Traveling with Spirits (14 page)

  “Your mother must be very proud.”

  “She was a wonderful woman, who died too young of a broken heart. And afterwards I had no reason to stay in that godforsaken country. I couldn’t remain in Texas. India seemed the ‘logical’ choice,” he says.

  They sip tepid tea in silence. Raul taps his foot against the wooden table leg. He seems to expect her to say—or ask—something.

  “Your father, you have no idea where they took him?”

  “Back to Mendoza, I always imagine.”

  “Oh?”

  “They tossed them from planes, you know. I can just picture the bastards flying back to Papa’s beloved mountains and then ‘releasing’ him there.”

  “Oh, Raul, no,” she automatically puts her hand over his. It’s warm and she feels blood ruggling through the tangled veins.

  “I must not torture you with my grisly imagination,” he lowers his voice.

  “You’re the one who is tortured.” Where is she going with this? Walking onto Lake Calhoun before the ice has frozen over. “And talking about your grief, well, that’s what friends are for.”

  “Friends,” he regards her dolefully. “I’m not a person with many friends.” He gulps the last of his tea and stands. “I wasn’t, as you say, socialized properly. I didn’t learn the ways of normal, happy children.”

  Monica holds her tongue. Her own girlhood pain is nothing compared to his loss. Still, she’s a little piqued that he assumes her passage has been simple.

  “Thank you for the conversation.” He turns. “I wish you pleasant dreams.”

  “Good night. Sleep well,” she whispers.

  He nods, waves on the way to the door.

  Understanding that he prefers to walk to the residence alone, she lingers at the table. What a story. What a life.

*****

  Her phone rings at one the morning. Who would call at this time? Has Jeanne had another car wreck?

  “Hello, Monica?”

  “Hello,” she hesitates. “Ashok.”

  “Yes, oh, my god, did I wake you? I’m so sorry. I’m calling from Madison and I didn’t really think through the time properly. Oh, no.”

  “It’s fine,” she laughs, amused by her apologetic, absent-minded friend. “I was just getting up. How is the conference?”

  “Grand. My paper went over well. But I was thinking of you,” he pauses.

  She waits.

  “Well, this is the weekend I was planning to visit you in Moorty.”

  “Yes,” she says vaguely.

  “So I was thinking about you,” he stammers. “Because this was, well, going to be our weekend.”

 
Our weekend
is all she can hear.

  “Monica, are you OK? Have you fallen back to sleep?”

  This feels like a dream. Our weekend. She’s fully awake now and thoroughly tongue-tied. He’s calling from the States. Her heart races.

  “So,” he continues gamely, “I decided to call you from your country. I don’t know, it was a silly notion.”

  “No, a lovely idea,” she finds her voice. “Very thoughtful. Tell me about the conference, about your panel.”

  He describes the meeting, his observations about Madison, the weather.

  “Ah, yes, July in the Upper Midwest, a soggy time.”

  “You forgive me for running off like this?”

  “Of course.” She tried not to think of Dad. This was just a weekend.

  “I’d like to come in November, if that works for you.”

  “Yes. It will be snowing.”

  “I’ll bring warm clothes, Doctor, so I don’t catch a chill,” he laughs.     “Tell me how things are at the hospital? With your friend Sudha?”

  As Monica talks, she savors this simple conversation with, well, a good friend. She hopes he’s more than that. And she imagines how Sudha will tease her.

*****

  Sudha has promised a fête. The
mela
is crammed into a huge tent. It’s almost possible to forget this site was an empty lot between the Tasty Bite Café and the derelict liquor outlet last week. Today Sudha and Monica are surrounded by a cheerful yellow canvas. Stalls display brilliant tie-dyed scarves from Rajasthan; pink and white pearls from Bangalore;
khadi
from the Punjab; appliqué from Orissa;
ikat
from Andra Pradesh.

  “This is the ideal place to buy presents for my trip to Delhi.” She thinks about those lovely farewell tokens. “So many gorgeous fabrics.”

  “You are from England?” the woman in the purple sari asks as she wraps Monica’s silk scarf in brown paper.

  “No,” she’s slightly taken aback. Sometimes she forgets how much she stands out. “I am from the U.S.”

  “Welcome to our country.”

  “Thank you.”

