Departure

On the eve of her departure from the states she called me from her apartment’s telephone. Megha told me, her voice crackling from the reception, that she wanted to revisit her childhood home for her last years of life. She had been alone in Southern California, and even though the temperatures were the same, she missed the company, the smell of her house in India (I was imagining a mélange of mothballs and masala). She wanted me to come with her and hear the cacophony of cows mooing and bike bells ringing late at night.

“I know it’s been a while, but I want to go with somebody and you’re the first person I thought of. I always wanted to show you where I grew up. This is our last chance.”

I remember, decades ago, cupping her face and staring right into her eyes, begging her to take me with her when she went to India. She didn’t. She wanted to see her brother alone and needed someone to feed our cat. When I watched television that night, she was standing in line to board her flight. The doorbell rang, and I jumped up excitedly, hoping she had returned after having changed her mind. She had ordered me Thai food as a way of apologizing, and I felt water fill the slope of my eye while I poured extra sauce over my noodles. I had thought, “she’s feeding her pig before the slaughter.” I had no reason to think of this, yet it was the first thing that came to mind. I felt patronized—she thought I would accept her apology and eat her gift happily. I spent the week deciphering what she meant by ordering food for me—perhaps she wanted to repair our relationship quickly so that I wouldn’t starve our cat (it was more hers than mine, she had brought it with her when we moved in together).

I recall a letter I wrote to her on one of her sacred trips to India. I had written, in complete despair, “I see the tragedies of war when I think of our brief separation. Do come back, papillon marron.” I would write formally, to emphasize the barrier she had brought upon us by leaving; I would never dream of using contractions. My letter then went into more local discussions, but these were hidden with little pleas for her return: “There are large nicks on the stair-railing. I cannot bear them. I must call Andrew to repair them with that special goop he enjoys so much to overcharge us on.” I’d lure her with Andrew—she hated him, saying his beard reminded her of tangled weeds. She knew I liked to be dramatic, and I knew she would never take my pleas seriously. To some extent, we were both content with this—it was a sort of harmony. I eventually got over my desire to go to India. It had become this great mystery, and I knew that if I ever actually went, I would inevitably be disappointed because it wouldn’t reveal Megha in the way I had hoped it would. I saw India as some tropical paradise, and saw her adorned in florals dancing with those cows, which was perhaps influenced by my upbringing. Any place with Megha would have been paradise, of course, but not in the same way.

Megha’s request to join her in her old age still haunts me; I refused her offer. Whatever loyalty or love I had to her during our youth wasn’t strong enough. I’ve felt guilty since. When I said no, it was mainly because I was worried about not remembering her the same way, and that she might’ve been more disappointing than I remembered. I grew, and a part of me couldn’t visualize her growing too. She was still immature in my mind. I didn’t want to confirm my fears. I spent the rest of that night sitting cross-legged on the carpet, sifting through pictures of the two of us. There weren’t many. I wanted to visualize her face. I found one of her with her arms crossed, a cigarette grasped between fingers, and wearing a linen shirt that had marks of paint clogging the frail weaving.

For a long time, she and I lived in a small one-bedroom apartment above a bakery in Fort Greene, and many of the pictures had the same background of dried wine glasses on a windowsill that overlooked the park. She’d only half-smile for them all, too busy in whatever she was doing to give me her full attention. Every Saturday morning she’d clean the apartment, opening the window to feel the wind. She wouldn’t move the wine glasses. Those would stay, never officially washed—just briefly rinsed—until one would inevitably fall late at night and we’d argue about who would go get a new one from the kitchen. Funnily enough, they never held wine, but water. Megha just liked the feeling of holding a glass with one curl of a finger. It felt elegant to her. She was always aiming for this idea of American elegance; she wouldn’t stop talking about Grace Kelly.

She left for India alone, and spent her last ten years there. She thought she’d have less time, and I thought she’d have more. I never visited.