Before We Visit the Goddess

by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

  “This woman really means a lot to you, doesn’t she?” he said. What he meant was, Why?

  I shrugged. I was not sure of the answer.

  “We can try it out next weekend,” he said. “I’ll ask her to make something Indian, something popular. If sales go up enough, she can continue.” He stared at a spot on his desk. “Do you want to go out sometime?”

  My chest felt like it was too small to contain all the things knocking around inside it. Heart, lungs, excitement, a surge of blood like sorrow. The backwash of memories. Finally I said, “I’m sorry. It’s too soon.”

  It was. I spent most of my free time at home, surfing the Net. I had a hard time sleeping. Late at night, I would go down to the gym on the ground floor and run on the treadmill until I was soaked with sweat. I tried to go out a couple of times, but it was too stressful, even when I hung with a group of friends. Their silent glances weighed on me. I wanted to denounce David. I wanted to defend his defection. Each time the door to the bar opened, my throat clenched. I feared it would be him. When it was not, I was pierced by disappointment.

  I was concerned that Lance would be angered by my reply. That he would cancel Mrs. Dewan’s gig. Some men would have done it. But he said, “I’ll check again in a couple weeks. Maybe you’ll feel different by then.”

  At noon on Saturday, Mrs. Dewan gave her first demonstration. I had put up flyers in the bookstore and told my coworkers, and Lance had placed announcement boards around the store. About fifteen people showed up—better than I had expected. When Mrs. Dewan emerged from the back, wearing an apron and chef’s cap, she looked terrified. She stumbled over her words as she explained the dish she was cooking: chicken tikka masala. Her hand shook when she held up the bottled sauce she was using. Her accent was heavier than usual. She would not make eye contact. Things improved a bit when she began to sauté the chicken and no longer had to look at her audience. She dished the pieces into little paper cups and speared them efficiently with toothpicks. But when customers crowded around her with compliments and questions, she lost her nerve and fled to the storage area. Lance had to take over and guide people to the aisles where they could buy the ingredients she had used.

  There was an event that night at the bookstore, so I had turned off my cell phone. When I turned it back on, I discovered that Mrs. Dewan had called several times. She had not spoken, though I could hear her breathing above the static. I found this troubling.

  Told you, said the David-voice.

  Technically, since she had not left a message, I was not obliged to call her back. At midnight I gave in and phoned.

  “I am a failure,” she said, in the slow, formal intonation of the inebriated. “I have let you down. Lance says I must improve my customer interaction skills.”

  “Please go to sleep,” I said, though I knew the futility of such advice. “We can discuss this later. I’m sure we can come up with a strategy.”

  “I’ve never cooked from a bottle.” She was weeping now. “And chicken tikka—why, it’s not even real Indian.”

  I did not fully understand her grief, but I said, “Let’s talk tomorrow when our brains are clearer.” I was pleased at my reasonable tone because David had sometimes claimed that I was an unreasonable man.

  As I was falling into sleep, it struck me, the shameful answer to Lance’s unspoken question. Mrs. Dewan was important to me because she was worse off than I was. I found it easy to be reasonable with her because her life made me feel less wretched about my own.

  Over the week, Mrs. Dewan and I went over her demonstration, discussing what she did well and what needed improvement. We came up with a list of recipes that were authentic enough for her and easy enough for her audience. She practiced answering questions. She practiced accepting compliments. She practiced smiling. She watched chefs perform flashy moves on my TV and tried a couple of them herself. She did better the next weekend, and when I took a photo of her, she managed a smile. She was still timid about speaking to strangers, but there was no mistaking her talent. People loved her shrimp in coconut-milk gravy. Perhaps they responded to her shyness, too. To the fact that this was not easy for her. Afterward, they bought so many items that Lance decided to give Mrs. Dewan two sets of cooking gigs on Saturdays, and the same on Sundays. A couple of weeks later, reconnoitering again, I was pleased to see that her kitchen shelves were not as empty as before.

