There was a little restaurant a few miles away in Paonta Sahib. It was the only place my father would take us to when we decided to eat out. A metallic exterior with glass doors, the smell of butter chicken inside sitting thick in the air because of the air conditioner, and in large red letters, the sign outside the door spelled the name, ‘Mezbaan.’ Mezbaan had grey sandstone textured dinner plates, probably ceramic, and gleaming glasses always already filled with water, to which my father would add ground black pepper and salt from the shakers and drink it. They took a lot of time to bring the order, and he used to fill up that time with this drink. My sister and I laughed so much every time he did it. But my mother could not stand it. She thought it was a call for attention, nudging them with each sprinkle of salt and pepper to look at his need to be served as soon as he wanted to.
There was another day -like many other days- when my father did not get what he wanted when he wanted. Mukherjee uncle had come for a visit on a rainy evening with his wife. He had been my father’s oldest colleague and a senior in the office as well. Food was ordered from Mezbaan because my mother had to go somewhere in the afternoon. The delivery boy arrived right before the Mukherjees with piping hot garlic naan, butter chicken, and chocolate ice cream. For an extra 50 rupees, he agreed to run to the nearby paan-biri stall to get a large 500 ml bottle of Pepsi and a packet of cigarettes for the men. The rain was pelting down harder and harder as the evening advanced. Mukherjee uncle and his wife came earlier than expected, and my mother had still not returned. So, my father asked us to be the host. “Some woman has to do this. Aren’t you two my sweet little women?” We went to the kitchen and started to pour the Pepsi into glasses. We had no idea what utensils to use to serve the food, so my father decided to wait until Mom arrived. We secretly drank a few sips of the sugary fizzy drink as soon as my father went into the living room to smoke with Mukherjee uncle.
It was really late in the night, almost 10:00 PM when my mother came. She was soaking wet and had a cut on her cheek. She was also limping a little, the part of her sky blue sari covering her knee soiled and torn. My six-year-old sister ran to her, crying:
“Mummy, what happened? Did you get into a fight?”
My mother laughed, wincing a little: “I was waiting for a long time for a bus because I had no money for a cab. I could not call your father because there were no payphones nearby. Finally, I spotted the bus speeding past me and stopping at a stop further down the road. I ran to catch it and slipped on the mud. People around helped me get first aid, and finally, a kind man dropped me home in his car. We should get one of those wireless phones that have come out. What are they called now?”
“Mobile phones,” my sister said.
My father was in the bathroom all this while. And as soon as he entered the room, Mom stopped smiling. She was about to apologize for being late, but my father was quicker with a loud slap on her face. It sent her hurtling towards the sofa near her.
“Tell those stories to them, not me. I am not a kid. I know what the woman in the house is really doing if she is out this late, you lying whore! Just think what the Mukherjees thought when there was nobody to host them here,” my father spat at my mother and left the room to go to bed.
At 2:00 AM in the night, when I woke up to get myself some water to drink, I saw my mother sipping on a cup of tea and sobbing into the darkness of the kitchen. When she saw me stepping in, she planted a kiss on my forehead and poured a glass of water for me.
“Did you have dinner, Mummy? Did you eat the naan and the chicken from Mezbaan? It was delicious!” I asked her, holding my glass of water in my hand but too sad to drink.
“Yes, I did. Will you say ‘sorry’ to your father tomorrow for me?”
“Why? You did not do anything wrong. You slipped and fell, and you were not getting a bus. That is just bad luck,” I told her innocently.
“I was not a good host.”
Last week, close to sixteen years after that night, while reading a book about South Asian cuisine, I discovered ‘Mezbaan’ is Persian for ‘host’.