by Galaxy Craze
The last time we went to stay with Renee, she was living with a band of gypsies on a farmer’s field in Warwickshire. We stayed with her in her wooden caravan with a hot plate and a mini fridge. Eden and I slept in a cupboard under the bed, with a red velvet curtain that pulled across the opening instead of a door.
“Will we fly on a jumbo jet?” Eden asked.
“I think so, darling.” She laid plates on the table, butter, and toast. Outside the day was brightening. Through the garden door I could see mist rising off the grass.
“I don’t want to go to America,” I said.
My mother looked up at me, as she buttered her toast. The light against her knife flashed like a sword.
“I’ll stay here and take care of the cat,” I said, and crossed my arms in front of me and stared at the legs of the kitchen chairs.
She let out an exaggerated sigh, dropping her knife and fork on her plate. “Why do you always have to be so difficult? I thought you would be excited to go to America. Do you know how many people would love to have this chance, a holiday? I thought you would be happy.”
“Who will look after Porridge while we’re away?” Eden asked.
“Greta will.”
“Greta?” I said, with venom. “She doesn’t even stroke her. She hates cats; they give her hives.”
Mum pressed her forehead against her hand and closed her eyes. I thought, One more word and she will break. She will open her mouth and scream. She was so happy when she told us we were going on holiday; so proud of herself and of the holiday she had planned. Now I had ruined it with my questions and worries. I thought, She’ll get the knives out; she’ll leave the house, run down the street in her stocking feet and never come back.
“And who’s going to take care of the shop?” I said.
“Oh, fuck the shop.” She waved her hand in the air. “I can’t be tethered to the bloody shop. Anyway, if your father cared so much about it, he would have come back when he said he was going to.”
“I’ll come with you, Mum,” Eden said.
“Well, we’ll have a lovely time together, won’t we, Eden? Sunbathing on the beach in California while May stays here in the drizzle.”
California, she said. California was famous; it was in songs and movies. All the film stars lived there.
“I didn’t know Renee lived in California. You didn’t tell us that.” I kept my arms crossed, trying not to lose my frown.
But I was already planning my return. Off the plane, tanned, wearing a denim jacket, my hair wavy and bright blonde from the sun. Maybe even an American accent. A new girl, thin and confident. With something changed about me that no one could quite place: straightened like a book spine. I imagined the girls at school, flocking around me, like they do to Samantha Fenton, asking me questions about the film stars I’d met in California. A gate, separating them from me—the girl who’d been to California—so that I was admired from afar but never again involved in schoolyard cliques or gossips, never caught in a web. Yes. This would be the best part of the holiday: bragging about it in school. Already, I couldn’t wait to come home.
TEN
We flew across the ocean in a jumbo jet to California. Renee met us at the airport, waving her sunglasses in the air.
“Lucy!” she called through the crowd. “Lucy, I’m over here!” They held each other tightly and for a long time. When they parted, my mother wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.
The light in the airport was glaring, like sunlight reflecting on glass. Announcements were called out over the loudspeakers, but the American voices sounded fake. They sounded like television.
In the car, Renee told us we were going to a town called Rosemont. We drove on winding cliff roads overlooking the ocean. The windows were open and warm air blew against us. The air smelled like the sea and the tar melting on the highway.
Rosemont was a two-hour drive from the airport. It was not on a cliff overlooking the ocean but in a canyon. Renee and Mum were talking in the front seats, laughing and smiling, as we drove across a rust-colored bridge. The wind and the sound of the cars on the highway made it difficult to hear the words they were saying. I closed my eyes. They felt dry from the airplane, and the sun was too bright, making me feel unbalanced and awake. Eden sat next to me, looking out his window.
We turned off the highway onto a two-lane road. Renee looked back at us, “How’s it going back there?”
Her skin was darkly tanned, which made her teeth look surprisingly white when she spoke. Her dry chapped lips made her seem thirsty, even as she sipped water from a plastic bottle.
