America for Beginners

by Leah Franqui

  After a few more minutes Satya gestured for Rebecca, who was reading, and Pival to get off at the next stop, outside of the Lincoln Memorial. Together they debarked and Pival paused, drinking some of her water from her ever-present purchased bottle.

  Satya guided them into a strange white mausoleum-like place, where an enormous man was sitting on an equally enormous throne. She recognized the face, as they grew closer, from her history lessons on America. This was President Lincoln. In front of her, Satya was holding up a five-dollar bill next to his face and grinning.

  “Look familiar?”

  Rebecca rolled her eyes. She seemed uncomfortable in DC. Satya frowned at her but continued his lecture on Lincoln, the Great Emancipator, only Satya pronounced it EEE-maahn-cipa-TOOOOR and as a result it took several minutes before Pival understood what he was saying, and only then because she read a plaque on the side of the statue.

  The image of the giant man in the giant chair was awfully frightening, though Pival understood that it was intended to be inspirational. Certainly the things Satya was saying about Lincoln were very nice. This president had freed slaves just like their own Gandhi had ended the caste system. He had also maintained the wholeness of the United States in some way, which was unclear to Pival, but it sounded good. Ram, she thought, would have liked this part. It was nice, for a moment, for once, to think about what Ram would have liked, instead of what he had hated.

  Pival looked up at the enormous statue in the Lincoln Memorial, marveling at it. The heaviness of the stone seemed to sit on her heart. President Lincoln was so massive and weighed down in this prison of marble. It troubled her to see a real person on such a massive scale, and in such a strange place. She wondered if he got lonely, Mr. Lincoln, as he sat alone here forever. She wondered where Rahi’s body was now, if it was rotting under the ground, trapped beneath a large stone slab somewhere. She wondered if that person he had been with, the person who had taken him from Pival, had the body, and if they had buried him, according to their own tradition, or cremated him, according to hers.

  “Some people say he might have been gay, you know,” Rebecca said, looking up at the statue. Pival couldn’t breathe. All the air was sucked from her lungs and she could feel the blood rushing to her face. She looked at Rebecca.

  “Who?” she asked, in no more than a whisper.

  “Lincoln.”

  “That’s disgusting!” Satya said strongly, his eyes flaring. “Why would you say such a thing?”

  “Why is it disgusting?” Rebecca asked, her tone biting.

  It just is, it is, it is, thought Pival, trying to breathe, trying to look normal, trying not to cry.

  “In Lincoln’s day maybe it was unacceptable. But now? It’s fine. Gay people can do anything, they can live together, adopt children, get married, get divorced. Be as unhappy as the rest of us. Look, even if he wasn’t gay, isn’t that what Lincoln would have wanted? A land of equality? Well, now we have it, sort of. Sometimes. Thanks, Abe!” Rebecca saluted the statue. Satya, shaking his head in disgust, walked off to get a water. Rebecca smiled at Pival sheepishly.

  “Sorry. I couldn’t resist.”

  “Is it true?” Pival asked, not sure if she wanted it to be or not.

  “Who knows? We probably won’t ever have a clear answer and they thought of sexuality so differently then—”

  “No. Is it true that sometimes things are equal here?”

  Rebecca paused at the question. “I guess it depends where you live. But I think generally yes, it’s better than it used to be. It can be pretty great, actually. It’s legal—hell, it’s cliché. And I fully support gay rights, by the way. It’s not disgusting. At least, I don’t think so.”

  “Where do you have to live for it to be okay?”

  Rebecca looked at Pival curiously. “Um, cities, really. Big ones. New York, Chicago, L.A., San Francisco of course, but even here, or some of the Southern cities, places where people aren’t so afraid of what’s different, you know? Look, I don’t know. It’s good in New York, I know that much. You see couples all the time, holding hands, kissing in public, going down to city hall to get hitched, and no one cares. Or if they do, they don’t say anything. Which is all you can hope for, really, for anything.”

