The Sleepwalker's Guide to Dancing: A Novel (29 page)

“Shhhhhhhit,” Mindy breathed.

“He’s got a breath issue,” Dimple said. Mindy flipped the picture over. “So, I can have it?”

Amina felt herself warm, though she wasn’t sure if it was because she was pleased to be asked for the picture or because she didn’t want to give it away. Mindy leaned closer, her eyes reflecting the burgundy hood of the car, the shadow of Amina’s head. Her glossy lips parted to reveal rows of curiously small teeth, and Amina felt an astounding urge to rub noses with her, or purr, or roll over.

“Fucking
finally
,” Dimple said. Amina turned to see Akhil walking across the parking lot, head ducked to his chest, one hand dug deep into his jeans pocket. He looked up suddenly and came to a halt.

“What are you doing here?” It wasn’t exactly clear whom he was
asking, as he looked from Amina to Mindy to Dimple and back to Amina.

“Looking at pictures of you naked,” Mindy said.

“Not naked,” Amina said quickly. “Just sleeping. I have ones of Mom, too. And Dad,” she lied.

“Pictures?”

Before Amina could protest, Mindy grabbed the photo from her lap, thrusting it at Akhil. Amina watched her brother take it in, her gut sinking as his brow furrowed. He looked up at her again but didn’t say anything. He unlocked the car door, threw his books into the back.

“I told you he’s a freak,” Dimple said. “He flips out all the time for no reason.”

Mindy slid off the hood as the engine started. She opened the passenger door and leaned down. “Can I get a ride?”

“To Corrales?” Dimple asked.

“Yeah.” Mindy swayed slightly. Akhil’s gaze, trapped in the crease between her breasts, swayed with her. Mindy smiled, drawing his eyes to her face.

“Do whatever you want,” he said, and Mindy eased into the passenger seat. She unlocked the back door for Amina, who got into the car, feeling a little sick and thrilled with the oddness of it all. Dimple’s mouth was a hard slash through the window as they drove away.

Amina wasn’t totally sure where one should be when one’s brother was being seduced, but she was pretty sure the backseat was not the right place. She stared into the rearview mirror, trying to catch Akhil’s eye, but her brother wasn’t looking back or even at Mindy. He was slouching behind the wheel, his right knee at an odd angle, as though it were being magnetically drawn to the passenger’s seat.

They weren’t two minutes into the drive when Mindy reached into her bag and pulled out a cigarette. She turned to Akhil. “Do you mind?”

Akhil glanced down. “Is that a joint?”

“Yeah. Do you smoke?”

“Yeah.”

“No you don’t,” Amina said, but if they heard her, they didn’t answer. Mindy pulled out a lighter and sucked in, pinching the tip before handing it to Akhil. He took it.

“So, fucking Corrales, huh?” Mindy exhaled. The car filled with a rich, funky odor, and Amina coughed.

Akhil took a tiny puff and held it in, nodding. He handed it back to her.

“You want some?” Mindy turned around.

“No!” Akhil said. “She’s a fucking kid.”

“Oops! Sorry.”

“It stinks,” Amina said.

“It’s skunk,” Mindy replied, and Amina sat back, baffled.

“So how long you guys lived in Corrales?”

“I don’t know. Nine years.”

“Cool. I have an aunt that lives in Rio Rancho.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Rio Rancho sucks,” Amina said.

Mindy looked over her shoulder and laughed, her hand landing on Akhil’s knee. “Doesn’t it? It’s like the old-person capital of the state.”

“TB survivors,” Akhil said, taking the joint back.

“What?”

“A lot of them are tuberculosis survivors. The climate is easy on their lungs.”

“Fascinating.” Mindy turned so that she was leaning against the passenger door, her body facing Akhil’s. “So what else do you know?”

“About what?”

“About other things.”

“Other things?”

“About Indian things.”

“Indian things?”

Mindy squeezed his knee. “Kama Sutra?”

