The Journey Prize Stories 28

by Kate Cayley

  A line began to form. I intended to move out of the way, but Sapna wrapped her hand around my elbow and held me fast. The line of congregants began to offer us their good wishes and blessings while the pundit, next to us, distributed the prashad.

  The academic I had recognized from earlier approached. “Wishing you the best, Mistry,” he said. I still couldn’t remember his name. “I didn’t know you were dealing with…but I hope the worst will come to pass without much ado.” I nodded in thanks, as I did with the others.

  When the crowd had cleared, the pundit led us through a door at the back. “It is very nice to see you with us finally, Santosh,” he said. “Sapna has been keeping us updated on your situation. You are always in our prayers.”

  I nodded again. Both Sapna and the pundit—whose name I realized I had never learned—stared at me, and I knew I was expected to speak. I nodded again.

  “Swami-ji,” Sapna said, “everything you have done for us, you don’t know how much it has meant, how much more peacefully I am able to sleep at night. Shukriya. And please, accept this for the temple, as thanks from us.” She handed him a thick envelope.

  On the drive home, I fixed my thoughts on the traffic lights and turn signals and road signs. The roadways here were better controlled than they had been in Delhi. The rules were accessible and easy to learn, and drivers followed them for the most part. The system worked because of a combination of cooperation and accountability. That was what allowed all of us to make our way to various destinations safely. Evidence of clear thinking and reliable procedures: this is what I was after, too, in the work I did.

  I had managed to forget Sapna was even present, sitting beside me in silence, when my mind alighted on how Sapna had thanked the pundit—shukriya. Shukriya was not shuddha Hindi, a pure form of the language. Shukriya was an Urdu word, of Arabic and Persian origin. The two languages had muddied together and nowadays the words were used interchangeably.

  “You should have said dhanyavad,” I said.

  “What?”

  “Shukriya is Arabic. Dhanyavad is Hindi.”

  I looked over and saw that she was puzzled but still smiling.

  “I would think that would matter with things like these. Isn’t that what these rituals are all about? Being as pure as possible, connecting to your so-called Bhagvan?”

  “I know dhanyavad is Hindi,” she said, then paused. “Why do you talk about God like you have all the answers?”

  “It doesn’t take much to accept God, it seems. It’s harder to speak in your mother tongue.”

  “God brought us together today. Everyone came out to support us. That’s what God does. Thanks to their prayers, everything will turn out all right. Without God, how could we believe that?”

  I was careful to keep my tone even. “It worries me that you believe this. That you think like this. It worries me that you will be passing on this kind of nonsense to our baby.”

  She answered just as calmly. “It worries me that my daughter’s father is the kind of man who has no culture, no belief, no principles to live by. You might be a big scientist type, but as a man, you are empty.”

  I gripped the steering wheel, rubbing the soft insides of my hand into it. I lowered my voice. “Next time you take out that much money, you ask me first.”

  “This from the man who says I don’t have to ask him for anything.”

  We didn’t speak again until I pulled the car into the garage. “I am going to the lab,” I said. For the first time in our marriage, I was the one who was refusing to speak to her.

  I spent most of my hours in the months before I became a father in the laboratory. I watched the fish devour their unborn, and I wondered why I had married Sapna. I wondered what mistake in thinking led me to trust that our families would know that we would be a good match. It was true that the sense behind the arrangement of marriages had appealed to me, but if I had thought about it carefully, I would have discovered the bedrock of ignorance it was built on.

  I first met Sapna in the lobby of a hotel, selected by her parents for its neutrality. She entered through the doors like Parvati dancing for Vishnu, rolling her hips and breasts, trying to stoke fire. It wouldn’t have mattered if it had been her, or another woman my parents had selected. All I cared about was the permission that marriage would give me: to touch her, to witness her nudity, to insert myself inside her. And now, what it had left me with: to endure her. In the end, my own bestiality was to blame.

