The Mountain Shadow

We parked the bike outside and walked through lanes decorated with flowers. Long, thick garlands linked every house. Johnny’s nephew, Eli, guided us with a torch in lamp-lit shadows. He paused at every spectacular bouquet, scanning the torch over the cordons of flowers, allowing us to admire every bloom. He was dressed in his finest clothes, suitable for devotion, as was everyone we passed in the lanes.

He finally led us to an open space, used in the slum for weddings and festival days. Plastic chairs had been arranged in a wide semicircle around a small stage. The space was becoming crowded.

Women gathered in a flame-lit garden of coloured dresses, their hair plaited with frangipani flowers, their talking laughter like birds at sunset.

Charu and Pari arrived with Oleg. Then Kavita joined the crowd, with Naveen and Karla a few steps behind.

Karla.

She saw me, and smiled. Those things inside, when the woman you love smiles at you: those spears of courage, that rain.

People called for Diva to speak. She found an open space, where all could see her short form, but her speech was even shorter.

‘I want to thank you all, so very, very much,’ she said in Hindi. ‘I know, because you saved my life here, that we can do anything, together. And from now on, I’m with you all the way. I’m supporting fair slum resettlement in decent, safe, comfortable homes across the city. I pledge myself to that, and I’m doing it with all the resources I have.’

The women cheered, the men cheered, and the children leapt about as if the earth was too hot to tolerate more than a frantic skip. The band played furiously until no-one could hear properly.

A place had been set out for a meal, with a long, blue plastic sheet on the ground. Authentic banana leaves were arranged, side by side, for guests to receive food. I’d already eaten, but it was impolite to refuse, and bad luck.

We all squatted beside one another. Charu and Pari had to sit side-saddle, because their designer skirts were too short, but they didn’t mind. Their eyes were as wide as if they were studying lions in Africa.

It was their first time on the wretched side of the line. They were repulsed, horrified, and terrified of germs in the food. But they were also fascinated: and a fascinated Indian is yours.

As Fate would have it, Kavita sat on my right, and Karla on my left.

Vegetable biryani was served, along with coconut paste, Bengali spices, Kashmiri refinements, tandoori-fired vegetables, cucumber and tomato yoghurt, yellow dhal, and wok-fried cauliflower, okra and carrot, offered by an endless line of people, smiling as they served us.

‘Funny time for a party,’ I said to Karla.

‘If you knew anything about this,’ Kavita said, leaning over to catch my eyes, or my soul, or something, ‘you’d know that this is the time between shifts, and the only time that day workers and night workers can join in together.’

It was silly. I’d lived in that slum, and Kavita hadn’t, and there wasn’t much she could teach me about it.

‘You really won’t let this go, will you, Kavita?’

‘Why should I, cowboy?’

‘How about you pass me the pungent chutney, instead?’ Karla said, playing peacemaker.

I passed it across, my eyes catching Karla’s for a moment.

‘Ran away, when Lisa died,’ Kavita said. ‘And running away now.’

‘Okay, Kavita, just get it off your chest.’

‘Is that a threat?’ she asked, squinting spite at me.

‘How can the truth be a threat? I’m just sick of the guilt games. I came to this city with my own crosses. I don’t need you making new ones for me.’

‘You killed her,’ she said.

I didn’t see it coming.

‘Calm down, Kavita,’ Karla said.

‘I wasn’t even here. I wasn’t even in the same country. That was on your watch, Kavita.’

She flinched. She was hurt, and I didn’t want to hurt her: I only wanted her to stop hurting me. Her eyes brimmed, like snow domes of the world inside, made of tears.

‘I loved her,’ she said, the domes bursting. ‘You only used her, while you waited for Karla.’

‘This is the ideal moment, with foresight, to stop this, and focus on the occasion,’ Karla said at last. ‘Stop this bickering, both of you, and be gracious guests. We’re not here for us. We’re here for Diva, who suffered a lot as well.’

I pretended to eat, for a while, and Kavita pretended to stop. Neither one of us managed it.

‘It should be you who died on that bed, all alone,’ Kavita spat at me, losing control.

‘Stop this, Kavita,’ Karla said.

‘Nothing to say, Lin?’

‘Stop it, Kavita,’ I said.

‘That all you got?’

I started to get up, but she pulled at my sleeve.

‘You want to know what she said about you, while she was making love to me?’

I should’ve stopped. I didn’t.