Monsoon Summer (5 page)

NINE

The woman was shouting into the phone in an unfamiliar language. While I waited for her to finish, I went back to worrying about Steve. Now that I—his bodyguard—was gone, Miriam was sure to make her big move. Somehow, I'd have to find out everything I could about the progress of her mission, without revealing anything about mine.

When my turn came, the grumpy-looking man behind me tapped the sign on the door. I read it: WITH A QUEUE WAITING, KINDLY LIMIT CONVERSATION TO TEN MINUTES. I nodded, latched myself into the glass phone booth, and turned my back on the man.

The phone rang three times before Steve picked up.

“Jazz! I was hoping it was you! It's been a week already. What took you so long to call?”

“We don't have a phone in our apartment. Lots of Indian families don't; I'm using a phone in a store.”

“That's terrible. I'll have to wait for you to call all the time then.”

“I haven't figured out a way to e-mail yet, but Dad's trying to find a good place. We'll have to write regular letters until then.”

“I've already written you one,” Steve said. “I sent it to the orphanage.”

Auntie Das had told us before we'd left Berkeley that it might be better to receive our mail at Asha Bari, since the post office was used to delivering foreign mail there. I'd given Steve the address and was thrilled that a letter was already winging across the ocean to me.

“So, tell me about India,” he said. “What's it like?”

I hesitated. What could I say? How could I describe it to him? “It's amazing, Steve. Crowded. Confusing. Colorful. Oh, I don't know. Ask me something specific, will you?”

“Okay. What's been the best thing so far?”

That was easy. “The monsoon. The rains, I mean. They make everything green and fresh-smelling. And the flowers! They're incredible.”

“You always did like rain. All right, next question. What's been the worst thing?”

“Well . . . ,” I said. “There're a lot of poor people here. Beggars, even. Children who don't have enough to eat. That part's awful.”

“It must be tough. I mean, you see the poverty on TV, but it must be harder in person.”

“It is. And there's more bad news. I start school on Wednesday.”

“School? In the summer?”

“Summer in India is in April and May. They actually have a rainy-season term going on right now.”

“Still, I can't imagine your parents making you go to school.”

“They're not. But they gave me a choice between the academy or the orphanage.”

“Really? I'd have picked the orphanage.”

“You and everybody else. The nun who's in charge has already recruited Eric to coach soccer, and—you'll never believe this—Dad's going to teach the nuns how to use their computers.”

“I thought he hated teaching. He always says he's strictly a behind-the-computer kind of guy.”

“He does. He did before coming here, anyway. Now
he's
going off to that orphanage, too.”

“Sort of leaves you out in the cold, doesn't it, Jazz? That's rough.”

The sympathy in his voice gave me permission to keep going down my list of complaints. “There's more, Steve,” I said. “Everyone stares at me like I'm some kind of freak. I can't figure out why.”

“Hmmm,” Steve said. I could tell he was trying to come up with a good explanation. “I bet they're not used to seeing Asians and white people in the same family. You know. A mixed-race family. We've lived in Berkeley all our lives, Jazz. It's no big deal here, but you might get a different reaction there.”

“Maybe you're right,” I said doubtfully. But why did they still stare when I was on my own?

“Let 'em look,” Steve said. “You guys can be an ad for the American melting pot.”

“So how is life there, anyway? What have you been doing?”

“Not much. Besides work, work, and more work. The Biz has been really crazy this week. I did see some of the kids from school at the Y when I went for a swim.”

Which kids? Guys? Girls? Was Miriam there? Was she
wearing a bikini? A skimpy one?
I forced myself not to ask any dumb questions. “Why's the booth so busy?” I asked instead.

“The university had some reunions, and we got a huge rush. All kinds of customers.”

“How much did we make?”

“Enough to give our employees a raise. All of them except one have found rooms to rent, and they could use the money.”

I sighed. Steve was a softie, just like Mom. He could never say no when somebody asked for money. “Just three percent, right? Like we agreed?”

“Yup. But that still leaves plenty to fatten our accounts, Jazz.”

We talked numbers until the grumpy man rapped on the glass door.

“Have to go, Steve. I'm only allowed to talk for ten minutes at a time.”

“Okay. How's the kid doing?”

“Sweet as ever. Eric'll never change. The rain makes the bugs here extra huge and disgusting. They're everywhere.”

“Bring him along to the phone sometime. I'll pay for the minutes. Get to the Internet, will you? And we're splitting the cost of our calls, so keep track of them.” He paused. “It's been pretty boring around here, Jazz.”

You won't be bored for long, I thought, picturing Miriam's thick-lashed green eyes, auburn hair, and slender figure in those short skirts she loved to wear.

“Focus on profits, Morales,” I warned him sternly. “Business, business, business. You've got to save enough money to buy that jeep.”

“I know,” answered Steve. There was a brief silence. “Call soon,” he said.

“I will,” I promised.

I was halfway up the hill before I realized we hadn't fixed a time for our next conversation. I couldn't call randomly in the middle of the night again; I wanted to be sure he'd be there so I didn't wake up his parents. Now I was stuck trying to get hold of him during the day, unless Dad discovered a quiet place to send e-mail. Hopeless cause, I told myself glumly as I climbed the stairs to our apartment.
In more ways than one
.

Mom and Dad had decided they liked the Indian custom of drinking late-afternoon tea and that our balcony was the perfect place for it. They'd plugged in our new CD player, and soft sitar music drifted outside from the living room. I'd been resting in my room, thinking about my conversation with Steve. As soon as I heard the music, I grabbed a pen and a piece of the stationery Helen had given me and joined everyone.