  I often worked alone at the lab, the only sound the gurgling tanks. My research team, comprised of graduate and postdoctoral students and peers, was in and out, and though we exchanged notes and ideas, I perceived that, to them, my presence was strictly ornamental. I didn’t know how many had knowledge of what had transpired at the temple, of my medical condition, or that I had relied on prayer to defeat genetics. That was how it would seem to them, no matter the truth. I knew what I would be thinking, were it someone else: typical Indian. I began to wonder if my team’s reticence with me had always been present, or if it was something I was just becoming aware of. It was hard to be sure if my inability to form a relationship with them was a result of their suspicions about my scientific integrity or if it was simply my failure as a team leader to integrate us. It had never bothered me before, but now I felt outcast when the members of the team went to lunch together and no one asked me to join.

  In my isolation, I prepared what I would say if someone brought up my status as a carrier, so that I would not be caught by surprise. It would be my opportunity to educate, demonstrate my knowledge, and remove any suspicions about the soundness of my science. It was possible, I would inform them, to prevent the spread of Thalassemia. If two carriers did not reproduce, then Thalassemia major would not occur; if a carrier did reproduce with a non-carrier, which is what had happened to me and what might happen to an offspring of mine, then the likelihood of Thalassemia minor would continue to exist, but the risk would be decreased.

  I would cite the authors Verma et al., who said it well in their 2011 study: “If the policy of premarital screening were to be successful, control of thalassaemia in India should have been achieved a long time ago, because this course of action has been available for decades. For the reasons given above the policy of identifying carriers and advising carriers not to marry carriers is not likely to be successful, given the current state of knowledge of the general public about science and genetics.”

  The reality is that India is a country that manages marriages with an eye toward economic and social shrewdness, not medical common sense. Ergo, my wife knew more about the affairs of imaginary gods than she did about blood, and the way blood keeps us chained from one generation to the next. This was why, after I moved to this country, I did an inventory of all religious iconography I possessed and threw it away. My disease was not a matter of chance, God’s will, or karma, whatever Sapna might think. It was the result of poorly made decisions, specifically my grandfather refusing to have my mother tested as a carrier, despite obvious indicators, because he was afraid the knowledge would make her undesirable as a marital partner. The unfortunate situation was that this was true. Even without an official assessment from a doctor, my grandfather had to increase the dowry for my mother, to compensate for her tendency toward illness.

  Armed with these facts, I felt ready for any confrontation. Even so, sometimes I had thoughts that were not suitable for a scientific mind. Sometimes I wished to return to the time when the gene first appeared. I longed to snatch it from history like snatching a pearl from an oyster, killing the host and crushing the stone into sand.

  My daughter arrived in the world two weeks before her due date, but I didn’t know she existed outside her mother’s womb until it was already done. My lead assistant, Dr. Barry Leeds, was in my office with the initial results of the experiment. “I have unhappy news,” he said. Perhaps I misunderstood his expression, but he appeared satisfied, even smug. The results disproved the hypothesis: the fish, regardless of
their social standing, targeted the foreign offspring first. It seemed the fish gave preferential treatment to their own genes.

  The phone rang as I reviewed the data. I recognized the number and picked up the call after the first ring. “Dr. Santosh Mistry,” I said. Dr. Leeds mouthed, “I gotta go.” I nodded.

  Sapna’s mother, Kalpana, didn’t bother with a greeting, her style with me in general. She had arrived a week ago and filled my absence at home completely. “Your daughter is born,” she said. “You might want to come.” She spoke as if I had refused to.

  I asked her to tell me more, but she cut in. “Someone needs to be with Sapna,” she said. “She is alone.”

  My daughter scrunched up her pink face in a bassinet in the third row of the hospital nursery. I recognized neither myself nor Sapna in her. She was small and delicate, too fantastic to be human. I had my first chance to hold her when she was brought out to feed, for only a moment, before the nurse passed her to Sapna.

  “I am going to return to the house,” Kalpana said.

  “But why?” Sapna asked. “Don’t leave me here alone.”

  “I won’t be gone for long. We need to get things cleaned up before this one comes home, don’t we?” She screwed up her face for the baby and then turned to me. “You will be here?” Her manner was suspicious. I nodded.

