Inspired, she wrote again. Submitted again. When the rejections filled her inbox, she wrote again. Submitted again. When her first short story got published in the Rosebud online literary journal, it felt like the sweetest victory, as if she had won the Man Booker award.
It shocked her that she thought so little and so fleetingly about Sanjay these days. She felt no anger, no pain, no neediness; every emotion she had ever felt for him, she had left behind in her suburban dream.
He appeared briefly on her mind one evening, on her drive back home from work on I-85 south, when a billboard caught her eye as she passed Jimmy Carter Boulevard. Instinctively, her foot hit the brakes. Her steering wheel trembled, as it decelerated from sixty-five to fifty mph, causing the black Mercedes Benz behind to almost bump into her. As the driver changed lanes and whizzed past, he pulled down his window. He shook a fist in her direction. Shit! Tara looked ahead, shaken. She would have to come back to see herself on the billboard, now in bridal wear, looking demure, a red silk dupatta covering her hair, a second-time model for Raj Jewelers.
It brought back memories of the storm that the first photo had brought into her life, and before that, her desperate hopes for Sanjay to see the advertisement and find her beautiful and worthy of him.
How unworthy of her he had been all along. How blind she had been not to see it that way. She turned back to catch one last look at herself in her demure bride avatar. If nothing else, it served as a reminder to her to put a legal end to her marriage saga.
The divorce came quickly. It was uncontested. She asked for nothing, not even the meagre belongings she had left behind. The only thing she carried over to her new life was her legal status as a permanent resident of the United States. It amazed her how easy change had become, once she took the leap of faith.
Chapter 21
Tara pulled up a sling patio chair to a warm corner of her balcony which overlooked the road. She put her feet up on the chair, her long maroon, polka-dotted pajama-clad thighs taking on a V-shape. She rested her mug of tea on her right knee, holding it lightly. She enjoyed these peaceful Saturday morning moments, thinking up a storyline, creating characters, feeling their emotions.
She took a sip out of her mug and closed her eyes. She felt the warmth of the dappled sun on her eyelids. There was so much to be absorbed through the other senses when the eyes were closed. Birds chirped with enthusiasm. A car revved to life. She heard the patter of little feet running, a child’s voice saying, “Bye, Mom.” The mom responding with, “Bye, sweetie. Love you.”
She wondered why Americans felt the need to say I love you to their loved ones every single day. She wondered why Indians had so much trouble saying I love you. Amma and Daddy had never said I love you to her. Ever. She doubted they had even expressed their love for each other with those words. She wondered if she could manage an essay on this topic. But really, what did she know about love?
She’d see. She lowered her legs, slipped her feet into her pink plush bedroom slippers, walked lazily back into the kitchen, fixed herself a bowl of Quaker Oats in the microwave, and took it to the living room. She propped her legs on the edge of the coffee table, slipped a soft red cushion into the concave of the sofa to buffer her lower back, and set her laptop on her thighs. She worked on the bowl of oats as she waited for the laptop to boot.
She logged on to Hotmail first. She couldn’t remember when she had last checked her personal emails; it was at least two weeks ago. Nobody ever wrote to Hotmail anymore, anyway. She had lost touch with almost all her friends at the Morning Herald, and she didn’t use MSN messenger any longer. Still, her inbox was inundated with emails, the kind she either did not bother to open or deleted immediately. There was a notice from the library reminding her that Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy was due, a cell phone bill from AT&T, sale notices from Macy’s and Target, a 20 percent off coupon from Border’s bookstore. Ensconced between the mostly junk emails was one from C. Saldanha, which she almost deleted but chose to open instead, if only because the name Saldanha meant something to her. It was dated September 28, 2005, almost a week earlier. The subject line simply said, “Hi!” Junk, she thought, but opened it anyway. It read:
Twinkle, twinkle little Star,
How I wonder where you are!
She read the two lines, and instinctively knew.
Twinkle, twinkle little Star,
How I wonder where you are!
I saw you on I-85 this morning, sparkling like a diamond, causing accidents. You almost got me killed! I am in Atlanta for a few days. I hope I can see you.”
He had signed off with just his first name and cell phone number.
She put a hand to her chest when she Googled his number; it was a San Jose area code. The email had been sent exactly a week ago. Was she too late seeing his email? Was he back in San Jose? She was shocked that he still remembered her, that he had recognized her on the billboard, that he had reached out, that he had retained his wit.
But did she want to write back? What was she to write, anyway? What was to come after Hi Cyrus? She shut her laptop and changed to go for a leisurely walk instead. She had hoped to develop her essay on the verbal and nonverbal expressions of love, but her thoughts kept coming back to the email.
“I don’t need this type of distraction,” she murmured. What she needed at this point was the peace to heal, to rediscover herself. Yet, her hand was pressed to her chest when she returned to her apartment, her heartbeat erratic. She had no idea how long she had walked, only that it was a sunny day and she was thirsty. Still, her feet took her to the laptop in the living room rather than the kitchen to quench her thirst.
Again, she wondered if she should simply delete the email. But what was the harm in meeting him once, an opposite force reasoned. She was curious to find out where life had taken him, how he had turned out, if his eyes had changed color. Eventually she replied, after sending three drafts to the trash bin. The first one was too cold, the second one too friendly, the third just didn’t sound right.
“Hi Cyrus,” her email said. “So good to hear from you. I’m sorry, I haven’t been regular at checking my Hotmail. I just saw your note. Hope you are still in town. Would you like to do lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, Perimeter Mall tomorrow? Is 12:30 good? Looking forward to catching up. –Tara”
She had no reason to stay on Hotmail, but she did. In a few minutes, her inbox had a new email from C. Saldanha.
“Star, you are late but lucky. I am still in town. Can’t wait to see you tomorrow! How did you know I have a weakness for cheesecake?”
She smiled from ear to ear, lips stretched across her face. The cocky charm. He hadn’t lost it.
Tara drove over to Alyona’s apartment that afternoon, and gave her the news and its backstory, taking care to suppress the nervous energy that was spiraling inside her chest. When Alyona’s last relationship with Amir Rezaee, an Iranian who owned a Persian restaurant in Roswell, ended two months ago, she had vowed to stay off men forever. “Men are dogs,” she had proclaimed then. “I am through with dogs.”
Maybe Alyona was right. Maybe she just needed to hear from another person that she ought to stay away from Cyrus.
“Girl, you are full of surprises,” Alyona exclaimed “And Madonna face? Nobody has said nothing like that to me before.”