Eric had taken some of his bugs outside to be sociable, but he seemed a little overwhelmed. A wide variety of creatures was crawling around on the balcony floor. Our parents were sitting cross-legged on chairs with their feet tucked under them. I decided not to tempt any biting insects with my toes, either.

Dad was frowning over a computer instruction manual. A company in Mumbai had donated four outdated Russian computers to the orphanage, and Sister Das had left a stack of manuals on our kitchen table as a not-so-subtle hint for Dad.

Mom was still rummaging through the folder Sister Das had given her, smiling over photos of herself at five, seven, and thirteen that Helen had sent to the orphanage. “How's Steve?” she asked, putting down the folder to pour me a cup of tea. “It sure is strange not to have him around. It feels like part of the family's missing.”

“Fine.”
It feels like part of myself is missing
, I thought, but I didn't say so. “When you go to the orphanage, Mom, could you check and see if any mail came? I'm expecting a letter.”

“Sure, honey. Mail takes over a week to get here, though, so don't count on it.”

Dad shook his head. “The Internet's supposed to be all over the place in India, but I can't find a place to access it. Sister Das didn't even know what I was talking about when I asked her.”

I unfolded the piece of stationery in my lap. The smell of lavender wafted up, and I held the paper to my nose.
Mmmm!
Helen, the eternal romantic, had given me scented paper. I hadn't written a letter on a piece of paper in ages, let alone a perfumed one. But if Steve had already written me, I had to write him back. Somehow, I'd have to compose the perfect letter—a brilliant combination of wit, intelligence, charm, and mystery. Didn't history prove that even the most unattractive woman could capture a guy's heart with the written word? I couldn't think of any examples off the top of my head, but I was sure there were scads of them.

I gazed across the valley to the hills and tried to think of what to say. Faint noises drifted up from the houses and shops below us. Rain clouds gathered behind tall trees on the hills. I gnawed the end of my pen as I watched a triangle of brilliant green parrots visit one magnolia tree after another. Then I started writing.

Great. I was so used to using the Delete button on my computer, I couldn't finish a sentence without wanting to change it. I was crossing out so much of the letter I'd have to write it over.

“Listen to this one from Frank, Pete,” Mom said, holding up a yellowed letter. “ ‘Sarah is the joy of our lives. It still amazes me that her birth mother managed to find her way to your orphanage, just so that we could become her parents. I was disappointed to hear that there is no way for us to contact her. Are you certain you have no clues about her identity? We'd so like to establish a relationship with her if we could.' ”

“Your parents tried for years to find her, Sarah,” Dad said. “You know that.”

Mom sighed. “I know.”

“Anyway, it's good you have those letters,” Dad said. “There's something almost magical about reading a letter long after it was written, isn't there?”

I looked down at the stationery in my lap. A handwritten letter
was
a lot more heirloomish than e-mail. Maybe, just maybe, Steve would keep it. Years from now he might read it again, just like Mom was reading letters from her parents. Would my words stand the test of time? I reread the ones that weren't crossed out. They made the letter sound like a business memo written by some stodgy executive, in spite of the lavender paper. Crumpling it up, I stuffed it into my pocket and tasted my tea. It was cold and bitter, and I noticed that everyone else had only taken a sip or two before giving up.

“I'm sorry about the tea,” Mom said, sighing. “Our helper from the orphanage will be here on Wednesday, thank goodness. She'll come every day at noon and stay till the dinner dishes are done. Except on the weekends, of course.”

“I don't know why Sister Das thinks we need help,” I said. “We managed fine in Berkeley on our own.” The last thing I wanted was an orphan from Asha Bari lurking around our apartment.

“We're going to be busy this summer, Jazz. Especially now that your father's decided to come to Asha Bari, too.” She beamed at Dad. “Besides, I want this girl to teach me how to make Indian food. The real stuff.” There were lots of cheap takeout options in Berkeley, but nobody in our family ever had much time to prepare home-cooked meals. Unfortunately, we loved eating them.

“How much are we paying her?” Dad asked.

“Only about three dollars a day. I wanted to pay her more, but Sister Das insisted we pay the market rate. Anyway, the girl's name is Danita. She's just your age, Jazz. Fifteen. She has two younger sisters at the orphanage.”

“Isn't fifteen sort of young to have a full-time job?” I asked.

“Not really. Danita's finished Asha Bari's academic program. She speaks excellent English. Working for us is a good chance for her. She needs to earn money for a dowry.”

“What's a dowry?” Eric asked, looking up from a gigantic caterpillar he was trying to lure into a small jar for transport back to the living room.

“It's the money a bride's family agrees to give the groom's family when they get married,” Mom explained. “Danita doesn't have parents, so she'll have to come up with the money herself.”

“Doesn't the groom's family have to give anything?” I asked. “Besides, this girl's too young to be thinking about marriage.”

“Not in India,” Mom answered. “Girls from poor families don't have much choice. They're considered a liability because they can't earn money. That's why they pay dowries. Sister Das asked us to hire Danita as a favor to the orphanage. They simply can't afford to pay dowries for all the girls.”

“Sounds like a favor to us,” said Dad, tiptoeing gingerly around the bugs to collect the full cups of tea. “We'll certainly need the help, what with Jazz starting school and the rest of us at the orphanage.”

School. I'd been worrying so hard about writing a letter to Steve that I'd almost forgotten what loomed ahead for me in three short days. Slumping in my chair, I watched the caterpillar squeeze itself into the jar. Run for your
life,
I wanted to yell, feeling a strange connection to the creature.