  Pival nodded. She had so much more to ask, so much more she wanted to know, but she was afraid. L.A. Rebecca had said it was good in L.A. No matter how misguided Rahi might have been, thinking he was a homosexual, calling his father and declaring it as if it was nothing to be ashamed of, she didn’t want him in danger. She wanted him to be happy, to be safe. To be close to other people, to love and be loved. Even if it was in the wrong way.

  She wished so badly that it had been her, the day the other call came, who had answered the phone and not Ram. She would have no doubts in her mind now if that had been true. She would have asked the person who he was, how he knew her son, if he was happy. She had never been sure who it was who called to tell them, but she assumed it was him, the man Rahi had told them he loved. The man who had taken her son away. But it should have been her on the phone, checking, double-checking. She would have thought to ask for Rahi’s body back, to make sure, not just thinking of pride, like Ram. She would have been no less revolted, no less angry with the person who had seduced and ruined their son, who had broken their family apart, but she would have remembered the important things. She wouldn’t be living in this agony of doubt.

  Ram had not started out a bad husband, she knew. He had done everything for her that his father had done for his own mother. He had fulfilled his duty, fed her, clothed her, kept her safe and comfortable, denied her nothing he did not deny himself. It was only when Rahi failed them, failed himself, that Ram blamed her for the way things had turned out.

  She had not protested at the separation after Rahi had told them he was different, that he would not be what they wanted. She had understood the ban. But after the moment that Ram slammed down the telephone and said nothing other than that some son of a whore said Rahi had died, she knew that it was not Rahi who had been wrong all this time, but Ram. If they had welcomed Rahi back into their family, if they had tried to understand him, convince him of the folly of what he was doing, if they could have gotten him back to India at least, it would have all been all right. They could have saved him from himself, from his silly notions and this strange lust he had. They could have tried, at least. That would have been better than nothing.

  The tour group walked away from the memorial. Pival looked back several times until it was out of view. Satya tried to take a photograph of her in front of it but she refused. She did not want a record of that moment.

  Pival thought that Rebecca was looking rather strange as they walked the streets of Georgetown. This was the first area of the city that Pival actually truly liked. This part of town was all brick and shorter buildings, smaller streets and trees. There wasn’t a trace of white marble or anything monumental in sight. This was lovely, Pival thought, all little shops and friendly people. She wondered whether this was where she would do her shopping if she lived here. She looked around for a decent grocery store but didn’t see one, which seemed strange to her. How did people eat here? Everything seemed so specialized; there was a cheese shop, a wine shop, a shop for small iced cakes. Did they not have one big store for everything? When she had been a child in Kolkata she had followed her mother as she shopped this way, from one place to another, something here, something there, but now the grocery stores had everything you could need in one place. Her driver would take her weekly, and carry all the bags into and out of the car. It seemed strange that Washington, DC, hadn’t developed such a system yet. Come to think of it, she hadn’t seen grocery stores or street markets in New York at all, just little shops. How did people manage to eat so much in America if there was no food to be had?

  It was warmer in Washington, especially by the middle of the day, and Pival enjoyed the sensation of the sun on her skin. She felt it warm her, soothing the little bumps left by th
e sheets. That morning she had adopted a short-sleeve kurta and loose drawstring pants, not wanting to bother with a sari. No one had said anything, and Satya had not seemed bothered, but Pival couldn’t escape the feeling that she was doing something very bold. She looked at Rebecca again, who wore a loose button-down top layered over a lacy camisole, which peeped, rather provocatively, in Mrs. Sengupta’s opinion, out of the edge of her neckline, and a pair of tight trousers that ended just below her knees. Rebecca wore such daring things, with fabrics that floated around her or clung to her tightly, but she seemed comfortable, free. Pival wondered what jeans would feel like. Some girls she had known in school had worn them sometimes. Back then they had been high-waisted bell-bottoms that had seemed awfully fashionable, and only the wealthiest and most modern girls wore such things, parading around with feathered hair and tall shoes. But most girls had only watched and wished they could wear such things. She had never been daring enough to ask her father for permission, and once she had married Ram, it had seemed like a silly thing, a schoolgirl fantasy, though she still watched other women with something like envy. She wondered if she would ever try on a pair of jeans, or if she would be watching other women until she died. Now that her death might be only days away, it seemed like it was now or never. After all, what was there to stop her?

