Tulip Season (21 page)

If she'd consulted with Veen before this visit with Adi, she would have growled. “No, Mitra, don't go to him, you'll get nothing but grief,” and would have tried to talk her out of it.

Had Adi, by now, noticed her cardigan on the floor of his garage? If so, what had he done with it? Or to her good fortune, did he still walk around his house as oblivious as he was before Kareena's estrangement?

Adi was apparently at home. Lights in the living room shed a pale aura on the white curtains on the bay window. Mitra surveyed the front yard. The greenery looked withered, as though Kareena's absence had disrupted the spontaneity of nature.

Stepping into the entry porch, Mitra pushed the doorbell. The cold evening air hit her face and momentarily hampered her breathing. The door opened with a jerk. She jumped back involuntarily.

Adi's eyes flashed both surprise and annoyance. Their gazes locked just below a hanging petunia basket. For an instant, neither of them could summon a greeting. Her eyes ran over his lightweight black t-shirt. Just below the glaring company logo of his software company, Guha Software Services, a slogan screamed: S
ave Your Business Soul
.

“What are you doing here, Mitra?” Adi said in a nasal voice. He coughed deep in his lungs, his face flushing like an autumn maple leaf.

“Just happened to be in neighborhood. Looks like you have a cold.”

“A touch of bronchitis,” he said. “Got it playing golf. Can't seem to get rid of it. I'm resting, cooped up here.”

“I'll be happy to make you a pot of tea. That might help break up the cough.”

Adi's face softened. “Come in.”

Stepping aside, he opened the door a little wider and she walked in. Precious little had changed in the passageway or the kitchen since she had been here. The mail basket still overflowed. An old note in Kareena's handwriting was affixed to the memo board tacked to a wall. The smell of furniture polish lingered in the air, indicating the cleaning lady still did her job.

The thermostat ought to have been cranked up, but everyone knew that Adi was impractical about daily living, even if he had fallen ill.

“I'll make the tea,” Mitra said.

“Let's wait a while.” Adi gestured toward the living room. On the coffee table sat an open laptop, a wine goblet, a remote control, and a Kindle. Mitra crossed to a plump club chair, the one close to the door. Adi offered her first a glass of Chateau Ausone and then orange juice, both of which she refused.

He slumped down on the sofa, reached for his glass, and leaned toward her. “So what are you doing in my neighborhood?”

“I'm off to Kolkata to visit my mother and thought I'd stop by before I leave.”

Adi's face turned ashen. He stayed silent.

Most of Mitra's Indian acquaintances would have jumped in with: C
ould you carry a gift for my auntie? Otherwise, I'll have to pack the darn thing, fill out a customs slip at the post office, wait in line, and hope it arrives in one piece. My auntie will surely ask you to stay for dinner.
Adi did not.

His face, so introspective, so lacking in his typical predatory alertness, struck Mitra as odd. Bereft of his throne, his script, and his restless gaze, he seemed half the usual Adi.

Slumped in his chair, seemingly weak and broken, he asked, “Did the detective tell you she's in Kolkata?”

The best defense, Mitra figured, was to be bold. “That's not the main issue. I think we both have a vested interest in Kareena's welfare.”

“Look here—my throat hurts if I talk too long.” The strong downturn in his sentence indicated he was starting to bridle again at her interference. After a pause, he added, “Mademoiselle Basu, Kareena happens to be my wife. Our marriage is a private matter.”

“Did she leave you? I can't imagine how devastating it must be for a DV counselor to be married to an abusive man.”

Adi stared hard. “Okay, you've said your piece. If you want to know the truth, here's how it actually went. A wife becomes bored with her loving, faithful, hard-working husband and decides she needs a little thrill. She starts flirting with men. She starts coming home late. The husband finds out, asks her to stop.”

“And he ‘straightens her out?’”

“Things are seldom quite that simple.” Adi's voice thickened. “Suppose the husband tells the wife he loves her, he'd do anything for her, and it is for her sake he gave up his family. They'd tried their best to stop him from marrying her.”

Mitra inspected Adi's face. His eyes were soft with anguish. He wasn't lying.

“She keeps defending her right to see whom she pleases,” he continued. “She's been faithful to him a long time, but not any longer. She calls him dull. Her extravagant taste is the only reason she's stayed with him. Finally, the husband can't take it any longer.”

