Fever Dreams: Living With My Uncle Perry

PERRY 

Even as a child of six, I knew there was something different about Perry 바카라� he heard voices that no one else did. 
바카라�Oi, Rangan is screeching in my ears again and blaming me for what happened,바카라� Perry would stand at the door to the kitchen and complain to Amma.  
Amma, in her characteristic gentle way, asked him what Rangan was shouting about. She always managed to convey by the tone of her voice that Rangan was unfair in accusing Perry and that what he said did not matter. I never found out who Rangan was or why he was blaming Perry.  Like all children I intuitively understood that the topic was taboo.  

Perryappa or Perry, as I affectionately called him, was my father바카라�s elder brother. He lived with us and was more of a father to my father because he had brought him up from a very young age. Grandfather had died when Appa was barely nine. Perry had then been in his early twenties and had taken up the responsibility of supporting a large family consisting of several siblings and his mother. They didn바카라�t starve, but they had none of the luxuries they were used to.  

A few years later tragedy struck in the form of schizophrenia. Grandmother often told me how Perry had gone to the office in the morning, a perfectly normal man and had been brought home violent and unmanageable. She always maintained that it was a jealous colleague who had put his brilliant competitor out of the way by resorting to black magic. She said he had cast an evil spell into an orange and left it on Perry바카라�s desk knowing Perry바카라�s fondness for the fruit. 

That was the beginning of a downward economic slide. The family suffered great privations. Relatives pitched in to help with work at his office and so Perry didn바카라�t lose his job. He was treated for his illness; 바카라�cured바카라� and resumed going to work, but all hopes of a brilliant career and marriage were dashed. Perry remained a bachelor, though he often claimed that several generously made, curly haired, Christian women, with smooth skin the colour of gingelly oil had approached him with offers of marriage. 

바카라�Maashae, you should read the doctor. I suggest you start with An Idealist View of Life. That바카라�s the simplest,바카라� Perry would say, cornering Maash and showing him the book but not giving him the precious possession. 

바카라�Maash바카라� who always looked like an advertisement for a detergent, clad in brilliant white mundu and matching brilliant white shirt, was the headmaster of a school and a frequent visitor to our little home. 바카라�The Doctor바카라� was Dr S. Radhakrishnan, India바카라�s philosopher president. Perry worshipped the man. Any conversation with Perry veered into a discussion about Dr S. Radhakrishnan, with Perry바카라�s favourite phrase 바카라�as the doctor says바카라�. Perry bought all of Dr S바카라�s books and read them cover to cover. No. That is an understatement. He studied them. Even now while dusting the books, I find small sheets of fragile, yellowing notepaper 바카라� that Perry 바카라�borrowed바카라� from my notebooks 바카라� with closely written jottings in his beautiful hand, neatly tucked into the pages. On the title page of every book Perry stuck a photograph of Dr S, clipped carefully from newspapers of the day. Most pages have underlined passages and the marginalia reveal his erudition and scholarly bent of mind.  

Another of Perry바카라�s great loves was Carnatic music. He could identify ragas easily. Many days in our small household ended with all of us gathered around the radio listening to late night Carnatic music concerts occasionally aired on All India Radio, with Perry humming along in his deep sonorous voice and waving his arms above his head in appreciation whenever the singer skilfully executed a difficult musical phrase.  

바카라�Arre! Pani dalo! Pani! Bucket lao!바카라� screeched our normally sweet, soft-spoken landlady as she rushed up the stairs followed by a gaggle of women hastily roused from their post lunch nap.

It was a lazy mid-afternoon on a Sunday. Appa was then posted in Jabalpur. In answer to our puzzled looks she gestured wildly towards the window and climbed on at a run. We could see tongues of fire leaping outside Perry바카라�s window! All of us ran upstairs to the terrace and poured buckets of water from the overhead tank. The fire died down but it could have easily spread as it was the peak of summer. Doubtless, Perry was the cause. He had casually thrown a lighted cigarette out the window after a few puffs, as he was prone to do and it had landed on an abandoned nest. All of us came down in a tumble, the adults ready to pounce on Perry. As we entered his room we found him seated on a straight backed chair by the window, a book in his right hand and a lighted cigarette in his left; the smoke curling peacefully upward. Appa바카라�s thunderous call only made Perry look up mildly from his book for a moment and enquire in a gentle way what the matter was. Then without waiting for an answer, he dismissed us with a nod and went back to reading. 