In London, Renee had been known for her eccentric style. She would wear colored striped tights with a gypsy skirt, high-heeled boots, a leopard-printed shirt, and a cowboy hat. “By some minor miracle,” Annabel would say, “it all comes together.” She had been overweight and always trying new diets she cut from the pages of magazines. I remember coming home from school and seeing her in the kitchen, beating her thighs with wooden spoons to get rid of the cellulite.
Two years ago, before she left London for California, she helped her elderly mother sell her flat and move into an assisted living home in Brighton. She was her mother’s only child, so this was her responsibility. At the home in Brighton, her mother had a nice room, with a short walk to the shops. Renee had not been back to England or seen her mother since.
The houses in the canyon were built of wood and painted brown. Trailers were parked in rows in lots. A torn couch sat in the driveway of a house. A baby in a playpen watched her mother water the lawn. A man fixing his car turned to look at us as we drove past.
Renee pulled into a gas station. While she filled the car we went into the convenience shop, and our mother bought us each a Coca-Cola and a packet of American crisps.
Even in the canyon, the sun seemed too bright: hot, pressing down against the tops of our heads and on our skin. We drank our Cokes through plastic straws and wandered around the convenience shop, looking at the American things: pink bubble gum, Pixy Stix, baseball caps, suntan lotion, FOR RENT/FOR SALE signs in neon orange.
Mum and Renee sat on a bench outside. Mum sipped a ginger ale and smoked her last cigarette. Renee drank a seltzer. “This is the closest shop,” Renee told her. “It’s where you come if you need to make a phone call or are desperate for a fag.”
While they talked on the bench, Eden and I wandered over the parking lot to the edge of the woods. The trees in California were a reddish color, tall and thin. They were not wide and stout like the trees in England. One tree had been used as a place to put chewed-up chewing gum; its entire trunk was covered in it. Of all the trees, what bad luck to be this one.
Cigarette butts and beer cans littered the ground. Dried pine needles covered the earth, and the air smelled faintly of smoke. In the car, Renee told us that it hadn’t rained in weeks. There was a drought and fires were burning in the forests all across California.
We turned down a dirt road and stopped before a set of mesh metal gates. A man appeared from behind the gates, waving to Renee. He unlocked the chain and motioned us to drive ahead.
A sign inside said WELCOME TO THE PARVATI ASHRAM.
Renee explained that to leave or enter the ashram you must have permission from Parvati. “Once you’ve been invited here,” she told us, “no one ever wants to leave.”
Renee parked and helped us with our luggage. We followed her along a sandy path that led farther inland between the trees. The air was dry with the scent of sun and wood. A twig caught beneath the strap of Eden’s sandal, and burrs stuck to his socks. A large winged insect flew by and I covered my hair with my hands, worried it might get caught. That had happened to me before, in the loo at school, when a spider had fallen on my head.
As we walked, Renee put her arm around our mother. “I’m so happy you’re here,” she said. I saw our mother’s face flush from the compliment.
“I’m glad to see you too,” she answered, but the words sounded awkward.
“Parvati’s followers purchased the land about seven years ago and built the houses and the temple on it,” Renee said. “See, everyone who lives here pays a monthly rent, depending on their income. The rich pay more, the poor pay less. All people who live on the ashram are assigned a chore, like cooking or cleaning, even gardening. Some people have jobs outside, in the neighboring towns. I used to work in the kitchen, but now I’m in training to be one of Parvati’s Women.” Renee gripped my mother’s arm with excitement.
“I see,” our mother said, her voice full of air.
“It’s like a large family and Parvati is the mother,” Renee said, smiling at Eden and me.
We came to a large wooden house. Renee rang the doorbell and we stood on the stone steps, waiting in the shade of a palm tree. Bright flowers and waxy green plants had been planted around the house, and the grass looked green and soft, despite the lack of rain.
