“Hello,” she hears herself say.
She is full of what she’s plunged herself into—months of Jiro’s depression and grief, his wanderings and circling back on himself with remorse and despair and doubt. He pops up for a day or so of fresh air, then returns to his deep grief. She looks at the window and is surprised to see it is dark and the windows are streaked with rain. At some point, she remembers going to bed, then waking up, eating something, then back to her study.
“I just got back,” says Tomas, his voice is tired.
If a moment ago Hanne was floating out of herself, absorbed in Jiro’s story, she is now fully in her body. “What’s happened?”
“Anne said your English is back.” He takes a deep breath. “That’s good news.”
“Did you go see Brigitte? How is she?”
“You know the way it works. I can’t—”
“No. I can’t do this any longer. I can’t stand it.” Her voice is cracking. “She’s my daughter, whether she wants to be or not.”
“Oh, Mom.”
“Please. You must do this for me.” She’s pleading now, desperate. “Won’t you do this for me?”
“I don’t think—”
“I have to see her.”
Silence, only the sound of her refrigerator humming.
“Please, Tomas. Imagine if it was one of your daughters and you were denied.”
Somehow, she’s crossed into the living room and is standing by the window. It’s raining and the lone tree across the street is a blur. Most likely, the last of the little red flowers have fallen to the sidewalk.
“I will see her.” She speaks slowly, loudly. “I have to.”
He doesn’t say anything.
Her teeth chatter, as if she’s suddenly been dunked in ice. “I’ve failed her miserably, I see that now. I was wrong to send her away. I must see her.”
The wind rattles the windows and blows the tree across the street, and a couple passing below on the sidewalk pull their coats tighter, and still the rain falls. Most of the people living here came from somewhere else, she thinks. Including me. A city of transients. No one belongs here. Like dust balls rolling in on the wind and soon to roll out. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. For dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. Where is home?
Dear Brigitte, Hanne begins to compose in her head, I remember when we went to Sonora, Mexico. Just you and I. Tomas was off to college and your father was at another conference. Your spring break and we rented a convertible, you wanted that, and we drove for miles with the top down, our hair going wild, and everywhere, as far as the eye could see, there were marigolds. Valleys and hills of deep golden yellow. We entered the world of yellow. You were enchanted and insisted on a bouquet. We paid a small fee to enter a field, and the two men in cowboy hats and pointy boots laughed and said “Take as much as you want.” They must have been sick of those flowers. We picked until our fingers turned bright yellow. And that smell for days after—musky and pungent and sharp.
One of those marigolds is pressed in your book, Letters to a Young Poet. It’s in a box of your things, in the back of my closet. Four boxes of your things. I opened them the other day and looked inside.
Pages of your poetry are in those boxes. Do you remember: The surface is still. The women slide off the muddy bank into the water that peels off warmth like a tight skirt, removing rings and bathing suit tops surnames and endless duties and turning them again into bodies of milk, blood and water, into luminescent bodies with green-blue tails and scales finely patterned.
You wrote that after we swam at Bass Lake. A long hot hike, a jump in cool water. You dared me. “Go ahead, Mom. Jump!” Other things—a rock that sparkles gold, Fool’s Gold, your blue ribbons from swimming and tennis, your beginning French book, your handwriting, careful, precise, handwriting of a six-year-old. You collected the world in small objects.
And a letter to your classmates, asking them in your nine-year-old handwriting to contribute money for the animal shelter. All those dogs and cats without homes. The animals need good food, you pleaded with your peers. Another of your fundraising efforts for the soup kitchen. When you were twelve, you volunteered there on Saturdays and served a hot meal to the homeless. I didn’t approve, too worried about all those loose-ends men. People wanted to be near you. You drew them toward you, somehow. At least once a month you came home without something, a coat, a scarf, gloves, socks, you gave these things away. Are you listening? Or have you slipped away from me into a hidden seam I can’t cross to? Don’t turn away. I won’t rave about you or tell you what you could have been. I won’t say you are made of stars. I am brimming with memories, stored up, unknowingly, spilling out of me. I thought I’d forgotten them, but I haven’t.
