Hiding in Plain Sight (22 page)

“What is it? What's in it?” she asks, thrilled and surprised.

“It is a gift from me to you,” says Gunilla. “Open it.”

“I love gifts,” says Bella.

She is so eager to see what it is that she tugs at the tape impatiently. But the tape is stubborn, and she is about to resort to her teeth when Gunilla has the presence of mind to get up and fetch a pair of scissors, whose mysterious location she clearly knows well.

Bella gazes down at the gift, remembering a line from a poem by
Apollinaire:
“La joie venait toujours après la peine.”
It's a collection of photographs: Aar with friends at a party; Aar with Gunilla and the children camping; Aar in Nepal, India, Bangladesh, and Burma; Aar with Gunilla in Istanbul. Bella has never seen any of them before. And they are good, very good, every single one of them.

“They're Aar's,” says Gunilla. “I've put them together for you and the children.”

“Grazie, carissima Gunilla!”

She receives the present with out-and-out joy, appreciative of the time and thought Gunilla has put into arranging them in an album and giving it to her and the children.

Bella embraces Gunilla, who says suddenly, “That reminds me. We had a phone call earlier today at the office from an elderly Italian lady. She said her name was Marcella and that she'd been ringing every UN office in Nairobi trying to reach someone who knew you.”

Bella sits up with a worried look. “Maybe Marcella called me on my Italian mobile number, which has been turned off since my arrival here. And Marcella hates e-mails so we've never communicated that way. We always use the telephone. That is typical Marcella, seventy-five and still volunteering in a Rome hospital. And you know what? She delivered me. Anyhow, what message did she leave?”

“She said to tell you, ‘
Come mai ti sei perduta?
'”

Bella asks Gunilla, “Do you know what that means?”

“My Italian isn't perfect, but I thought she was telling you that you should be getting in touch with her. You're lost or something,
perduta
? No?”

Relieved, Bella relaxes. She will call Marcella in the morning. And now Gunilla reverts to more Swedish ways. They chat and drink some more as if one or the other of them were going to go away at the break of dawn, never to be seen again. Gunilla promises that each glass will
be her last, but they keep unearthing memories and anecdotes about Aar that they want to share. They page through the album together, Aar's photos inspiring further recollections.

Eventually, they are too exhausted to talk, and Bella offers Gunilla a place to sleep, but Gunilla declines. “No,” she says. “I'm sober enough, and tomorrow I have to work. I'll call you to let you know I got home okay.”

“Till tomorrow, then,” says Bella.

Later Bella starts to retrieve Aar's computer from under the mattress, but she can't bear the notion of any more incursions into his privacy tonight. Granted, she knows many things about him that no one else knows, but it is also increasingly evident to her that there are many, many things he did not tell her and that there are even things he didn't want her to know.

She leaves the laptop where it is and goes into the bathroom to brush her teeth. Just as she comes out of the bathroom, Gunilla rings. She has arrived safely, thank you. And with relief in her mind, Bella sets the alarm and goes to sleep.

Today, things are not going swimmingly for Valerie. She is not getting anywhere with her plan to ease her way back into Salif's and Dahaba's hearts. She speaks to Dahaba, when the girl is at Fatima and Mahdi's, and makes an attempt to woo her with the pleasant-sounding idea of a trust in her and Salif's names. But Dahaba says she doesn't understand what “trust” means in this context or how it works to her and Salif's benefit, and suggests that Valerie discuss the matter with Salif, “who is smart and bound to know the legal and other ramifications.” She then adds, “And please remember to talk about the matter to Auntie Bella, who, so far as I know, is our legal guardian.”

It is evident from Dahaba's choice of vocabulary that she has a better grasp of legal matters than she claims. It's also evident that she is not keen on taking a position on what her mother is suggesting. She signs off with a quick and unconvincing “Take care, Mum, I love you,” then runs off to join her friends, and gives her mobile phone to Salif.

Salif is very short with Valerie when she speaks to him, partly because it is the second time she has interrupted him during this visit with his friends. The first time she interrupted his chess game with
Zubair, and when he went back to the game, he could not regain his focus and he lost to Zubair—Salif hates losing a chess game to Zubair, of all people! This time he is even more annoyed as he immediately suspects that his mother's latest move is nothing short of a ploy to cheat him and his sister out of their rightful assets. “You are scheming to sabotage the smooth running of our lives in any way you can,” he tells her curtly, “and we won't buy into it.” Then, just as Dahaba did, he makes kissing sounds into the phone, saying, “
Arrivederci
, Mum,” and hangs up.

Padmini, who stood by yesterday afternoon listening in on Valerie's conference calls with her lawyer and Gunilla, is of the opinion that both the lawyer and Gunilla were less than enthusiastic about the idea of creating a trust. In her view, Gunilla, in fact, seems biased in favor of Bella. Padmini suggests that it was foolish of Valerie to suggest herself immediately as the trustee. In her opinion, Valerie should have made no mention of the trusteeship at all at the outset.

