by Anne Ostby
He glances over at me. “Thanks so much for a great meal. Will you tell Mom I said good night and I’ll see her tomorrow?”
He vanishes out the door with Lisbeth.
My head is dizzy and pounding, the two glasses of wine are spinning round and round in there, and I know I should go to bed. But Ingrid is still up, and I know she’s thinking what I’m thinking. I turn toward her so sharply that my chair scrapes the floor. “Can you believe that?”
Ingrid rolls her eyes. “Incredibly rude. But we knew that. Maybe I shouldn’t have told him about the chocolate. I don’t know why I did that.”
I shrug my shoulders. It makes no difference. It’s obvious Sina’s son is greedy no matter what.
Ingrid heaves a deep sigh. Places both her elbows on the table.
“I think it might be a blessing not to have children,” she says. “The fear of everything that could happen. The worrying about their future.”
I know exactly what she means, and complete her thought: “The disappointment over how they turned out.”
A moment of silence. Maybe it’s the wine, maybe it’s Armand, I don’t quite know why I say it: “I would have preferred to have had a girl, myself.”
A caramel-blond lock of hair, the squeeze of a small, narrow palm in mine.
Ingrid doesn’t respond, and closes her eyes for so long I start to wonder if she’s fallen asleep.
“Maybe,” she says eventually. “That way, you think you might understand what makes them tick. I don’t know.” She takes a long pause before continuing. “You haven’t met Simon and Petter, Kjell’s grandkids. We have nothing in common, absolutely nothing. They live in a world I don’t know the first thing about. But when they visit me, we have a nice time together. Simple. They don’t expect anything other than good food, and I have no delusions about getting into their minds. There’s no drama, no hopes to be fulfilled. Just…a nice time.”
I’m exhausted by this day, my head is swimming, and I don’t know where Ingrid is going with this. “Because they’re boys, you mean?” I’m surprised at the belligerence in my own voice. “Without the feelings…and the hopes and dreams—yes, call it drama if you like—there’s no intimacy!”
A shadow falls over Ingrid’s calm brown eyes, and she shakes her head firmly.
“That’s not true. I love those boys. I’ve always been in their life. How many people can you say that about? Love and responsibility, they’re intertwined.”
The night gives me no solace. I have one of those unbearable dreams where part of me knows I’m sleeping and that this isn’t real but I can’t tear the other, terrified part of me out of the nightmare. I’m lying on the beach with my legs in the water, the tide comes in, and I can’t move. My arms and legs are paralyzed, I can’t speak, I can’t cry for help. The water climbs higher and higher on my body, it’s warm and comforting, lapping softly upward. Still, the terror ripples through me, the only things I can move are my eyes. I roll them from side to side in the hope of finding rescue. Seaweed sticks to my legs, little white crabs emerge from holes in the sand and dart up my body. Now only my face is above water, I inhale through my nose in desperation. A large, shimmery blue starfish washes up on a wave and embraces my throat, as if to console me. But I don’t want consolation, I want to breathe, get up, be free! I lower my eyes, flashing a signal to the pulsating sea creature: Go away! Leave me alone! Something soft tickles my chin, flows over my face with the water and waves, drowns me in golden brown curls. The Star of the Sea looks at me with sorrowful eyes and fills my mouth with tears.
31
Ateca
Dear God
I know that in Heaven, we’ll all live in great wealth and glory. It doesn’t matter how much or how little we have in this life. Please show me humility, and teach me to appreciate what I have.
But it’s so hard to be poor, Lord! You know how much I want to give Vilivo what he wishes for. He never asks for unnecessary things, and it’s not his fault that he doesn’t have a job. And now that he’s gotten this new chance! To play rugby for Korototoka against Nausori at their away game next Saturday. But he can’t play on a real rugby league team without shoes, Lord! He hasn’t even asked for the most expensive ones: “Only eighty-nine dollars, Na, and they’re really nice! Black with green stripes. The same ones Salesi has.” But eighty-nine dollars is almost a week’s salary, Lord. And Mister Armand did offer! It wasn’t my fault that he overheard me mentioning it to Madam Kat. “Won’t you let me be rugby sponsor?” he said. “To thank Ateca for securing me such great accommodation?” His smile hung in the air, big and round like a glistening fried egg in a skillet. I saw that Madam Kat didn’t like it, her mouth was dissatisfied. But Mister Armand pushed and pushed, until I finally said yes, and thanked him. Afterward I couldn’t hold back my laughter, it rolled out of my mouth in big gulps. Mister Armand got scared and hurried out of the kitchen.