She stops. Gasps as she realizes what is happening. A life is passing before her eyes—Brigitte’s life. As if Hanne will never see her again, and she is left with only memories. Hanne’s eyes well up with tears. Faster now, she speaks faster to Brigitte, as if to keep her close. In those boxes is your version of Camus’s story. You rewrote it, remember? You had the teacher go after the prisoner and guide him to freedom. It was his duty, you wrote. What he needed to do to remain human.
Yes, I have your objects, the things you said don’t matter, that you’d rather live without. They belong to the life you renounced. But an object is a bridge to memory, and memory is a stored experience, something lived—the constitution of a life. Memories upon memories weave together into a fabric of a life. You are woven into me, me from whence you came. And I live inside it. Please. All I want is to sit beside you. You don’t need to say a word to me.
She can hear Tomas breathing.
“She’s at the end of the earth, Mom,” says Tomas, his voice weary. “A remote village in India.”
Chapter Twenty-One
More than thirty hours later, she stumbles off the plane and is bombarded by screeching tires, jackhammers, sirens, loudspeakers blasting music, shouts, rumbling engines, and hordes of people. It is Delhi and it’s sunny and sticky hot and noisy and the air smells of diesel fumes and burning garbage. She has no interest in peering aghast at the poverty, no interest in anything but seeing her daughter, who has transported herself into the countryside. Hanne hails a taxi. She does not speak Hindi, Garhwali, Urdu, or Punjabi, but fortunately her young driver knows enough English.
He cranks up his radio, blasting American rock and roll, and heads into the hustle of traffic: cars, motorcycles, rickshaws, bikes, oxen, starving dogs, and emaciated cows wandering the sidewalks and streets. It is a collision of civilization—if it can be called that—and rural life.
When he stops at a traffic light and turns off the engine, a charge of alarm—this is not where she wants to be. He must see her panicked expression because he tells her it’ll be a while, twenty minutes, maybe longer before the light changes, and he must save gas or he’ll never make any money.
From her window, she watches a pack of scrawny boys dig through a ten-foot mountain of garbage. One boy wearing only a T-shirt and dirty underwear drags to the sidewalk an old bicycle tire. Another waves in the air a bent steel spoon, as if he’s just won a magnificent trophy. Orphans fending for themselves? Or sent out to scrounge for scraps for their families? A boy retrieves a chair missing a leg, along with a torn blanket, a bit of frayed red carpet. When one of the boys finds a two-meter-long copper pipe, he holds it triumphantly above his head and dances in a circle. If one’s standards drop, if one has no standards, anything, it seems, can be salvaged.
Before she left, she had packaged up her new translation of Kobayashi’s novel and sent it to him with a letter. Dear Kobayashi, I want to apologize. I see now how much I distorted your story, turning it into something it was not. You said I should be ashamed, and I am. In an attempt at recompense, I re-translated your novel. I don’t expect you to use it, but I wanted you to know I believe I understand your story now. Jiro, his tortured heart, his immense loss that reverberates throughout, coloring everything
. Again, my sincerest apology. Hanne Schubert.
The light changes and the driver revs his engine and the music blares, joining the cacophony of noise, as they creep along to the outskirts of town, to the train station. After paying the driver, and with the heat pressing down, she elbows her way through the crowds waiting for the trains, sidestepping a large gathering of monkeys picking through a garbage can. She purchases her train ticket and, much later, collapses in a window seat, drowsily watching through the haze the farms speed by, the haystacks—or huts, she can’t tell—the fields of sugar cane, and brown cows along the railroad track.
She’s fifty-three years old, soon to be fifty-four in a matter of months, but she feels one hundred. She suspends her thoughts, her worry that Brigitte will refuse to see her. The point is to cross from A to B. It is one thing that is possible, one thing she can do, though it’s taking nearly every ounce of her energy. She sees the shadow of her face in the window. She looks oddly serene. Perhaps because she is doing what she must do, she has no choice in the matter. Though she suspects it’s because she is so tired.
