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.
She arrives first. When she sees the empty hall and notices the lack of voices, she hesitates at the bottom of the stairs.
El calls her to come into the living room. She drags her feet on the old, wood floors and enters. The rooms are filled with hazy sunlight. The two chairs have been moved so that they’re against the wall and underneath the narrow window. The dining room table is under the main front window. The lower pane has been raised, and damp sheets are tacked over the opening with bowls of ice standing in front of them. Three dinner-plate-sized platters of food and sliced bread line up slantwise on a wooden board on the table.
The front door bangs open, and a voice rings out, “Hello El!”
El turns to Aban, “In the latter days, your grandmother would send me to greet the guests. But this is your home now. I am sure my friends would like to meet you.” He ends with an encouraging smile.
She slouches out into the hall.
“Hi,” the stranger says. “Who’re you?”
“Aban. I own this place.”
“Oh! You’re Aban! It’s great to meet you,” the stranger exclaims. “Lucky you, to be right here, living in this gorgeous home your grandmother made, seeing El every day. El’s the kind of guy everyone wants for a friend but don’t know it till they meet him.”
“Really?”
“Definitely.” The stranger steps forward as the door opens behind her. Another two walk in, a man and a woman. They greet each other like old friends, are introduced to Aban, and begin chatting as they walk down the hall and disappear into the living room. The front door opens again. This time a group bustle in, shouting and cracking up at each other. They giggle hello to Aban as they pass her by. She stands there as more people open and close the front door, stream past her on their way to say “Hi!” to El, to each other, and to dig into the fresh food. She frowns after them: there’re so many coming and not enough food. They begin to spill into the hall, into the kitchen, and out the back door. Maybe they eat less here in Toronto at dinner than in the country. Suddenly, she misses her mother’s cooking. She shoves that thought down automatically.
It’s so hot. She fans her face with her hand. It’s useless, like moving stalled water-laden clouds with her pinky.
She takes a step towards the living room door when she hears the knob click, feels the outside air moisten her back, and a bigger group jostles in. They are all in a hurry, in such a hurry that they almost trip over each other, but the yakking crowd in the hall slows them down. This group doesn’t see her; she creeps back towards the wall at the bottom of the stairs, hiding in the shadows.
“I can’t wait to see what El’s cooked up,” says one.
“Cook? How can you think of hot food in heat like this?”
“Hey, even cold food has to be cooked first. And what diff would it make anyway?”
“You gotta say Hi to El first.”
“Sure, sure. But the food is probably half gone by now.”
“You’re such a pessimist. You know El always makes enough for everyone.”
“Yeah, but you say Hi to him and next thing you know, an hour’s gone. I’m going for the food first this time.” The group’s laughter fades as they wade through the crowd into the living room.
For the next half hour, she watches groups and couples and singles come in, knocking and immediately opening the door, expecting they are welcome to enter. All are eager to see El. She doesn’t get it. He’s so hard to understand, how can they be so eager? Now if it was Deepak Chopra, she'd get that. She’d be the first in line to meet her hero. She’d wait all day if she had to! And she’d take all her books to get him to sign them. Mom never let her come to Toronto when he was doing that renewal weekend and he was gonna teach the secrets of healing too. It was the biggest disappointment of her life. And she’d forgotten until now.
These people are like Chopra fans.
But they don’t have to pay, she suddenly realizes.
Voices rise, clash, pile on top of one another, echo off the plaster walls, spill out into the hallway. People follow the cacophony out into the hall and flow into the kitchen and out through the open back door into the back yard. The voices have more space in the open air, but the humidity is like a wall, and the noise builds on itself there too. It’s like the party back in high school, the one which she'd snuck out to attend, where she'd felt alone while everyone else got drunk to have a good time and she'd dared not. Mom forbade alcohol. She could smell it a mile away, Dad would joke. If she'd smelled it on Aban's breath...
Aban shivers.
The walls feel like they're closing in. She shoves the feelings down and stays in her place. Conversations pierce her consciousness.
“Did you see what the TSX did today?”
“Yeah, my stock tanked. The solid one, the one that was supposed to be safe.”
“Oh no. How much you’d lose?”
“Too much.”
“Did you tell El?”
“No. Why would I? He’s not a banker!”
“Or an investor, though maybe he’d be smarter than my financial planner.”
“I can’t believe it. I could kick myself. My budget’s shot to pieces. I don’t know what I’d do if I didn’t have you guys.”
“El can help.”
“How? He doesn’t do anything but listen. How’s that help?”
A throat is cleared.
“Hey, don’t spout medical science to me. I know all about how sharing and being heard makes your stress hormones go down, for women anyway. But I need money. El’s not going to loan me money. He won’t pay my bills. He won’t put food on my table. He doesn’t even have enough for himself!”
“Yeah, but he's never in want, you notice that?"
"Yeah..."
"Well, since you know so much, you know I’m right. And besides, you know that being with El makes you feel stronger, like you can face the most impossible situation and find solutions. I did when my wife left and cleaned out my accounts. I’m doing fine now.”
The door opens, and traffic and new voices drown out his answer. Aban makes a face. Then another conversation floats up from the centre of the crowd to grab her attention.
“I have to see the doctor again.”
“The tests came back positive?”
“I don’t know. He just said, come back in.”
“I’m sorry. Maybe El can help?”
