Story: Aniruddha Sen

The Portrait
After so many years, Mithun may not feel embarrassed now to admit that in adolescence
he had a crush on his auntie Smita. As he is presently at a matured thirty-five and she
would have been in the graying fifties, the relationship could have been reminisced with
guarded amusement.
As it is, her memory evokes mixed emotions, as she passed away eighteen years ago.
A traditional Indian family, they lived together in their ancestral house in a Kolkata suburb.
His uncle married Smita when he was in mid thirties and she was thirty minus. A petty
office staff, he adored his wife who was not exactly exquisite, but smart and ‘mod’ in the-
then standard. Mithun, however, wondered if uncle could ever fathom her.
She was a novel buff, and like most Bengali boys Mithun was an aspiring writer. Literature
was a conduit for their interactions. They animatedly discussed a range of novels, short
stories and poems. He noticed that she carefully avoided issues that touched upon extra-
marital love and relationships. He considered it just womanly bashfulness. But now that
he reminisces, he realizes there could be more to it. Possibly she was uncomfortable to
bare what all she had read in the eyes of her teenaged admirer.
But all those were mind games. Going physical even to the extent of holding her hand
was out of bound. He was brought up with the traditional values that elders are to be
venerated and even to think amorously of them is sacrilege. He, therefore, lived
perennially with a kind of guilty conscience.
Subsequently he realized that he lived in a restricted society with limited scopes for boys
and girls to interact. The females they knew were mostly the family members. Under
such circumstances it was but natural that complicated feelings would develop, and he
was sure that his was not an isolated case. As he grew up and went places, he met girls
and ultimately his sweet wife Roopa. Life now gave him the maturity to view the whole
affair in an objective and impassionate manner.
Thank God, things are different now. Unlike him, his son now has co-ed schooling. Lucky
chap! Or is he? In the overdrive for nuclear families, uncles and aunties or even brothers
and sisters are now rare species. What society giveth with one hand, it taketh back with
another.
All these thoughts were triggered off by his visit to their ancestral house, after a decade.
Uninhabited, it’s now gathering dust. There’s a plan to sell it off. At his father’s behest

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he’s now going there to take stock of the furniture and goods that still remained usable –
with the fond hope of salvaging some with material or sentimental value.
His grandparents have long expired and parents have moved nearer downtown. His
auntie had died of a mysterious fever that was never properly diagnosed. Mithun was
then away in a hostel and couldn’t see her one last time. Uncle, intellectually her inferior,
was very much dependent on her. Shattered by the unexpected tragedy, he lost bearings.
Having no issues, he desperately tried to hold on to any straw for some time. He tried
séance, grew a beard and then tried to remarry – all in vain. Ultimately he focused back
on his job and moved to an apartment nearer his workplace for easy commuting.
Mithun stepped into the house. There was that small playground which he used to find
very big when he was a kid. There stood that bushy tree, his bosom friend in whom he
would confide all his secrets – now the smarty couldn’t even recognize him. Bypassing
them he approached the main door and turned the key.
It took him hours to scour through the rooms and still a lot remained to be done. He
scanned through his grandparents’ and parents’ blocks. Ultimately he opened his uncle’s
room. As he switched on the lights, memories flooded into his mind.
Across that table that’s now gathering dust he would often sit for discussions with auntie.
She used to maintain it spotlessly clean. Once he had inadvertently left his poetry
notebook there. When he went back to collect it, the room was dark and the door slightly
ajar. Unsuspectingly he entered and turned the light on. As he recalls what happened
next, it still accelerates his heartbeats. There was a muffled scream, an unexpected sight
and immediately he switched the light off and bolted out – she was changing inside!
The room was strewn with her memory. His uncle had taken only a few items of her use,
leaving the rest behind. On that small side table lying upside down now, he tasted the
mystery brew called tea for the first time. And there lies one of her empty perfume
bottles. Dated as it may be today, he can still sense the eerie atmosphere and strange
excitements associated with its strong odor.
He was separating the few items he intended to hand over to his parents. Then he found
the portrait.
It was hanging on the wall, with layers of dust on it. Mithun carefully wiped it clean and
there she appeared, in shining glory. The photograph was shot just months before she
had expired.
Mithun couldn’t turn his eyes away from the portrait. As he intently looked at it, he saw
the smiling face of a woman known, and yet unknown. He thought and thought and
ultimately figured it out – Auntie Smita was eighteen years his elder. But the portrait
woman is of his age! For the last eighteen years while he grew and matured, she stood in

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time frozen by death in this portrait, and after nearly two decades of wait, has ultimately
caught up with him!
She is no more an elder! As Mithun realized this and gazed at the portrait, he strongly felt
she was calling him with a lusty, inviting smile. He was transfixed and could move neither
his eyes nor feet. As time passed, the attraction became more and more irresistible.
Ultimately he gave in and entered the portrait.

Author Introduction:
Born in 1949 and an Electrical Engineer from Jadavpur University,
Aniruddha Sen is a Senior Scientific Officer at Tata Institute of
Fundamental Research in Mumbai, India. He is the author of several
international papers in speech science. Writing in Bengali and English
is his serious hobby. His story “A Win-win Game” was highly
commended in Commonwealth Broadcasting Association (CBA) Short
Story Competition, 2007.
Contact: asen@tifr.res.in

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