Mother Land

by Leah Franqui

  Rachel swallowed her worries and decided to focus on one thing at a time. She needed coffee, which meant she needed clean dishes, which meant soap and water and methodical physical movement. She worked efficiently, as she liked to do, the smack of water on ceramic and metal loud in the quiet apartment. As she worked she snuck glances up at her mother-in-law, but Swati hadn’t changed her position since Dhruv had walked out the door. Rachel finished, filled the saucepan with filtered water, and placed it on the stove. She took out the French press she had brought with her from New York and a bag of coffee from a local place she had found and liked and scooped overflowing spoonfuls into the glass cylinder.

  “You don’t have the instant kind?” Swati asked her, her voice startling Rachel.

  “No, I don’t like it.”

  “It is less work,” Swati said pointedly.

  Rachel shrugged. “I wouldn’t exactly consider this work. And the instant stuff is disgusting. Do you want some?”

  “I don’t take coffee. It isn’t good for blood pressure. You should drink tea.”

  “I don’t like tea,” Rachel said, looking Swati in the eye as she poured the water to let the beans steep. “What would you like to do today?” she said in bright tones. She was eager to get past talking about her coffee. It felt absurd, treating her mother-in-law like this was a vacation, but she wasn’t sure what else to do.

  “I don’t want to be in the way. You should continue your normal day,” Swati said rather pathetically. Apparently Jewish mothers didn’t have the market cornered on making people feel guilty. Here was Swati, doing a wonderful job all on her own. “Although I can see you need some things,” Swati said, looking around the kitchen dubiously.

  “We can pick up whatever you want. I have time to shop. I don’t have a normal routine yet, still trying to figure that out.” Rachel reminded Swati, “I don’t even have a job yet.”

  Technically, she didn’t need to get one. Dhruv could, and wanted to, support her completely. It was one of the things that had been the bedrock of his argument for why he should take a job in Mumbai, the fact that he would be making more than his US salary in a country that was so cheap, she would never need to earn a dime. Or a rupee.

  Rachel had never thought that she would be one of those people who wanted to be taken care of, one of those women, but after almost a decade in New York, she had to admit that the idea of a place where life was affordable, and a man who would make it more than that, luxurious, even, had an appeal she couldn’t deny.

  Money had been the crushing force that flattened Rachel’s life in New York. She was, she knew, extremely privileged, and had more than many others, but the whole of New York, it seemed, ran on a near panic about money. People who had more than Rachel tore their hair out, people who had less ran themselves ragged, and she would wake up in the middle of the night sometimes and remember wisps of dreams that were all about the contents of her bank account. She sometimes found herself short of breath while paying for something, anxiety cutting off the air to her lungs. She had a good job, but what would have secured her life in another city merely sustained it in New York, and it had begun to wear away at her, exhaust her, defeat her. Why were people so tied to the romance of money woes? They didn’t make Rachel feel romantic, they made her feel sick, and strapped her into a job that she had come to truly and completely loathe with every fiber of her being.

  When she had met Dhruv, Rachel was working for a company called Dinner, Delivered. The company prepared all the ingredients for a meal and packaged each one individually, then delivered it all in a box to customers who could then make themselves dinner with none of the preparation work left to do. It made cooking as easy as humanly possible for the customer, while giving them the illusion of making something themselves. It was a good idea, and it sold well, but Rachel hated it.

  The real problem with her work wasn’t finicky vendors, or selling the concept, or demanding sponsors, all of which were challenges that she enjoyed. It was that she didn’t like or respect the customers themselves, because she didn’t respect the very product they bought, the one she sold them. She didn’t understand them. The whole point of food was the effort you put into it. If you wanted food without effort, why not just go to a restaurant? It made no sense to her. It seemed like a huge con that no one else saw but her. And as the company did better and better, Rachel grew more and more depressed.