“I have to be the principal trustee,” Valerie insists.

“Why?” Padmini asks.

“Because I am the only living parent.”

“If that is what you are trying to do, then you better get the children on your side, especially Salif, who is no fool.”

Now, with the telephone dead in Valerie's hands after Salif has rebuffed her, Padmini says, “This is not working out, darling, so give it up.” And as if in accordance with Valerie's sense that the hotel room has started spinning, a glass precariously balanced on the edge of the nightstand falls to the floor, spilling the dregs of last night's liquor and shattering on contact with the hard wooden floor.

But Valerie is as dead to the world outside her head as she is alive to the obsession that has taken hold within it, the idea that she believes will allow her to play a part in her children's lives, giving her a chance
to make up for her earlier failings. Padmini says nothing, because she knows from experience that when Valerie is in the grip of an idée fixe there is no convincing her of anything she doesn't wish to hear and that Valerie, being Valerie, will not give up the hope of achieving her ambitions until either success dances attendance upon her or she stares into the ugly face of defeat.

Padmini comes from a traditional background of the Southeast Asian variety—never mind that she was born in Uganda and raised in Britain. She was brought up in a monogamous household—never mind if her parents' arranged marriage was a happy one or not. The fact is that the idea of unknotting the marriage ties linking her and her husband together was not only shocking but also unthinkable to either of her parents.

Valerie's background, Padmini knows, is different. The lifestyle in which she was raised is of the European—that is to say, British—variety. Add to this her father's career as an actor, his drunkenness, his infidelities, and his predatory sexual behavior, imposing himself on his young daughter. Valerie is unlike most women Padmini has known. She is a woman apart, a woman who sets her own tradition, different from everyone else's, while claiming to be continuing that tradition into which she was born. Valerie had left Aar and her children to be with Padmini and before that had done the same to a number of other lovers, abandoning each as she started a liaison with another. So Padmini knew from the beginning not to be surprised if Valerie erred in her ways, whether with a man or a woman.

And yet Valerie and Padmini have always seen their rapport as special. Not for them the rows over betrayal that have caused several of the couples they know to go their separate ways. Or so it was until a few years ago in Cape Town.

They were visiting during Gay Pride Week, staying with
like-minded friends in Simon's Town. Padmini was so much in love with life in Cape Town that she suggested to Valerie that they consider relocating there. Valerie seemed to be falling in love with Cape Town too. She'd discovered a gym in Claremont that she liked, and she started going every day, returning later and later with an air of something different about her. When Padmini asked what was going on, Valerie had no explanations to offer. She said only, “We aren't married, are we?”

Padmini went off her rocker. Such was her anger that she threw her mobile phone at Valerie. When she missed and hit the wall, shattering the phone, her fury reached epic heights. The fight escalated, with unforgivable words exchanged until finally Valerie shrieked, “You know what I like about her? Her cunt doesn't stink.” She meant to inflict pain, and she did. Then words were not enough, and Padmini tore into Valerie, the two of them struggling like bitches in heat.

When their hosts returned from work, they found themselves staring at broken chairs, tables with no legs, splintered mirrors, and doors without handles. They couldn't make out what had happened, since neither Padmini nor Valerie would tell them. Maybe their hosts worked it out on their own or maybe they didn't, but they stopped asking.

For Padmini and Valerie, what happened during that week in Cape Town remains the elephant in the room, and neither will admit to seeing it. From that day on, they've avoided any kind of conflict that might lead them back to such a precipice. Sometimes, when it threatens, one or the other of them will say, “Cape Town,” and the reminder is enough to check their rage. But the rift that happened there has never fully mended, and it has left Padmini with the suspicion that Africa itself may not be good for them.

Already they have approached acrimony on this visit over who is to blame for the fact that Dahaba came upon them on the night they were Bella's guests in what is still, technically speaking, Aar's house. Was it
Padmini's fault for not staying in the sofa bed or was it Valerie's for inviting Padmini into her bigger, more comfortable bed?

Padmini, for her part, has been trying to support Valerie however she can, even though she does not wholly agree with the way Valerie is going about things. After all, Valerie stood steadfastly by her side through all the difficulties in Uganda, which stemmed from an ancient dispute involving her family. And she is sensitive to the difference between her mission there, which was purely financial, and how much is at stake for Valerie emotionally with her children.

Still, the ups and downs are hard to weather. Valerie's conversations with Dahaba and Salif have sent her into a dramatic oscillation between frantic busyness approaching mania and almost total inertia, accompanied by a significant increase in alcohol intake. Meanwhile, their plans for the future—whether to return to their restaurant business in Pondicherry or relocate to Nairobi if Valerie finds a footing in the lives of her children—hang in the balance. Each time they make love after one of their quarrels, they talk and talk before they fall asleep, and Padmini reassures Valerie that she is innocent of blame, and as Padmini drifts off, she hopes that the morrow will bring peace back to their lives. But nothing of the sort has happened—and Valerie is all the more obsessively driven in her pursuit.

