Miss Buddha (18 page)

“So how?”

“How water?” said Ananda. “How can this
liquid glass, so life giving, so always moving, so rushing, so
trickling, so storming, so rising as vapor, so falling as rain, so
freezing as ice. So never the same river. How can it be?”

“God?” suggested Melissa.

“Do you know,” said Ananda, “that all
matter, I mean all matter, grows denser and heavier the colder it
gets.”

Melissa laughed. It sounded a little like
morning to Ananda. “You presume I stayed awake in Physics
class.”

“Sure.”

“Well, yes, I remember something of the
sort.”

“Except water,” said Ananda.

“Except water?”

“Except water. Water is at its very densest
and heaviest at plus four degrees Celsius, then it gets lighter as
it freezes. And a good thing that is, too.”

“Why?” she said. “Why is that a good
thing?”

“Because if it were not so, we would have no
fish in our northern lakes. Ice, as it froze, would then sink to
the bottom, and so eventually fill the lake, forcing any living
creatures to the top, where they no longer could breathe, or would
die from exposure to the cold.”

Melissa took this in with an almost comical
expression of disbelief. “Well, I’ll be,” she said. “It’s as if it
was intelligent. I mean the water. As if it had thought the whole
thing through. Instead of sinking, it decided to stay afloat and
keep the fishes nice and warm.” Then, after thinking about it for
another little while, added, “That’s really true, isn’t it?”

“Yes,” Ananda agreed.

“I think that qualifies as a miracle,
doesn’t it? When you think about it.”

“That’s my thought, precisely,” said Ananda.
“And, Melissa,” here Ananda reached for, and again took her hands
in his. “You should think of Ruth as a miracle, as a natural
miracle. As natural, and as miraculous, as water.”

Then Ananda added, “And when you stop to
think about it, miracles are as natural as anything, they obey
laws, too, only that we are not yet privy to them.”

To Ananda’s mild
astonishment—or perhaps not so mild—Melissa seemed to understand.
No, there was no
seemed
about it, she did understand. Or, he thought, if
not understand, she certainly accepted. Yes, that’s perhaps the
better word. She fully accepted the miracle that was Ruth, that was
water, with not even a trace of fear.

For Melissa smiled at Ananda when she said,
“Yes, she’s a miracle. all right.” Then laughed softly, “I can live
with that.”

::
41 :: (Los Angeles)

Melissa’s father-in-law, Dexter Marten, did
cheat on his wife once, but he considers this an excellent fidelity
record, all things considered. No, he never told her. Of course
not. For one, it really had nothing to do with love; for two, he
really did not love his wife; so, for three, it was none of her
business.

However, once was enough to
open his eyes to the impracticality of the thing. Not that he had
not enjoyed it, for he had, but affairs, especially with younger
associates—she had been a 3
^rd
year associate at the
firm—complicate things, and for a lawyer unnecessary complications
stood in the way of clear thinking and superlative court
performance. Ergo, not to be engaged in.

For Dexter Marten, first and foremost, was a
lawyer, and he had never wanted to be anything but.

His father, a son of a Scottish immigrant,
had worked his way out of New York City poverty to put himself
through both college and law school, and once he shared his
rags-to-lawyer story with his then sixteen-year-old son, Dexter—as
son with a maturity beyond his years—clearly saw his father’s
sagacity and the beauty of working directly on the power-grid of
the world: Money and Law. For what influences and determines lives
more than law and money?

Money and law. Congressmen and Senators,
almost to a man (or woman) were lawyers, were they not? The outcome
of life (and often death) in the hands of lawyers. The fate of
nations, in the hands of lawyers.

Money and law. Nothing was to stand in the
way of this. Not for him.

Not ever.

Dexter was not a quick
study, but with a near monomaniacal focus, and a determination to
intimidate Calvin Coolidge he nonetheless managed to graduate in
the top third bracket at Stanford, and two months
later
—having studied for it most nights
during his final year at law school, and much to everyone’s
amazement—he
passed the California
bar.

