Fifteen Lanes

by S. J. Laidlaw

  Bosco, who was pressed up against me, raised his head and growled.

  “Who do you think it is? Tina’s too busy with her new boyfriend to be texting me on the weekend. Do you think they broke up? I don’t wish that on her, but we were both supposed to get boyfriends this year and I’m not even close.”

  Bosco gave me a thoughtful stare.

  “I know. It’s weird, right? Who could it possibly be?”

  I had a flutter of anticipation as I slid off the bed and walked to my bag to dig out my phone. I carried it back, clicking through to the message at the same time. It was from an unknown caller. I opened it.

  Hi. What u up 2?

  Could it be someone I knew? That seemed unlikely. I could probably count on two hands the number of people who even had my number.

  “What should I say?” I asked Bosco. “Should I ask who it is? It must be a wrong number. Should I admit I’m chatting with my dog and doing homework on a Friday night? I’m not sure which part of that would sound more pathetic.”

  Listening to music, I typed. What are you doing?

  I waited.

  Thinking about u.

  I smiled. “That’s so cheesy it’s sweet. But he’s definitely got the wrong girl, if it is a he.”

  Do u know who you’re txting?

  The girl I’m crushing on

  “The wrong girl all right.” I sighed and tried not to feel jealous of the girl who should have been getting these messages. Bosco put his head in my lap again and I stroked his head as I thought about whether to fess up. It was so nice to actually be communicating with another human being. It had been weeks since I’d done anything in the evening other than watch TV and do homework. But it was only going to get more embarrassing if I let it continue.

  Its Grace, I texted finally.

  McClaren, I added.

  I waited again.

  Gracie ive waited 2 yrs to tell you I like u. I no who u r!

  I stared at the name, Gracie. Only my family called me that.

  Who is this?

  Don’t u no?

  I stared at Bosco as if he might have a suggestion. “I have no idea who it is. Do you think I could have a secret admirer?” As unlikely as that was, I couldn’t help but feel a warm glow of excitement. In my head I knew it had to be some weird mix-up, but what if it wasn’t? What if someone actually did like me? Tina liked me. Could lightning strike twice?

  Sorry I really don’t know who u r.

  Its todd

  No freaking way, positively no freaking way! I didn’t think there was more than one Todd at our school but it was just too coincidental. I had to be sure.

  Todd who?

  There was a long pause this time.

  Gracie, ur killing me. I w8t 2 yrs till yr brothrs out of the way to finally get up the nerve to ask u out and u say todd who?

  I gave this some thought. I’d always thought there was bad blood between Todd and my brother. Could this have been why? Did Todd want to ask me out and Kyle didn’t want him to? But why? Kyle wanted me to have a social life. He was always bugging me to be more sociable. He’d even tried to drag me to a couple of his cool-kid parties. I’d chickened out, of course, but that wasn’t his fault.

  “What do you think, Bosco?” I gave him a questioning look, only to discover he’d dozed off. “Some help you are.” I ruffled his ears. He opened an eye and closed it again.

  None of it made sense, but what if it was true? Guys can be weird about other guys. Maybe Kyle thought Todd was too old for me. Todd was a jock, and from the little I knew he’d had a number of girlfriends. Maybe Kyle thought he was too experienced for me, or a bit of a player. I felt the tiniest flame of annoyance as I considered the possibility that Kyle was being overprotective. It wouldn’t have surprised me. No one in my family trusted me to do anything on my own.

  Why would Kyle stop u? I had to ask.

  Dunno u hav 2 ask him. What music u listening 2?

  Crap! The truth was, I listened to angry indie girl bands. I didn’t want to tell him that. It’s not that I was trying to impress him. I just didn’t want to un-impress him so quickly.

  What music do u like? I was pleased with myself that I’d managed to dodge his question without lying.

  U listen to indie doncha?

  Crap again! Another message came in before I could figure out how to respond.

  U want to watch me play sometime? We hav r 1st match nxt Sunday.

  I tried to remember what season we were in. Cricket, maybe?

  Wat u playin? I decided to be honest. Perhaps he’d find it charming.

