Portrait of Another Woman

Mrs. Khan wasn’t bothered by the subject of the painting so much as the drama that surrounded it. Her husband was not an extravagant man, but the day he brought the painting home, he was in a frenzy, knocking things over, first the vase, then the bowl of jasmines. He asked Mrs. Khan to clear the wall of framed photos, dusty relics from their past, their daughter’s birthday, lunch with parents, son’s graduation. She hurried to remove them for she feared he would throw them to the ground, he was so enthusiastic to clear the space. 

Then in came two burly workmen, carrying the framed monstrosity. They propped the life-size portrait against the wall. Mrs. Khan was amused by the child-like excitement in her husband’s eyes. He was so mesmerised by the painting, he forgot about the workmen, and it was she who finally paid them and saw them to the door. She then turned on the fan to make the room comfortable for her husband and pulled up a seat next to him to admire the art. 

It was the portrait of a woman in a forest, looking over her shoulders, contempt in her hazel eyes. The forest didn’t look tropical; the leaves ablaze with Western autumn. The woman, too, was not quite Bangladeshi. Despite her sari, she looked more like a Mem Sahib.

 “I like the colours,” said Mrs. Khan. Mr. Khan grunted, eyes glued to the canvas. “Though it’s a bit bright,” Mrs. Khan continued. He grunted again, a hint of irritation. 

Mrs. Khan was not an intrusive person, so she left Mr. Khan to his gazing. She had purchased a ten pound rui from the fish monger to prepare her husband’s favorite dish. She didn’t make it often. With all the bones to clean, it was a true labour of love, but, when she made it, he showered her with compliments. 

As she lined the garlic up for her knife, the light above flickered and then blacked out entirely. She couldn’t reach the bulb and Mr. Khan, who was a foot taller than her, was probably in no mood to help her, engaged as he was with his new acquisition. 

Mrs. Khan rummaged through the kitchen drawers till she found two sufficiently long candles so she could continue her culinary acrobatics by candlelight. She chopped, diced, sautéed, spiced, and finally, when she was satisfied, she called her maid to clean the mess. 

The maid scratched her head lazily and asked if she should prepare rice. 

“Yes, yes, of course,” said Mrs. Khan. “And stop scratching your head! Have you got lice?” 

The maid nodded with a petulant smile. 

“What? Why didn’t you tell me before?” Mrs. Khan rushed out of the kitchen for a quick bath before dinner. 

Mr. Khan was usually hungry by nine, but when the clock struck ten and he still hadn’t emerged from the living room, Mrs. Khan had had enough. She barged into the room to find him dusting the painting, a silly grin on his face. At first she didn’t say anything, just stood next to him. Then she cleared her throat, but he still did not look up. Finally she announced, “Dinner!”

Mr. Khan reluctantly followed her to the dining room. Hastily he ladled fish and rice onto his plate and returned to the living room, without so much as washing his hands. In forty years of marriage, they had never eaten in the living room, but Mrs. Khan allowed him his eccentricity and joined him there, with her plate. 

“Who’s the artist?” she asked, trying to make conversation.  

“Nasreen.” 

“Never heard of her.”

“How many artists do you know? She’s fresh out of art college.”

“How much did it cost?” Mrs. Khan asked, curious to know what a new artist could charge.

“Two lakhs,” Mr. Khan replied. 

Mrs. Khan nearly choked on her fish. “What?” she exclaimed.  Had she heard him wrong?

“Two lakhs,” he repeated, as if it were loose change. “It’s worth three times more,” he muttered blissfully. “Just look!” 

Mrs. Khan was looking and she didn’t see how a painting by an unknown artist could cost that much, or, more importantly, how Mr. Khan had felt it appropriate to spend such a sum on a whim without even consulting her. They weren’t poor, but, with him now retired, they had little to live off, and a painting that costly meant dipping into their savings. 

“The colour of the leaves,” said Mr. Khan. “They match the sparkle in her eye. Her expression, can you see, it’s an enigma. Isn’t it sublime? When I look at it, my soul lifts up from monotony to a place of divinity. A thing of beauty, a joy forever… One day we shall be dead, but she is eternal.” 

Mrs. Khan unintentionally snorted at her husband’s eloquent little speech. 

“You wouldn’t understand,” he retorted. “You don’t understand art.”

He spit his words out without looking at her, but they hit her like a slap across the cheek. Did he find her uncultured? An unsuitable companion to share in his passion? She loved art, how dare he say she didn’t! As a child, she used to paint. In another lifetime she might have been an artist, like Nasreen, dancing with the brush on canvas, spraying colours into eternity. But she had to work to support their family. Rent, college, hospital bills. Then there were the endless household drudgeries. But for those, she might have been a Picasso or Monet. Tears sprang to her eyes and she ran to her bedroom. 

She must have fallen asleep because, the next thing she knew, the morning prayers were drifting in through the window. The space next to her was empty. Mr. Khan had not come to bed.  She tiptoed to the living room, afraid of what she might find. Sure enough, there he was, in his armchair, snoring, his plate on the coffee table, the fish uneaten.

With the curtains still open from the day before, the faint rays of dawn peeped in. Mrs. Khan stared at the portrait. The woman was flawless. No wrinkles from nights spent worrying, no c-section scars that gave way to laughing children, no sagging breasts that were once milk rich, no circles under her hazel eyes. 

Mrs. Khan remembered the first time she met Mr. Khan. Her parents believed an unmarried woman could not be seen outside purdah, but they allowed Mr. Khan to meet her, just once, with her eyes naked, everything else veiled in black silk, even her forehead and lips. She outlined her eyes with kajal for the occasion and sat in her parents’ room, blushing and unsure, a fawn meeting a stag. He too was a trifle shy, not far into his twenties. Later he said it was the mystery of her dreamy dark eyes that drew him in. Now did he find those eyes tired? 

The painting was someone’s imagination of perfection frozen forever. Mr. Khan saw in it perhaps an excellence he longed for but had never found. Something beyond reach that must always remain so. To Mrs. Khan, the woman in the painting was bland. She had not experienced the suffering or fears of someone who had lived, loved and lost. She had no hopes or dreams. No grand disappointments, no unrecoverable mistakes. She had not tasted the wondrous turbulence of life, with its uncertainties and its predicaments, sometimes so bitter and yet, softly yielding better times ahead.  From our lowest moments we learn to appreciate the sweetness of life, the wonder of God, the importance of love, thought Mrs. Khan. The portrait’s impish grin was that of a girl, pampered and protected. Unsullied, a virgin with no past. This perfection would never sweat nor bleed nor ache, but its failure was that it could not respond. Life could never be that. It responds and acts spontaneously. It loves, it falters.

Mrs. Khan returned to her bedroom, wondering what Nasreen was like. Was this a self-portrait? Had Mr. Khan met her? She was youth and freedom. Agonizing jealousy gripped Mrs. Khan. She paced the bedroom till morning settled in, then took a rickshaw to the supermarket. 

In the same aisle as the English Lice Soap that she bought for her maid, she noticed a row of beauty products. She fondled an anti-ageing cream, silver promises of youth. The price made her bite her tongue. So much for a simple cream? Then again, if Mr. Khan could throw down two lakhs for a painting, why couldn’t she splurge a bit for her skin? With that resolution, she placed two creams in her basket, along with a kajal and a lipstick. By the time she reached the checkout counter, her resolve had weakened. She returned one of the creams and the lipstick.