  The hospital room was silent after Kalpana left, the only sound the soft sucking of the baby pulling milk. “She’s so strong,” Sapna said. She even sounded friendly. “So healthy.”

  We were waiting for the doctor, who would give us a final assessment. He arrived in a rush of energy, brandishing a smile like a clown’s. “Congratulations to your new family,” he said. “How are mother and child?”

  Sapna pulled her sheet to cover her naked breast. I wanted to point out that a few hours ago she had her legs spread wide. I had fallen into a habit of cruelty with her, a habit I enjoyed because she no longer bothered to fight back, she simply ignored what I said. The presence of our daughter stopped me.

  “And, Dad, how are you doing? Any broken fingers?” I was confused until I realized the doctor had forgotten I was not present during the birth.

  I laughed, though I wasn’t amused.

  The doctor picked up the chart. “She was born a couple weeks early, and sometimes that can lead to problems. She’s a bit small, but she’ll catch up in no time, especially if she keeps at it like that.” He winked at Sapna, who frowned. He went through a list he must go through with all the parents before arriving, finally, at the point that concerned us most.

  “About the matter we discussed a few months ago. I had warned you that your daughter could still be born with Thalassemia minor. I am happy to tell you that your daughter did not inherit.”

  “Hai Ram!” Sapna kissed the top of our baby’s head heavily and repeatedly.

  The doctor replaced the chart. “You can speak to the nurses about the exit procedure. I’ll check in in the morning.”

  “I knew she would be fine,” Sapna said. “And now you can stop fighting with me for no reason.”

  “She is fine,” I said, puzzled. I seated myself in the armchair by the window.

  “I will name her Jaanvi. As precious as life.” She kissed the top of the baby’s head again. “Actually, go ahead and be angry if you like. My daughter is healthy and that’s all I care about.”

  “She is my daughter too,” I said, but I felt unconvinced. It occurred to me that if Jaanvi had inherited my disease, the connection between us would have been stronger. Father and daughter, bound by blood. It was an illogical thought.

  Jaanvi’s lips unloosed from the nipple. Sapna repositioned so that the baby’s cheek remained against her breast. The baby’s eyes closed, and her breathing deepened and lengthened, then she fell asleep to her mother’s heartbeat. Soon, Sapna’s eyes began to droop.

  I took Jaanvi from her mother’s arms and carried her to the window. The code my blood could have passed on to my child was lost in the gap between generations. A perfectly normal, even desirable event, and yet, I couldn’t make sense of my disappointment. I could think only of what Darwin had said, of evolution, that “non-inheritance was the anomaly.”

  PAIGE COOPER

  THE ROAR

  When Dino gets back with the guests it’s dark and the helicopter’s chop has both dogs crying at the door. Loyola stands up from the table to pull bottles from the fridge. The girl on the couch opens her eyes.

  “You can go to bed,” Loyola offers.

  The girl, hair greased around her face, stays put. Dino brought her home last night.

  Loyola follows the dogs out the side door. They fear the rotors about the same as they fear the vacuum: hackling and moaning at the asphalt’s edge while the hired hands dart under the blades. Stein unropes a pair of chamois from the game cage. Heads loll and long black devil horns scrape the paint’s gloss. He carries each in his arms into the hangar’s white light, their beards dripping over his elbow. Inside, Riley’s already hooked a tahr buck over the drain. The guests, disembarked, look on. The bird’s still putting off a swell of fervid heat. Dino won’t winch it the thirty feet into the hangar until season’s end. He’s clambering around in it collecting firearms and ammunition, headset collaring his neck.

  “You should’ve seen the stag,” says the man who paid. He takes a bottle off Loyola’s tray.

  “Twelve-pointer,” says his brother. “Broadsided him on a cliff.”

  “Prehistoric,” says the wife. Her face is lit and lined by the fluorescents. Upon arrival, she’d exclaimed devoutly through the tour of the main lodge, the cabins, the green rocky pool, every glance out over the valley bowl. Down the trail, she admired the old barn’s rack and ruin. Now she stands on the hangar’s stained cement with sweat on her lip and navy mascara freckling the top of her cheekbone. She flashes wide eyes at Loyola. “Just breathtaking,” she says, “All those creatures out there.”