  Leaving that job had been easy, in that way, because it was almost a relief to go, and to have a reason that didn’t reveal her true feelings about the business. Who could blame her that she was moving away to join her new husband, the man who had swooped into her life and dazzled her and everyone she knew, halfway across the world? It excused her from having to explain her dislike toward her job, and no matter how progressive the world seemed, no one at her company questioned a woman moving for a man. They had thrown her a party, making many of the dishes they sold, and Rachel had avoided all of them, finding herself unexpectedly drunk at the end of the evening because she hadn’t eaten a thing. Everyone found it romantic, and Rachel, buzzing with Dhruv’s concentrated and intoxicating interest in commitment, sold that story of them. They were a couple off to see the world, she was about to change her life, it was fast and wonderful.

  It thrilled her, in a way that was troubling and intellectually illicit and therefore attractive, that Dhruv wanted to take care of her. He was so self-contained that she sometimes wondered what he needed from her that he couldn’t get from anything else. But he loved telling her about India, how to be there. He loved the way she looked to him for knowledge, and she delighted in his certainty, more, even, than she had in New York, where she, too, had had her bearings.

  Now, in Mumbai, all the energy she had put into imagining her new life had fizzed and popped away, leaving the stale taste that follows carbonation and the sinking feeling that she had no idea what she wanted to do with her life. Exploring the neighborhood around her, even the city itself, disoriented and disheartened her. It was so big, and overwhelming. She had never been to a place that was so full of people, never known so many people could be in one place. She laughed now when friends talked about how New York was so crowded. It was a ghost town compared to Mumbai. A street could move from shaded quiet to crushing, bustling masses within a block, with people, animals, and vehicles all competing for space. Horns rang out constantly, along with bicycle bells and the cries of street sellers, everything at once. It made her dizzy and it had not motivated any ideas, and her newfound comfort, her joint bank account with Dhruv’s generous monthly deposit, didn’t immediately inspire her. She had time and space to think and ask herself what she really wanted, yes, but so far, nothing had bubbled to the surface.

  On that day, however, she would have killed for a job, a task, a meeting, for something that could take her out the door of the apartment and far from her mother-in-law, who had clearly already decided to make herself at home, despite her protests that she wanted Rachel to have a normal day. Normal would have been devoid of Swati.

  “Surely you have something you like to do?” Swati said.

  Rachel’s face twisted and she almost said, No, nothing, but that would have been cruel. “I like to take walks. I’ve been trying to learn the neighborhood.” This was true. After her initial overwhelmed attempts, she had been trying to take the city piece by piece, venturing out in circles that expanded slightly every time.

  “In this heat?”

  “Well, it’s pretty much always like this, so, yes. I guess so. I mean, it’s not going to change, right? It doesn’t get much cooler, I don’t think. Dhruv said it wouldn’t, at least.” Rachel paused. “Would you like to come?”

  Swati gave Rachel a look like she had just asked her if she would like to participate in a Satanic ritual.

  “It’s too hot for walking. I will wait for when the maid comes, and I will make sure she cleans properly.” Had Deeti been cleaning improperly, Rachel wondered, and if so, what did that mean? She thought the
apartment was very clean.

  “Okay. Well, she usually comes around one p.m.,” Rachel said, which corresponded with the hours of Rachel’s daily walk, carefully constructed so that Rachel didn’t have to sit in her apartment while someone cleaned around her, served her, a concept that made Rachel squirm.

  “She should be coming twice a day. For the dust,” Swati explained. “It is very dusty in here.”

  Twice a day? It was bad enough she came once a day. Rachel had told Dhruv they should have someone come only a few times a week, but he had said that they couldn’t, that wasn’t how it worked, the maid would find it confusing, and everyone wanted full-time labor. He had pointed out that they needed to contribute to the economy, that as people with money, they needed to spread it around. That was the only part of it that really comforted Rachel, although wouldn’t it be better for someone to get the same money for less labor?

