I am to be a mother this weekend. The assignment came through when I was dusting the house earlier. It’s a half a day’s work, from noon till sundown. The assignment, not the dusting. I never take that long with the dusting. The trick, I’ve learnt, is to do a little of it every day. Use a wax-tipped brush on the mantelpiece one day; run a thin cloth between the wooden slats of the bed the next, and so on. You do a little of it every day, and before you know it, your whole weekend will unfold before you, to do with as you please. 

This weekend, I am to be a mother. 

* 

It’s mostly women who do this. There are no definitive numbers because the company doesn’t release any, but a few third-party surveys have claimed that women outnumber men two-to-one. Nobody knows why. Some say women are better actors than men, others that they are more empathetic. I believe both these reasons. I like to believe anything that makes me feel good about myself. 

* 

On Sunday, I wear a black turtleneck sweater, a black skirt that reaches down to my ankles and black Converse sneakers—with black laces, not white. This is how I dress for all my assignments. I don’t know if the mother of the person I’m going to meet used to dress like this. The company doesn’t give us that kind of information. In fact, it gives us very little to go on. We get the name of the client and the address where we are to meet them, and that’s it. The clients aren’t allowed to make any requests or demands either. Perhaps the company believes that too many instructions will stifle the work. Or perhaps it thinks that they may have the inadvertent effect of adding an erotic or queasy charge to the interactions. Either way, I like this aspect of the service. I like being a blank slate. 

It’s a hot day outside, and the subway is a long walk from my home, so I carry an umbrella with me. The umbrella is also black. 

* 

Sometimes I think of my work as improv but then immediately feel bad about the thought. It doesn’t belittle what I do, not really, but it suggests a sense of flippancy that doesn’t sit well with my conscience. 

* 

I fall asleep on the subway. When I jerk awake, I’m still four stops away from my destination. There’s a young man on the seat opposite me who wasn’t there earlier. He has a piercing at the edge of one of his thin eyebrows, and he’s wearing a bright yellow t-shirt that would put a reflective jacket to shame. He’s also wearing a baseball cap, the brim turned backward. It’s a silly affectation at the best of times, but here, in the narrow tube of the subway, it also looks uncomfortable. Every time the man pulls his head back, the brim knocks against the curved wall of the carriage. 

After three knocks, I almost get a headache. 

The man catches me looking at him. He smiles. Crinkles form around his eyes,  and the piercing dips low enough to meet the top of his cheekbone. I imagine sliding the tip of my umbrella into the circlet of the piercing and wrenching it away. I imagine  torn skin and blood spurting onto the mottled flooring of the carriage. I imagine asking him, as he howls in pain, what his mother would say if she saw him dressed like this. 

* 

The other day I was at a restaurant, having a meal by myself. A young couple sat at the table next to mine. They were both good-looking, and they were both lousy at conducting a conversation. The man slouched over the tabletop and talked in a frenzied, unmodulated voice about subjects as disparate as the process for making mozzarella, the various benefits that his credit card afforded him and the tattoo of a rhinoceros that one of his friends had got in college. He paused every now and then to take a sip of his drink (a bright blue monstrosity that had me calling for the menu to find out what it was—it turned out to be lemonade flavoured with blue curaçao), but instead of straightening up to do so, he tilted his glass at a dangerous angle until the straw reached his lips. The woman, on the other hand, didn’t utter more than a dozen words over the course of their meal. She sat with the whole length of her spine touching the backrest of the chair as if someone had tied her to it with a piece of invisible rope. She drank three gimlets one after another and picked at her pasta, leaving most of it unfinished. 

By the time I ordered a slice of chocolate cake for my dessert, I was wondering if the two of them were on a poor date, or if they were in an interaction. And if this was an interaction, who was the client, and who was the actor? Had the man hired the woman so that his ego could be massaged by the sight of a beautiful woman listening to him prattle on about cheese? Or had the woman hired the man because she was too self-conscious to eat a meal alone and invited the distraction caused by an overly talkative companion? 

