THE IMMIGRANT (15 page)

She does not like her introduction to the new world.

Part II

Nina sits inside another pane, numb and weary. She drinks, eats, breaks the roll, spreads the butter, bites into the cheese, sips coffee, occupies her hands and mouth, and hopes her mind will follow suit.

The plane begins its descent. She cranes her head towards the window, to be greeted by masses of trees, and a few white buildings. Somewhere there is a husband waiting with her new life. Her immigrant status, no matter how closely examined, no matter how unpleasantly conceded, could not now be taken away. She supposed she had won, she was on a plane, looking at buildings as they came nearer, one of them her home.

The plane did its runway thing and stopped. Nina could see stairs being wheeled. With no immediate connection between plane and building, Halifax was obviously old fashioned. Already she was in the position of comparing the West with the West.

She had so much to tell the apprehensive, waiting Ananda. She had almost been deported. What would he say to that? He would share the knowledge and the shame. Just a few more minutes before they met, no barriers now between her and him.

Inside. Her first taste of the sparseness of people scattered through space. Could this really be the airport of a city? In front of the carousel, she waits, her hand on the luggage cart. That hand stands out, covered in bangles, gold, red and white with painted black circles. In this northern light the bridal turns into meaningless plastic. She pulls her shawl forward, a burkha for her wrists. Arms invisible, she waits for her luggage.

Across the barrier Ananda was getting impatient. He jiggled the car keys in his pocket, inspected the passengers as they came out—why was his wife taking so long? Was she in trouble, had she made the journey safely? He had not been in contact with her since she’d left India. Three flights, plus immigration and customs might be confusing for someone who had never travelled alone. He looked out of the glassed wall onto the huge car park. Soon he would introduce his wife to his car—a silver-blueish dream also known as a Saab. He thought of her transportation means in Delhi and grimaced. Anxiously, he turned back to the passengers—ah there she was. Swathed in metres of silk and wool, only her face visible above the trolley she was having difficulty pushing.

He moved forward to grasp it.

‘Hi.’

She looked troubled. ‘They stopped me at Toronto.’

‘What? Why?’

‘It took ages and ages.’ The mortification, resolutely kept down during the flight, coalesced into a brief sob. ‘They kept asking me questions.’

‘Questions?’

‘How long had I known you? When were we married? Where were we married? How had we met? What did you do? It was like the bloody inquisition.’

‘Calm down, Nina, calm down. This is standard.’

‘They were treating me like a criminal.’

‘Some people get into false marriages in order to gain entry, or to stay on; they were just making sure this was not the case,’ he said lightly. ‘If it never happened, there would be no need for such questioning.’

‘They wouldn’t treat a European or American like that. Why me? Every paper was in order.’

‘Sometimes you get a bad guy, you can’t help it.’

‘They did it because we are third world.’

‘Don’t be silly. These things happen.’

He was coaxing her into accepting and then forgetting what had happened. If they lacked the ability to do this, they would never be able to enjoy their new country. The situation made them vulnerable, one could hardly start fighting in an immigration cell, deportation would be the certain result. Ananda’s way of handling it was expedient. Nina now turned to him and smiled. He took her hand from underneath the shawl.

Outside she caught her breath. The light was slanting and lay gently on the cars in the vast parking lot, touching the trees in the distance so that they shone green. The sky was blue, so blue, and there were puffy white clouds floating in it. The air was kind and temperate.

Pride of ownership gleamed in Ananda’s eyes. ‘See, how clean, how spacious,’ he said performing the introduction. ‘Even the air sparkles. Ah!’ He closed his eyes in rapture.

She squeezed his hand. ‘Yes, it is truly wonderful. Just like the mountains of home.’

Nina did not respond to the Saab. She was still too upset, supposed the husband as they started to drive through the countryside with its many trees, lakes and the odd car or two. Nina remarked on the slim evidence of a Canadian population to be told there were only twenty million people in the whole country.

Then Halifax spread before them, gleaming in the sun, small and sweet. ‘Like it?’ asked Ananda, turning to her and laughing. He knew he was presenting something of value, civilized, ordered and therefore beautiful.

‘It looks wonderful,’ she breathed. ‘Reminds me of Brussels.’

