22
S
amir stood there frozen, as if his feet were nailed to the concrete, so still Mili didn’t think he would ever move again. She walked around him and faced him. His eyes were glazed over with such pain it took all her strength not to stroke his face, not to wrap her arms around him. He looked like she had taken an axe and hacked through to the center of his chest. All the color bled out of his bronze tan, all the life bled out of his limbs. They hung motionless by his sides. She slipped his laptop bag off his shoulder, reached into the flap, and removed his keys. He didn’t move, he didn’t even look at her, but he let her take his arm and lead him to the car.
At the best of times Samir drove like he was flying. But today he was racing something. Today he was trying to outrun each spot he was in. Get out, get away, get past. His entire being was focused on moving. Mili was sure it had nothing to do with getting where they were going and everything with just moving from where they were.
She had punched the address into his GPS, a routine they had fallen into on their drive to the wedding. They had driven for an hour and he hadn’t looked at her once. He hadn’t said one word to her since she had pushed him into the car and shut the door behind him and then fitted herself into the seat next to him. The waves of anger rising from him were as palpable as the silence between them. The pain on his face almost made her regret what she had done.
Almost. Because deep inside she knew what she had done was right. She also knew without a doubt that this was exactly what Samir needed and she wanted him to have it. She realized suddenly that she wanted him to have everything. From the deepest part of her heart she wanted him to be happy. She hated that he was not. It wasn’t like he wasn’t capable of happiness. It was almost as if he held himself away from it just the slightest bit.
He felt undeserving of it, mistrustful of it, and the unfairness of that made her want to shake some sense into his stubborn head. The kindness inside him, his generosity, was beyond anything she had ever encountered. Even after she had told him she wanted nothing from him but his friendship, she had leaned on him far more than any friend had the right to and he had let her. Her own hypocrisy, her stupidity, baffled her. What kind of idiot doesn’t see what’s right in front of her face? No matter what she felt for him. No matter how different their worlds were, one thing she knew was that she was done pushing him away.
Samir jammed his foot into the accelerator and sped along like the madman he had turned into. Next to him Mili sat in complete silence, her fingers clutching the leather seat. She was trying to not let her terror show on her face, but as usual the canvas of her face painted each and every one of her feelings in vivid color. Good. At least that fucking pity was gone. He wanted her to talk to him, so he could put her in her place, blow her to shreds, ask her to shut up.
Suddenly the most horrible thought struck him. “Mili?”
She sat up straight but she didn’t respond.
“If you’re lying to me about the dying thing, I’m going to kill you.”
“What kind of person do you think I am, Samir?” She had the gall to sound hurt.
“Just the kind of person who would make up something like this to get me to do what she thought I needed to do.”
She squirmed in her seat but even she couldn’t argue with that. “You’re right, I would. But I’m not lying, Samir. I’m sorry.” She reached out and touched his arm. When he didn’t yank it away like he wanted to, she wrapped her arm around his and sidled up to him. And he knew without the shadow of a doubt that she wasn’t lying.
She held on to him like that until they pulled into a muddy farm lane that cut through fields and led to a small cottage.
Behind the cottage loomed a huge red barn.
Everything inside Samir went cold. He stopped the car right there in the middle of the gravel road, raising a cloud of dust around them. The entire sweeping sight in front of him: blue sky, red barn, yellow house, green grass—it was all washed in gray shades of twilight. But Samir’s mind colored it in, painting it with colors from another time, colors that were buried under his skin. And the force with which they rose to the surface sucked everything out of him. He sat drained of all feeling, unable to move forward, his arms and legs numb with cold.
When Mili tightened her hold on his arm, he realized he wasn’t alone.
“I can’t do it, Mili. I don’t want to. It doesn’t mean anything.”
She didn’t respond. His words hung in the air. Her hand moved up and down, the gentlest strokes. He removed it from his arm, but he couldn’t let it go. He held it in his lap, clutched it like his life depended on it. Stupid, weak bastard.