Five hours later, when the train screeches and blows its whistle, she emerges bleary-eyed. Green tree-covered hills surround a green valley and she smells luscious water in the air. It’s cooler here, at least, but not by much. The Ganges River flows through this city. Haridwar, she learned, is Hindi for Gateway to God.
Another taxi. This time the driver with glossy black hair and sparkling black eyes speaks only Urdu, and it takes a while to find another driver to translate her directions—please she’d like to be driven to what is called the Center for Higher Living and Thought.
The taxi driver nods, smiles, and says something. The other driver translates: “You are here for pilgrimage. Haridwar is one of the seven holy cities of Hindusim. Everyone comes for pilgrimage. You too?”
“Yes,” she says. Of sorts.
“Foreigners come for the Ganges to wash away their sins and meditation and moksha.” Moksha, says the translator, is nirvana.
Moksha, she is sure, is not for her in this lifetime.
As he drives, he chatters on in Urdu, and she slumps in the back, staring out the window. A spidery crack stretches across half the windshield, making it seem like she’s looking at the world through a different lens. She’s never wanted to come to India, never had a desire to explore the heart of the Hindu world. Too hot, too much suffering and despair. Naked, hungry children on the street. Dying children, abandoned children. Things that are unacceptable are eventually, resignedly accepted.
They pass by the green Ganges and men in rags along the roadside, pushing carts selling papayas and popcorn, and a stream of souvenir shops with colorful cloth lanterns, sandals, silk and cotton for saris and churidars. The perfect tourist destination for hungry souls, she thinks. Yoga and spiritual retreats are offered, like items on a menu. Her daughter is here, among the hungry souls.
She smells a hint of sewage, but the air is cleaner here than in Delhi. The taxi crosses over a bridge, with the Ganges calm and quiet below, then turns down a bumpy dirt road, with cows grazing in tall grasses.
To the ends of the earth, she thinks.
Up ahead must be the compound of Higher Living and Thought. A temple made of cracking white sandstone, the edges softened because large chunks have fallen off, along with many of the orange roof tiles. A cluster of small buildings surrounds the main temple in a U shape. In the center of the plaza is blood-red dirt. As the taxi pulls up, a plume of red dust rises up and surrounds it. Hanne steps out as if she’s floated in on a blustery red cloud.
She hears the sound of children. She pays the driver and drags her one piece of luggage into a small building that has its door swung open wide. Fortunately, the frowning woman whom Hanne met long ago in France has been replaced by a young Indian girl in a white robe who smiles shyly at Hanne and places her palms together, bowing slightly. Hanne says she is here to see Brigitte. The girl looks at her, curiously, as if to say “Who?”
Has Brigitte gone? Did she know Hanne was coming and fled? Then it occurs to her: “Nivedita,” says Hanne. “The woman named Nivedita.”
The girl smiles brightly. “You’re here for a blessing?”
A blessing? Hanne explains she is the mother of Nivedita.
The girl looks at her wide-eyed, as if it never occurred to her that Brigitte had such an earthly thing as a mother, and motions to a chair. “You have come so far. America, yes? Please sit. Rest your feet.”
What a kind girl. Hanne moves away from the window and positions herself near the oscillating fan.
The girl, who introduces herself as Aruna, says “Welcome.” She smiles shyly. “Nivedita taught me English.”
“Wonderful,” says Hanne.
She will bring Nivedita to Hanne.
While cooler than Delhi, the heat is still oppressive. She supposes one eventually acclimates, but she’s soaked with sweat. The fan does little to alleviate the heat. She mops her forehead with her sleeve, slips off her shoes and presses her nylon-covered feet onto the cool tile floor. But that is not enough. She opens the top buttons of her blouse, leans over and strips off her nylons, letting her pale legs breathe. She drifts, observing the slow drip of her thoughts. She is here. She will or she will not see her daughter. Or rather, her daughter will or will not see her. She packed only a few things, unsure how long she’d be here—a day? A week? As Tomas cautioned, there is no predicting what Brigitte will do.
