The effect is charming, even I must admit this. From the look in his eyes, Raven seems to agree.
“Excuse me, you understand English? Our office, they’re having a potluck, we’re each supposed to bring something ethnic, you know, from our culture, make it ourselves. We didn’t have a clue.” She smiles an ingenuous smile. “Maybe you can help us?”
That word help. I cannot steel myself against it. I put aside my annoyance to think. It’s a challenge, to find a party dish simple enough so they couldn’t ruin it in fixing.
“Maybe you can do vegetable pulao” I say at last. I tell her how it’s cooked, the water measured and boiled, the Basmati soaked just the right amount of time, the kesar sprinkled in, the peas, the roasted cashews and fried onions for garnish. I list the spices: clove, cardamom, cinnamon, a pinch of sugar. Ghee. Maybe a dusting of black pepper.
She looks a little doubtful but she is game. She takes copious notes in a little gold-edged pad with a matching pencil. Her friends smother giggles as they look over her shoulder.
I tell them where to find the ingredients. Watch them wander toward the back of the store, all sway and undulation. Raven too is watching. Appreciatively, I think. There is a pricking like pins in the center of my chest.
“Quite amazing,” he says, “how women can balance themselves on heels no thicker than pencil points.”
“Not all women,” I say wryly.
He smiles, squeezes my hand. “Hey. You can do things these girls couldn’t in a hundred years.” The pinpricks begin to fade.
“You’re authentic in a way they’ll never be,” he adds. Authentic. A curious word to use. “What do you mean, authentic?” I ask.
“You know, real. Real Indian.”
I know he means it as a compliment. Still, it bothers me. Raven, despite their fizzy laughter, their lipstick and lace, the bougainvillea girls are in their way as Indian as I. And who is to say which of us is more real.
I am about to tell him this when one of them calls, “Help, we can’t find the cardamom.”
“That’s because we don’t know what it looks like,” says another. They laugh at the delicious humor of it, that such arcane knowledge should be expected of them.
I am about to go back there but “Let me get it,” says Raven. He disappears behind the shelves—for a long time, it seems. More laughter flits through the store, flocks of swallows. I gouge the countertop with a thumbnail, force myself not to follow.
Finally they are back, Raven carrying packets and sacks. Cans. They have bought enough to feed the entire office ten times over.
“You were so helpful,” one says. She looks up at Raven from under her lashes. “The crispy papads and mango nectar will go great with the pulao.”
“Yeah, and it was a great idea to buy enough so we could practice at home before the party,” says another, training a brilliant smile on him.
The third bougainvillea girl, the one in the silk blouse, puts a hand on his arm. Bright as a blackbird’s, her eyes take in his high cheekbones, his trim waist, the firm muscles of arm and thigh, “I know what,” she says, “you can come and be our taster. Tell us if we did it right.”
“No, no.” But he is grinning, quite at ease with all this attention. In his manner I see how many beautiful women have invited him thus, and perhaps how many he has accepted.
Unaware of the blister of heat building inside my skull, he nods at me. “She’s the expert, she’s the one you should be calling.”
She of the lacy bra dismisses his suggestion with a flicker of lashes. “Here’s my card,” she smiles, scribbling something on the back and putting it into his hand. I see her fingers brush his, lazy, deliberate. “Call me if you change your mind.”
The heat blister bursts. When the swirl of steam has settled I see clearly what I will do.
He helps them out with their sack of purchases. Closes the car door solicitously, gives a last friendly wave.
Raven you are no different from other men, pulled by the high arch of a foot, the curve of a hip, the way a diamond shines moistly against a woman’s silkskin throat.
He is leaning over the counter now as though there had been no interruption, reaching for my hands again. “Tilo, dear one, what do you say?”
I draw my hands back out of his reach. Busy them with busywork, folding tidying dusting clean.
“Tilo, answer me.”
“Come back tomorrow night,” I say. “After the shop closes. I will give you your answer then.”
I watch him all the way to the door. Smooth spring of step, soft glint of hair, under his clothing the glide of his goldriver body. There is a wrenching in my heart.
O my American, if youth and beauty is what you want, the joy of what you can see what you can touch, I will give you your fill. I will draw on the powers of the spices to fulfill your deepest fantasies about my land.
And then I will leave you.
When I look down at my gnarled hands I find I have torn to bits the card the girl gave to Raven. Which he chose (but why) to leave behind.
On its own shelf in the inner room sits makaradwaj, king among spices. Has sat all this time, certain in the knowledge that I will one day come. Sooner, later. Days months years. It does not matter to makaradwaj who is the conqueror of time.
I take the long thin vial in my hand, hold it till it grows warm.
Makaradwaj I am here as once you predicted, I Tilo for whom time is running out. I Tilo ready to break the final, most sacred rule of all.
What, asks makaradwaj.
Makaradwaj who knows my answer, why must you make me say it.
But the spice waits in silence until.
Make me beautiful, makaradwaj, such beauty as on this earth never was. Beauty a hundred times more than he can imagine. For one night so that his skin will dazzle, his fingertips be branded with it for always. So that never again will he be with another woman without remembrance and regret.
