It wasn’t the day Anamika was born, nor the next, but on the third night, as she slept, that her parents noticed the baby’s tongue flicking its ear. ‘The devil’s work!’ Ananda hissed at his wife, whose frail lips were already quivering, her eyes closed as she prayed, ‘Dear Brahma, have mercy… have mercy…’
Soon, with alarming rapidity, Anamika began exploring the rest of her body—her eyelids, those wisps of dark curls, between her toes—so that by her first birthday, she could lick herself clean (not unlike a cat) and no longer needed to bathe. Mercifully, this wasn’t as unsettling as they’d expected, and had things stopped there, Anamika’s mother, who by now secretly welcomed this modest hygienic independence, might even have perceived it as a blessing.
Yet within days, the precocious child had extended her curiosity outward, her tongue tracing her mother’s familiar japamala, her father’s sharp-smelling whiskey, lingering over the faded portraits of those solemn-faced ancestors on the wall, whether to study them deeply or to understand her own limitations—or perhaps something else entirely—one could not say.
‘What are we going to do?’ Anamika’s mother murmured into the darkness the first day their daughter was sent home from school—despite her parents’ warnings, the wilful girl had employed her tongue, curling it around the hapless crayons, lifting and drawing and dropping, frightening all the other children, whose incomprehensible shrieks had annoyed her, made it impossible for her to concentrate.
‘Don’t you like it, Ma?’ she asked on the way home, pointing excitedly at that peculiar rose-coloured river surging across the page, those exuberant stick figures thronging its shores. ‘They’re celebrating Holi!’ But Anamika’s mother remained silent. Confounded by that water’s unnatural pink, by the sun’s burning happiness, the giddy crescents on all those colourful faces, she felt only a shivering dread for her daughter.
Word swept the village, flowing from the tongues of trembling children to the anxious ears of their parents, who carried it in fraught whispers to neighbours, to friends, to far-flung acquaintances. By dawn, it had reached Swami Haridas, the village priest, who arrived at the girl’s residence to see for himself.
‘So it’s true,’ he whispered, noticing Anamika sleeping in the corner; from her mouth, a narrow pink object emerged like a serpent, drifting languidly across the mud floor. When he drew closer, he saw a long procession of ants marching over it like a bridge.
‘Swami, forgive us for not telling you sooner,’ Ananda murmured from behind, his eyes lowered. ‘We hoped the child might outgrow it.’
‘You fool!’ the priest cried, swinging around; but before he could proceed with his reproach, Anamika’s mother fell at the old man’s feet and pleaded, ‘Guruji, will you help her?’
Thus began Anamika’s year of penitence: what else, after all, could explain this grotesque anomaly—Swami Haridas decided—except some terrible sin committed by the child in an earlier life? And to undo this previous wrong, wasn’t she now, as decreed by the gods, compelled to devote an entire year to proving her contrition?
Anamika was sequestered in the servants’ quarters behind the temple: a sparse, dimly lit concrete chamber inhabited by hordes of starving rats, from which the only sounds she heard were the devotees’ muffled chanting, the ceaseless tolling of the temple bells.
At first, oblivious of the reason for her punishment, she didn’t think to restrain herself. But on the fifth day, after a novice priest delivered her afternoon meal—a bowl of watery rice—he stayed outside to watch through the narrow slit in the door; and upon noticing how she slurped the last grains, how they slowly snaked toward her mouth, the priest rushed in and slapped her so hard, with such a hateful scowl, that she understood and never ate that way again.
Time seemed to splinter, slowing to a trickle for Anamika, who spent her captivity in a sort of trance, living solely for the nights: when she would come alive, gliding her tongue impatiently over every surface—confident only the friendly eyes of rats were watching.
Meanwhile, outside, the girl’s aberration gradually faded from the villagers’ minds: by the fifth month, hardly anyone spoke of her, and when they did, it was always with a vague fondness they couldn’t quite explain; by the seventh month, hushed conspiracy theories began to emerge (a shaman was threatened by the girl’s beauty, her father crossed so-and-so); and toward the end, there was a growing suspicion that perhaps it had all been an unbearable dream.
Her homecoming was a day of grand celebration. Sarpanch Bhishma Singh declared a holiday; the entire village, donning its brightest fabrics and most jubilant smiles, crowded around the skeletal girl seated shyly in the courtyard outside the temple. They carried various offerings for the gods—sweets, fresh fruit, sandalwood paste, copies of sacred texts—and sprinkled vibrant marigolds on her, murmuring their gratitude for the healed child.