  Ha! Wat u do for fun?

  Read, swim, movies. I was honest again.

  Want 2 see a movie sometime?

  He couldn’t begin to imagine how much I wanted that. Ever since Tina left, the only people I’d gone to movies with were my parents. Even Kyle never wanted to go with just me, and I refused to go with his gang of boisterous friends. I’d had some hope at first that Madison’s group might invite me some weekend—they often talked about going to movies right in front of me—but the invitation never came. After today, it wasn’t likely it ever would.

  Was I doomed to spend the rest of my high school years with no one to hang out with but my parents? Was Todd offering me an alternative? If so, it couldn’t have come at a better time. As bad as I’d felt when Tina left, today had been a new low. It was one thing to miss my best friend but quite another to feel like a social pariah.

  I wasn’t sure if I wanted to date Todd. The fact that Madison was under the impression they were starting something gave me serious qualms. I had no desire for revenge. Quite the contrary, I still clung to the faintest hope we could somehow make up. At the same time, she couldn’t have been clearer that she had no interest in being friends. And Todd did. Maybe I didn’t have to spend the year lonely and bored.

  I needed to clear up a few things though.

  R u goin out with anoosha?

  No! Not since last year. Why, do u want to go out with me?

  R u asking?

  I looked at the screen. I wasn’t really going to send that, was I? Of course I only meant it as a joke. I added a happy face.

  R u asking? I typed

  It still looked like an invitation. From a desperate girl. Who had no friends. I deleted it.

  Maybe to a movie sometime … I hit send.

  U dont like me?

  Didnt u just ask Madison out?

  Madison who??

  Ha! After the grief she’d put me through, he didn’t even know who she was! My phone tweeted again.

  So u dont like me?

  Surely a guy like Todd wasn’t really worried that an average-looking, morbidly shy girl wouldn’t like him. He had to be fishing for compliments, not reassurance. Despite that, his question stirred something in me. What if he wasn’t as confident as he pretended? I’d seen Kyle fake it enough times to know that some guys were good at hiding their insecurities.

  It was a relief that Madison’s relationship with him was all in her head. That didn’t stop me from feeling guilty though. Obviously she had a crush on him. But I couldn’t help feeling a glimmer of satisfaction that the very guy Kelsey said would never be interested in me was the guy who was. The symmetry of it was almost poetic. And wildly coincidental. Unfortunately, the wildly coincidental aspect didn’t occur to me until later.

  I do like u. I typed it and hit send before I could change my mind. I gave a little squeal at my own boldness. Bosco pricked an ear and woofed.

  “I don’t really know if I like him,” I confided to Bosco, “but I think I could. He’s really cute, and Kyle said I need to take more risks.”

  U don’t really like me. u r just sayin that

  I shot Bosco a guilty look. Bosco flipped onto his back for a belly rub. I laid the phone on the bed so I could text and rub at the same time.

  Im not. I don’t know u vry well but I want to get to no u. I lik what I do no of u

  U don’t

  I
DO!!!

  How can I believ u when it took u so long to say it?

  I’m shy

  2 shy 2 kiss me?

  Bosco pawed the hand that had frozen on his stomach. My own stomach was doing somersaults. I’d never kissed a boy in my life. Even the idea made my whole body feel tingly. It wasn’t a pleasant sensation, but it wasn’t entirely unpleasant either.

  “I think this is it, Bosco. I think this is the opportunity Kyle was talking about. My life will never get better if I don’t change. I need to take risks.”

  I could feel the sweat beading on my forehead and collecting under my arms. If Todd had seen me just then, kissing me would have been the last thing on his mind.

  “What should I do, Bosco?” He’d rolled over again and was watching me intently. “I have to go for it, don’t you agree? Maybe Madison will understand. If Todd likes me, it would never have worked out for her anyway. And it’s not like she and I are best friends. I just want a life, Bosco. Imagine what Mom and Dad will say when I come home with a boyfriend. They’ll have to stop worrying that I’m a social reject. Kyle might be angry at first, but when he sees how happy I am …”

  I looked at the clock on my side table: a minute to twelve. I picked up the phone and cradled it in both hands, almost as if it were the boy himself. Just like Cinderella, on the stroke of midnight, my life was about to change.