  Lance and I went out one weekend. He came by the apartment to pick me up. On our way downstairs, we ran into Mrs. Dewan. She was on the small balcony next to the staircase landing. She liked to stand there in the evening, watching people return home. We exchanged greetings. She asked where we were going and nodded knowledgeably when I mentioned the name of the restaurant, though I was sure she had not heard of it. As we were about to get into our car, she leaned out from the balcony and shouted, “Have a good time, boys.”

  “Is she always this nosy?” Lance asked. “That would drive me crazy.”

  I considered the question. Mrs. Dewan and I had fallen into the habit of chatting on the phone every night. During these conversations, she told me about her day and asked, with great interest, about mine. I quite liked these nightly exchanges. I did not have anyone else who considered the details of my humdrum life worth such attention.

  I could not tell this to Lance. “I don’t mind it,” I said.

  “You’re a good man, Ken,” he said.

  I accepted the compliment. It was easier than trying to explain.

  We had an enjoyable time at dinner. Lance was funny, which I had known, but smarter than I had expected, more worldly. He told me about his backpacking adventures in Slovenia this past summer. “Maybe we can go together next time,” he said.

  My stomach gave a small lurch, part from excitement and part at the thought of strange Slovenian foods, blood sausages and whatnot. “That sounds great,” I said.

  Later we went for a walk along Town Lake. The setting sun had turned the water orange-pink. In the distance we could see the Austin skyline, and against it, the colonies of bats that had emerged from under the bridges. I had not been out in nature in a long time. David was more the museums-movies-clubs type. The bats milled around. I told Lance that they looked like tangled skeins of black silk. It was a poor analogy, but he laughed and said, “Why, Ken, you’re a poet.” Then he kissed me.

  All of a sudden, my head was full of David. David rubbing my calf after I had pulled a muscle jogging, David cooking for us, holding up a forkful of fettuccine for me to taste, David reading out to me from A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, dissolving in laughter before he reached the end of a funny passage. I pulled away. I couldn’t help it, though I was angry with my stupidity. Lance’s face went dark. It stayed that way even after I apologized and he said he understood. That was the end of the evening.

  One night, after our weekly dinner, Mrs. Dewan said, “Kenneth, I want to show you something.” She ripped the tape off a box in the corner and took out a package wrapped in a fine white woolen shawl. When she shook it out, I saw that it was a beautiful silk costume, long and skirtlike, red with a gold border and a fitted blouse.

  “It’s my dance costume,” she said. “I couldn’t bring much from India when I came to this country—I ran away from home with just a suitcase. But I made sure to bring this.” She held up ankle bells on long cords. There were a lot of bells because she had studied dance for many years. “I used to love dancing. I was good at both Kathak and Rabindra Nritya. I performed in front of hundreds of people. Me. Can you imagine? When the auditorium went dark and the spotlight was focused on me, I felt a thrill like I’ve never felt since. Moving to the beat of the tabla, I forgot my life.” She gave a sigh. “I’d love to wear it again, to dance so I can forget like that, even for a few minutes. But I can’t fit into it anymore.” She pinched at the flab of her underarm, making a face.

  An excitement blazed through me. Perhaps all of us have a bit of Pygmalion in us. “You can do it,” I said. “We’ll make a pl
an.”

  Our plan progressed well. Mrs. Dewan went for walks, morning and evening. She cut out carbs and fats from her diet, including the donuts she was so fond of. Her dinners grew innovative, though no less delicious: quinoa upma, rutis made from chickpea flour, grilled masala chicken wrapped in lettuce leaf, mango glacé topped with rose petals.

  “You should write a cookbook,” I said. “You’re so good, I bet you’d be a hit. I know a couple of publishers who might be interested. Would you like me to introduce you?”

  She had a considering look on her face. “Maybe.”

  “You could start with a blog. I write one for our bookstore. It isn’t difficult. I’ll set it up for you. You can call it Bela’s Kitchen.”

  She laughed. “Bela’s Kitchen. I like that.” She extended her glass. “Could you please pour me another?”

  I obliged. Today our drink, which I had made, was a frothy lassi with crushed pomegranate seeds. Mrs. Dewan was making a serious effort to give up alcohol. She announced that she had lost two inches from around her waist in two weeks.

  “You’re doing great,” I said. “I’m proud of you.” I meant it.