A woman answered the door. “I’m Keshi,” she said, taking our mother’s hand in hers. “It’s so nice to finally meet you. Renee has told us so much about you. Welcome home.”
Keshi was a tall woman with dark skin, eyes, and hair. She wore a white sleeveless blouse and long skirt. She made me think of an island.
She led us through a large empty room with stained-glass windows and brown carpeting. “This is where darshan is held,” she said. She led us through the house and into the kitchen.
We sat down at the table, and she offered us a plate of sliced apples and oranges, sprinkled with coconut. She poured us each a glass of water and offered to make us tea.
“Keshi,” Renee said to us, “is one of the Women.”
“Oh, really?” Mum’s eyes went back and forth between Keshi and Renee.
The Women, Renee told us, were the closest people to Parvati. They lived in her rooms, cooked and brought her all her meals, and helped to advise her.
“Ladies in waiting,” Renee said jokingly.
Keshi brought cups of tea to the table, and I could smell the mint and steam rising from them.
The sun shone through the windows and sliding glass doors. In the distance we could see the dark blue pond, glistening under the sun.
“Mum”—Eden tugged at her shirt—“I want to go swimming. You promised us when we got here we would go for a swim.”
“Let me just finish my tea and then I’ll take you.”
“Oh, they’ll be fine on their own,” Renee said. “All the children swim by themselves. You don’t have to worry. And I know Parvati would like to see you alone.”
I saw my mother glance at her. This was one of the things that irritated her the most: when her friends who didn’t have children told her what to do with hers.
“Mum, you know I’m a really good swimmer. I already have my trunks on under my trousers.”
“Will you go with him, May?”
I nodded. The sun in the kitchen and the warmth from the tea was making me feel tired and dizzy.
“Oh, all right, you two, go and have a look,” she said. “But May, don’t let him go in by himself.”
We stood up from the table. Renee opened the door for us, and Eden and I stepped outside onto the flat stones. When I looked back, I saw our mother watching us, as she sat at the table in the bright kitchen with Keshi and Renee.
“Come on, May,” Eden yelled, eager to get to the water. “Whoever gets there first is the winner!” he shouted, as he ran toward the pond.
“The winner of what?”
Two yellow and black butterflies flew by me. One landed on my shoulder, and I raised my arm to make it fly away but it stayed, closing and opening its wings, not afraid. They were larger than the butterflies in England, whose wings were so thin you could see through them. As delicate as pressed flowers, you were afraid to touch them. These butterflies had a thickness, their yellow and black wings beating like bees.
Eden kicked off his sandals, stepping down the slope to the water. “It’s so warm,” he said, turning to look at me. “It’s like a bath.”
Mud floated up from the bottom, mud and tiny black fish. I stood in the warm water, looking at the houses, the acres of neatly mowed lawns and planted flowers.
A man wearing shorts and no shirt, his hair pulled back in a ponytail, pushed a wheelbarrow along the path. Small birds flew above us, crossing the pond from treetop to treetop. For a moment everything went silent: the birds made no sound and the man pushing the wheelbarrow made no sound, as though I were watching from behind glass.
I lay back on the grass, thinking about how far we had traveled. Eleven hours on the airplane; we had never been this far from home. I imagined I could see a bridge in the sky connecting us. A map, a string to follow, that would lead us home.
As I sat up, I saw three girls sunbathing on the wooden dock across the pond. A girl wearing a red bikini stared in our direction, shielding her eyes from the sun.
“What’s your name?” she called. At the sound of her voice, the two other girls sat up, rising sleepily from their beach towels.
“Me?” I touched my collarbone. “My name’s May.”
“What?” she yelled back, louder. Now she stood with her hands on her hips at the edge of the dock.
I tried again. “May!” I could hear my voice disintegrate across the water. When I thought of returning from California to my school in London, I imagined this part of me would be gone. A shyness, a voice that couldn’t reach the front of the classroom, frozen in the loo stall afraid to pee, while Samantha Fenton and her friends waited in line outside.
