The Story Hour (2 page)

“Wow. Are you sure?”

I nod. I see my feets in the dirty Bata rubber chappals I wearing in restaurant and then look at Bobby's feets in his leather sandal. All pinky-pink his toes are, like a baby's. I feel ashame and look up quickly before he follow my eye.

Bobby is staring at me, his head on one side like our old dog used to do when he puzzle. Then he smile. “Bye, Lakshmi,” he say. “Thanks for this.”

He put his hand out for me to shake, like I also a man. No man ever handshake me before. I unsure to do what. If the husband see, he will not like. But I see the hairs on Bobby's white arm, like golden thread. Soft, like a girl's hand. And then I think: I's in Am'rica now. I must shake hands like proper Am'rican. And so I takes Bobby's hand in both mine. “Good luck,” I say. “God bless.”

“God bless,” he repeat. Then he pull out of my hand. “S'long, Lakshmi,” he say. “I'll drop you a card from California.”

I watch Bobby's blue car make left turn on main road. I knows Rekha, with her big eyes and long ears, counting the time for how long I absent. But still I standing, moving not forward or back, even though the sun strong on my skin, even though the breeze moving the pallov on my sari. I not ready to enter the hot, smelly restaurant. I not ready to serve the customers who is not Bobby. I wonders what would happen if I begins to walk, to leaf my life and just take one step, then second, third? I would go past Russian tailoring shop, liquor store, Dollar Store. But where I go once I exit plaza? Across main road is Shell station. But I don't drive the car—the husband say I too stupid to learn. I have twenty dollars in my hand which Bobby gave for the care. I have dirty Bata slipper on my feets. Not too far I can go on my own, I knows, but still, thinking of going inside store and restaurant makes a vomit in my throat. I hates my life, I thinks, and the thought give me the shock. Until this minute, I not knowing this.

“Lakshmi,” I hears, and even without turning, I know who is calling. It is the husband and he walking fast near to me. He is without shirt, still in the white sleeveless ganji he cook in, and I notice the big arms with the dark hairs and the stomach that moves like a handi of water as he walk. He also breathe huf-huf-huf as he come to me.

“Are you mad?” he say when he reach me. “Going on a walk while the customers are waiting? Standing in the middle of the plaza talking to yourself?”

I say nothing.

He eyes narrow. “What's this?” he say, lifting my hand holding the twenty-dollar note. “You stealing from register? Rekha say you take statue with you. Forty-five dollar, statue is costing.”

I let him take note from me. “Customer tip,” I say. “I thought he make mistake.”

“If customer make such stupid mistake, it's on his head,” he say, and then smile, like he making a funny joke.

But I not laughing.

“Come on, stupid,” the husband say. “Finish your work, you.”

Sometime I think my real name Stupid. He call me this more than my own name.

He put his arm behind my neck and lead me back to store. If he could pulls me from my nose, I thinks, he would.

Rekha give me the funny look when we enter store. And then, in front of her, he say to me, “Now, where is statue you took?”

Rekha begin to wipe counter, as if she not heard. First time in her life she wipe that counter without me telling her to. “I tell later,” I say softly to husband.

“No later-fater. I need to maintain inventory. Everything accounted for. That's what Suresh advise.”

This year, the husband hire accountant for first time. One of the men he play cards with every Thursday become his new accountant. He feel very prideful about this. It make him feel like real Am'rican businessman, I think. Now everything is Suresh-says-this and Suresh-says-that. I not liking Suresh. I not liking any of the mens who my husband friend.

“I gave it to Bobby,” I say. I turn my back to Rekha, so she cannot hear.

Husband raise right eyebrow. “Who Bobby?”

I feel dirty, having the husband say Bobby name. But he want answer. “Our best customer. He come every Thursday. He moving to the California. So I give gift.”

Husband slap his head, like killing a fly. “Oh, you stupid. Who give gift to non-returning customer? You trying to bankrupt me or what?”

Behind me, I hear Rekha giggle. Chu-chu-chu, she sound, like mouse. My face feel hot as the iron. “You chup,” I say to her. “Ears like open sewers you is having. Listening to other people's business.”