  “And when does your cook come?”

  “We don’t have a cook,” Rachel said. It had been very important to her, actually, that they didn’t have one, and although at first he had said that it was how things were done, Dhruv had relented on this point, especially when it turned out that his job gave him lunch daily.

  Rachel loved cooking. It was why she had disliked her job so much, because she felt like she had been promoting fake cooking. Food was essential to her, and to her family, and everything in their lives revolved around it. She had learned to cook as a child, with her mother, and her grandmother, who was an immigrant who had spent most of her life in Iran and cooked Persian dishes with skill and love. Her father had grown up with Polish parents who told him he was lucky not to be eating rocks, but then he met Ruth and learned what good food could be.

  When it had come time to go to college, part of Rachel had wondered if maybe culinary school would be the right choice, but when she got into Cornell, her father’s alma mater, there was no question of her going. It was an Ivy League, and she loved Russian literature and Chinese history, two things she couldn’t get at a culinary institute. Four years of freezing in Ithaca had left her as confused and uncertain about what to do with her life as she had been when she had arrived. However, beyond struggling to understand Tolstoy and Mao, there had at least been classes about food science and the business of dining at the hospitality school, and a semester abroad in Naples, where she had learned to make luscious pastas and perfect sauces.

  Before her last job she’d worked in business development for Dean & DeLuca. Everything was just close enough to food that she felt she was living her passion, while not close enough to taste. But it was sensible, rational, certain, the things she knew she should have in a career. Now all that certainty was centered on Dhruv.

  Thus far, Rachel’s favorite thing about Mumbai was that she could cook herself every meal, and the two things she had actually cared about in Dhruv’s apartment search were that he find them a place with a decent kitchen and that he order an oven when he arrived in Mumbai. She had tried making cuisines of all kinds in the three months since she had arrived, including Indian dishes originating from Kashmir and Chennai and everywhere in between, but Dhruv liked the simplest things, and she found each recipe she tried assumed there would be many diners with large appetites. Wasting food was a cardinal sin for her, and she had stopped. She wondered if all that would start again now that Swati was there. Perhaps she could teach Rachel to make something? But then again, she thought hopefully, she probably wouldn’t have time to do so before leaving.

  “Oh. But, who makes your food? Too much outside food is not healthy,” Swati warned her.

  Rachel was always amused by that turn of phrase, “outside food,” using outside to mean anything from another place. So many Indians she had spoken to talked about outside food like it was something radioactive, bound to cause injury or death. They spoke in hushed voices about how dirty the kitchens were, how cheap the materials. In Rachel’s experience, most professional kitchens were far cleaner than the one she had seen in her in-laws’ house, in which their cook had squatted on the floor as dishes covered every surface in between sprays of turmeric, salt, onion skins, and carrot peels.

  “I make our food. Are you hungry?”

  Swati nodded slowly.

  “What would you like to eat?”

  “Well. For lunch, I usually take dal chawal. And some vegetables, and roti.”

  Rachel thought about this. “Well, I think we don’t have any flour for roti in the house. I haven’t been baking much, the oven isn’t great, despite the promises of the seller, but I can get some. I have to pick up other things, anyway. More sheets, and towels, and pillows, and anything you want to be comfortable. So I can grab that as well. And you said you wanted me to pick up some other things anyway.”

  Swati pursed her lips. “Doesn’t Dhruv want a cook?”

  “He did, yes.”

  “Oh. So—”

  “I didn’t,” Rachel said firmly, and decided to leave it at that, uncomfortable with the clear judgment in Swati’s face. She did not owe this woman an explanation about anything. This was her life, her home, and she decided what it contained and what it didn’t. “Would you like to come with me? That way you can buy the things you like and we can have lunch outside, to make sure you get what you want.”

  “But, the girl. Don’t you want to be here, to watch her clean?”