  “Now if only I could find you a girlfriend,” she said, “things would be perfect.”

  I stared at her, dismayed. I supposed I sometimes passed, but I had assumed that she would know about me from my comb-over fade, my red Converses. From seeing Lance’s arm around my shoulders when we went out. Now I saw that despite her years in this country, she wasn’t familiar enough with America to pick up on the signs. I knew I should tell her, but I couldn’t bear to. I didn’t want to see on her the look that had taken over my parents’ faces. I didn’t want to lose her.

  “Sorry, sorry,” Mrs. Dewan said, laughing. “I’m being a nosy auntie, just like those neighbor women who used to drive me crazy when I was a girl. I won’t bring it up again.”

  It had been a harrying day. Our store had booked a bestselling author and hired a large theater venue. The author, who was to arrive next week, was notorious for being temperamental. I had been fielding calls all day from his publicist about the items he required during his visit. No music in the car. Water: only Evian, with the limes cut open in front of him. For dinner before the event, Thai food, authentic but mild. He did not like air-conditioning. It made his eyes dry out.

  I ventured to say that no air-conditioning in Austin in the summer was a bad idea.

  “No air-conditioning,” the agent repeated. “Also, no photography, no taping, no questions after the talk. And no cell phones. This one’s really important. He’s been known to storm off the stage if a cell phone rings.”

  It was my night to dine with Mrs. Dewan in her apartment, but first I needed to decompress. I threw down a stack of notes that I had to go over later, turned on the CD player, and got a chilled beer. Mrs. Dewan had recently started going to meetings, so I did my drinking before dinner. I had just put my feet up on the coffee table when she knocked. Sometimes she ran out of ingredients and came over to check if I had them. I never did, but I think it made her feel neighborly to be able to do this.

  I opened the door. It was David. A thinner, more somber David. He had shaved his head. It made him look monkish and sexy. He carried two of my shirts, ironed and neatly folded. He looked nervous, which was not his normal condition. I wanted to hate him. I was halfway to forgiving him.

  “I found these among my clothes,” he said. “I thought I should return them.”

  He could have left them outside the door. We both knew that.

  The world never ceases to surprise. Did I mention this already?

  “Would you like to come in?” I said. My hands were sweaty. Inside my chest an ocean heaved and crashed and heaved again.

  “I would,” he said. I saw his Adam’s apple jerk as he swallowed. “Thank you.”

  I was distracted by that thank-you. We had moved past the language of formality long ago. It was strange to relearn it with each other. “You’re welcome,” I said.

  We sat on the couch next to each other, staring at the blank rectangle of the TV screen. Around us, like the soundtrack to a bad movie, rose the sounds of Simon & Garfunkel’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” I picked up the remote to turn it off, but he put his hand over mine. His nails were blunt and wholesome and familiar. It took all my effort not to turn my wrist and clasp his hand.

  “How are you doing?” he asked.

  “Okay,” I said. He was waiting, but I didn’t ask him anything.

  “I’m not doing so well,” he said. “I miss you.” He ran a thumb along my jaw. Then his mouth was on mine. He tasted, unexpectedly, of blackberries.

  After that, things moved in and out of focus. His shirt hanging unbuttoned. The dip of his navel. The slight softness to his belly, which I’ve always loved. His impatient hands on my belt buckle. I banged my shin against a chair and heard it topple to the floor. I don’t remember how we got to the bed, but there we were, straining against each other on the blue quilt he had bought me as our first anniversary gift, whispering into each other the special names we had created for such moments.

  He heard the knocking on the door before I did and stopped mid-motion.

  “Kenneth?” I heard Mrs. Dewan call out. “I heard a crash. I was worried because you’re usually down for dinner by this time. Kenneth, are you there?”

  “Dinner?” David said. “Usually?” He looked at me. “Who the hell is this woman?”

  “Just the downstairs neighbor,” I said. “I’ll explain later.” I felt absurdly guilty and annoyed for feeling this way. I pressed against David, trying to get him to continue, though I feared the moment was lost.

  “Kenneth,” Mrs. Dewan said, knocking again. Her voice was unsteady. “Are you okay? Can you talk? Do you need help? Shall I call the ambulance?”

