Cutting for Stone - Abraham Verghese [176]
One morning, when I woke up in the chair and saw her face, the texture of the skin, the relaxation around the brow, I knew she was going to make it. She was skinny to begin with, and now the illness had consumed her, burned her down to just bones. Her color was returning; the sword that hung over her had lifted away. My shoulders began to unknot.
That afternoon I went to my room in Ghosh's quarters, and I fell into a black sleep. It was only when I woke up that I turned my attention to Shiva. Did he understand how he shattered my dreams? Did he see how he hurt Genet, hurt us all? I wanted to get through to him. The trouble was that I couldn't think of any other way than to pummel him with my fists until he felt the same degree of pain he had caused in me. I hated my brother. No one could stop me.
No one but Genet.
When she told me about her deal with Rosina, how she had agreed to be circumcised if Rosina said nothing to Hema, Genet hadn't finished what she had to say. Later that first night, she struggled to consciousness to ask something of me. She had made me swear to it. “Marion,” she said, “punish me, but not Shiva. Attack me and cast me away, but leave Shiva alone.”
“Why? I can't do that. Why spare him? “
“Marion, I made Shiva do what he did with me that night. I asked him.” Her words were like kidney punches. “You know how Shiva is different … how he thinks in another way? Believe me, if I hadn't asked him, he would have read his book and I wouldn't be here.”
Reluctantly, on that first night, I had given Genet my word that I wouldn't confront Shiva. I did so mainly because that night had looked as if it might well have been her last.
I never told Hema what had really happened, leaving her to imagine whatever it was she thought I had done.
Why, you might ask, did I keep my word? Why did I not change my mind when I saw that Genet would survive? Why didn't I tell Hema the truth? You see, I'd learned something about myself and about Genet during her battle to stay alive. I'd come so close to losing her, and it helped me understand that despite everything, I didn't want her to die. I might never forgive her. But I still loved her.
WHEN SHE WAS DISCHARGED from the hospital, I carried Genet from the car to the house. No one objected, and if they had I would have stood my ground. My unceasing vigil at Genet's bedside had earned a grudging acknowledgment from Hema; she didn't dare deny me.
As I carried her daughter into our house through the kitchen, Rosina watched from her doorway. Genet never looked in that direction. It was as if her mother and the room in which she had lived her life no longer existed. Rosina stood there, beseeching with her eyes, pleading for forgiveness. But a child's ability for reprisal is infinite, and can last a lifetime.
I carried Genet to our old room, Shiva's room, which would now be hers.
The plan was that Shiva and I would sleep in Ghosh's old quarters, but separately, he in the living room.
Half an hour later, when I went to get Genet's clothes from Rosina's quarters, she had locked herself in and wouldn't answer despite my knocking. I pushed on the wood in anger, and I could tell from the resistance that she'd barricaded the door or else she was leaning against it. A peculiar silence blanketed the atmosphere. I went to the window. The shutters were bolted, but now, with Almaz helping, I pulled on the flimsy slats till they snapped off. The wardrobe had been used to block the window. I scrambled onto the ledge and tried to shove the wardrobe aside with my hands, but I couldn't. I craned my neck to peer above it. What I saw made me set my back to the window frame, put both feet on the wardrobe, and topple it without a thought to its contents. It hit the ground with a terrific crash, the wood splintering, the mirror shattering, plates