Aban's Accension

Chapter 14: The Dinner

Chapter 14: THE DINNER

by Shireen Jeejeebhoy

Aban wakes up restless. She had slept in the guest room on the second floor, shedding only her pants as she fell onto the bed in the wee hours. She wanders into the kitchen in her bare feet and damp, wrinkled T-shirt, looks around at the cupboards, stares at the bare table, glances up at the window, and sees dried-out trees. Sighing loudly, she pads out, down the hall, and into her empty living room. She stands inside the open door. She just stands there, her eyes not focusing on anything. She blinks rapidly three times and sees the lonely chair, sitting there, waiting, empty. She pads over to the window and looks at the sky. Her head droops down, and the road comes into her view. Cars slide by in both directions, grey, silver, taupe, all the different shades of grey that clog the highways, even the small one near her home. Occasionally, a burgundy one punctures the sameness.

An ambulance wails by. She jumps. She hadn’t heard the siren till the wide, white van-truck was in her sight; the flashing lights startle her. A small sedan driving in the opposite direction screeches into the curb as the ambulance swings out into the left lane of the oncoming traffic to fly past the oblivious cars in its lane.

Aban reaches down deep into her lungs for air and blows it out.

She wanders out of the room and hesitates at the bottom of the stairs that go to the third floor. It’s hot up there. She climbs into the heat, and standing at the edge of the landing looks around. She leans into the wall for long minutes.

Clink; chop, chop, chop; water gush: the sounds vibrate her sharp ears and percolate into her mind. She frowns and twists her head round to look down the stairs, as if the dark tunnel will tell her what she’s hearing. Letting the wall support her, she turns her body round to follow her head and steps down the stairs, one step at a time. At the bottom, she stops.

Bottles rattle together in the distance. He’s opened the fridge.

She takes a step forward, feels the wall brush her bare leg, and glances down at herself. She stands there for long minutes, contemplating her bare legs and the shortness of her T-shirt, the hot, humid air oppressing her. She climbs the stairs back up slowly, pads into her room, picks up a pair of pants on the floor, and fights to put them on as the fabric sticks to her moist legs. With a grunt, she pulls the waistband into place and buttons and zips her pants closed.

Many minutes later after a pause on her bed, Aban is standing in the doorway of El’s kitchen.

“What’re you doing?” Aban asks eventually.

“I’m making dinner,” he answers.

“Oh.”

“My friends are coming over. Would you like to join us?”

She shrugs.

He picks up a saucepan from the stove, carries it over to the sink, lifts its lid, and pours out water. She takes a step in, another step, until she can see that there are whole eggs in the saucepan.

“I’m making Salad Niçoise, a pasta salad with fresh vegetables, and fresh bread to be dipped in olive oil or eaten with cheese.”

“Oh.” She watches him as he pours the eggs carefully into a bowl of ice water and begins shelling them.

He tells her: "Dinner is at six."

At six o’clock, she comes downstairs dressed in her plainest white T-shirt and khaki pants, her hair still wet from the cold shower she had taken after spending long hours splayed on her bed, her chest weighed down by the heat and an unwanted emotion that she cannot identify. She wears bare feet; it’s even hotter than this morning. The humidex has risen all day.