  Sudha draws her to a stall of Kashmiri shawls. “I told you the
mela
would be fantastic.” She’s glowing. “This shawl would suit you nicely in that Tundra of yours.”

  “Trying to get rid of me again?” Monica teases.

  “Or for your friend Beata? You’re always saying how she hates cold winds.”

  “Did I tell you Beata is coming at Christmas now?”

  “Yes, she went off to California with that boyfriend for a summer holiday. Imagine choosing California over India.”

  “Florida,” Monica smiles. “Indeed, what possessed her to follow her heart? The guy does seem perfect for her.”

  “
Perfect
. Dangerous word.”

  She’s grinning, pleased that Sudha and Beata almost know each other, often ask after one another. She can’t wait until December when they all have supper together.

  “Look, look at these dolls from Haryana,” calls Sudha threading her way through the bargainers to the other side of the aisle.

  “Cute. I like the one carrying wood on her head.”

  “A worker doll.” Sudha lifts the wooden doll in the air. “I can see how you would be drawn to a worker doll. But for Meenakshi, I think I will choose the one holding a baby. My niece is a traditional child.” Sudha’s arms are filled with gifts and she’s still eagerly looking around.

  “Sometimes, my friend, you’re like a child yourself. We need to rest. Have lunch. A carbohydrate pick-up.”

  “You think I’ll grow faint under the weight of all this fun?”

  “
I
am growing faint. Under the weight of hours. It’s 2 p.m.; I ate breakfast at dawn.”

  “OK. OK. I’ll repress my consumerist weakness for the sake of your stomach.”

  Taking several of Sudha’s packages, Monica shakes her head. “You could use a porter.”

  “Thanks.” Sudha turns left and cries, “Oh, we must!”

  Monica sees nothing but a bindi stall and, next to that, an old woman at a card table.

  “Our fortunes,” Sudha exclaims. “I haven’t heard my fortune told since I was twelve.”

  “I can tell your fortune.” Monica shakes her head. “Tomorrow over dinner you’ll complain about having spent too much. Come, let’s get something to eat.”

  “No, really, we must do this.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “Maybe my student was right. Maybe you Americans are not a spiritual people.”

  She’s tempted to laugh, then realizes she knows nothing about Sudha’s history with fortune tellers. And what harm can it do?

  “OK, but you owe me one.”

  “Sorry?”

  “An American saying.”

  The old woman purrs softly to herself. Her pale skin is almost the color of her ivory sari. She doesn’t seem to register their presence.

  Sudha greets her, “
Namaste
.”

  She peers through clouded eyes, offers “
Namaste
,” and motions for them to sit.

  Monica perches on the edge of a rough wooden bench.

  Sudha settles her packages on the dirt floor, then joins Monica on the bench. She leans forward fixedly.

  Loud, raucous music intrudes from the carnival, just outside the tent. Monica finds herself oddly drawn to the rollercoaster, remembering flying high over the State Fair with Jeanne, holding her once impetuous sister in her seat as the red metal car swayed wildly from side to side. Jeanne shivered while the other kids squealed in delight.

  “Do you have a question for me?” the old woman inquires feebly.

  “Yes,” Sudha’s face lights up. “Will a professor come to visit my friend?”

  “Oh, no, no,” Monica cringes.

  “Your hand,” the woman urges.

  She extends her left palm. What if Sister Catherine or Father Freitas wanders through the
mela
now?

  “You must relax,” the psychic instructs.

  She inhales slowly. The woman doesn’t examine her palm. Rather she holds her wrist and resumes humming. Of course, how could a nearly blind person read palms?

  The woman’s voice is hoarse, low. “I see a man from Delhi, running for a train.”

  Sudha elbows Monica on her right arm.

  “Yes, he is catching it. Heading to the mountains. And…” She raises her venerable head, sighing and staring past her into the middle distance.

  “And?” Sudha implores.

  “No, that’s it.” She purses her lips. “That’s all I see.”

  “Thanks.” Relieved, Monica slips a coin into the chipped blue bowl.

  “And now your friend?”

  Sudha speaks up quickly. “Will we find a benefactor to fix the windows at the school?” She presents the woman with her right wrist.

  Once again the psychic shuts her eyes and hums. Then halts. A frown crosses her forehead. “Would you repeat the question? Slowly? I must hear your voice again.”