The air is a tangible presence, adhering to her skin, and the heat heavy with the smell of cows, hay, dirt, and sweat, her sweat. Sounds drift into the small room. Laughter, feet running by, the bleating of a sheep, the slosh of water in a bucket. Thirsty, she realizes she is thirsty, her throat parched.
A girl, maybe five, with big brown eyes, pokes her head through the open door and stares at Hanne, her mouth open. What does she see? An ugly old white woman with ghostly white legs? And what does Hanne see? A beautiful girl, drenched in youth, a whole life stretched out in front of her. Hanne smiles, which elicits a quick smile from the girl, who darts away.
She closes her eyes and listens to the hum and rhythm of the fan. All this way, what if her daughter refuses her? The rupture declared irreparable, Brigitte will not grant two minutes to acknowledge Hanne’s presence.
“I can’t guarantee anything,” Tomas said.
“I didn’t think you could,” said Hanne.
“You’ll be traveling for nearly two days, Mom. But I suppose that won’t deter you.”
Stubbornness had nothing to do with it. And she did not expect to show up and all to be forgiven. Nor did she assume a heart-warming reunion. She told Tomas she would cross all seven continents if given the chance to see Brigitte again.
Now minutes go by. I feel so old, Brigitte. You have every right to turn me away, to go about your life as you’ve seen fit. But I beg of you, please do not. Does this sound like a plea? I suppose it is.
A fly circles around Hanne’s head. She tries to shoo it away, but it does no good. She looks out at the bright sun and sees a reddish brown cow eating hay, its tail twitching, flicking away black flies. A small starling lands on its head. For a moment she is deeply pleased by the sight and thinks of Moto. No five-year or ten-year plan, is that what he meant? A life made up of only these moments stitched together? Would that ever be enough for her? Not a translator, not anything, just a soul existing, living off a web of beauty and sorrow? If she is allowed to see Brigitte, will the sight of her be enough?
Finally Aruna appears and, with her head bowed and an expression of embarrassment, says Brigitte cannot see her right away. Unfortunately, she has a full schedule. Very busy. Hanne will have to wait until tomorrow morning. If Hanne would like to rest, she can show her to a vacant room. They are reserved for visitors.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The room’s sparseness reminds Hanne of the ryokan. Or a monk’s cell. Or a prison’s. Only a twin-sized bed, a faded wood nightstand, a lamp, and one round windo
w too high to look out of. With her head bowed, Aruna asks if she might need anything.
Don’t feel ashamed, my dear girl. I am just relieved I wasn’t sent away. “A glass of water would be wonderful,” says Hanne.
Aruna quickly returns with a pitcher of water and a cup, along with slices of homemade bread and whipped butter. Hanne thanks her and empties the glass. A visitor only. She relinquished her status as mother when she sent her daughter away, and now she will be treated as someone visiting. To visit, to go to see, to avenge, to visit the sins of the father upon his children, to afflict, to reside as a guest. It is something. It is a beginning.
In the morning, Aruna appears, wearing a clean white robe. After she shows Hanne to the shower, she is to bring Hanne to the prayer hall. Hanne rushes through her bathing—an outdoor stall by the hay field—dresses and tells herself to accept whatever Brigitte has to give. Anger, frustration, rage, sorrow, self-pity, Hanne will nod and say she understands. She is here, that’s what matters.
Hanne follows the girl outside to the large white sandstone building. Before entering, Aruna removes her shoes and points to Hanne’s. “I’m sorry. Full of impurities,” she says. Hanne takes them off, padding to the tile entrance in bare feet.
Inside, it is cavernous and dark. Thankfully, the air is cooler and it smells of incense and candle wax. Rows of pews fill most of the room. At the front, a window lets in a stream of sunlight. The girl bows and leaves. Is that Brigitte up at the front? If so, Hanne does not recognize her.
The woman does not come at once. She is lighting candles, one by one, about twenty or so, taking her time, as if she’s never seen a flame before. As if it is the most astonishing thing. Hanne sits on a pew and watches the match touch the wick and burst into a flame. Two insignificant things coming together to create fire. Is that what is about to happen? Hanne and Brigitte meeting again, Brigitte igniting with fury?
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