They left before I did, splitting the bill equally between them. When my waiter, who had also served their table, came by to ask me if I needed anything else, he had a smirk on his face. 

Was that excruciating or what, he said. 

I thought this extremely rude of him. I didn’t say so to his face, but when the  time came for me to leave, I left him the smallest possible tip. 

* 

Most interactions take place in public. At the food court in a mall or at a Starbucks next to a busy thoroughfare. On a bench in the middle of a park or at an outlet of H&M or Zara. Most actors, when they sign up, even stipulate that they won’t do private interactions. Me, I don’t mind them. 

Like today, for instance. I’m meeting the client at his home, which happens to be in one of the nicest parts of the city. He lives in a gated community with a dozen residential towers, round-the-clock security, manicured hedges that separate a dedicated pedestrian zone from the driveway, a heated swimming pool, its own grocery store and pharmacy and an artificial lake that houses a family of ducks. The guard at the entrance gives me detailed instructions on how to get to the right building, but I get lost anyway. I roam around for fifteen minutes before finally mustering the courage to ask for help from a child who is zooming by on a hoverboard. She stops, looks me up and down and then points me in the right direction. 

* 

The service is expensive, and the company doesn’t do refunds, so it’s rare for people to back out of an interaction they have already booked. Even so, it’s happened to me on a few occasions in the past. The company policy in such cases is to wait at the designated meeting spot for at least an hour before marking a client as a no-show on the app. I usually wait a little longer. Perhaps the client got stuck in rush hour traffic. Perhaps there was a meeting at work that went on for longer than anticipated. Or perhaps she is battling cold feet but will decide to go through with the interaction in the end. 

On every occasion that I’ve waited like this, I’ve done so in vain. 

* 

He is younger than me but not by much. Short in stature and slightly built, he has a full head of dark hair and is clad in a black t-shirt and white shorts. His feet are bare. 

The weather out there is horrendous, I say; get me a glass of water, AJ, would you? 

I step into the apartment and get to work on removing my shoes. AJ looks bemused. 

That’s quite the cold open, he says; do you always start like that? 

I stop with one shoe off and the other still on, my foot perspiring steadily inside it. Most people prefer getting right into it, I tell him. 

I see, he says before closing the door behind me. Come on in, and make yourself comfortable. Can I get you that water? Or is that something you just said as part of the act? 

I can have some water, I say before adding, thank you. 

He leaves me by the entrance and goes to the kitchen. The apartment has an open-plan structure, every part of it lending itself to my scrutiny. In the living area in front of me is a TV and a semi-circular sofa, white with black splotches on it like the coat of a Dalmatian. Beyond that is the kitchen, with two parallel counters, an island holding up a fruit bowl filled with ripe mangoes and more steel and chrome than you would find in an automotive factory. A study takes up one corner of the apartment. It houses an austere desk, a table lamp and a white board balanced against the wall. Next to it is a bookshelf that stretches to the other end of the apartment. It’s stuffed with tomes tall and short, fat and thin, their spines printed with text too small for me to read from where I stand. The bookshelf ends at the foot of a single bed, little more than a cot really, with a bedspread on it that looks like someone has spilt a cup of milky tea all over it. 

I’ve never entertained this thought before, but I do now: an open-plan home is conducive to easy cleaning. Fewer surfaces, fewer nooks and crannies, fewer spaces that you forget all about as they collect dust and grime over the years. 

* 

Though there aren’t any specific rules on how an interaction must take place, there is one dictum that all actors abide by: never ask a client why. Why do they want to talk about the microwave incident from their first job? Why do they want to go and buy a vanilla soft serve with an aunt who has been dead for over thirty years? Why do they want someone to accompany them to a movie depicting the bloody days of the Partition? It’s not our place to ask why. That’s not why we’re there. 

* 

Have you ever been a mother? 

I take a sip of the water and wince when I realise how cold it is. My gums throb, and it feels as if I’ve swallowed a shard of ice that is now tearing its way down  my gullet. 

Oh, AJ says, I’m sorry, was that an inappropriate question?

Yes, I say. I mean, no. I mean, I’ve been a mother before, yes. 