The laughter of the spice is low and deep, but not unkind.
Ah Tilo.
I know I am wrong to ask this for myself. I will not pretend repentance, I will not act shame. I will say to you with my head high that this is my desire, give or withhold it as you may.
Do you desire it more than you desired us on the island, that day when you would have thrown yourself off the granite cliffs had the First Mother said no.
Spices why must you always compare. Each desire in the world is different, as is each love. You who were born in the world’s dawning know this far better than I.
Answer.
Weigh it yourself: To him I will give one night, to you the rest of my life, whatever you choose it to be, one hundred years on the island or a single moment, conflagration and consuming, in Shampati’s fire.
As I speak the last of my doubts fall away, the last of my hopes. I see my future distinct in the vial’s glow. What I cannot have. And I accept.
Tilo it was never for you, the ordinary human love, the ordinary human life.
My answer has satisified. The spice speaks no more. The vial is hot now in my hands, its contents melting. I raise it to my lips.
And hear the Old One’s long-ago voice: “Makaradwaj most potent of the changing spices must be handled with most respect. To do otherwise can bring madness, or death. Whatever a person weighs, measure out one thousandth of it, mix in milk and amla fruit. It must be sipped slow, one spoon an hour, over three nights and days.”
I drink it all at once, I who in three nights and days will be gone who knows where.
The jolt of it hits me first in the throat, like a bullet, a burning such as I have never felt before. My neck is exploding, my gullet, all the way to my stomach. And my head, expanding, a giant balloon, then shrinking to a nugget of iron. I am lying on the floor. The nausea pulses out of me like blood from a torn artery. My fingers are stiff and splayed, my body bends and buckles beyond my will’s controlling.
Tilo too confident, who thought you could absorb the poison like Shiva of the blu
e throat, who have risked all for nothing, die now.
For nothing. That thought is the hardest to take.
But wait, the pain is less now, enough that I can breathe in gasps. Through it I feel a different sensation, deep in the body, a shifting, a tightening. A reknitting of bones. Makaradwaj doing its work.
And a voice: By tomorrow night Tilo, you will be at beauty’s summit. Enjoy well. For by next morning it will be gone.
Ah spices, why should I worry about the next morning. By then will I too not be gone.
And will you be happy going, or will you come to us with your heart stained with the colors of regret.
For myself I have no regrets, I say. And almost believe my words.
But, I add. There are two left in my care whom I have not helped. I cannot go in peace unless I know the end of their story.
Ah, the boy, the woman. But their story has only begun. It is yours that is ending.
I understand. But though I have no right to request this, I want to see them one last time.
More wishes, Tilo? Have you not already asked your final desire?
Please.
We shall see, say the spices, their voice indulgent, knowing they have won.
My last day dawns heartbreaking-bright, the sky colored palest indigo, the air smelling of roses, though how in this city I do not know. I lie on my thin mattress a while, afraid to look, but then I hold up my hands. The knotted knuckles are gone, the fingers are long and tapered. Not yet fully young but growing toward it.
I release my breath in a great sigh. Spices I apologize that until now I had not dared to hope.
O you who are young, you will never know the delight with which I rise from bed, how the simple act of stretching these newly middle-aged arms upward makes me giddy with forbidden pleasure.
I shower, running my hands over my body, feeling it grow firmer even as I touch. I let my wet hair fall over my face, half darkness, half light.
Already this. By night how much more.
Impatient Tilo, put aside night thoughts. First there is a full day’s work to be done.
I pull back my hair in a no-nonsense coil, pull on my American dress from Sears. I open the front door to tape up the LAST DAY sign.
On my doorstep, a bunch of them, spilling red velvet. Roses the color of virgin blood. Until tonight, says the note.
I gather them tight to me. Even the thorns are a pleasure. I will place them in a jar on the counter. All day we will look at each other and smile our secret.
News of the sale has traveled. The store is busy as never before, the cash register rings without pause, my fingers (younger, younger) are tired from punching buttons. The register drawer grows full. When it can hold no more I stuff the money into a grocery sack and smile at the irony of it, I Tilo to whom these banknotes are of no more use than dead leaves.
I would have given it all for free, for affection’s sake. But it is not allowed.
“What’s happening?” the customers ask over and over, eager for a story.
I tell them only that the old woman is closing the shop for health reasons. Yes, something sudden. No, not so serious, not to worry. I am her niece, helping out this last day.
“Say good-bye to her for us. Say thanks for all her help. Say we will always remember her.”
I am moved by the warmth in their voices. Even though I know that what they say, what they believe, is an illusion. Because in time all things are forgotten. Still, I imagine them walking this street next month, next year, pointing. “There once was a woman here. Her eyes like a magnet-rock drew out your deepest secret,” they say to their children. “Ah, what-all she could do with spices. Listen carefully.”
And they tell my story.
Late in the afternoon he comes slowgaited, Geeta’s grandfather pausing to catch his breath.