‘Brussels is
European.
This is
North America.
’

‘It’s the
West.
’

‘Well,’ said Ananda, who had never been to Europe, ‘wait till you drive through. It’s like a garden.’

It went on, tidy, neat and pretty. She exclaimed, he was encouraged to point out more Haligonian wonders. Finally they entered a complex of apartment buildings, halting in front of the highest and ugliest.

‘This is the only block with a lift. From the flat you can observe the whole city, even the Arm—the North West Arm—the bit of sea water that comes into Halifax.’

‘My, an ocean view,’ marvelled Nina, the hitherto landlocked one, as they rode the elevator.

‘Your new home,’ announced Ananda as he turned the key in 612, Hollin Court, and ceremoniously ushered Nina in.

She faced a tiny corridor with a little kitchen at the end of it. To the right were two rooms, a drawing-dining with a picture window, behind that a bedroom, and opposite a bathroom, a blinding vision in pink.

Nina would not have thought there was so much to show in one tiny apartment, but there was: the drawer for her clothes, her cupboard space, the peculiarity of the bathroom taps, how the stove operated, where the switches were, where the spices were, where the bathroom cleaners were, how to put on the TV when Ananda wasn’t there. ‘And the rest you will learn by and by.’

Eagerly Nina followed her husband from knob to switch. Her new place looked comfortable, compact and cosy, unlike those terrible rooms in Jangpura that her mother would inhabit alone.

To get rid of her sad feeling, she said, ‘Show me the sea, you said there’s a view from the house.’

‘Arm, I said we could see the North West Arm from the—and it is not a house, it’s an apartment.’

‘Whatever it is, just show me.’

He parted the net curtains in the bedroom, ‘There.’

‘Where? I can’t see.’

‘There.
’ He jabbed at a thin black line in the distance.

‘Oh.’

‘I told you it was not the sea, it is more like an outstretched arm.’ He drew her close to him. ‘One weekend I will take you out of the city so you can see the ocean properly. We can drive down the coast, go to Lunenburg.’

She would have to wait before she saw her image of the ocean: vast quantities of yellow sandy beach, grand foamy waves, white gulls circling in the brilliant blue sky and their own wobbly line of footprints as they walked hand in hand next to the water. She threw her arms around his neck, and nuzzled his lips. ‘That’s so sweet of you, I have never seen the sea—and the house is perfect, I shall be very happy here.’

‘Of course you will,’ he said pecking her mouth before disengaging himself. ‘Now I thought we could order pizza for lunch. How about a special combo with pepperoni, anchovies, olives, green peppers and onions. Nothing in India quite compares.’

‘I thought you were vegetarian.’

‘At home they think I am. But here I eat what everybody else does, it is simpler and convenient. You too will get used to it.’

‘I won’t.’

Meat had never crossed Nina’s lips in thirty years, how could she change now? She thought of the recipes her mother had anxiously written down for her, the special pickle she had given her so lovingly, that she had secretly carried these ten thousand miles. Five years old, a delicacy of blackish, salt encrusted pieces of lemon, their pale seeds glowing against dark skins.

‘Well, I can get you a green pepper, mushroom and olive pizza. That should do,’ decided Ananda, reaching for the phone.

In the bedroom, Nina sank to the carpet in front of her suitcases. Though she needed her toilet things, she hesitated before opening them, for all of home lay within, and she was scared of pain. Her mother and she had packed together, trying to cram within the trousseau that had been collected over a lifetime.

Slowly she fit the tiny keys in the locks. She took out her saris and stroked the intricate woven surfaces. Benarasi, Kanjeevaram, Orissa patola, Gujarati patola, Bandhani; she had fancied carrying all parts of India to Canada in her clothes. She spread the brightest one on the bed, and gazed at the magic of the green, yellow and red Gujarati weave.

‘Look, Ananda, look.’

He came, looked, remarked that it would get dirty if used as a bedcover, and would she hurry up, the pizza was coming.

Men didn’t know about saris.

She hung their radiance on hangers, shut them in the cupboard and drew comfort from knowing they were there.

ii

Next morning. Her shoulder was being shaken. ‘I’m going now, I’ll call you,’ said a voice.

