Midnights Children

when it comes, sounds high-pitched, as though somebody had speeded it up: “Amma-Abba?” he asks. “The Monkey?” And Hanif booms, “Yes, tickety-boo! The boy is really ship-shape! Come on phaelwan: a ride in my Packard, okay?” And talking at the same time is Mary Pereira, “Chocolate cake,” she is promising, “laddoos, pista-ki-lauz, meat samosas, kulfi. So thin you got, baba, the wind will blow you away.” The Packard is driving away; it is failing to turn off Warden Road, up the two-storey hillock; and Saleem, “Hanif mamu, where are we …” No time to get it out; Hanif roars, “Your Pia aunty is waiting! My God, you see if we don’t have a number one good time!” His voice drops conspiratorially: “Lots,” he says darkly, “of
fun
.” And Mary: “Arré baba yes! Such steak! And green chutney!” …
    “Not the dark one,” I say, captured at last; relief appears on the cheeks of my captors. “No no no,” Mary babbles, “light green, baba. Just like you like.” And, “
Pale
green!” Hanif is bellowing, “My God, green like grasshoppers!”
    All too fast … we are at Kemp’s Corner now, cars rushing around like bullets … but one thing is unchanged. On his billboard, the Kolynos Kid is grinning, the eternal pixie grin of the boy in the green chlorophyll cap, the lunatic grin of the timeless Kid, who endlessly squeezes an inexhaustible tube of toothpaste on to a bright green brush:
Keep Teeth Kleen And Keep Teeth Brite, Keep Teeth Kolynos Super White!
… and you may wish to think of me, too, as an involuntary Kolynos Kid, squeezing crises and transformations out of a bottomless tube, extruding time on to my metaphorical toothbrush; clean, white time with green chlorophyll in the stripes.
    This, then, was the beginning of my first exile. (There will be a second, and a third.) I bore it uncomplainingly. I had guessed, of course, that there was one question I must never ask; that I had been loaned out, like a comic-book from the Scandal Point Second Hand Library, for some indefinite period; and that when my parents wanted me back, they would send for me. When, or even if: because I blamed myself not a little for my banishment. Had I not inflicted upon myself one more deformity to add to bandylegs cucumbernose horn-temples staincheeks? Was it not possible that my mutilated finger had been (as my announcement of my voices had nearly been), for my long-suffering parents, the last straw? That I was no longer a good business risk, no longer worth the investment of their love and protection? … I decided to reward my uncle and aunt for their kindness in taking in so wretched a creature as myself, to play the model nephew and await events. There were times when I wished that the Monkey would come and see me, or even call me on the phone; but dwelling on such matters only punctured the balloon of my equanimity, so I did my best to put them out of my mind. Besides, living with Hanif and Pia Aziz turned out to be exactly what my uncle had promised: lots of fun.
    They made all the fuss of me that children expect, and accept graciously, from childless adults. Their flat overlooking Marine Drive wasn’t large, but there was a balcony from which I could drop monkey-nut shells on to the heads of passing pedestrians; there was no spare bedroom, but I was offered a deliciously soft white sofa with green stripes (an early proof of my transformation into the Kolynos Kid); ayah Mary, who had apparently followed me into exile, slept on the floor by my side. By day, she filled my stomach with the promised cakes and sweetmeats (paid for, I now believe, by my mother); I should have grown immensely fat, except that I had begun once again to grow in other directions, and at the end of the year of accelerated history (when I was only eleven and a half) I had actually attained my full adult height, as if someone had grasped me by the folds of my puppy-fat and squeezed them harder than any toothpaste-tube, so that inches shot out of me under the pressure. Saved from obesity by the Kolynos effect, I basked in my uncle and aunt’s delight at having a child around the house. When I spilt 7-Up on the carpet or sneezed into my dinner, the worst my uncle would say was “Hai-yo! Black man!” in his booming steamship’s voice, spoiling the effect by grinning hugely. Meanwhile, my aunty Pia was becoming the next in the long series of women who have bewitched and finally undone me good and proper.
    (I should mention