  “Took a shot, anyway,” the man says. “Went down most of that bluff on his feet. Spent an hour tracking him.”

  “Who knows,” says the brother.

  “Bad luck,” says Loyola.

  “We couldn’t get down to the bottom,” says the wife. “The cliff.”

  “Couldn’t see a fucking thing.” The man’s shrivelled smirk. That red stag’s an easy twelve hundred pounds. Antlers thick as ankles. Loyola remembers him. She’s not a small woman, but if she stood at his feet and embraced his neck she wouldn’t reach his withers. Her fingertips spread wouldn’t span the tines of his crown. No trophy for a shot like that, all the glory’s in the fall.

  Dino blinks all the bird’s little lights off and carries an armful of slick black branches to the cage at the back of the hangar. He doesn’t look at her as he passes. He replaces each rifle into its cradle, slides drawers around, bolts the lock.

  Riley’s already got the tahr half-naked, hide draping his knees. The paying man wants to do the chamois, so Dino hands him a skinner. Forelegs snap wet like live wood at the ankle. The pelts peel bloodlessly. Fat greases their hands. Loyola twists her own bottle.

  “Never seen deer so huge,” says the wife. This wife, who spent four hours in a helicopter with three men and an arsenal. She’s had twenty years of this. She married a man who took her to the shooting range on their first date. She likes the soft muzzles so much she wants them in her home: clear eyes overlooking dark wood and grey slate.

  “Biggest in the world,” Loyola agrees around her bottle’s lip. Her teeth set in the ridges of the glass. The tray cocked against her right hip.

  Out in the yard, the dogs writhe around each other at the lit periphery. They aren’t begging. Dino instructs the tourists without instructing them. They’re experienced. They know how to slice a body hung from the ankle bones so the offal balloons from the incision like a fawn’s head. The organs slide over themselves to the cement. The drain runs. Dino has the discreet authority of a butler, the woolly presence of an uncle, and the guests don’t notice his correction
s. Riley finds the stereo and smudges a button with a finger to clatter the steel walls with guitar noise.

  The wife is watching close enough that when the men laugh she laughs. Loyola hovers back in the open air. She’ll have to get more beer. A smoky breeze sneaks down through the scrub pines from the peaks. The girl’s emerged from the lodge. She steps like she’s passing through an herb garden in those battered boots Dino brought her home in. Her hair might be alive. When she got out of the jeep she was wrapped in a scabby fur. Dino said, “You don’t want this” and peeled it from her shoulders as she twisted away. She pauses out past the dogs and their switching shadows, watching the hooked game jerk and spin under the lights. The heads hacksawed, lined up on the tool gurney like they might want to watch. The girl cranes.

  Loyola crosses the yard, tray dangling, and the girl lets her approach. Loyola does not touch the bare shoulders as she says, “Go to bed. Honestly.”

  “Don’t you hunt elk?”

  “Whatever the licence is for.”

  “That’s what they wanted, though, right?”

  “Bad shot,” says Loyola.

  The room they installed her in last night is just a few knocks down from Loyola’s own door. These are extra rooms, upstairs, barely used because the guests all prefer the privacy of the cabins. There’s a black iron queen with a blue quilt and a slit-eyed bobcat treed over the mantel. Last night Loyola gave the girl a nightgown, a toothbrush, and pointed out the white towels in the ensuite. This morning, when she found the girl in the kitchen before dawn, she handed over spare clothes.

  The quilt is rumpled in circles like one of the dogs napped in the centre of the compass rose. The girl goes straight to the window. In the white light of the hangar’s mouth, the men stand like fangs.

  —

  Dino drives the guests out the next morning, the jeep loaded with racks and meat. Loyola finds the wife’s shampoo and conditioner in the first cabin’s steam shower. They smell like flowers she doesn’t recognize, invasive exotics, but they’re not so expensive the woman will call and ask for them to be mailed. Loyola can take them back to her room. They’re for redheads and she’s red-haired, though not like the wife with her layers and shades.