An enormous effort and she managed to unglue her eyelashes a fraction. Who was this man? Into her blankness he repeated, ‘I’ll call you.’

Her husband. ‘But—but what about breakfast?’ she asked, heaving under the bedclothes.

‘I’ve already had it. If you need anything, here is my work number, here, see, under the clock.’

The front door banged, and she was left in silence. Alone, she was alone. Luxuriously she welcomed the exhaustion that forced her eyes shut.

When she next opened them it was noon. She lay in bed a long time, looking at the grey sky hovering over her through the large window, gazing at the blue and white stripes of the quilt, noticing the jumping green digital numbers of the clock radio. She snuggled deeper into the bedding, it was so cosy and she was so comfortable. There was no one to shout, get up, get up, it’s getting late, no task that would suffer by her staying in bed, no person whose loneliness she had to assuage. Only Ananda, who was at this very moment filling the teeth of Canadian children. (She brought to mind he had a family practice.)

Eventually lying in bed became boring. She must explore, she must examine her territory in private. Boldly she strode about in her nightie, the shape of her breasts visible, as was the shadow of her pubic hair. No servant, landlord, landlady, neighbour or mother was there to see. After years of night and day protection against the eyes of the world, it felt strange to abandon the shield that had defended her modesty.

Eat, she must eat. She stares at the pink meat slices, milk, eggs, bread, butter in the fridge. She holds the cold bottle of grape juice in her hands, 1.99 dollars—just 1.99. Welcome to the land of plenty, Nina. Remember how impossible it was to drink grape juice in Delhi? The last time you had it was courtesy Zenobia’s birthday at Dasaprakash, and it cost sixty rupees. Now it seems practically free.

She found a long stemmed glass, and poured the juice. It wasn’t quite the fresh, thick, pulpy taste she remembered from the south Indian restaurant at the Ambassador Hotel, but it was grape juice, and caused a similar puckering in her mouth. She poured herself another glass and continued to drink slowly. If nostalgia came she would fight it.

The phone rang. It was her husband.

‘Hi.’

‘Hi.’

‘How are you doing? Everything all right?’

‘I have just gotten up.’

‘Jet lag, sleep it off.’

Sleep some more? Oh all right.

‘Have you had lunch?’

‘No.’

‘Make yourself a sandwich.’

‘There is only meat.’

‘Eggs? Boil some eggs. Or try the peanut butter in the cupboard. We’ll go shopping in the evening. I would have come home, but I have to catch up on patients here. Sorry about your lunch.’

‘That’s all right.’

‘See you, bye. Have to run.’ He put the phone down, and silence caught up from where it had left off.

Eggs. He had told her to boil eggs.

She attempted to light the stove but it resisted stubbornly. She rummaged some more in the cupboard and came up with milk and cereal, easier than putting peanut butter down her throat, which seemed a very viscous, unsubtle, peculiar smelling mass.

It was strange to have no sign of any living thing around her. When was Ananda coming home?

She resumed her roaming, opening every drawer, peering into every cupboard. On close scrutiny there did seem to be a thin film of dust in the apartment. She found a damp blue and white cloth lying bunched up next to the sink and started.

For an hour she cleaned, with much examining of each object her duster wiped. There was nothing to disturb her. No landlord, no sound of traffic, no vendors, no part-time help to clean and swab, no mother who chatted while she worked. Chores finished, nightie clad, she stretched on the sofa and flung her legs over the cushions.

She closed her eyes, she was tired, so tired. She would get up just before Ananda came home she told herself as she drifted off.

Five o’clock. There he was, bending over her, shaking her. ‘Are you all right?’

She looked at him. Again the slight shock.

‘Did you eat?’

‘Cereal.’

‘You must be starving. Come on, we better rush, the grocery store closes at six.’

‘I haven’t had a bath.’

‘Doesn’t matter. Just put on your clothes.’

‘Aren’t you going to have tea first?’

‘Tea? I don’t have tea in the evenings. Do you want some?’

‘No, it’s all right.’

‘Hurry then, the supermarket will close.’

After some hesitation Nina put on her plainest salwar kameez. It was silk with embroidery at the neck, sleeves, and borders. She wished she had some ordinary clothes, but what with getting married and travelling to the West, ordinary was out of the question