Why won’t they leave me alone? Longing to be home—to escape this hollow spectacle—Anamika summoned a stiff smile, her gaze rooted to the sweltering earth. Yet every few moments, her father, as though hungry to appease them, would urge her to stick her tongue out for the eager visitors.
‘A miracle’, the sarpanch whispered to his wife, who squeezed her daughter’s hand, silently thanking Lord Vishnu for sparing them from such hardship.
‘Her parents must be so relieved,’ the seamstress murmured, observing the delicate pink flesh—so harmless, so ordinary-looking.
‘No more trouble finding a husband!’ everyone agreed, congratulating the girl.
Only when the great unexpected winds began to blow from the East did Anamika finally dare to look up at those celebrating her. In the faces of these revellers—in their sweating grins, their shining dresses and heaped plates—she saw a duplicity she’d come to recognize so well. Aren’t they rejoicing not for me, but for themselves?
As though confirming her suspicion, the wind began to howl: screeching, ominous gusts that scattered the villagers, driving them to the temple for cover. Watching them flee, Anamika began to laugh; her tongue, small and hesitant at first, slid to the earth, then, gathering courage, made its way in wide, savouring loops through the dusty courtyard, past the endless statues of deities, up the temple’s marbled stairs. There, at the entrance, it stopped as if to catch its breath.
Huddled in terror, the villagers turned to Swami Haridas, who stood transfixed, his palms raised as if in reverence before the tongue.
‘The girl isn’t cured!’ someone finally cried.
‘It’s all a lie!’
‘What do we do now?’
‘What can we do?’
Suggestions flowed quickly: ‘Let’s bludgeon it like a cobra.’ ‘Or we could set the tip on fire and see how far it burns?’ ‘Chop it into pieces and feed it to the dogs!’ The more peaceful among them proposed myriad natural remedies: a potent concoction of garlic and snake venom; a cloudy broth made from the intestines of Himalayan lizards; a giant ball of turmeric rolled meticulously along the length of the tongue… Yet each recommendation, no matter how imaginative or well-considered, had its detractors. Then, just when it seemed they would reach no consensus, a trembling voice offered a solution they could all agree on: ‘Let’s marry her away,’ Anamika’s mother whispered.
A special committee was formed. Bhishma Singh, in consultation with Swami Haridas, declared the third Friday of the following month—the auspicious festival of Holi—as the wedding date.
The village, galvanized by its shared responsibility, threw itself into preparation: frantic requests for suitors were spread to all the surrounding areas; a customary silver plate—the weight of the girl—was commissioned from Jai Bhavani, the famous jeweller from Agra; the women descended in buzzing swarms, armed with baskets of fattening, home-cooked delicacies; and Didi Sonia, the local beautician, applied a lavish body mask on Anamika every evening—a fragrant serum of honey, gram flour, and gooseberries—to make her more appealing to the eyes of reluctant men. Children prayed in their classrooms before school. Priests delivered spirited sermons late into the night. Even the godless put aside their scepticism and rang the temple bells.
Their labour was not in vain: despite news of the girl’s deformity and the regrettable reality of her caste—her father, a Vaishya cattle-herder—dozens of enterprising men had shown interest, travelling from the remotest corners of the region. Assembled now in the cramped, ornamented marriage hall, dust-caked and bleary-eyed, these suitors craned their necks to catch a glimpse of the bride: still absent, the giant silver plate lying empty in the centre of the stage.
At last, a barrel-chested man in a starched white kurta strode to the podium. ‘Namaste, gentlemen. My name is Bhishma Singh, sarpanch of this humble village. Before we bring the girl out, I must warn you again about the unusual phenomenon of her tongue…’
Anamika emerged from behind the curtains, clutching her parents’ hands: barefoot in a floral lemon frock (a gift from the villagers); her soft, heavily powdered face adorned by her mother’s favourite bronze jhumkas; a strip of black tape covering her mouth. They dragged her to the waiting utensil, where she was made to sit down—quivering as she crossed her legs—and her mother gave her a quick kiss on the forehead before disappearing to the side; eclipsed by her father, she issued a stream of muffled pleas, silenced promptly by the fierce rise of his hand. ‘Enough! It’s for your own good, beta.’
As he stepped away to join his wife, murmurs erupted. The suitors’ eyes, which moments earlier had harboured only thoughts of competition, now stared at each other with disbelief. Could this beautiful child truly possess such a horrid affliction?
