of churning immortal nectar from the earth’s core.
The gods, scheming as they were, needed the help of the demons in this grand task. And demons, trusting as they were, believed that their luck would change once they got their hands on their rightful share of the nectar. For, like gods, even demons wanted to live for ever.
At the completion of this magnificent partnership between heaven and hell, the gods became frightened at the possibility of demons reigning eternally. How could gods maintain their godhood if demons acquired similar privileges as the gods? No, something had to be done, and only the cunning Vishnu, the preserver of the universe, could come up with a solution. And this was how Mohini was born.
Mohini, who was none other than Vishnu himself, was the epitome of beauty and youthfulness, her image impossible to replicate in the three worlds. She was an illusion, one of Vishnu’s tricks to distract the demons from the nectar.
Vishnu as Mohini was unstoppable.
Not only was she successful in making the demons surrender the jar of nectar (they were gullible, that lot), her exploits even made their way to the ears of Shiva.
Shiva, curious to see this unusual form of Vishnu, decided to pay him a visit. Along with his wife, Parvati, he arrived at Vishnu’s abode.
Shiva said, “I have seen the incarnations you assumed while playing with the three energies of which the universe is composed. However, what is this I hear of this divine femaleness that no one can resist?”
Vishnu laughed, “My old friend, I would gladly show her to you, but what will Parvati say?”
“You forget, o Vishnu, that it is the symbol of my virility that humans worship on earth. And what is more, no entity in this universe can arouse my desire without my consent.”
“As you wish,” Vishnu smiled and disappeared.
3
To put his hypothesis to test, Richard decided to approach the dilemma at hand through what he believed to be the best solution to any problem: food. That night, he prepared Naveen’s favourite, a spicy meat jambalaya, tossing all of his distress into a single preparation. To balance the piquancy of the dish, he picked out a light chardonnay on the sweeter side, a summer wine from a trip they had taken together.
“Bet you missed this,” Richard said.
“Can’t say I didn’t,” Naveen poured himself a drink.
“How was the trip home?”
“Same old.”
“Did they pressure you again?”
“You know how it is.”
“Did you try… to tell them?”
“It wasn’t the right time.”
“Is it ever?”
As they fell into silence, Richard’s eyes kept straying to Naveen’s hands. Even in the way Naveen tackled his food—picking at the bits of carrots and snow peas, separating the chorizo from the pieces of chicken—there was mindfulness in his manoeuvring. As if their hyper-awareness lay in the way they conducted themselves around Richard; a kind of stubborn skittishness walking on eggshells.
Richard sipped his wine, swirling its sweetness in his mouth, letting it drown whatever bitterness threatened to rise in him.
4
While Shiva was a patient god, he could be short tempered at a moment’s notice. Parvati was not immune to these coexisting paradoxes within her partner. Her resignation came with her acceptance of Shiva’s many idiosyncrasies. She dismissed his desire to glimpse Mohini firsthand as one such eccentricity. And even though she was slightly aggravated that Vishnu had not addressed her directly in his exchange with Shiva, she withheld her tongue in favour of witnessing this phenomenon herself.
5
Richard met Naveen at Woody’s during Pride a little over three years ago. Eyeing Naveen at the bar, he surmised that he was of South Indian descent, his litheness similar to a Tamil boy he had an encounter with on a graduation trip. He wanted to know for sure, yet being aware of how rude ‘where are you from?’ sounded, he said, “Welcome to the neighbourhood.”
“How can you tell?”
“It’s a small community here.”
Naveen grinned, his teeth worthy of toothpaste ads, “Do you frequent a lot?”
“Enough to know a new face.”
“I am Naveen,” he offered his hand, “my company just transferred me from Vancouver.”
“Richard,” Richard said, reaching forward to grasp the extended hand, “I am finishing up my dissertation at U of T.”
“What’s your research on?”
“Queer representations in Hindu mythology.”
“Anything I might be familiar with?”
“Do you know the one where Vishnu turned into Mohini, and teased Shiva into submission?”
“I don’t believe so …”
“Then let me tell you a story.”
6
In the distance, couched among bushes blossoming with hibiscus, jasmine and tuberose, Shiva spied a figure of a woman.
The woman’s features were the personification of symmetry. Her shapely arms ensconcing the length of her body; her eyes, the outline of blooming lotus petals; her lips, the colour of the blush on a winter evening sky; and the heaviness of her breasts were matched by the weight of her hips, as if one balanced the other on either side of her slender waist.
Mohini turned and winked at Shiva, challenging him to follow her.
Parvati smirked at the juvenility of this display. Mohini was nothing but a caricature of human male desire, with her fluttering lashes, her swaying hips, and her heaving chest. How trite. And yet, here was Shiva, as if pulled by a force beyond his control, lessening the distance between him and the figure.
In her ensuing embarrassment, Parvati looked away.
7
Richard wondered not for the first time why was it that he chose to narrate this particular tale to Naveen that night. There was nothing romantic, or even poignant, about Shiva’s defencelessness in the face of Mohini’s charms. Yet, he always reasoned that even though the narrative was a pedestrian portrait of heterosexual attraction, Shiva’s knowledge of Vishnu as Mohini hinted at an already existing homosexual desire.
Shiva’s lust for Mohini was heightened by this very awareness.
Later, when Richard kissed Naveen in an alley not far from Woody’s, he wondered, who embodied Shiva and who Vishnu, in that moment.
8
Shiva chased Mohini over valleys and mountains, and large expanses of both barren and lush land. He tracked her through forests and deserts and waded through oceans and rivers. At every turn, as his desire peaked, he felt he almost had her within his reach, his fingers just about to graze her bare back. And then, she was further away, again, as he stopped to gather his energy to continue the pursuit.
“Stop, o lovely one!” he said after the disappearing figure, his feet carried by the desire raging in his loins, Mohini’s teasing laughter fuelling him on.
9
Richard stared at the photos on the most recent email in Naveen’s inbox, photos of him and an unfamiliar woman surrounded by friends and family, as Naveen placed a ring onto the woman’s outstretched finger.
He fixated on Naveen’s smile, a pouty side crinkle of his lips, a smile Naveen reserved for when he was at his happiest, while also reluctant to reveal this intimate aspect of himself.
A smile Richard first glimpsed when he asked Naveen to move in with him.
Richard guessed the woman was Meera from the sender’s name, her hand on Naveen’s thigh indicating familiarity. Her hair was coiffed in the style of seventies Bollywood heroines, while the salmon of her salwar kameez matched the pocket square in front of Naveen’s charcoal Nehru jacket. She was someone Richard would probably never meet but instantly despised.
He glanced at the alarm clock which read 5:48 AM, almost time for Naveen to wake up. He gingerly replaced Naveen’s phone at its usual place, in-between their pillows, like a newborn they would never have.
10
It was only when Shiva was completely spent, when every ounce of desire had left his body, when his feet could carry him no longer, that he found himself falling to his knees, not far from where he began his quest.
As a young girl, Parvati heard the story of a man so consumed with love for a woman that he drank the poison of the bitter trumpet-shaped datura to cure his desire for her. While the flower did nothing to wane his yearning, it ended up taking his life.