Now Valerie is gathering some of her things, as if readying to go out: wallet, room key, and body lotion.

“Where are you going, love?” Padmini asks.

“I am not going anywhere.”

But despite what she says, Valerie continues to pack her handbag, putting into it combs, a hairdryer, a change of underwear, a pair of pants, and a couple of shirts.

“Why are you fretful?”

“Because I am getting ready.”

“Cape Town” threatens.

Valerie is on the edge. And no wonder. She has slept and eaten little and drunk a lot as she schemes about how to lay her hands on the treasures that appear close, within reach—if only! There is nothing that would delight Valerie more than to forge some closeness with her children, and after that, oversee a trust in their name. And if Padmini is unhappy because Valerie closes a deal in which the children become her own again and the problems with the trust are hammered out the way she likes, then it is just too bad, she thinks. Padmini can go where she pleases. As a matter of fact, Valerie believes that since Padmini has never been a mother, there are certain maternal instincts that evade her comprehension. The same is true of Gunilla. And if only Bella were not here to spoil things and deny Valerie's ambitions—ambitions that are for the good of the children, she is sure. She says to Padmini, “Blame it on Bella and Gunilla, dear.”

Padmini has been intent on averting disaster, but at this she cannot help but say, “I wonder who Adam would blame if there were no Eve?”

Valerie takes her handbag and heads for the door.

Padmini asks again, “Where are you going, love?”

“To the bar in the hotel to have a stiff drink.”

“Isn't it a little early in the day?”

“You are most welcome to join me,” says Valerie.

She closes the door behind her and runs down the flights of steps, not pausing until she takes a seat in the bar. Her back is to the wall as she waits for someone to take her order and watches men and women coming and going, white-shirted, khaki-trousered, well-primed specimens every one of them. How Valerie hates them; they remind her of her father.

A waiter sporting a well-tended hairdo, yellow lips, and a nervous smile asks, “Anything, madam?” He smells of Lifebuoy soap.

“Two whiskies, three tots in each, plenty of ice on the side, and two glasses of water, please.” She adds, “My friend is joining me shortly,” even though she knows this is untrue. She will drink everything, just as she has done every day for the past few days in secret binges Padmini has not detected.

“Yes, madam,” he assures her.

“We can put the drinks bill on the room, right?”

The waiter leans down to whisper as if he were sharing a confidence with her—how his body smells, despite the Lifebuoy, she thinks. “I'm sorry, madam, cash up front. That is the hotel policy for hard liquor.”

“You go and get it,” she says.

“Cash up front, as I've just said, madam.”

Valerie can't decide with whom she is angrier, the waiter, Gunilla, Bella, or the children, the multiple sources of her troubles. And to top it all off, she discovers that her wallet is bereft of cash. Enough. She is sober still, sober enough to decide she won't be bullied by a Kenyan smelling of soap.

When she gets back to the room, Padmini is reading and doesn't even bother to look up from her book, pretending she hasn't noticed Valerie's return. It is broad daylight, but Valerie gets under the covers and, weighed down with depression, goes straight to sleep.

—

Qamar and Salif are lying side by side on the bed with their shoes on, their heads on huge cushions, passing a cigarette back and forth. The windows are wide open and the two ceiling fans are doggedly running, producing scant air. Through the wall, they can hear the sounds of Zubair and Dahaba shrieking with laughter as they play computer games. Salif's phone rings.

“Are you having a good time, darling?” Bella asks.

“Yes, Auntie, we are, thanks.” Indeed, they have been having a splendid visit, eating too much chocolate, smoking, gossiping about their friends, and taking turns telling tall tales to one another. Salif is aware that Dahaba is stiff with worry about their mother's unscrupulousness. But he will assure Dahaba, when they are alone in their house later, that he knows a lot more than his mum does about the existing will, his father having confided this to him. Their father was more worried about the legion of his so-called Somali relatives who, like vultures, would descend to make their clan-based claim on his children and Bella's inheritance were he to die without a will. This is why the will names Bella, his closest living blood relative, as their legal guardian.

“Will you be ready if I come to pick you up in half an hour?” asks Bella.

“Is it okay if you come in an hour instead?”

“Yes, it is. See you in an hour.” And Bella hangs up.

“I've been wondering,” Qamar says, trailing off.

Salif teases. “Keep going; keep wondering.”

Qamar asks, “How binding is the will of a dead person?”

Qamar has probably spoken to Dahaba, who is understandably worried about their mother's talking the way she did about trusts, with Bella seemingly unaware of her machinations. He can imagine why Dahaba would want to know if their father's will would protect them.

“Wills are more than a word given, they are written and signed in the presence of witnesses,” says Salif. “And they are binding. Otherwise, not honoring them might create avoidable frictions within family units, and nobody wants frictions.”

Qamar draws long on the cigarette and waits for him to continue speaking. She holds the cigarette away from her face until he passes her the ashtray. Then she brushes the ash off and passes the cigarette back to him.