After this incident Amma persuaded Perry to give up smoking and take up chewing betel leaves instead. He had to have one vice, I suppose. Amma often persuaded him to give up one for the other after minor disasters. She had earlier persuaded him to give up paan when a jet of paan juice that Perry expertly spat out the window landed pat on a pedestrian바카라�s head!

Amma and Perry shared a bond. He never called her by her name always making do with 바카라�oi바카라�. 

바카라�I have a name you see,바카라� she often told him with mock sternness. 바카라�Why don바카라�t you call me by it? If you바카라�d married, you바카라�d have a daughter my age.바카라� Perry would smile in answer but stick to his 바카라�oi바카라�.  

In spite of his disease and his bouts of moody anger, Amma and Perry got along famously. She always served him food first. Whenever she made any delicacy Perry got to taste it before everyone. Even I, her only surviving child, came a poor second. Years later, as Perry lay unconscious on his deathbed, he would respond only to her voice, recognising perhaps subconsciously the voice that had been unfailingly kind to him. 

Perry insisted on running errands for Amma. He would buy her little things like a couple of matchboxes or a packet of tea leaves 바카라� things that she had forgotten during her monthly grocery shopping trips. He would refuse to put the money in his shirt pocket and would insist on holding it in his hand, clasped precariously between thumb and forefinger. Often the money would be snatched away on the way to the shop by rude boys who shouted 바카라�pagla, pagla바카라�.

Perry shooed them away energetically, abusing them in earthy Malayalam; which they thought was gibberish. When we came down south to Kerala, Perry spoke chaste Hindi to all the shopkeepers and would be delighted when some of them responded fluently in the language.  

바카라�Go buy yourself a packet of biscuits,바카라� Perry would say, coming up quietly behind me and tapping on my shoulder.

That was his standard remedy for my tears. Whenever I cried, (and I was a cry baby) he sent me on this little errand. He never once went out and bought the biscuits for me. As I left the house, eyes streaming and huge sobs wracking my body, (yes, I was, and proudly remain, a drama queen) I would hear him ask Amma the reason for the waterworks. By the time I got back with the biscuits I usually forgot what I had been miserable about. After his death, while sorting out his things, I found a few crisp two-rupee notes tucked away in his little leather purse. 

For some years Perry and I shared an L shaped room.  His bed was along the stem of the L and my bed and study table were tucked into the corner of the base. As I reached higher classes I used to put in a few hours of study at night and the light from my table lamp often woke him up.  

바카라�Who has switched on the lights?바카라� he would growl. 

바카라�It바카라�s me, Perry. I was going through what was taught today in school,바카라� I바카라�d reply.

바카라�Oh, carry on, carry on,바카라� he would say generously. 

This conversation was repeated a few times every night.

 Sometimes we shared a casket of kajal! As Perry grew older, he was troubled by cataract.  Appa바카라�s attempts to take him to a doctor were met with stubborn resistance. Perry was convinced that the doctor would 바카라�gouge my eyes out바카라�! He took to applying kajal to his eyes firmly believing that it would help 바카라�peel the cataract away바카라�. We often shared kajal from the same little box. 

Perry died of old age. What always amazed Appa was that Perry knew the end was near and calmly accepted it. While in hospital he often remarked that his was a decaying body and that it would soon be no more. When someone came to fetch me from school in the middle of my class ten exams, I knew Perry was gone.  

The dead are never really gone. They live on through and within us. I바카라�m not surprised when I find that I write my 바카라�d바카라�s and 바카라�r바카라�s the way Perry did and my handwriting increasingly resembles his. Over the years I바카라�ve read up on schizophrenia. May be it was stress that made Perry ill. The stress of knowing that many lives depended on him for their well-being. Often, I've listened to check if I can hear voices nobody else can. Mercifully, there has been a peaceful silence. 

(Veena Narayan is a Kerala-based author whose work has appeared in Scroll, Jaggery and Desi Books Review among others. She is currently working on her second novel while her first is with an agent. She lives in Kochi, Kerala.)