  “Ambulance?” said David. His raised eyebrow said, Oh, Ken, what kind of crazy mess did you get yourself into while I was away?

  I was not sure which of us three I was most angry with. “I’m fine, Mrs. Dewan,” I said, making my voice cheery and casual. “I’ve just been delayed. Please go back to your apartment. I’ll see you in a bit.”

  “You sure?” She sounded calmer now, about to leave.

  “I’m sure.”

  But David was off the bed already. “Stop!” I called. He yanked his arm away, shrugged on the robe hanging on the door hook—a green yukata, another of his elegant gifts—and strode to the door. I barely had enough time to pull on my jeans before he threw it open.

  “Ken’s busy right now,” he said.

  “Who are you?” Mrs. Dewan’s voice was suspicious.

  “My name is David,” he said. “I’m Ken’s boyfriend.”

  I saw Mrs. Dewan staring past him at the bedroom, where I stood half naked. In the dim light of the passage, I could not make out the look on her face before she turned away. But I saw the slump of her shoulders. I heard the heavy clatter of her footsteps receding down the corridor.

  Over the next few days, I called Mrs. Dewan numerous times. She did not pick up. I sent her texts. She did not reply. I waited around the staircase to catch her, but she was orchestrating her arrivals and departures carefully to avoid me. I stopped by the grocery during her shift. Usually she would be stocking shelves or tidying up after customers. Now she was nowhere to be seen. Finally, I asked Lance. It was awkward. We hadn’t spoken to each other since the botched date, only nodded across the corrugations of checkout lanes.

  He gave me a look. I was not sure what it meant. Overnight, I had become expressions-illiterate.

  “Maybe she’s in the back,” he said. “Avoiding you.”

  I walked to the storage area and peered through the glazed plastic sheeting into the bowels of the store. Employees scuttled around trays of bread, carts mounded with carrots and kale. I could not find Mrs. Dewan. “Excuse me, sir,” a plump Asian woman in overalls said as she pushed a dolly loaded with laundry detergent past me, “customers are not allowed in here.”


  David and I had had a fight that night, the fight we did not have when he left.

  “You didn’t tell her, did you?” he said.

  “You are not my boyfriend,” I said.

  “Why didn’t you tell her?”

  “What gives you the right to ask me?”

  “Ken,” he said in his reasonable voice, “I still care about you as a person. Whatever this codependent thing is that you have going on with her, it’s unhealthy.”

  “Please go,” I said. The traitor part of me wanted him to refuse. To insist on staying. But he left.

  After four days, I stopped calling Mrs. Dewan. What was the use? Let her turn away from who I am, I thought. I don’t care. But it was untrue, just as it had been untrue with my parents. I felt restless and feverish. At work I paced up and down, and people looked at me strangely. At night my head swarmed with troubled thoughts. Had I pushed Mrs. Dewan back into alcoholism? Had I, in telling David to leave, made a dreadful mistake? In my imagination, Mrs. Dewan tilted back her head and drank straight from the bottle, wine spilling redly down her chin. In my imagination, I grew old and shriveled in my empty bed as the years limped by. In the mornings, I felt hungover. A headache squeezed my brain. I took double doses of aspirin. They did nothing but roil my stomach.

  In the middle of all this, the famous author arrived, sweaty and irritable. I had forgotten the limes to go with his Evian. Things devolved rapidly after that. At the restaurant I had chosen, he said, “You call this pad Thai?” Introducing him at the event, I stumbled over the name of a major prize he had won. In spite of my request to turn off phones, one rang during his talk. He threw a tantrum onstage, making certain comments about Texans. People shouted back. Some walked out. Books were not sold. I knew I would pay for it when I met with the bookstore owner the next day.

  It was midnight by the time I got back. I had stopped at a 7-Eleven on the way and picked up a six-pack of beer, which I consumed in the car. My headache was so bad that even my jaw hurt. I dragged myself up to my apartment and stood outside the door, staring at the dark vortex of the peephole. Then I made my way down to Mrs. Dewan’s apartment, taking the stairs one shaky step at a time. I punched the bell. She did not answer.