Akhil looked like he’d been hit with a bad smell. He knocked her hand away, and a nervous swell rose in Amina’s stomach. Would they pull over right there, on Coors Road? Would he yell furiously, or talk extra slowly to make each word hit harder? Would his speech be about
racism or appropriation, or would he just tell Mindy she was a big fat nothing? Anything was possible. Amina imagined the heat-blurred silhouette of Mindy in the rearview mirror, waiting for some low-rider to pity her and give her a lift back to school.

Akhil said nothing. Mindy slid her hand to his upper thigh, squeezed again. He did not remove it.

“Where’s your brother?” Kamala asked, some forty minutes later.

“Dunno.”

“What do you mean don’t know?”

“I’m reading,” Amina lied. She fanned the pages of the book with her thumb. She hadn’t really been able to read at all, had only circled the words
Kurtz, green
, and
river
.

Kamala frowned. “Did he go somewhere?”

“He’s out.”

“Out where?”

Amina shrugged. After they dropped her at the head of the driveway, Amina had watched the car roll fifty yards down the dirt road.

“Hey! Idiot!” Kamala snapped oniony fingers in front of her face. “Where did he go?”

Amina sighed. “Jesus.”

“What Jesus? I’m asking you a simple question, and you’re sitting like some deaf-mute.”

“I’m trying to read.”

Kamala grabbed Amina’s left ear, twisted hard.

“Ow! God! He just went to Ben Franklin’s for paint! He’ll be back soon!”

Kamala let go. “Why didn’t you just say so?”

“What the hell does it matter? He’s out doing whatever he wants, and it’s not like we have to keep track of him every shitty second of the day!” Amina rubbed her ear.

“No cursing!”

“Leave me alone, then!”

Kamala scrunched her face and abruptly held a cool palm to Amina’s forehead. “You’re having a hormonal episode,” she announced.

Three hours later Akhil sat at the dinner table looking like he’d gotten a once-over from an industrial-strength vacuum cleaner. Hair stuck out from his head in charged puffs, a half-inch circumference around his mouth was swollen and pink, and his left ear glistened gooily. His hooded sweatshirt was oddly bungled around his throat, as though hurricane-level winds had whipped it into a knot. Kamala passed the potatoes.

“So you’re the team captain again?”

Akhil took a spoonful of vegetables. “Uh-huh.”

Kamala scooped two more spoonfuls onto his plate. She followed with a leg of chicken, three spoonfuls of yogurt and cabbage, and two chapatis. “How many people are on the team?”

“Can I have one?” Amina asked.

Kamala reached for the water pitcher, filling their glasses. “Ten? Twelve?”

Akhil’s fingers pressed tenderly at his ear before migrating to his mouth. “Six.”

“And all are National Merit semifinalists?”

“Yeah.” Akhil rubbed his nose, then stopped, sniffing his fingers.

“I tell you, in India we competed in maths all the time, but there was never a real tournament—such a good idea! A sport that tests the mettle of the mind!”

“That’s not really a sport,” Amina said.

“Not true! What do you think chess is?”

“Not a sport either.”

“Shut up, idiot box! You know your grandfather was the champion chess player of Madras Christian College and went on to become the—”

“Semifinalist for the All-India Chess Championships. Yeah. You told me.”

“Well, you’re in a fine mood today, Miss Impressed with Everything. Maybe you should try using your brain for something instead of criticizing everyone. Maybe you should try leading a team of—Akhil, what’s wrong with your ear?” Kamala pointed a serving spoon at him.

“Nothing.”

“You keep fiddling with it. It’s infected? Come, let me look.”

“No.” Akhil leaned back. “No, it’s fine.”

“But it’s swollen, no?”

Akhil shook his head, and the sweatshirt around his neck slipped to reveal a pulpy bruise.

“Oh my God!” Kamala stood up. “Oh my God, you’ve been hit!”

“What?” Akhil looked at Amina, who pointed a finger at her own neck.

Akhil slapped a hand over the bruise. “No. Nothing. It’s nothing, Ma.”