AJ chuckles. We are both on the sofa now, at each end of the semi-circle. 

He’s close enough that I can see that his hair, which I had thought was completely dark at first, has threads of silver running through it. Oddly enough, this doesn’t make him look any older. 

What’s the weirdest thing you’ve had to do, he asks. Especially when you were a mother. What’s the single weirdest thing someone asked you to do as a mother? 

I think for a moment before answering him. I was asked to breastfeed once, I say. 

AJ’s jaw drops. Wow, he says, that’s…wow. That really happened?

Yes. 

That’s, I mean, what was he thinking? Did you bolt right out of there? I know I would have. 

He laughs, and the sound of it is like the call of a hyena, both nervous and unsettling. I rotate the glass in my hand, my palm damp from the condensation on its surface. I don’t correct AJ that the client had been a woman, not a man, and that I hadn’t walked away from the interaction. 

AJ opens his mouth to say something more but his phone—it has been on a pouffe nearby the whole time I’ve been here—begins to vibrate with an incoming call. He sees the name on the screen and grimaces. 

I’m sorry, he says, but I need to take this. I won’t be gone long. 

* 

Every actor gets a handbook after signing up for the service. The first page of this thin booklet declares, in big bold letters, that this is a relationship based on absolute trust. Think of yourself as doctors, the handbook adds; think of yourself as lawyers. 

I’ve heard a fellow actor joke that we have all the flexibility of an Uber driver and all the responsibility of a shrink. This man also moonlights as an Uber driver, and he hates every minute of it. 

* 

Some clients, AJ says as he walks back from the study, they don’t understand the meaning of weekends. 

He is halfway to the sofa when he stops, the cheerful grin from earlier back on his face. I’m not any better, am I, he says; it’s a weekend, and yet you’re here. 

I like working on weekends, I tell him. 

I’m about to add the bit about my house-cleaning routine, of how it affords me more time on weekends, but then I decide against it. He may think I’m a strange bird or, worse, that I’m somehow commenting on the cleanliness of his own home. 

Should we start now, I ask instead. 

AJ covers the rest of the distance in four big steps, but instead of going back to his previous spot on the other end of the sofa, he sits closer to me. 

Is there a meter or something, he says. I promise I won’t take more of your time than what I’ve already paid for on the app. It’s just that I’m curious to know more about your work. Like, are most of the people you portray dead? 

Dead, I say, or imaginary.

Does that make it easier? 

I’ve never thought of it like that before. 

It must make it easier, AJ insists. It should be the easiest if they’re imaginary because you’re working with a clean slate there. But even if they’re dead, you could always say that they might’ve changed over the years if they had been alive. Does that make sense? I mean, you’re not supposed to be a facsimile of the person you’re portraying, right? That would be impossible given how little you know about your assignment before you turn up for it. It’s almost as if the company expects us, people like me, to do a lot of the heavy lifting here. You’re not my mother, I know this, but if I act like you are, that helps you. It makes it more immersive for you. If the person sitting in front of you is not questioning who you are, you wouldn’t question yourself either. That’s human nature. And your role in all this, it’s a little like that game we played as children. Mother, May I? Have you ever played it? You ask questions of the  mother, and she reacts to them. That’s her job there, to react. Anyway, maybe we should begin now. The interaction, I mean. 

It takes me a beat to respond. I set the glass of water on the coffee table and nod. Sure, I say, we can start whenever you want. 

Great, let’s do it then! 

I wait for him to begin, to say something to get the interaction started, but he looks at me expectantly, much like a child looks at his mother when they are in a new place, and he doesn’t know how to behave. This should make it easier for me to  slip into my role, but all I experience is a deep sense of irritation at his helplessness. 

So, I say, how’s work been for you, AJ? 

It’s been good, Ma, he says. I’ve been very busy, but it’s an exciting time for  the firm. I’m sorry our conversations are so short these days. I just don’t seem to have the time with all this work on my hands. 

I don’t blame you for that, I tell him. Work is important, I’ve always said that.

Yeah, AJ says, you always did say that. 