Impressed with the
accomplished young man, a newly formed Los Angeles
firm—
Nesbit, Kuugler, and
Stroan
, then specializing in labor
law—accepted him as an associate that very summer.

Now, almost forty years
later, he was a managing partner and fixture at the same firm, now
grown to
eighty some attorneys and focusing
more on medical litigation than labor law—though they still
retained a well-regarded labor department. He had served on the
managing committee for the last eight years straight, an
unprecedented record. There was even talk of changing the firm’s
name to Nesbit, Kuugler, and Marten—Mr. Stroan now deceased and
Dexter Marten now the senior partner as to ownership. No official
resolutions yet, but plenty of talk—much of it gendered by Dexter
himself.

With Dexter, then, as father, Charles’s
career was less a matter of paternal suggestion than edict: the
law, naturally.

And as naturally, Charles complied.

:

To say that Charles was afraid of his father
would perhaps be to overstate things; to say that he had an
unhealthy respect for Dexter was pretty much on the money.

That is why it took him a good two weeks to
work up the courage to confess his worries about Melissa to his
father.

:

Charles dialed Rachel, Dexter’s secretary.
“Is he busy right now?” he asked, with as much weight as he could
muster. Being Dexter’s son was definitely a two-edged sword in the
firm. Charles was neither brilliant nor quick, and many a tongue
wagged in the direction of fatherly influence when he had been
taken on the year before.

“He’s got a ten-thirty,” she said.

Checking his watch, Charles saw a ten-minute
window, all that he would need, really.

“I only need ten minutes,” he said.

“I’ll let him know.”

Although he found it demeaning to knock, he
nonetheless did—everyone knocked before entering Dexter Marten’s
office, whether son or secretary, partner or client. “Enter,” said
his father with practiced impatience.

Charles did, and took a seat. Uncomfortable
as always in his father’s presence, and more so in this office.

“What’s up, son?” Dexter asked.

“I think I have a problem, Dad.”

“Dad?” said Dexter. “So, it’s personal, is
it?”

“It’s Melissa.”

His dad, almost frowning even when smiling,
now truly frowned. Dexter was not fond of Melissa, never had been,
and Charles was painfully aware of that. “What is it?”

Charles looked at his watch, eight minutes
to go. At which point the intercom buzzed, “You’re ten-thirty is
here, Mister Marten.”

Dexter picked up the receiver, “Thanks,
Rachel, I’ll only be a couple.” Then to Charles, “What’s the
problem?”

Charles again looked at his watch, seven
minutes. Well, better just say it. “I think she’s going mad,” he
said.

Dexter looked at his son through silence.
“What do you mean, mad?” he finally asked.

“Delusional,” said Charles. “I think she’s
delusional.”

“Delusional,” repeated
Dexter, for some reason stressing the
lu
in delusional. It was more a
statement than question, but it did call for a response, and
Charles supplied it.

“
Yes, I think so,” he said,
again looking at his watch. This was not going to work. Then added,
“Possibly.”

“Look,” said his father, checking his own
watch, “let’s talk about this later. How about lunch?”

“Yes,” nodded Charles. “That would be
great.” Relieved about both the reprieve, and that his father had
suggested the lunch.

The waiter scurried away with their order,
and Dexter took a sip of his standing order designer water that
appeared the moment they had sat down, something that always
impressed Charles. What clout.

Now he put the glass down, regarded it for a
second and then looked up at Charles. “So, tell me, Son,” he
said.

Charles did. First, he touched on the
problem with Ruth not crying which had Melissa all upset and
worried and unable to sleep; and then, the real trouble, Ruth
disappearing, as Melissa had put it, and the ambulance she had
forgot to mention.

“And there is nothing wrong with the child?”
asked Dexter, helping himself to some bread and olive oil.

“No. Nothing.”

“You’ve checked?”

“I, no, not personally. But Melissa brought
her to Doctor Fairfield, she said. And everything was fine.”