I don’t think Madam Sina liked it either. She looked sad this afternoon, as if she’d heard bad news. Forgive me if I shouldn’t have accepted the money, Lord. But it wasn’t for me! And I’ve been thinking that Mister Armand probably has more than enough money.
I told Vilivo tonight that we can never accept anything else from Mister Armand. I’m sure he understood, though all he did was stick the money in his pocket without a word. Please help him, Lord. Help him and let him find work, so he can support himself, become an adult, and start a family.
In Jesus’ holy name. Emeni.
32
Maya
The strip of sand she’s walking on grows narrower and narrower. Tall grass encroaches on the beach from uphill, the houses with thatched straw roofs grow smaller and disappear behind Maya. The rank stench of piles of seaweed, half-rotten green coconuts, and food waste makes her wrinkle her nose and halt.
She’s standing on a beach. Maya looks down at her toes. The straps of her black rubber sandals are dusted with a fine layer of sand. She stops and removes them. Lifts up the long floral skirt tied around her waist and walks carefully into the water. Stands there a while and lets the warmth of the white frothy waves envelop her feet, takes a few steps farther out. Now she has to hike her skirt up higher. She looks down at her knees, the skin wrinkling over the round kneecaps. Lifts her gaze back out over the water—is she going swimming? No. Maya turns around and wades back to the beach. She lets her toes rest on the firm yet soft surface. The tender prickling under her feet flows up through her legs. She focuses inward, feels how the grains of sand circulate in her body, follow the bloodstream, slink between the cells. Maya sees a picture in her mind’s eye, a yellowed chart she’s pulled down over the chalkboard many times. The human body stripped of skin, red muscles, pink tendons. The circulatory system, the skeleton. The grains of sand rush through her, dance past the long quadriceps, glide softly up into her hip joint. She stands perfectly still and shuts out the sound for as long as possible: “Maya! Maaaya!”
The woman walking toward her has grayish blond hair, thin and lank. She shouts, waves her arms, and looks agitated. When she catches up to Maya, she stands still for a moment, pulling herself together before she speaks.
“Look how far you’ve gone! Don’t you remember we were supposed to have an early lunch? And go into Rakiraki this afternoon? Now the others have left without us.”
Maya looks at the woman blankly. Lunch? She can’t remember whether she’s eaten lunch. She just wants to stand here, with the sand and sun rippling through her body. She opens her mouth, but the right words won’t come. She tries, feels her mind searching, doing sweep after sweep, but no. The confusion upsets her, the sand swishes in her ears; she looks at the gray-blond woman, pleading with her gaze: Help me!
“Come,” the woman says. Her eyes are kind, and Maya feels the murky wave recede, leaving her head above water.
Sina grabs her hand and slowly turns her around. “Wait,” Maya says. She bends down and picks up her sandals before they start walking back in the surf that erases all footsteps.<
br />
Why is Kat asking her for help? Maya eyes her friend suspiciously. It’s evening in Vale nei Kat, and all Maya wants to do is sit here and listen to the comforting sound of the waves. She traces the smoke from the man’s cigarette with her eyes. Who is he again? He’s pressed up against the thinnest of the women, she laughs loudly at something he says.
“You’ve taught a few home ec classes, haven’t you?” Kat says convincingly, and tugs at her arm, trying to get her out of her chair.
Maya yanks her arm back, irritated. “Literature,” she says emphatically. “Norwegian literature and history.”
“Okay.” Kat smiles. “But can’t you come take a look with me anyway? I sewed a dress. It’s finished, but I want to fasten some ribbon around the collar, and I can’t make it look nice. Didn’t you say you used to make a lot of your daughter’s clothes when she was younger?”