As if in response, Swami Haridas marched over to yank the tape from her mouth; he sprang back nervously. For several moments, nothing happened. Anamika stared into the faces of the gaping men; their eyes, glinting, devoid of mercy, awakened only memories of imprisonment: of suffering, of crushing loneliness. She knew, looking at them now, that she’d hated them before they’d arrived, the very idea of them: these strangers who would come from all over to marry her, for whom she’d had to force relentless food down her throat, had to bury herself in strange-smelling sludge—these ravenous old men who wanted to steal her away to their homes. Let them wait forever.
Then suddenly from the back: ‘There’s… nothing wrong with her.’ And as though jolted awake, the men were shouting over each other: ‘I will marry her!’ ‘Let the girl be mine!’ ‘I accept her as my bride!’ Anamika peered at them in astonishment. Those feverish expressions. All the frantic hands in the air. At last, she opened her mouth. In the anxious hush, her tongue flew out—like a vengeful bird released from its cage.
The hall emptied within moments.
The frivolous were the first to depart, followed swiftly by those with relatively minor handicaps—the penniless, the alcoholics, the maimed—so that by the end, the ones still remaining, watching peacefully as her tongue slithered along the ceiling, were the truly desperate, the unfortunates who believed, not unreasonably, that they would never obtain a wife on the outside: the affluent pensioner who, since childhood, had the terrible affliction of striking people in his sleep, whose eleven previous wives had all succumbed to these accidental beatings; a young pyromaniac, strikingly handsome, yet unable to resist setting fires to even the most insignificant objects (toothbrushes, pillows, chins etc.); and a clever, particularly hairy dwarf from Mount Abu, known for marrying average-sized women and later attempting to flatten them to his stature with a special machine he’d constructed (though he hadn’t succeeded yet).
Grateful that anyone—let alone three—had prevailed, they formed a hurried semicircle behind Anamika: Bhishma Singh in the middle, her parents to his left, the orange-robed Swami to his right. Over the next hour, each candidate was called upon to present his case.
‘I vote for the first man,’ Swami Haridas announced as soon as the men had left. ‘The girl will be his twelfth wife—a sacred number. It shall result in a propitious union.’
At this, Anamika’s mother gave a choked sob. ‘Swami, you are most enlightened,’ she whispered, ‘but perhaps the child would be better off with someone closer in age?’
‘Tch! You’d rather she live in perpetual fear of being set ablaze?’
‘Might we consider the… dwarf, then?’ Anamika’s father said. ‘A tragic specimen.’
In each man’s proposal, Anamika had pictured an abandoned girl—beaten, mangled, burned—someone far away, in a body that wasn’t hers. But when the elders began their deliberations and she overheard her parents’ wishes, she finally grasped the looming inevitability of her fate.
Slowly, she withdrew her tongue until it lay limp, coiled on the floor of her mouth. Biting it to stop from crying, she removed her mother’s earrings, kissing the first one softly before leaving it on the floor; the other she tucked carefully into her pocket. Before they looked up, she crept to the back door and, pushing it with her tongue, slipped out into the sunlit alley. Unusually still. Everyone was home, preparing last-minute sweets, gathering wood for the great bonfire; the village would soon emerge for the festival. But where to go? Where did she belong?
Anamika began to run. Past her home. Past her school playground. Past that forbidding temple. Ran. Ran with her head down. Ran with tears stinging her eyes, her tongue trailing faithfully behind. Tasting the land of its birth. Its quiet violence. Its betrayals.
Desperate search parties were mobilized; even the three finalists—quickly assured the first to find the girl could keep her—hurled themselves at the task. They looked everywhere: inside every house, every shop, every dumpster, in the tall paddy fields, above the water tank, behind every tree, beneath each jagged stone… Toward dusk, confident that they’d combed the entire village, a few began to whisper that the girl was no longer here—that she must have taken the only road out.
The village started to rejoice.
The men lit the giant bonfire—to the delight of the young pyromaniac who jumped in to help—the women brought out the sumptuous sweets, and everyone began to throw colourful powder into the skies; they danced all night, high on bhang, to lively folk music drifting through the air, their arms locked together in swelling, jubilant chains. Even Anamika’s parents, initially so troubled by her disappearance, felt their gloom evaporate amidst the glorious cheer, the grateful tolling of all those temple bells.
It was only at dawn, as the villagers gathered along the banks of the sacred river—scrubbing their skin, children splashing—that a few noticed how much colour they’d used that year. How the water had bled into a single, vivid pink.
A brittle wind.
One by one, their laughter broke, swallowed by the newborn light.