“Who did this to you?” Kamala demanded. “Those boys?”

“No one, Ma, it’s nothing—”

“What nothing? You’ve been beaten! Was it the same boys as last year? Mr. No Good Martinez and his thuggy band of
goondas
?”

“No, I swear—”

But she was already rising from the table. “Mesa Preparatory code of honor my foot! They said it wouldn’t happen again, and now this! Why didn’t you say anything? When did this happen? I’m calling your father.”

“No! Don’t!”

But Kamala was already walking quickly to the kitchen, hand held in front of her like a weapon.

“Do something!” Akhil whispered, hurrying after her.

“Like what?” Amina followed.

In the kitchen, their mother punched the buttons on the phone with her middle finger, pointing it at them when she finished dialing. “Thugs! I saw it on the
Eyewitness News
, gangs coming to Albuquerque with their initiations and putting ideas in the heads of teenagers! Yes, operator, can you have Dr. Eapen kindly call home? His son has been beaten to a bloody—”

“It wasn’t a boy!” Amina shouted.

Kamala stopped talking, her mouth puckered over her next word.

“It wasn’t a boy,” Amina repeated.

Her mother put the phone back in the cradle. “A girl?”

Akhil nodded.

“A girl beat you?”

“He wasn’t beaten,” Amina said. “It’s a hickey.”

Kamala’s eyes widened. “Who?”

“The thing. On his neck. It’s like a kiss, but sort of hard. Like a sucking kiss. He was with Mindy Lujan. That’s where he was when you asked. That’s why—”

Kamala waved a frantic hand and Amina stopped talking. Her mother stood dead still, palms flat against the counter like she was holding it in place. She looked at them, her mouth twisting at the corners, and Amina realized she was trying not to cry.

“Oh, Mom …,” Akhil started, but Kamala’s lips just stretched tight and thin and paper-flat, as though they could be torn. She walked around the counter to her purse and picked it up, stuffing it under one arm. Then she went out of the kitchen and down the hall and out the front door, opening her car door and slamming it with a thump. They watched her pull out of the driveway.

“Thanks a fucking lot, Amina.”

“You said to do something.”

“Shut up.”

It took four hours for Kamala to come home. Amina knew because she was awake, wondering if it was possible to lose both parents to the difficulties of living in America. Could their mother really just leave them, too? Was that all it took, one good fight and members of her family would drive off down the driveway forever?

But then came the noise of the car, the keys landing on the countertop. Kamala hushed the dog’s whining with the low hum of Malayalam. Footsteps and paw steps made their way across the house and the bottom stair creaked as Kamala climbed up to the kids’ landing. Amina hurriedly arranged herself into something she thought a mother would feel good about coming back to—back straight, nightie smoothed. A good girl. A Girl Scout. But Kamala didn’t knock on her door. She didn’t knock on Akhil’s either. Amina stared at the brass knob, listening to what sounded like rustling and fleeing, Kamala’s steps softer on the stairs as she hurried
slipslapslipslapslip
down.

Amina got up. She tiptoed across her room and opened the door as silently as she could, peeking into the hallway. Nothing. No Kamala, no Queen Victoria, no one to look intrepid for. But wait. She squinted. Yes, there was something. A paper bag. It sat outside Akhil’s door, as familiar and mystical as a lawn gnome. Amina slid across the floor in her socks and knelt in front of it, dumping out the contents. A box fell to the floor. Small, neat, not much bigger than her hand. She turned it over, looking at the picture of a couple silhouetted by the sunset.
LATEX
, bold letters proclaimed, and with the proclamation, Amina understood that she had no business with it whatsoever. She shoved it back into the bag and half ran back to her bedroom, diving under the covers.

The next morning the bag was gone. Akhil did not say anything about it as they ate their toast alone in the kitchen. And Kamala did not come out at all, even as they washed the dishes and packed their bags for school, though Amina thought she caught a glimpse of her mother’s dark head looking through the dining room window as they pulled out of the driveway.

CHAPTER 4