Her daughter. Evy. Maya can feel her blond hair between her fingers, thin and smooth, it was a struggle to gather it into a ponytail. The Christmas dress she sewed for her in the plaid material, green and red, the collar a shiny dark green. Ribbons down the sides for tying up in a big bow in the back. Maya lifts her hands in front of her, ties the bow again. She smiles at Kat and gets to her feet, walking past the man with the cigarette.
The machine is on the table in the corner; Maya knows she knows what it’s for. She examines the orange material patterned with big flowers, the white ribbon rolled up next to it. She sits down in the chair and feels Kat’s gaze like a murmur in her neck. Her hands pull out a long length of ribbon, she places it on the material, it looks pretty. White on red and orange—the colors fill her with anticipation, something is about to happen. She turns around and looks at Kat, and her friend nods encouragingly. “Can you sew it on?” she asks.
Sew it on? The ribbon sits in Maya’s hands, a twitching, unwelcome animal. She doesn’t like to hold it. Doesn’t know why she’s sitting here. Why is Kat standing behind her, asking questions?
“No!” Maya says, and stumbles to her feet so abruptly the chair falls backward. She strides through the living room, not looking at anyone as she rushes down the porch steps and out the gate. She doesn’t know what Kat is after. She doesn’t understand what they all want. She can’t be here!
The road is bumpy and there are no streetlights; still, her feet keep running. She looks down at them—why isn’t she wearing shoes? And where’s Steinar, why isn’t he here to help her? She has to go home, she doesn’t know what she’s doing here on this dark road. Where is Steinar? The fear rips through her. She doesn’t know why she’s running up the hill; has she been here before? She has to stop after a while, her legs can’t run any farther. She has to rest, and looks around for a good spot. A path beside her leads to a house, a green chair planted outside the door. She can sit there. Maya sits down, rubs her feet to get the sand and mud off. Her feet are dirty.
“Is everything all right, Madam Maya? Can I help you?”
The man who comes outside knows her name. She’s seen him before, but nothing is certain. There’s something that won’t quite clear up in her head, everything is murky, loose.
He looks at her awhile. “Wait here, Madam Maya,” he says. “I’m going to get Ateca.”
As he walks away, she can see his legs are crooked, as if he’s walked far. She gets up and keeps going uphill. It’s nighttime, and the big house at the top of the hill is dark. A long beam runs across the length of the roof, the straw hangs heavy over the thatched walls. Maya walks right over to the little side door. It’s unlocked, she pushes it open and enters. Sits down on the floor. There’s nobody home. A large wooden bowl sits against the wall, it’s decorated with shimmery shells. The wall above it is patterned with circles and squares in black and brown. Why is this house full of weapons? There are sharp, dangerous things on the floor, axes and rows of pointed spears. Maya stands up; she can’t stay here! She stumbles her way over to the door and gets outside. Her legs hurt.
“Madam Maya!”
The figure standing beside her is short, but her hands are large, with strong, warm fingers. They’ve grabbed her wrists, hold both her arms in a tight grip. “Madam Maya! Shouldn’t you be at home? It’s dark, you could trip and fall. I’ll walk you back.”
Maya feels nothing, thinks nothing, just lets herself be led through the darkness. She senses the sharp rocks on the road cutting up her feet, sending an irregular but not uncomfortable rhythm through her body. She’s going home. The woman with the short, curly hair is taking her home.
33
Sina
Sina can feel it right under her collarbone. Something about the muscles there, they had been loosening up, smoothing out, softening. Making her neck less taut, her jaw looser. Now they’ve knotted up again. Bound back together. The furrows from her mouth down to her chin have been carved another millimeter deeper. The tendons in her neck are tight, her shoulders tensed up the way they were before she came here. Fiji had been filling her with bula; now it’s disappearing, trickling away.
—
When Ateca came home with Maya that night, she’d been out looking for her as well. When Maya stormed out after the sewing incident, Kat had first told them to leave her alone. “Maybe I pushed her too hard,” she’d said. “She just needs some time to herself.”