  If I’d only known how much …

  Noor

  Ma is a devadasi …

  Deepa-Auntie and I were in the washing room, doing dishes. It was my job. Even on school days, dirty dishes would be left there, awaiting my arrival. The single bucket of water, which had to last me two days, was also my responsibility. Along with the dirty dishes, I collected money from the aunties to pay for the water.

  The space in the washing room was too small for us to crouch side by side so Deepa-Auntie couldn’t really help me. That wasn’t why she was there. It was a humid Sunday afternoon with not a breath of wind, so there were no customers. The aunties had arisen, as they always did, around one o’clock in the afternoon, to bathe and eat. Most had gone back to sleep. The men would come later that evening, when the temperature dropped, which meant more customers squeezed into fewer hours. Deepa-Auntie wanted to enjoy the temporary respite, so she had to hide where Pran wouldn’t find her. He always considered a lull in customers his own chance to take a turn with her.

  He could have had any of the aunties. Some would have appreciated the opportunity to win favor with Binti-Ma’am’s son—even Ma would have agreed—but Pran’s cold eyes always fell on Deepa-Auntie. Ma said Deepa-Auntie’s golden skin was both her good fortune and her bad. I wasn’t sure it was Deepa-Auntie’s skin that held Pran’s interest. He didn’t have the restless hunger of the men who came at night. Usually he looked tired, even bored. Only if Deepa-Auntie cried and begged him to choose another did he light up, and Deepa-Auntie always cried.

  “I grew up on a farm,” said Deepa-Auntie. It was the beginning of a story I’d heard variations of many times. I never tired of hearing it, nor she of the telling.

  “We were very poor but I didn’t know it. When the rain came it was so heavy it dripped through our grass roof. Mama caught it in buckets and joked that it would save me a trip to the river, though in the rainy season I never had to go as far as the river to fetch water. It filled the cistern in our front yard and was so plentiful we’d throw full buckets over ourselves when we bathed.

  “I never went to school. Only my younger brothers went. I didn’t mind. I was happy to have them out of the house. They were always chasing the chickens and stealing eggs. They never took a turn milking the goat, or helping Daddy hitch the bulls to the plow. The house was peaceful without them. I enjoyed the time alone with Mama and my baby sister, Yangani. I carried Yangani everywhere on my back, even while doing chores. Daddy called me ‘little mother,’ and I dreamed about the day I would have my own babies. My blood had not yet come when the man took me and brought me here.”

  Deepa-Auntie always stopped her story at this point, though she arrived there in a slightly different way each time. She never told me what happened between the day a man came to her village with promises of domestic work and the day she ended up in our house. Many times I’d seen the scars on her body. I pretended not to notice. Though I was nine and in the 4th class at school, she thought I was too young to know the truth. We colluded in this, my feigned innocence and her delusion that anyone could remain uncorrupted in that house.

  With the dishes done, I sat back on the floor, trying to stay clear of the drain so I didn’t get my kameez wet. It would take hours to dry and I didn’t own another. I wanted to go outside but I couldn’t leave Deepa-Auntie.

  “Tell me about Yangani,” I said.

  Deepa-Auntie smiled at the memory. “She was the most beautiful baby in the village. All the other girls were jealous of me and would beg to hold her. I’d let them, but Yangani would always cry until they gave her back. After I taught her to walk, she followed me everywhere.”

  We both jumped when the door suddenly opened. It was only Ma, with my sister, Aamaal, who was born three years earlier.

  “What are you doing in here, Noor? If you’re done with the washing up, you should do your homework.”

  I was already finished my homework, as Ma well knew. It was the first thing I did when I got home from school every day, such was my pleasure in studying. Ma also took pride in my schoolwork. Every year I won firsts in Math and English. She secreted each medal into the hem of her skirt as if they were made of real gold and not just gold-colored tin. Her real concern was not too little time spent on homework, it was too much with Deepa-Auntie.