“You shouldn’t have done this. You had no right.” Now he couldn’t turn around and he couldn’t go in.
“Let’s go in just for a few minutes. Then we’ll leave. I’m right here with you. Turn the car back on, Samir.”
He turned the ignition and put his foot on the accelerator. The little house grew and grew until they were outside the porch. A woman sat on a rocking chair. She was wrapped up in shawls and knitting under the bright patio light that made her silver hair glow. Her eyes hitched on Samir over her half-moon glasses, but her hands never stopped.
Mili waved at the woman as if she’d known her all her life. “Kim?”
The woman put her knitting down and stood.
Mili turned her wide eyes on Samir. Unconsciously, he stepped out of the car and went around to let her out. She laced her fingers through his and clung to his arm. They climbed the patio steps.
“Mili?” This Kim person walked up to them.
Without letting his hand go, Mili gave the woman a one-armed hug. “This is Samir.”
He focused on Mili’s voice, focused on how she said his name, focused on her fingers slotted between his.
The woman squeezed her palm against her mouth and looked at Samir as if she could not believe what she was seeing. His stomach turned but he knew this wasn’t the worst of it.
“Kim, is he here?” A thin, faded voice called from inside. The urge to turn around and run was so overwhelming he almost obeyed it. But the voice dug into his head and held him in place. Mili squeezed his hand.
“She’s been waiting for you,” Kim said, stepping inside the house.
Mili ran her hand up and down his arm. He had to move.
Move,
he told himself. She tugged gently at his arm and he followed her.
“Sara, he’s here.” Kim spoke before they entered the room.
It was dimly lit, the air thick with the astringent smell of disinfectant and medicine. The bed was metal, one of those hospital beds you could crank up and down. A sickbed. A dull numbness spread through him.
He looked at the yellow floral stripes on the curtains, the powder-blue walls, the graying white sheets, the floral comforter. All those flowers to cheer the space up. He looked at the thin body on the bed but he could not look at the face.
“Samir.” She said his name like a foreigner. Rolling the
r
around her tongue and extending it.
Mili moved toward the bed. He let go of her hand. “Hi, Sara. I’m Mili.”
“Hi, Mili,” the raspy voice said. “Kim, could you sit me up, please?”
Kim rotated a crank and the bed folded into a seated position with a metallic groan.
“How are you feeling, Sara?” Mili placed a hand on her foot. Such a familiar gesture.
“Right now better than I’ve ever felt in my life.”
“She hasn’t sat up in months,” Kim said.
“This is Kim, my sister. Samir, this is your Aunt Kim. She’s your godmother.”
Samir didn’t move. His godmother. The person responsible for his welfare if his parents died.
“How was the drive?” Kim asked.
Mili replied. Then Kim asked another question. Then Mili. They went back and forth. Their voices buzzed around Samir’s head. He didn’t hear a word, just the occasional mention of his name and the occasional expectant pauses.
The raspy voice spoke again. It wasn’t wet like he remembered, but parched, scratchy and dry as sandpaper. “Are you two hungry? You must be hungry. Kim made chicken curry. I gave her my recipe.”
“Mili’s vegetarian.” Finally he found his voice.
“I’m sorry. I should have asked on the phone. Kim can fix something else. Maybe some
da-hl.
” She said the word like she had a right to say it but it sounded foreign in her mouth.
“We ate before we left. Please don’t worry about it.” Mili’s voice fell calm and soothing on the festering, wounded feel of the room. Why wasn’t she making her big admonishing eyes at him?
“Maybe Samir is hungry. Do you like chicken curry? Your father used to love chicken curry.”
He felt short of breath. “I’m vegetarian too.”
“Yes, of course you would be. How is Lata?”
Samir looked up at her.
She wore a black knitted cap. No hair stuck out from under it. Her eyes brimmed with tears, but she smiled when she caught his eye. “It looks like Lata kept her promise. You know what she said to me? ‘I’ll raise him like my own son, but I cannot let him eat meat.’ ”
“That does sound like something my mother would say.”
She flinched. “She kept her promise, then?”