  As they passed by a store with many varieties of denim in the window, Pival opened her mouth to ask if they had the time to stop when Rebecca, whose body had grown tenser for the past several blocks, took her arm and dragged her in before she could even say anything at all. Gesturing wildly for Satya to follow, Rebecca flung them both behind her, and she watched from the window as someone passed by. She turned back to them both, stammering.

  “I’m sorry. It’s just, I didn’t want to see someone I know so I just, I’m sorry, this just seemed easier.”

  “Why don’t you want to see someone you know? And how do you know people here?” Satya asked, looking at her suspiciously.

  “I know lots of people,” Rebecca retorted, biting the words out. Satya and Pival looked at her, waiting. She sighed.

  “I’m from here. I grew up here. You know how it is, your hometown, sometimes you just don’t want to deal with people.” Pival and Satya looked at each other, confused. Pival had never left the city in which she had grown up. She suspected that Satya hadn’t either, before coming to the United States. And this idea of not dealing with people, obviously neither of them understood that. There were people she did not like in Kolkata, but she had certainly never found a way to avoid them. After all, most of them were related to her through marriage. There was no avoiding people like that.

  “I’m sorry to derail us, but it’s just a minute, okay? Is that okay? Satya?”

  The boy looked to Pival, who nodded. She had wanted to see the store. But despite her acquiescence, she didn’t know what to make of this. The girl had seemed so calm and confident, and now she chewed the edge of one nail furiously as she waited, her body tense, for whoever it was she didn’t want to see to pass.

  “Who is it? This person you are knowing?” The words bubbled to her mouth before she could stop them. She was not normally a person who pried into the lives of others, and she felt ashamed. She certainly hated when people pried into her own life. That being said, Rebecca was her employee, her servant. Surely she had a right to ask?

  “Oh, it’s, nothing, it’s just, well, it’s my mom.” Rebecca said it so quietly that Pival barely heard her. When the word registered, her mouth hung open with shock.

  “Your mother is here?”

  “Both my parents live here. I didn’t tell them we would be coming, since I never thought I would see them. I just—look, it doesn’t matter. I apologize.”

  “You don’t want to see your own mother?” Pival’s voice rang out clearly and loudly, startling people around them in the store. Rebecca looked at her, shocked.

  “No, of course I do, it’s only that I’m working, obviously, I’m here to be your companion, not to see my parents, right, so—”

  “You saw your friend in Philadelphia,” Satya commented, looking at Rebecca curiously. Rebecca’s face now wore the sour expression of all children caught in their own lies.

  “You should see your mother.” Pival spoke loudly again, and firmly. More and more people were looking at them, but she didn’t care. Rebecca should not pass through the city without her family’s knowing she was there. What if Rahi had done such a thing? Perhaps he had, and she hadn’t known. The thought felt like a blow.

  “I wouldn’t want to abandon you like that—”

  “I will meet her, too.” Rebecca looked at Pival, her eyes wide. “Go. Now. Please.”

  Rebecca went. For once, Pival had injected the kind of authority into her voice that Ram had always had, and it had worked. She thanked her husband silently.

  As she watched Rebecca walk down the street and carefully tap a woman on the shoulder, Pival swallowed deeply and inhaled, checking her throat and lungs. She had not spoken so loudly in a long time. She wanted to laugh. It wasn’t the years of coaching that had helped her voice. It was her feelings for another mother.

  Now Rebecca was leading a confused-looking woman back toward them. Pival waited with Satya, all thoughts of jeans vanished.

  “She looks like her mother, does she not, madam?” Satya murmured to Pival. Satya had grown more familiar with her since they had left Ronnie’s care, and while Pival knew she should stop that and impose boundaries, she couldn’t force herself to do so. It was very difficult to maintain distance as they traveled. She was equally dependent upon and interested in them. Rebecca and Satya were the first new people she had met in such a long time. They might be the last people she ever met and got to talk to, besides the man in California who didn’t know she was coming and wouldn’t want to see her. There was no society here to impress, no one to judge how she treated others. She would like to leave the world actually knowing someone who was left behind.