Rehka get look of Hindi film heroine when she kidnap by villain. “Bhaiya,” she say to my husband. “This is so unjust.” Bhaiya, she call him, means brother. But way she look at him, not like sister at all.

Husband say nothing to Rekha. He only looking and looking at me, as if he seeing something on my face he not before see. “Lakshmi,” he say quietly. “You thirty-two-year-old woman. Why you acting like some stupid teenage girl? Now, please, go faata-faat and wait on customer. We have job to finish.”

I feel the tears in my eyes. But I am not crying when Rekha can see. In six years in Am'rica, I learn one trick—how to cry without tears. In my village, in the arms of my mother, I use to cry like baby. If I don't come first in my class, I cry. If Dada talk angry to Shilpa, I cry. If village children tease Mithai the elephant, I cry. When Ma get sick and I have to leaf my school in eight standard, I cry and cry till Ma joke we not needing monsoon that year. But in Am'rica, I cry from inside. Like singing song without moving your lips.

But now, as all pills are in the row, I don't feel sad. I feel relief. In Hindi film they always write letter when heroine do the suicide. But no one for me to write. Shilpa, I don't know address for. Better if Dada not knowing. The husband be upset for two-three days and then he hire new help for restaurant. Nobody here to miss me. Maybe Rekha miss me more than anyone.

At last minute, I get the husband's whiskey bottle and put on coffee table. The husband will be more angry over loss of whiskey than loss of wife. I smile to myself for making the joke. But inside the smile is thousand hot needles. Because in making joke, I making the truth, also.

I have never tasted daru before. Dada say good girls never drink the daru. But I pour some in glass now and drinks. Yah, bhagavan. It is like swallowing the burning matchstick. Maybe no need for pills, this alone kill me. But I swallow three My Grain tablets. I sit for a minute, looking at clock. Husband home from card game in two hours. Is the dying happening yet? Nothing happening, just room moving or I moving. Muscle pain medicine bottle is heavy in my hand. I pours out many tablets in my hand, like a maharaja pouring gold coins. I feel rich. I fills big glass of water and then swallow six or eight tablets. Then I drinks a little more of husband's whiskey. It tasting so bitter, I wonder if this is what making husband bitter all the time.

The room is going fast, like merry-go-round at the village fair. I pour more tablets into my hand but the hand so shaky that many falling on coffee table and then on floor. I don't care. I feeling lazy, happylike. I just swallows more pills. I knowing now that I am dying. I tries to think of my Shilpa's face, tries to remember her laugh, what her hands look like. I knows I should say the prayer, ask God for pardon for sin I am doing, but I don't. God seem very, very far away now. I wants Shilpa's name to be last name on my lips, my sister's face to be the last face I see before I am leaving this cold, empty life forever and ever.

S
HE WAS ALMOST
out the door when the phone rang. Dr. Margaret Bose groaned to herself as she glanced at the clock. Quarter to five on Friday and she was on her way to meet with Peter for a drink. Since they were meeting in Homerville, it would take at least a half hour to get there, and she was already late.

“Bose,” she answered shortly.

“Maggie? Am I glad you're still here.” It was her boss, Dr. Richard Cummings, head of the psychiatric unit. “Need to talk to you about a patient. You got a minute?”

“Actually, I was about to leave, Richard. Can this wait till next week?”

“Actually, it can't. We have a late admission. Came in directly from ER. Hard case. Immigrant woman. Attempted suicide. I can't get her to say a word. Husband says she understands English, but you could've fooled me.”

Maggie wanted to cry with frustration. Sudhir was out of town only until Tuesday, and she had spent all week looking forward to seeing Peter Weiss again, ever since he'd phoned her on Monday and casually asked her out today, as if simply picking up a dropped conversation, as if he had not disappeared from her life three years ago with barely a goodbye.

“Can't Wayne see her?” she asked. “As I said, I was almost out the—”

“He tried. He can't even get her to look at him. Like I said, it's a tough case.”

Despite her disappointment at having to cancel with Peter, Maggie was flattered. She felt a stab of self-hatred for being so susceptible to Cummings's flattery, after all these years.

She realized he was waiting for her to reply. She sighed heavily, cupping her hand over the mouthpiece as she did so. “Okay, give me five minutes to get there. What room is she in?”