Mitra could still picture Kareena's bruised forearm. “Yeah, right. It's the woman's fault. She pushed his buttons. How do abusers get away with such rationalizations?”

“Let me tell you the rest. He leaves town for a week. The wife goes to visit her lover during that weekend, comes back with bruises on her arm. Apparently, he has a temper. She defends him. She says things happen in a moment of frustration.”

“You're trying to tell me that those bruises were someone else's doing?”

“Yes. Do you think she would have taken any beatings from me? She'd have called the police and they'd have picked me up.”

It struck Mitra, the irony: Adi would rather be portrayed mistakenly as an abuser by Mitra and possibly other community members than someone left behind. With a pained expression, he turned to the empty wine goblet poised in his fingers. His fixation spoke of loneliness, desolation, and lost time.

Mitra found herself swollen with doubts. Kareena had never shared her contempt of her husband with her. If what Adi said was true, that is.

Adi began coughing, the sound ragged. He flung himself up and lurched toward the kitchen. She glanced at the window as a wave of light from a passing car broke against the glass, reminding her she needed to get out of here soon.

An incident from the past floated back to Mitra: the occasion of her twenty-eighth birthday. She and Kareena had driven to Spice Route, a popular Indian hangout. Adi was waiting just outside the restaurant entrance on that chilly evening, cradling a pair of purple-and-white orchid bouquets. Smiling gently, he presented a bouquet to each of them and wished Mitra many happy returns. With delight and gratitude, she accepted the exquisite flowers, but noticed Kareena frowning over hers.

“Orchids make me sneeze,” she said.

On that day Mitra had noticed Kareena's petulance, her lack of appreciation for her husband's sweet gesture.

Sitting in Adi's living room, Mitra fleetingly saw that both the parties were at fault.

Adi reentered the room, tissue in hand, and dropped back into the sofa, harder than necessary.

“I still need to go to Kolkata and see if I can find her,” Mitra said. “From what I hear, Kolkata has changed a lot. I wouldn't know where to start. If I'm going to have any chance of tracking her down—”

Adi rearranged his feet. “Go to the Gariahat shopping area. She probably hangs out there. Try some private restaurants. She goes to exclusive places—I don't know any names. I trust you'll keep all this to yourself? This is for her security.”

Gariahat—at first Mitra had a hard time believing Kareena would spend time in such a congested section of Kolkata. Then again, the area boasted shopping bargains. Kareena took special delight in finding them. Mitra now had a location to scout.

The mention of the word security, however, had alerted her and reminded her of another issue. “Have you paid the rest of the ransom?”

Adi wrung his hands, avoiding her gaze, and she wondered if he wasn't purposely holding back. After a moment he said, “Do you know what my biggest regret is? I was too driven, didn't spend enough time with her, didn't show her my love often enough. She wanted a kid. I said no. I wasn't ready. She asked again. I still said no. Now I'd like to have children, I very much would. You know what I mean? I did it all wrong.”

Poor Adi—he was stuck. He'd tried to buy Kareena during their marriage, and now he was still trying to buy her back. And for all his faults, he had standing in the community. If all this ever got out, it would drop a truckload of shame on him.

Mitra's heart wavered—was Adi the victim of Kareena's betrayal, or had he driven her away? She was no longer sure.

“I wish you and I had gotten along better,” she said, “talked more, shared more.”

“I called my family yesterday,” Adi said. “Finally, after a decade, everyone spoke with me. My mother asked me to come visit her in Mumbai. My kid sister, Malti, wants me to meet her new husband. I never told you about her, did I?”

Mitra shook her head.

“She's eight years younger,” Adi said in a hurt voice. “We used to quarrel a lot and, of course, being older, I always won. When we talked yesterday, she said exactly what you just said. I wish we'd gotten along better. I wish we'd talked more.”

A queasy guilty feeling gnawed at Mitra. Perhaps she'd judged Adi too harshly, without realizing he was going through so much stress. “What will you do now?”

“I'll be a nomad, a desk-less person for a while. Then I'll outsource myself somewhere. It's time for me to move on. I'll have to put all this behind me and turn over a new leaf. Is that a good aphorism for a gardener?”