  “I’m telling her about my farm,” said Deepa-Auntie. “Didn’t you also grow up on a farm, Ashmita-Auntie?”

  “No,” said Ma. “I didn’t. And if I had I wouldn’t waste my time thinking about it since I’d be smart enough to know I would never live there again.”

  “How can you be sure, Ashmita-Auntie? The voyage of life is very long with many bends in the river. So many things can happen. Who knows what course it might take?”

  “It’s not so long for us,” said Ma.

  “Why do we never visit your home anymore, Ma?” My breath quickened to ask.

  The last time we’d been to Ma’s village was for the birth of Aamaal. Before that we’d gone once a year. On our final visit, Ma and Grandma had argued behind closed doors, and when we left, Grandma didn’t walk us to the main road, where we waited in silence for a bus. Ma hadn’t spoken of Grandma since. I never asked, but I missed those visits. For those few days, I could laugh as loudly as I wanted and run far and fast. No one shouted at me, or beat me. I risked a beating now, asking Ma about these visits, but she was far less likely to let her anger loose with Aamaal beside her. I didn’t begrudge Aamaal her favored status. With her golden skin and thickly fringed eyes, anyone could see she was going to be a beauty. She was my mother’s child in a way I could never be.

  “You should not waste your time thinking about the past, Noor.”

  “Please, Ma.”

  She frowned.

  “Please, Ma,” Aamaal echoed. For once I was happy that she always copied me.

  “They only wanted our money, Noor. In my village the elders pretended it was something else, a sacred duty. Maybe there was a time when that was true but it was many years ago. When my mother dedicated me to the temple, it was for money, not religion, not even tradition.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Grandma felt it was time for you to learn your history, your calling. We didn’t agree. She’s a devadasi, as am I.”

  It was the first time I’d heard the word that dropped like a stone from my mother’s lips. I understood it was significant. “Am I also a Devadasi?”

  Ma laughed mirthlessly. “The foolish hen tells you life is a twisting river like the one in her mountain homeland. Do you see such a river flowing past our house? There is only the open sewer carrying f
oul waste discharged from bodies too numerous and worthless to count. Perhaps it goes underground when it passes the great mansions of South Bombay, or slinks, like a thief carrying treasures, when it courses through the sleek neighborhoods to our north. It makes no difference. When it empties into the sea it’s still shit, and the destination was never in question. You were born into your fate, Noor. I may forestall it but you can’t escape it. We can only hope your next incarnation will be more forgiving.”

  She stroked her belly where another child was already growing inside her, though the bump barely showed. “I’m going to lie down. Look after your sister.” She pushed Aamaal through the doorway and closed it behind her.

  “What’s a Devadasi?” I asked Deepa-Auntie.

  “I’m not sure, though I know several women here are also devadasis and they all speak Kannada, like your ma. I don’t think we had Devadasis in Nepal.”

  “If Ma and Grandma were devadasis, am I also one?”

  “You are whatever you choose to be, Noor-baby. Someday we’ll leave this place. I’ll pay off my debt to the fat one and her pig-faced son and we’ll go back to my village. We’ll climb the hills of my homeland, follow the egret’s flight to my father’s herd. We’ll see him first as we crest the hill overlooking my home. He will be watching for me, as he’s done every day since I left, and will run to greet us, shouting the news of my return. Even my worthless brothers will laugh with joy. We’ll take them presents like they’ve never seen—a cooking pot made of the strongest iron for my mother, and bells for each of our goats, so my father will never have to search long for them when they stray. But the greatest gift will be for Yangani.”

  “What will that be?” I asked. I already knew the answer.

  “It will be you, of course. A new sister for her to play with and love. She will follow you as she once followed me, or perhaps she will be grown and you will walk side by side, sharing secrets as sisters do.”

  I wanted to ask her how she could have such optimism. We knew not one woman who had escaped the trade. The few who had managed to buy their freedom continued to work alongside us. Rejected by their families, who were ashamed of what they’d become, regardless of the circumstances, they survived in the only profession they knew, among the only community that would accept them.