“No. She didn’t treat me like her son. She treated me better than him.”
“You have no idea how happy that makes me.”
Samir turned away from her and walked to the window. It was dark outside, but the black-on-black outline of the barn loomed in his vision like a surreal painting. A sudden memory of the dank, cold barn flashed in his mind, blasting open the hollow inside him. This was bullshit. What was he supposed to say to this woman? He felt nothing for her. Nothing. What had Mili expected to accomplish by bringing him here?
“Kim, could I have a glass of water, please?” He wanted to be annoyed at Mili’s voice, but it was the only thing that made sense. “I’ll go with you to the kitchen and get it.”
He turned on her. “No, Mili, I don’t want you to leave. You wanted this. Now you can’t bear to watch?”
“If you want me to stay, I’ll stay.” She sank into the chair by the bed. “I thought you might want some privacy.” She tried to calm him with her gaze. She was insane if she thought that’s all it would take.
“We have nothing private to talk about. In fact we have nothing to talk about.” He turned to the woman on the bed. “You look like you need rest. I’m sorry Mili called and bothered you. We’ll leave now.”
“Why didn’t you ever reply to my letters?” she said as if he hadn’t spoken.
You mean the ones you never wrote.
“I must have written at least a hundred letters.”
Since you dumped me and walked away.
“Why?”
“Why did I write to you?”
He couldn’t respond.
“Or why did I give you up?” She started coughing, a hollow hacking sound, like rocks in a tin can.
Mili rubbed her shoulder and offered her a glass of water from the nightstand. She pushed it away and tried to speak again.
He didn’t want to hear it. “You’re not strong enough. And it doesn’t matter anymore. Mili, let’s go.”
Mili was at his side in a moment.
“Your father and I fell in love,” she said, pushing back another coughing fit. “I knew he was married. He was always honest with me about it. We tried to stay away from each other, but we couldn’t. We knew he would go back when he was done with school. I thought I had two years and I chose to take what I could get. He didn’t want to but I didn’t give him a choice.” She stopped to take a breath. This time Kim offered her water and she took a sip.
Her chest heaved from the effort, but she went on. “I never expected to get pregnant. Everything changed after you were born. I was terrified of losing him. As the time for him to leave came closer, my mind started to close in on me. I couldn’t handle it. I slit my wrists. It was the only way I knew to make him stay.”
Kim, who was sobbing hard now, left the room.
Sara spent another five minutes coughing. Mili left him and went to Sara and held her as she sobbed between hacking fits that pumped nonexistent breath from her lungs. Samir couldn’t move. He felt like someone had smashed him into the floor with a sledgehammer.
“He was not a drinker,” Sara said finally, her voice stronger this time, more determined. “He got into his car drunk only once, just one time, and everything ended. You were four years old. I couldn’t take care of you. I couldn’t even get myself out of bed in the morning. Taking you back to Mir’s family seemed like the best thing for you.”
Samir couldn’t listen anymore. He turned away and headed for the door.
“Once you met Lata you wanted nothing to do with me,” she said to his back and he stopped. “You took to her like a fish to water. You were the most beautiful child, a spitting image of your father, who was the most handsome man I ever met, and the kindest. She couldn’t keep her eyes off you. When I left, you didn’t even leave her side to give me a hug. Years later when I wanted to bring you back, you didn’t want me anymore.”
He turned around. That hadn’t changed. He wanted nothing to do with her.
She started coughing again, but this time her coughing wouldn’t stop. Kim came back into the room and turned on a nebulizer. Liquid hissed from the plastic funnel into her nose and mouth and her chest stopped heaving.
She moved the nebulizer away and spoke to Mili instead of him. “One more day. Please stay just one more day.”
Mili didn’t answer. She didn’t turn pleading eyes on him. She looked to him to see what he wanted. What he could take.
He wanted to say no. The house suffocated him. He was choking on all the things she had told him. And Mili waited for his answer. “Fine. But we leave tomorrow morning.” As soon as he said it, he wanted to take it back.