Cutting for Stone - Abraham Verghese [148]
“When will you go back to school?” I said. “When will you start eating with us again?”
“They killed my father. Did you forget? I don't care about school.” Then she hissed at me, “Tell the truth. You told Ghosh, didn't you?”
“I did not!”
“But you were thinking of telling him, weren't you? Tell the truth!”
She had me there. When I felt Ghosh's arms around me for the first time in that prison yard, a confession jumped to my lips. I had to suck it back and swallow.
“Since when did thinking become a crime? … Don't look at me that way,” I said.
She took her plate and sat far away from me. Even if I didn't have great faith in myself, I wanted her to have more faith in me. It hurt that she no longer saw me as the hero who shot the intruder.
BY THE LATE AFTERNOON the tent came down, and now visitors from outside Missing arrived as word spread that Ghosh was free. For Evangeline and Mrs. Reddy the moment was bittersweet because, though Ghosh was back, General Mebratu was gone forever. Evangeline kept saying, “So young. So young to be no more,” dabbing at her eyes, while Mrs. Reddy comforted her, pulling Evangeline's head into her considerable bosom. The two brought a giant pot of chicken biriyani and the fiery mango pickle that was Ghosh's favorite. “It's your second honey moon, sweetie,” Evangeline said to Ghosh. She winked at Hema. Adid, their old friend, came carrying three live chickens roped together by their feet, handing them over to Almaz. He brushed feathers off his spotless white polyester shirt, which he wore over a flowing, plaid ma'awis that extended to his sandals. Behind him came Babu, who was General Mebratu's usual bridge partner, bearing a bottle of Pinch, the General's favorite. By nightfall, there was talk of pulling out the cards for old time's sake. At any moment I expected Zemui to drive up with General Mebratu.
The house got stuffy. I opened windows back and front. At one point Ghosh retreated to the bedroom to shed his sweater and Hema went with him. I followed and stood in the doorway. He went to the bathroom to brush his teeth. It was as if he couldn't get over the novelty of running water. Hema stood outside the bathroom looking at his reflection in the vanity.
“I've been thinking …,” I heard Ghosh say. “We've had a good innings. Maybe we should leave … before the next coup.”
“What? Back to India?” Hema said.
“No … then the boys would have to learn Hindi or Tamil as a compulsory second language. It's too late for that. Don't forget why we left in the first place.”
They didn't know I was listening.
“Lots of Indian teachers have gone from here to Zambia,” Hema said.
“Or America? To the county of Cook?” he said and laughed.
“Persia? They say there are huge needs, just like this place. But they have tons of money to spend.”
Zambia? Persia? Were they joking? This was my country they were talking about, the land of my birth. True, its potential for violence and mayhem had been proved. But it was still home. How much worse would it be to be tortured in a land that wasn't your own?
We've had a good innings.
Ghosh's words felt like a kick to my solar plexus: this was my country, but I realized it wasn't Hema's or Ghosh's. They weren't born here. Was this for them a job only good for as long as it lasted? I slipped away.
I stepped out to the lawn. I remember the air that night, and how it was so brisk that it could revive the dead. The fragrance of eucalyptus stoking a home fire, the smell of wet grass, of dung fuel, of tobacco, of swamp air, and the perfume of hundreds of roses—this was the scent of Missing. No, it was the scent of a continent.
Call me unwanted, call my birth a disaster, call me the bastard child of a disgraced nun and a disappeared father, call me a cold-blooded killer who lies to the brother of the man I killed, but that loamy soil that nurtured Matron's roses was in my flesh. I said Ethyo-pya, like a native. Let those born in other lands speak of Eee-theee-op-eee-ya, as if it were