  Puzzled, Sudha repeats her query about the windows.

  The old woman hums, squeezing Sudha’s wrist tighter, her weird noises resonating louder. She releases the wrist saying, “Unexpected benefactors will appear.”

  Sudha grins, and drops ten rupees in the bowl. “Thank you.” She turns to go.

  “Before you leave,” the fortune teller sing-songs, seeming to recover her sight so thoroughly she can see through them. “You are friends?”

  “Yes,” Sudha says.

  Monica wants to escape, to ride the roller coaster, to eat lunch, to take a nap.

  “Come, then—one hand in each other’s.”

  Sudha sits again, eagerly extending her wrist.

  Monica complies stiffly.

  The woman grips their wrists for a long time, so long, Monica thinks her arm will go to sleep.

  “Please close your eyes, both of you.”

  Really! Monica fidgets on the bench. As a child she learned clairvoyants were like ministers and rabbis, people to be avoided lest she contravene the First Commandment about false religions. Still, this is a simple game to humor Sudha.

  “Please quiet your minds.”

  The woman begins to hum again.

  A vibration travels up Monica’s arm from the shoulder. This is just too silly.

  More purring.

  “I see,” she manages breathily. “One of you will rest in a high place.” Gradually, she releases their wrists.

  “What high place?” demands Sudha. “What do you mean, rest?”

  The woman shakes her head. “That is all.”

  Sudha puts ten more rupees in the bowl.

  “But which one of us?” Sudha demands.

  “I have nothing more.”

  Sudha reaches for the money, but the woman deftly slips the coins into a purse.

  “
Al Vidah
!” their fortune teller calls after them.

*****

  The waiter brings a bottle of mineral water and two glasses.

  “You were right,” Sudha says crossly. “Silly superstition. A waste of money.”

  “Maybe she was predicting one of us will go to Heaven,” Monica jokes.

  “OK,” she says. “Clearly it’s you. I don’t believe in the place. You’re going to Heaven. Advance congratulations.”

   “I could have told you that.” Monica smiles. “On a more serious note, you do have the wrong impression about Ashok and me. We’re just friends. We share an interest in each other’s country.”

  “Of course.”

  “Really. Sometimes I think he’ll return to the U.S. He loved grad school there.”

  “That’s not the only American thing he loves.”

  “Sudha, you’re incorrigible.”

  “Since she’s obviously right about you going to Heaven, I guess I can count on my benefactor and on the chance to meet Ashok and evaluate this relationship for myself. You heard her. He’ll catch that train.”

  Monica sips her water, examining the menu.

THIRTEEN

January, 1995, Minnesota

  Monica tucks herself at a corner table, looking out the restaurant window at buses trundling down snowy Hennepin Avenue and studying the white flakes landing in the dark night on vehicles, on heavy coated people hidden in caps, gloves and boots. The way these street lamps momentarily light up the flakes makes her nostalgic for a childhood which, if it wasn’t blissful, was relatively safe and comfortable.

*****

  Dad used to drive these buses. Maybe she expects a bus door to yawn open at the restaurant stop. To see his mop of blond hair, finely featured face, blue eyes igniting.

  “Step on little lady,” Tim Murphy would say. “Do your parents know you’re traveling alone on a bus?”

  She’d perch on a forward bench, kitty-corner to her father as he adroitly steered the huge vehicle in and out of lanes, rolling past Lagoon and Lake and 31st Streets, turning a careful left at the cemetery and then a quick right on Dupont. When a regular passenger boarded, he’d introduce his “beautiful daughter,” bragging about her school grades.

  She loved the winter smell of wet wool, the parade of colorful coats and jackets.

  He was host to all those traveling spirits. She assisted in the hospitality. Tim Murphy’s bright and beautiful older daughter.

  Suddenly, after years of contented Saturday afternoons—their special time together with the guests—different adventures beckoned: homework, shopping and girl gossip. When she caught the bus—once a month at most—he seemed happy to see her. Yet, he was growing distracted, too.

  Then one day the gallant chauffeur disappeared. Vanished.

  Leaving Mom.

  Abandoning Jeanne and Monica, too. Journeyed out to the Lady Rancher in Wyoming. An exotic, improbable, excruciating ending.