Time to herself? Sina had been uncertain at first; the old respect for everything Kat says and does is still lodged inside her. But Maya’s face on the beach earlier that day—there’s something very wrong. She can’t fool herself any longer. Can’t keep telling herself that Maya’s just a little scatterbrained, a little more forgetful and absentminded than most. It’s more than that.
So she’d stood up, sounded the alarm, and raised her voice to Kat. “She could get lost. Or worst of all, drown. We have to go after her.”
She’d noticed the mocking look Armand shot in her direction, but brushed it off like a piece of lint on her sleeve. Set out running after Maya. To no avail: both paths, up toward Salote’s store and down toward the harbor, were empty. Fear dug its claws into Sina; the thought of Maya’s uninhabited, blank face led her farther, past the clearing behind the garbage dump and all the way down to the beach. She’d run and shouted, shouted and run the whole way back, stomped up the stairs to the veranda, and torn open the door: “Is she here?” It wasn’t until she saw Maya on the sofa next to Kat that she felt herself heaving for breath and noticed the sickening taste of blood in her mouth. This wasn’t the time to ask where she’d been found; Maya’s eyes were murky and distant, and all Sina could think of was how to make them sharp and unclouded again. So she hadn’t waited for a sign from Kat; she’d squeezed herself onto the sofa next to them and taken Maya’s cold hand. Stroked her stiff, resistant fingers until they loosened up and her eyelids started to droop. Until Ateca cautiously approached and asked if she should help them get Maya to bed.
It was only when Sina got up from the sofa that she noticed Lisbeth and Armand still sitting on two chairs at the dining table. In a flash, it struck her how out of place they both seemed. Useless and passive, two dolls dressed up for a tea party. Always taking, never giving.
—
Since that first night, she’s been waiting for him to bring it up again. The spark in his eyes when Ingrid mentioned the chocolate was the same old look she knew well; she’d heard the calculator whirring in his head. Armand has had plenty of time to look around; he’s inspected the sweet house; he’s been asking both her and Lisbeth casual questions. What are they planning to do, export? Oh, really, to Norway? How interesting. So it’ll be important to have a good contact on that end, right?
“We do,” Lisbeth responds. “My daughter knows all about market analysis; she’s working on marketing campaign strategy.”
The words sound completely comfortable in her mouth, Sina has to admit it. Not surprising, since Lisbeth uses them in discussions with Ingrid and Kat almost every day. But Armand isn’t so easy to impress.
“That’s great,” he sa
ys, and Sina recognizes the smile he flashes Lisbeth. Oh, how she recognizes it. “Of course you need people to handle the marketing. But what you also need is someone who understands how business really works. Someone who’ll be ready to pounce when it counts and can make the tough decisions without batting an eye. Someone who knows the ropes.”
She shuts her ears. Thinks to herself, Lisbeth isn’t the one making the decisions. It’s up to Kat. Kat’s cocoa, Kat’s chocolate.
—
Maybe she hasn’t been angry enough, maybe that’s where she’s gone wrong. Dismayed, yes. Ashamed, yes. Shattered, exasperated, yes. But not angry enough. Because Sina knows exactly what she wants. She wants Armand to leave. It feels brave, but good, to think the thought and turn it into words in her head. She wants him out of Fiji and out of her life. She wants Maya’s eyes to clear and for them to fall back into the synchronized stride they’ve found down here. And if Maya’s step falters, if she grows scared or panicky, Sina’s feet will find the way for both of them.
—
She decides to drive herself to Rakiraki that afternoon. Vilivo is nowhere to be found; he normally acts as driver for them, but he’s not always at the house, of course. He’s probably running around down on the rugby pitch; the black and green shoes he thinks Armand paid for are glued to his feet every single day.
She’s barely driven the truck before; in irritation, she thinks to herself that Kat doesn’t trust her with it. How hard can it be when traffic regulations are as ridiculously simple as they are here? Squeeze in wherever you can, and be ready for buses and taxis to do whatever they want. She’s getting used to the sight of driving on the left, and there’s only one road that leads straight into town, it’s impossible to get lost. Sina has errands to run in Rakiraki, and she prefers to handle them on her own.