by Pia Padukone
Karom had put the watch on immediately, and unless he was bathing or sleeping or going through the security line at the airport, he never took it off. He would wear it as a constant reminder of all that he had lost, his whole family all at once, wham bam, in an instant, like the second hand that ticked on his wrist.
* * *
On the morning of their departure from Delhi, Ammama tiptoes into the sitting room, where Karom is holding his watch between his fingers, studying its slightly scarred face. Ammama stops and smiles shyly, looking down at the tray as if to show Karom what she has brought him. He motions to her to sit down next to him.
“Come,” he whispers. She sits awkwardly on the bed next to him, pulling her tiny feet underneath her and adjusting her sari. The tray of bananas and cold coffee sits between them, but on this morning, there is also a thick book. Karom peels a banana and hands it to her. She shakes her head shyly. Karom urges, “Please.” She nibbles at the tiny fruit and Karom peels another for himself. So much sweeter than the huge bland ones we get back home, Karom thinks.
“What do you say to me?” he asks. “Are you praying?” Ammama colors and looks down at the floor.
“I thought you were asleep,” she says.
“I’m an early riser,” Karom says. “Please tell me.”
“It’s nothing, really. Just an old lady’s superstitions.”
“Please.” He takes her banana peel and places it with his alongside the book on the tray. He turns to face her. Ammama looks at him and purses her mouth.
“You mustn’t be cross with Gita for telling me. She tells me that you like to tempt fate. That you call it your game. Is that right?” Karom looks down, embarrassed. “Fate isn’t an easy thing to play with. Once it decides to shift in one direction, the gusts keep on blowing, and it’s out of your hands. You have to take care of one another, don’t you?” He nods. “But I know there is something over you. An omen.”
“An omen?”
Ammama nods solemnly.
“What kind of omen? Because I’ve been pretty lucky.” He tells her about Acadia and the tidal wave that he and Gita narrowly missed. He tells her about 9/11, how he’d feigned illness on the morning that his class was to visit a news studio in Tower 1 because he hadn’t finished a paper on Howards End, how instead he’d stayed home watching the news, stricken, while the first tower came crumbling down like a stale cracker.
“Do you think so? Then what is this game nonsense?”
It’s Karom’s turn to color. “It’s just my way of feeling alive. I can’t— I don’t have an explanation. It’s how I’ve conditioned myself, I suppose. To understand why I’m still...why I don’t...why I can’t...what’s keeping me from...” He trails off and looks down at his hands sitting uselessly in his lap. “But what do you see? How can you tell?”
“I suppose the same way, I can’t explain the feeling I had about you from the moment you walked through the door. But I knew it was there the moment I heard you whimpering and tossing about at night.”
“I’m still doing that, huh?” Karom bites his lip. “Is this something that will hurt me? Omens don’t have to be bad, you know. Are you praying to get rid of the omen?”
“I suppose I am. I am praying for you to win the game. I want you to win. Just like Gita, I want the game to end.”
Karom looks down sheepishly.
She reaches for the tray and picks up the book, weighing it carefully between her two hands.
“This is mine. I want you to have it.” Karom looks at the cover, his eyes wide with surprise.
“You—you wrote this?”
“It’s being released this Friday. Read it, and let me know what you think. I suppose it’s my form of sealing fate away in a place it can’t hurt me.”
Karom’s eyebrows knit together.
Ammama smiles. “You’ll see. I have only two copies, and I will give the other one to Gita before you leave.”
“Thank you,” he whispers. “I didn’t even know you were a writer. Gita didn’t mention...” He looks at the book again before slipping it into his backpack. “I’m honored.”
Gita appears now around the corner of the living room, wearing rumpled boxer shorts and a tank top. Even in the cloistered morning air, her nipples stand at attention and Karom looks down, embarrassed. She is wearing the neckpiece Ammama has given her and she pulls her hair out from where it is tucked under her camisole strap and braids it to the side.
“What are you guys doing?” She yawns, leaning against the doorway.
“You didn’t sleep with that on, did you?” Karom asks.
“Of course not. I just felt like wearing it now,” Gita says, twirling one of the fat golden ropes around her finger.