“Is still hurting a bit, didi, but I had to come to thank you, to tell what hap—”
He stops in midword, scowls at me. Keeps scowling even after my explanation.
“How can she leave us like this? It is not right.”
“She doesn’t always have control. Sometimes she must do as she’s told.”
“But she has so many powers, she could—”
“No,” I say. “That’s not why the powers are given. You in the wisdom of your age should know that.”
“Wisdom,” He gives a wry smile, then grows serious. “But I am needing to let her know things.”
“I’ll make sure she knows them.”
He frowns distrustfully, adjusting his glasses, Geeta’s grandfather, all the enjoyment taken from his tale.
“Did Geeta return to your house last night?”
His head jerks up. “How are you knowing this?”
“My aunt told me. She said to watch for you, you might come.”
He stares a long moment. Finally he says, “Yes. She came back with Ramu. Her mother is so happy that late at night she is cooking all over again, mustard fish, cholar dal with coconut, all Geeta’s favorites. We all sit around the table and talk, even I, because I have taken the medicine and feel better, though unfortunately I cannot still eat.” He clicks his tongue at the thought, all that good food gone to waste. “Anyway, everyone is being very happy and very careful, talking of jobs and movies and cousins back in India, not to get any more anger going, I most of all. Your aunt will be proud how I am holding my tongue, not asking this or that, only making comment about American political news.
“Then just before we get up to wash our hands Ramu says Well maybe you should ask your young man to come over for a visit. And Geeta very quiet says If you wish Daddy. Ramu says Mind you don’t take this as permission, and Geeta says I know. And that’s all. Each goes into their bedroom but smiling.”
He looks up, that smile still caught in the folds of his face.
“I am so happy for them,” I say. “For you too.”
“That father-daughter, so alike, so proud. I’m sure they are having many more fights.”
“As long as they don’t forget the love,” I say.
“I will remind.” He taps his chest proudly.
“Without too many words, my aunt told me to tell you. And here, she said you were to have all the brahmi oil in the store. Keep your head cool, she said. No, no, it’s a farewell gift from her.”
He watches me wrap the bottles in newspaper, place them in a sack. “So she’s really not going to come back.”
“I don’t think so. But who knows what the future holds.” I strive to keep my voice light, though sorrow swells in my throat.
“You have her eyes,” he says as he turns to go. “I did not realize all this time they are so beautiful.”
He does not ask more, this spectacled old man who sees deeper than many with perfect vision. Nor do I offer. It is our unspoken pact.
“Tell her,” he says, “I am wishing her all happiness. I am saying a prayer for her.”
“Thank you,” I say. “She is much in need of prayers.”
But look who comes into my store now, a young woman I’ve never seen, her skin the clean dark of a plum, her crinkly hair caught in a hundred tiny braids, a smile like fresh-baked bread.
“Wow, this is neat. I’ve never been in here.”
She is offering me something, an envelope. I hesitate and then, by her sky-color uniform and carry-bag, the curve-beaked bird on her armband, I know. She is the mailwoman.
“My very first letter,” I say, taking it in wonder. I glance at the handwriting, but it is not known to me. “You just get here?”
“No. In fact I’m about to leave.” I want to confide more in this friendly-faced woman, but what can I say that she—that anyone—would understand.
“It’s my last day,” I tell her finally. “I’m glad I got a letter on my last day.”
“I’m glad for you too. It took a while because this person didn’t have a zip. No return address neither, or else they’d have sent it back. See.”
I look where she’s pointing, but my eyes
stray to the name on the letter.
Mataji.
Only one person has ever called me that.
My lungs have forgotten how to breathe. My heart hammers so hard surely it will break my body into pieces. The edges of the day curl into burned brown.
“This letter means a lot to me,” I say. “Thank you for bringing it.”
Blindly I grope through the brown air to find something to give her. Return with a bag of golden raisins, kismis for energy that endures.
“From my country. A gift.”
“Thanks, that’s real sweet of you.”
She is looking through her bag. For what? Why does she take so long? When will she leave so I can open the letter?
Then it strikes me that she too wishes to give something. She finds it, hands it to me.
Thin silver rectangles all tied together with green paper, soft to the touch. The sweet fresh scent of mint rising.
“Chewing gum,” she says at my questioning look. “Thought you might like it. Something from America, you know, for your journey.”
I hope she sees it in my eyes before she goes, my appreciation for this unasked gift, I Tilo who for once cannot think of what to say.
At the door sunshine catches on her face, as it did so long ago for Ahuja’s wife.
I lock the door behind her. I need to give this letter my full attention, all the words and in between.
I unwrap a stick of gum, fold it into my mouth. The generous sweetness on my tongue gives me the courage to read.
Mataji,
Namaste.
I don’t have your full address so I don’t know if this letter will ever get to you, but I have heard the U.S. postal system is a good one, so I will hope. Because I want so much for you to know.
I am not at home anymore. I am in another city, though I am not allowed to say where for safety reasons.
All this happened one week ago although I have thought and thought of it for months.