Dexter chewed carefully, then took another
sip of water.

“She thought Ruth
was
dead
?” he
asked.

“At one point, yes. That’s what she
said.”

“Has it happened again?”

“No. Well, not to my knowledge.”

“Would she tell you if it did?”

A fair question. Charles wasn’t so sure. “I
don’t know.” But then he remembered something else: “And once—this
was before she thought that she was, that Ruth was, dead—she asked
me if I could tell when someone was looking at me from behind.”

“What?”

“She asked me,” began Charles.

“I heard what you said,” interrupted Dexter.
“Why did she ask you that?”

“She didn’t say, but I’m sure she had a
reason. Maybe she thinks people are looking at her from behind. I
don’t know, Dad. It’s weird.”

Dexter looked up as the waiter approached
with their meals. Made some room for his plate. Didn’t thank or
even acknowledge the waiter, but said to Charles, “The best
primavera in town.”

Charles, not a fan of angel-hair pasta, nor
any pasta for that matter, nodded in agreement. He had ordered the
same thing as his father, just to be sure.

“Of course,” said Charles after a while, as
if to placate his father (or as if to reassure himself) “she’s
always been a bit odd.”

“And you’re only realizing this now?” said
his father, fork midair, loaded with spun pasta and dripping with
spiced sauce.

:

If truth be told, they probably would not
have married had his father not been dead set against it.

What had started out as a more or less blind
date had led to several sequels. It was all Tom Chester’s fault of
course, for Melissa was his new girlfriend Mandy’s best friend, and
it was Tom—or Mandy, he never did manage to sort that out—who had
suggested the double date; though it was definitely Tom who had
said, “You’ll love her, Charlie. She’s real smart, and good
looking, too.”

And Tom was right, she was real smart, and
not bad looking at all. And Charles liked the way she talked, and
wondered about things that had nothing to do with law. Once, a few
months after they started dating, she had asked him outright, “Are
you sure you want to be a lawyer, Charlie? Is it really your
choice?”

He was not good at facing home truths, and
this particular one said the choice was not really his, in fact,
there was no choosing involved, it was a given. His father was a
prominent lawyer, as his father had been before him. There was
never any question, nothing to deliberate.

His answer, however, was equivocal. “It
seems the best way,” is what he said, and she did not challenge
him, though she gave him a long, searching glance.

Given a choice, however,
Charles would not have chosen law, he would much rather have been a
gardener—or a landscape architect. Somewhere in his heart lingered
the memories of being truly happy helping his mother planting new
flowers, bushes, small trees, and then tending them and watching
them grow. Something in them spoke to him, the colors perhaps, or
the actual
growing
, which on some level seemed to him a bit
miraculous.

Gardening, however—and
especially in California—is not for
men
, his father would imply as often
as say outright, “Unless, of course, your last name is Sanchez,”
he’d add.

One day Melissa pointed
out, apropos of spring, “Isn’t it amazing how things
actually
grow
?
From a seed, or an acorn. From such a small thing to such a big
oaky thing.” That was the day Charles told her of his secret love
for gardening—which made Melissa like him all the better. And,
having shared such a deeply personal thing, with nothing but
understanding in return, Charles knew he wanted to marry
her.

“What does she
do
?” Dexter wanted to
know when Charles brought up the possibility of proposing to
Melissa.

“Do? She doesn’t really do anything, Dad.
She’s a student.”

“So, what does she plan to do?”

“She hasn’t made up her mind yet. Perhaps
something with children, or with animals, or with trees.”

“Trees?”

“That’s what she said.”

“It sounds to me that she will not make a
good wife.”

“Don’t say that, Dexter,” offered his
mother, hovering at the edge of their conversation. “She’s a nice
girl. I know her mother quite well.”

“She’s not a lawyer’s wife,” said his
father.

“I really like her, Dad.”

“That,” said Dexter, in what was a
revelation to Charles, “is neither here nor there.”