  No, Rachel did not want that. “I’m sure she knows what she’s doing. She gets the key from the neighbors when I’m not in. I’ll get dressed, and then let’s go. Maybe we can even go for a walk, or something. I promise you, it will be nice, it’s really not so bad, the heat. When you’re walking, you get used to it. We can stay in the shade. And we can talk. About what is happening. About what you, uh, plan to do.”

  “I have said everything I need to say,” Swati said, her voice firm. “I am not interested in going backward.”

  “I see.” Rachel walked toward her bedroom and stopped, turning back to look at Swati. It was now or never. She had to ask or she would go out of her mind. “Swati? Did you talk to Dhruv about how long you will be staying with us?” She put on her kindest, most polite tone, but Swati looked at her like she was insane.

  “I am living here now,” Swati said firmly. “So forever. I will be staying with you forever.”

  And then Swati walked into the bedroom, her bedroom, and shut the door, leaving Rachel alone, and speechless, in the living room.

  She had never in her life been so unhappy to be right.

  Seven

  They ate in a stylish café, a continental-style place, the type Swati had seen in Bollywood movies, of which she was an avid fan. In a movie, this would have been the kind of place where the chic young couple would have met and bantered over artistically colorful salads and coffee drinks. All around them, couples in chic Indo-Western outfits, indigo-dyed kurtas in modern cuts over jeans, block-printed floral maxi dresses that revealed shocking amounts of shoulder skin, and linen salwars with T-shirts on top, dined on expensive bits of food. She didn’t like the cuisine much, but she thrilled at the idea that someone famous might come in at any moment.

  “I’ve just started exploring the neighborhood,” Rachel explained when they were sitting down. “This place seemed nice, I’ve passed it a few times.”

  It was nice, although Swati was surprised by the high prices and low necklines. Of course, women in Kolkata wore Western things, but it seemed odd to be at a café in India in which no one looked . . . well, what she thought of as Indian.

  Throughout the meal, which she picked at, she kept looking around, her eyes darting, to see if there were any movie stars dining there. She had only been to Mumbai twice before in her life, and Dhruv had picked an apartment in the center of Bollywood star territory, so she couldn’t believe her luck. She was sure she would see one of her favorite actors any moment and just die.

  It struck her as odd that Rachel, who did not seem to know much about Bollywood (Swati had asked), might see a star, a famous person loved b
y millions, and not know who they were at all. It was disrespectful, somehow, like being in a room with royalty and not recognizing them. Rachel should learn, Swati thought; perhaps they could watch some films together to prepare her. Swati would make a list of essential viewing.

  “How do you like it?” Rachel asked, gesturing to the picked-apart Thai vegetable green curry in front of Swati.

  “Fine, fine,” Swati said. It wasn’t bad, really. It just wasn’t what she had wanted. She wanted food that would comfort her, made by practiced hands, in the apartment that she would have to think of now as home. Not this outside thing.

  “Mine too. Just fine. Nothing special. As people here say, very average. Sort of a funny turn of phrase.”

  “Why?” Swati asked, curious. It sounded normal to her. In Kolkata, her best friend, Bunny, said it often.

  “Well, if something is average, then I guess it can’t really be very anything. Right? Like, by definition, it’s neither too much nor too little. It’s moderate. So it can’t be very much so, can it?”

  Swati leaned back, looking at Rachel.

  “You are rather smart, aren’t you?” Swati said. Of course, she hadn’t thought Dhruv would marry someone stupid, he wasn’t that kind of person, but Rachel was rather, well, the kind of person who had opinions.

  When Swati had been growing up, she wasn’t supposed to have opinions. Young people in general weren’t supposed to have opinions, at least not ones they voiced to older people. Not ones about big things, about ideas, about the world. Vinod had never encouraged Swati to have many of those at all. He hadn’t discouraged her, either. He just hadn’t had many himself, about the world, and so why should she? Their lives were what was important, and they thought a lot about them. Why think of these other things?