  Now Rebecca and her mother were right in front of them. Rebecca was smiling nervously.

  “Mom, this is Mrs. Sengupta, the tourist. And Satya Roy, the tour guide.”

  “And what are you? The entertainment?” the woman asked Rebecca, her eyes laughing. She was a pretty woman still, Rebecca’s mother, with silver shooting through her dark hair and wide eyes surrounded by fans of laugh lines, though the skin of her face was taut. She wore a fashionable gray dress suit with simple jewelry in shades of silver and coral, and sensible but stylish shoes. Her face, despite her dancing eyes, was tense, showing she was no more comfortable with this chance meeting than Rebecca.

  “I told you, Mom, I’m the companion.”

  “Of course, the companion. It’s all very Regency England, isn’t it? Are you going to have an affair with Mr. Rochester or something?”

  “Ladies and gentlemen, my mother, Cynthia Greenbaum. If you don’t get her jokes, don’t worry, you’re not supposed to.” Pival was sure that Rebecca was destined for an angry remark or a slap after that disrespectful comment but her mother just laughed. Satya leaned down to touch her feet almost automatically but Cynthia stepped back, looking confused. Satya hesitated, his hand hanging in the air for a long moment, and then drew back. Cynthia extended her hand first to Pival and then to Satya, shaking each of their hands firmly.

  “I had no idea that you were coming through here, Rebecca.”

  Rebecca winced. “I wasn’t sure if I would have time to see you. You know what these tours are like, something every minute—”

  “Still, you should have told me. Well, I suppose you didn’t bother to think of anyone but yourself.”

  Rebecca looked up, hurt.

  “That’s the problem with being an actress, you know? It’s like a job skill to be self-obsessed. What are you doing for dinner tonight?” Cynthia had spoken so quickly Rebecca didn’t have a moment to react. Pival watched the thoughts flash through the girl’s head before she took a deep breath and opened her mouth to speak.

>   “Mom, I told you, the trip has all these meals at different Indian restaurants—”

  “Oh, god, that sounds wretched. American Indian food every day? Tandoori chicken as far as the eye can see! Come home instead!”

  “Mom, I can’t just leave. We have to stay together.” Pival thought about dismissing her for the evening but realized that Rebecca wouldn’t thank her.

  “Oh, I meant all of you! Come on over, I’ll cook, your father will be thrilled, he’s just in stitches about this whole thing you are doing, he’s going to absolutely die. He’ll have no idea, it will be a wonderful surprise. Come at seven. You’ve still got keys? Pasta is okay, right? Of course, everyone loves pasta! Okay, sweetheart, see you then!” And like a whirlwind, Cynthia was gone, kissing each of them on the cheeks so quickly that neither Pival nor Satya could react and departing in a perfume-scented rush.

  Rebecca watched her hurry off down the street. She turned to Pival.

  “That is what I meant by ‘deal with.’” Pival’s voice had abandoned her again, lost in the onslaught of Rebecca’s mother, and she could only nod weakly. “My mother is a little aggressive. Do you mind coming?” Pival and Satya shook their heads. “Do you like pasta?”

  “I have never tried it.” Satya nodded his head in agreement with Pival’s quiet statement.

  “Then I guess we’ll find out.” Rebecca started walking again, away from the denim shop. Pival followed her, worried now.

  “But if you don’t want to, can’t you call your mother and say no?”

  Rebecca turned to Pival, gritting her teeth a bit. “My plan had been to avoid her completely. But now she’s asked us, and it would be rude not to go. Wouldn’t it be rude not to go? If it was your mother?” Pival nodded. “I’ll tell Ronnie, don’t worry. He’ll consider it a trip bonus, a free meal with a real live American family. All part of the package, right, Satya?” Rebecca asked, her tone as bright and brittle as the glass they had seen in the museum. Was that only three days before? It seemed like a lifetime.