The girl in the red bikini stood at the edge of the dock. In one sweep, she raised her arms above her head and dove into the water. The other two followed, diving in after her.
Eden stepped back from the water’s edge. “Let’s run!” His voice repeated in my head—let’s run, let’s run—but we stood on the grass watching them.
The girl in the red appeared first, wading toward us thigh-high in the water. “Hi,” she said. “I’m Sati.”
The water fell from her like rain, sliding down her tan body, landing on the grass. She was tall and thin with small breasts and a waist just starting to form. Her shoulder-length brown hair clung close to her face.
“I couldn’t hear what you said your name was,” she said, wringing out her hair. Her voice sounded softer as she walked closer. She had a pretty face and green eyes. Freckles covered her nose and cheeks.
“My name’s May.”
“May? That’s a nice name. Where are you from?” She stood next to me, the water dripping from her body onto the dry grass.
“London. I just arrived,” I said, not looking at Eden, as though he might somehow magically disappear beside me.
The two other girls emerged from the water, making their way onto the grassy bank.
“This is Summer and Molly,” Sati said. Summer had dark skin and eyes. She wore her hair in two long plaits to her waist. There was an awkwardness in the way she stood, slouched over, bending at the shoulders. The way girls who grew too fast, towering above the boys, stood hunching in the class line.
“You have a funny accent,” Molly said. She stood beside Sati, adjusting the top of her yellow swimming costume.
“I like your accent,” Sati said, looking at me. She turned the rope bracelet on her wrist. “We’re going to see the horses. Do you want to come with us?”
The horses grazed in the field and the girls stood at the fence watching them. The sun was in the middle of the sky and the sky was pale blue. After a while, the girls went into the stables, and Eden and I followed them. They walked barefoot over the prickly grass, pebbles, and stones and sat on the haystacks in their bathing suits.
Sati lifted the lid from a barrel of oats and Molly and Summer gathered around. Eden and I sat next to each other on the hay bales, watching them pi
ck out pieces of dried dates and coconut from the horse feed.
“Have you met Parvati yet?” Summer asked.
I shook my head.
“You’ll probably get to meet her tomorrow,” Sati said.
“Oh.”
As I watched them, I felt too nervous to speak. I felt the hay prickling against my legs.
“Do all of you live here?” I asked, then suddenly thought it was a stupid thing to say.
“Yes,” Molly said, in a tone that said Of course we do. “But I’ve lived here the longest. My parents moved here before Parvati was famous.”
In the car, on the way from the airport, Renee had told us about Parvati’s recent notoriety. She had been interviewed on television and in newspapers all over the world, because of her work with young men who were dying from AIDS. She was not afraid to touch and hug the sick and dying, while the doctors stood at a distance in masks and plastic gloves.
Now, on the ashram, she had built a hospice. It was filled with young men, her disciples, who were suffering from AIDS.
“What exactly is a guru?” I heard Eden ask.
The girls looked at each other, but none of them answered.
Molly shrugged. “A guru is a guru.”
“Parvati is a holy person,” Summer said. “She knows God. God talks to her and tells her things. God sends messages that only she can hear.”
I nodded. “Oh, I see.” I said, as though it were perfectly clear. Turn right, turn left—the directions to a street.
There was a sound at the stable door and the girls hurried to cover the barrel of oats, leaning back on the hay bales as though they’d been lounging all day.
Two teenage boys walked in; one pushed a banana-seat bike.
“It’s only Dylan and Brad,” Sati said, as she pushed herself off a hay bale. “They’re brothers.”
“Hey, Sati,” the boy with the bike said. “I bought you a present.”
Sati crossed her arms. “Whatever it is Brad, I’m not going to kiss you again. Your braces cut my lip.”
“Sorry,” Brad said. “I’m getting them off in a few months.”