“Room 745. Thanks, Maggie. See you Monday.”

“Okay.”

“Oh, Maggie? One other thing. For what it's worth, she's Indian. Just letting you know. In case, you know, it's helpful or anything. See ya.”

Of course. That was the real reason Cummings had asked her to help out—because she was married to Sudhir. She should've known that after all these years of working at the hospital, of being the best goddamn psychologist on his staff, when Cummings saw her, he still saw a black woman married to an Indian immigrant who taught at the university. God, how she hated working in this lily-white town. What did Cummings expect her to do—walk into the patient's room and announce, “Hey, guess what? We're both married to Indian guys. So you can trust me, sister”? Did white people presume some primal solidarity between all people of color? Would Cummings be disappointed if she and the patient weren't soon bonding over cups of tea and trading recipes for samosas while watching Bollywood videos?

“Whoa, whoa,” Maggie said to herself. “Where is all this hostility coming from? Cummings is a good guy, remember?” She and Sudhir had socialized with Cummings dozens of times, and she had never detected any of the reductiveness she was accusing him of now.

But she knew the answer to her question even as she posed it—felt the answer deep within, where a spitball of disappointment lodged pungent and hot. Peter. She had so looked forward to having dinner with Peter. Ever since she'd heard that he was back in town, had been rehired as a visiting professor of photography at the university, had returned from whichever war-torn or famine-struck country he had visited most recently, she had debated whether to get in touch with him, whether to risk finding out if the passion that had flared so unexpectedly between them during his last time here was still alive. Her better angels had won. She had reminded herself how close to the edge of infidelity she had walked three years ago and told herself that choosing the sweet comfort of her marriage to Sudhir had been the right thing to do. So she had not acted on the knowledge of Peter being back, knowing that sooner or later she would run into him—it was a small campus, after all—anticipating and dreading that moment when she'd find herself face-to-face with him, at a faculty concert, perhaps, or on the bike path, or at a party. She had told herself that she would not be taken in by him this time—by that easy, relaxed gait, the lopsided grin, those green eyes that flitted restlessly in a face as malleable as clay, eyes that moved from one thing to another, restless, probing, watching everybody, always a little distant, a little guarded, always the observer. A photographer's eyes. Which was why she'd been so unprepared three years ago when those eyes had landed on her face and then stayed there, intent, focused, and lost some of their usual critical distance; they'd softened, and Peter had smiled, smiled so slightly that only she had noticed, not his usual one-sided grimace but a real smile that had made her flush violently.

Five days later, she had found herself in his arms, feeling his tongue deep inside her mouth, allowing his hands to hold her breasts, feeling the kind of surrender, the abdication, the setting down of a weight, that she had never felt with Sudhir. Like she was no longer responsible for her own breasts, for her own bones, her own will. She would not have expected it to be a good feeling, this loss of control, but it was, liberating and peaceful. And sexy. She had looked at Peter's big white hands, capable hands, hands that wielded a camera lens as skillfully as they were now handling her, hands that had pitched tents in the desert, changed tires on the side of dusty highways, handed bribes to informants in distant countries, turned over corpses in the killing fields. Sudhir was a whiz at math, but if a faucet leaked in their bathroom, it was Maggie who had to fix it. If they had a flat tire, he was as helpless as a baby while they waited for AAA to arrive. Maggie knew that in his lack of handiness, Sudhir was typical of Indian men of his class, and she had never held his ineptitude against him, had even found it endearing. But being in Peter's arms, knowing her body was being expertly manipulated and enjoying the manipulation, she felt for the first time a sense of loss. Not that there was anything wrong with Sudhir's lovemaking. It was just that Sudhir in bed was Sudhir in the world—quiet, efficient, competent, with no drama. He would never lose himself in bed because he never lost himself in the world. Whereas Peter was roaming her body with the eagerness of an explorer mapping a new continent. So it was with the deepest of regrets that Maggie had told Peter to stop.

A paperweight slipped from Maggie's desk, and she moved her foot out of the way with a small cry. Shit. She hadn't seen Peter in three years and already she was acting like some fool schoolgirl. This was why she'd never taken it any further with Peter, unable to bear the intensity of her passion.