Sorry, I say, I’m finding this a bit awkward. 

That’s okay, Ma, it’s been a while since you were here. 

No, no, this is me, not your mother. 

Oh, right. 

AJ laughs his little hyena laugh again before fidgeting in his seat. He looks like he now regrets sitting so close to me. I get to my feet. The bathroom, I say, can I use your bathroom? 

* 

I was a mother in the first interaction that I ever participated in. I wasn’t dressed all in black that day—that was something I started doing much later. The client was a doctor, and the interaction took place at his clinic on a Saturday night, after all his appointments were done for the day. I saw a woman leaving the building as I entered who looked as if she worked as a receptionist. My hunch was proved right when I found the receptionist’s desk inside unattended, and the doctor himself opened the inner door to let me in. It occurred to me then that the woman hadn’t looked surprised when I walked past her in the opposite direction. Perhaps, I thought, she has seen other women visit the doctor late at night. 

The doctor, though not yet elderly, had a mop of grey hair and the grooved neck of an ox. He wore a crisp, pin-striped shirt and an expensive watch that had a shiny metallic strap and a dial rimmed in gold. As I entered his consulting room, passing by the outstretched arm that he used to hold the door open, the cloying funk of his sweat wafted over me. 

He was a gastroenterologist—I got this from the board that hung outside the clinic—but there was nothing in that room to suggest that he practised medicine of any kind. No stethoscope carelessly discarded on top of the large mahogany desk. No charts or posters on the walls that set out the groundwork for good gut health. No plastic figurine that depicted the inside of a human body, complete with removable organs painted in different shades for easy identification. There was no notepad with his letterhead and no white coat; there were no medical textbooks and no certificates. It was almost as if the man was an actor himself, and this was his half- hearted attempt at portraying a doctor. 

Once he shut the door behind us, he started hurling invectives at me. He stomped the length of the room and yelled that I had ruined his life. You miserable fucking woman, he said; you ruined it all for me, you did this, you! Every now and then, he stopped pacing long enough to loom over me. Flecks of his spit landed on my face like water from a faulty showerhead, and the stench of his sweat made me want to gag. I kept my eyes lowered to the Omega watch wrapped around his fat wrist and said I was sorry, over and over again. I even tried to take his hand once or twice, but he slapped my palm away each time. Don’t you dare touch me, he said; keep your filthy hands to yourself. 

When the interaction ended, a little after midnight, the doctor slumped into the chair behind the desk. Tears streamed down his face and wobbled all along his chin. He thanked me, and as he did so, it was he who found himself unable to meet my gaze. 

On my way back home that night, in the almost empty carriage of the subway, I opened the app and marked myself available for my next interaction. 

* 

I peel the sweater away from my armpits and then run a finger around its collar to separate it from my neck. My skin is clammy; there is sweat pooling behind my ears, and it feels as if there’s sweat clogging up my nose as well, making it difficult for me to breathe. I turn on the tap at the sink, take a palmful of water and rub it all over my face. My sweater gets a little wet, but I don’t care. I take a step back and blink the water out of my eyes until the bathroom comes into focus again. 

It’s huge, the bathroom. It runs the entire length of the living space outside and is almost the same size as my home. The wooden flooring, smooth with whorled patterns on it, is the same as the rest of the apartment. At one end is the sink, a shower stall with a futuristic panel full of dials and knobs and a bathtub made of marble sunk into the floor. The other end has a walk-in closet and a wall-length mirror with lights embedded into its frame. The whole place is spotless in a way that makes me think that AJ has someone come in regularly and clean it for him. 

Stop it, I tell myself; stop thinking about the damn bathroom to deflect from what happened outside. It’s unlike me to get tongue-tied and fumble with my assignments like this. AJ must be thinking that I’m not very professional, that I’m not very good at my job. And that stings more than I care to admit. 

A desperate vision fills my head, a vision in which I abandon the assignment and sneak out of the place. I crack open the bathroom door to slip out, tiptoe over to where I had left my umbrella and then hoof it to the exit. With any luck, AJ will not be in my path, and I can save myself further embarrassment. 