“It’s rather special to be wearing around the house,” Karom says. “Put it away. It’s delicate.”
“I’ll get breakfast started. You’ll have to leave for the airport shortly after your baths,” Ammama says, getting up.
“How much do you think this is worth?” Gita asks when Karom is alone with her in the living room.
“I have no idea. But aside from the price of the stones and the gold itself, I’m sure the antique design and the craftsmanship are worth a lot.”
“I was thinking about selling it,” Gita whispers, her eyes shining in the morning light. “It’s gotta be worth hundreds, maybe even a thousand. And then we can go to Argentina over Christmas.”
“Are you insane?” Karom nearly shouts. His anger seems to reflect off the walls of the small apartment. He feels his temple pulsing, though in the rest of his body, it feels as if his blood has actually run cold and stopped midcourse in his veins. “Gita, that’s your grandmother’s wedding necklace. She would never have gifted it to you if she knew you were going to sell it. It has to remain in the family.”
“Well, too bad you’re not in mine. ’Cause then you could save it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know what it means.” Gita sticks her chin out in a manner that would normally have made Karom tackle her onto the bed and initiate hours of intimacy, had they been in his bedroom back in New York, but now it just provokes him. “Besides, Karom, we can’t all hold on to the past like a narcotic. There are things that link us to our dark memories and don’t let us move on. This necklace is a prime example. It’s tainted.”
“Tainted,” Karom repeats.
Gita grits her teeth as she leans in, whispering toward him. “Yes, tainted. It’s my grandmother’s wedding jewelry. The groom fled this ship thirty years ago and treated her like dirt while he was here. Yes, let’s hold on to this blissful symbol of their awful marriage forever.”
Ammama sticks her head in the doorway. “Would you like Indian breakfast today or something light, like toast? Either is perfectly convenient.”
“Toast,” Karom says, just as Gita says, “Dosas.”
“One of each,” Ammama says, turning back toward the kitchen.
“I don’t want to talk about this anymore,” Gita says. “I have to finish packing.” She takes the necklace off and returns to the room she has been sharing with her grandmother. Karom has already finished packing. He is a meticulous planner and has learned to pack from a flight-attendant friend who showed him how to roll T-shirts and tuck underwear into his shoes. His toiletries are stowed in the plastic compartment at the top of his bag, the tube of toothpaste curled up evenly like a scorpion’s tail, ensuring that every inch of space is being utilized. His socks are balled into spheres, and his belts snaked around the perimeter, encasing all his clothes in a tight bundle. The hard shell of his maroon suitcase is streaked with dust, the way it always happens only in India. Dust gets in everywhere, no matter that Karom unzips his bag for only a few hurried minutes each day: in the morning before his bath and in the evening before bed. Dust is caked betw
een the grooved wheels, and he wipes the plastic with a wet towel, where it spreads and nestles into the suitcase’s zippered teeth. He can hear Gita’s version of packing in the next room: unfolded clothes tossed into her gaping Tumi—unwashed ones stuffed into a plastic Fabindia bag—and her huffs and squats as she clambers on top to zip it. Karom sits down on what has been his bed for the past four nights. He turns his wrist upside down and examines the fine hairs that grow where the white of the underside of his arm meets the tan line that has grown deeper during their vacation. His watch ticks reassuringly away. If they leave within the hour, they will make their flight with no problems.
Karom takes the watch off now, weighing it in the center of his palm. The skin underneath his watch is white and moist and gives off a peppery odor. The spicy scents of coconut and lentils waft down the corridor. He can hear Gita as she pads into the kitchen and muffled conversation as she sets the table. The watchstrap is fraying, but in a charming antique way. He rotates the dial, watching the hands spin freely. He picks up the flat pillow and the three sheets that are folded on his pallet bed, and for an instant, he considers leaving the watch on top of the pile. Instead he slaps it back onto his wrist and pulls it tight through the loopholes before pulling his sleeve to cover the face. Karom fluffs the pillow and places it on top of the pile before picking up his suitcase and rolling it into the hallway.
Copyright © 2014 by Pia Padukone
ISBN-13: 9781459292499
The Faces of Strangers
Copyright © 2016 by Pia Padukone
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