Mitra smiled a yes. Now that he'd opened up, he might appreciate the irony of the secret she'd suppressed from him: Kareena was her half-sister. She and Adi were related, after all.

Was now the golden moment? In Adi's face, she read pain, confusion, and resignation.

Some things, like fallen leaves, were best burned in a fragrant fire.

She drew herself up from her chair.

Adi glanced at her and held his lips tight, as though stifling a thought. “Wait just a sec.”

He returned and handed her a shopping bag, with a flourish. “I think you left this here.”

A row of pewter buttons protruded from a camel-colored cardigan. Mitra felt a flush on her cheeks. However fond she was of this sweater, she would never wear it again.

“Thank you,” she mumbled and started toward the door, turning and apologizing for any possible inconvenience and expressing wishes for his speedy recovery.

He followed her, maintaining a respectable distance. As she reached her car, she heard the torment of Adi's coughing. She turned and took one last look over her shoulder. Although he should really be inside, there he was, leaning over the railing, his shirt billowing in the cool evening breeze, the front door wide open.

“Mitra!” he called out to her, with the tiniest glimmer of hope in his voice.

Clutching the car key, she took a few steps closer to the balcony, and looked up at him.

“If by some stroke of luck you do find her, will you tell her …?” His voice caught and he turned.

She could finish the rest of the sentences for him:
I still love her.
I always will. I'll be waiting.

She stood solemnly, realizing what it must have taken for him to admit to his feelings, given the fact that Kareena had strayed.

She heard the door slam. A yellow streetlight illuminated the block ahead. She waited a moment, got in her car, then turned the key in the ignition.

THIRTY-FOUR

LAST NIGHT,
tossing and turning in bed, Mitra had again craved Ulrich's touch, even though it had been three days since she'd seen him. And the moment she woke this morning, her travel day, he floated to her mind.

She'd taken a shower and scrambled into a blue skirt and a matching travel blazer when Mary phoned from the newspaper. As they exchanged greetings in a somber voice, Robert's unseen, substantial presence seemed to hover over them.

“You can take a little more time with your next column,” Mary said. “We're doing a whole page story on Robert in this Thursday's issue.” She gave Mitra the exact date when she needed to e-mail the column.

Mitra could hardly believe it. They still wanted her as a columnist? “Well, I'm off on a trip, but taking my laptop with me. I'll meet the deadline.”

“You should know Robert thought highly of you. Recently, he'd put in a few good words about you to the management. They'd like to make you a permanent columnist. Keep this to yourself for a few days. You'll get an official call and a letter.”

Mitra should have been dancing. But there was heaviness in her stomach, and grief hardening behind her eyelids. She still had a hard time believing that Robert wasn't around. He'd puzzled her, but she had a deep regard for him. He'd left her with this gift, one she cherished. And it was because of him, she was flying to India.

Just as she finished the call, her phone rang again. “You won't believe this, Mitra.” Veen said, “Adi's missing. I'm spooked. He hasn't shown up at his office for two days, hasn't called his assistant, either. Do you have any ideas?”

It took Mitra several moments to process the news. “No, I saw him just a couple of nights ago. We had the best talk we've ever had. He seemed sad, but other than that, he seemed okay. Could he have gone to his beach house?”

“He never goes there during the week.”

Mitra glanced out the window at her driveway and glimpsed Grandmother alighting from her car. She'd arrived on time to give Mitra a lift to the airport. “I'm sorry, but I can't talk any longer,” Mitra said to Veen. “I have a flight to catch. Let's stay in touch. Be sure to call me at my mother's in Kolkata if you hear any more about Adi.”

Minutes later, Mitra and Grandmother cruised down Interstate 5. Finally this trip was becoming real to Mitra, as real as the snowy peak of Mt. Rainier etching its presence on the horizon. But she felt no joy. She reflected on Adi, a new-found sympathy in her heart for him, and a gloom settled inside her. What could possibly have happened to him? For sure, he'd looked depressed on her last visit, but she hoped he wasn't suicidal like Robert.

With the traffic slowing, Grandmother said, “Oh, I should tell you. Nobuo Yoshihama dropped by yesterday to see my garden on your suggestion. He liked the ‘hot’ color scheme. He said he was seeing your
mind
at work. We had tea. You have to get to know him a little bit to see what an interesting young man he is. And steady, too. We talked for over an hour. He asked about you.”