But of course, he’ll notice me. This home of his, where everything is out in the open, offers no place to hide. I can’t ever live in such a place, I resolve. It doesn’t matter how easy it would be to clean; I can’t do it. 

There’s a knock on the door. Alright in there, AJ asks, his voice muffled by the thick wall that separates the bathroom from the rest of the apartment. Can I get you anything? 

I’m fine, I croak out, I’ll be out in a minute. 

Can I; may I. I never liked that game, never saw the point of it. I turn away from the door to face the sink again and to face my reflection in the mirror above it. Over my shoulder, I can see the other, larger mirror and the multiple versions of myself looking at myself. It’s disconcerting how easy it is to lose track of your real self when faced with such an illusion. 

* 

Actors get a discount on the app if they book an interaction for themselves. The man who works as an Uber driver makes use of this all the time. He has the people who turn up for the interaction pretend to be drivers ferrying him around the city. But while his own experience of being a cab driver has brought him nothing but disappointment, he does his best to be a model passenger to his actors. He is unfailingly polite; he doesn’t dirty the cab, and when the actors drop him off at his destination, he always leaves behind a generous tip for them. 

I’m educating them, he explained once. Those actors, they’ll know how to behave the next time they hire a cab. And who knows, perhaps that cab will be mine. 

He asked me afterwards if I’d ever considered using the service too. I said that I hadn’t, that I wouldn’t even know what to use it for. 

* 

You won’t believe how bad the weather is out there, I say as I exit the bathroom; get me a glass of water, AJ, would you? 

AJ jumps up from the sofa, his lips parted in puzzlement. He is holding my umbrella, one finger on the tip, the fingers of the other hand wrapped around the handle. I walk over to the glass of water I had abandoned earlier and take a swig from it. The coldness of it assails me yet again, but I ignore the pain. 

There, I say, that’s much better. 

You know, AJ says, we can take a moment here. 

What for, I say; you see me after all this time, and you want to take a moment? Is that a new bedspread I see there? 

I point at his cot and then make a beeline for it. From the soft thumps on the wooden floor behind me, I know that AJ is right on my heels. 

You should have gone for something brighter, I tell him. And I see that you still haven’t learnt how to tuck a bedspread in at the corners. Look at all the wrinkles here! 

I really want you to stop, AJ says. I don’t know if I’m ready yet. 

I’m only straightening out the bedspread, I say. Why are you making a fuss?  

You know that’s not what I’m talking about. 

There’s a testiness in AJ’s voice when he says this, a hard edge that makes my heart race a little though the effect is not altogether unpleasant. I tuck in the last corner and turn around to face him. 

Do you want me to make you a snack, I ask him. Or how about a mango, I can cut a mango for you. 

I step around AJ and move toward the kitchen. He follows me yet again.

Really, he says, a mango? 

You like mangos, I tell him as I start opening drawers in search of a knife; you’ve always liked them. 

AJ leans against one of the counters and adjusts his grip on the handle of the umbrella. I open two more drawers before I find a knife. It’s long and black-handled, and the serrated blade looks sharp enough to pulverize a mango if one is not careful. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see that AJ has a smile on his face again. Except the skin near his eyes has gone tight as if he’s straining to maintain the gesture. 

You’re behaving like a mother, he says, but the mother I knew never cut any fruit for me, ever. 

People are capable of change, I say. It’s not my fault that you’ve been so busy with your work you haven’t paid any attention to me. 

I select the ripest mango from the fruit bowl and place it on the chopping board I found next to the knife. AJ continues to smile at me. 

This could’ve gone a different way, he says, but it’s too late now. 

I hesitate with the knife poised over the skin of the mango. There’s a voice inside my head that agrees with what AJ just said. It tells me that this situation is irretrievable, that no matter what I do now, it won’t be enough to set things right again. But there’s another voice in there, quieter but no less insistent. It urges me to remain hopeful, to not give up. It says that everything will be okay so long as I don’t give up. 

2024 Commonwealth Short Story Prize Shortlist: Issue 3