“Yeah, I talked to El. He listened. He made a couple of suggestions, but no one can help me really. Not even him. And I wonder if he wanted to anyway...”
“Of course he does!”
“Does he?”
“Yes!”
“So why didn’t he do more? Listening isn’t enough when your life --”
The words choke off, and an older man crashing through the front door distracts Aban from hearing any more.
After it seems like no more are coming, she leaves it and manoeuvres through the crowd. She searches for El but is waylaid by the first stranger, who speaks into her face.
“Hello Aban. How’re you liking Toronto?”
She shrugs, leaning back.
“Your grandmother loved this city and her friends. There’s nothing she wouldn’t have done for us. After she passed away, El kept up this tradition she started.”
Silence stretches. “Tradition?”
“Yeah, tradition. The tradition of this dinner. Didn’t El tell you?”
She shakes her head slowly from side to side.
“Typical. He tells no more than he thinks one needs to hear. It’s maddening, eh? Anyway, your grandmother, bless her. I still miss her. We all do. Well, what was I saying? Oh yes. Your grandmother started this tradition of having a meal for all her friends, all her students, and her neighbours, although I don’t see the new neighbours. But they didn’t know her, and people are more comfortable keeping to themselves. It’s safer.”
“Safer?”
“Yeah, it’s safer not to meet people because then you’ll have to talk to them when you see them, then that leads to coffee, and before you know it, you’ll be in a relationship with all those obligations," he stresses and lengthens the word "those" as he leans in. "And you know where thinking of another leads you. But I was glad to be friends with your grandmother. Being around her, I don't know, life was more...life! El's like that too. They remind you how rewarding friendships are, how buoyant they make you feel.”
Aban scans this stranger. It’s so hot, so sticky, but her clothes are dry, even her hair is dry and clean. Not one hair sticks to her forehead.
“Aren’t you hot?”
“Sure. But when you get to share time with people who like you and want to be with you, who feels the heat?”
Aban stares, disbelieving.
“Your grandmother fed us, she said, in the heat of the summer so we’d take memories of each other with us when vacations and trips temporarily parted us. She used to say memories of each other would feed us, bring us home again, and keep at bay the natural resentment of no longer being on vacation because we always had each other no matter how hard the job became or what crises we faced. She used to talk first, feed our stomachs second.”
“Talk?”
“Yes, talking and listening fed our spirits. We’d sit outside in the back yard on her lawn of thyme and grass, it smelled so good. And she’d sit underneath her evergreens -- back then they were ever green, if you know what I mean, not brown and dry like this summer. Anyway, she’d sit there, and when we all had gathered, she’d talk. And we’d listen. And then when she was done, she’d listen, and we’d talk. We had these most amazing conversations.”
“Oh.”
The stranger smiles at her.
“About what?” Aban asks reluctantly.
“Oh, about the ways of life, of being, of who we are and who we are meant to become.”
Aban frowns. More meaningless words. Doesn’t anyone in Toronto speak English?
“The cicadas would sing around us. Even after the sun went down, we kept on talking in the darkness with only the kitchen light on. After the sun had set and the mosquitoes had gone to bed, she’d tell us it was time to eat. It was always too soon for us. But she’d say that we needed food bread too, not just mind bread.” She chortles. “Also, it was usually cool enough by then to go in.”
The stranger pauses as she lingers in the past. “Your grandmother believed in the old methods of keeping a house cool. But between you and me, I like air conditioning, but we wouldn’t miss her supper for anything. Spending time with her was like sitting with good, you know as in the opposite of vampires.”
Aban blinks. This person believes fantasy is real?
The woman laughs on seeing Aban's expression. "You know, vampires, people who suck the energy out of you."
“Oh. Mom and Dad don’t believe in air conditioning either,” Aban says. She looks down at the floor, stuffs her hands in her comfortable pockets, and watches her fingers play inside their hiding place, wondering if Grandma made as little food as El has done. She looks up to see the stranger has gone. She lurches forward as someone bumps into her from behind. She walks into the living room, searching for El.
“Hi! You must be Aban. You look just like her, you know.”
“Uh, yeah,” she replies, wondering who “her” is.
“Your grandmother was the best person ever. She saved me. I was a telemarketer, you know, one of those people who calls you up at dinner hour and bugs you to buy something. Anyway, it’s a boring job, and people are awful to you. Geeze, I was just trying to make a buck, to eat, you know. One day after work, I was wandering the mall. I couldn’t go home. Well, to be honest, I didn’t want to go home. I didn’t make enough to live on my own, and I couldn’t find a better job or a second one. I was still living with my folks. I hated it. Every night, they’d tell me what a failure I was, not finding a real job, a disgrace to the family, they said. God! They didn’t get it. I went to college and everything, and I tried everything. I sent out hundreds of résumés. But no one was hiring, even the temp agencies said I was too inexperienced. I was a lousy typist anyway. So anyway, I was wandering through the Eaton Centre when your grandmother came up to me and said, ‘you look like you could use a cup of tea.’ I thought who is this old bat, something out of one of those PBS specials? But, you know, I went with her. She and El gave me courage. And the rest as they say is history. I work for Parks and Rec now. I look after the parks, and I love it. Not many women do my job, and I’m hoping to inspire more women to do the heavy manual work. It makes you feel good, using your muscles to create beautiful spaces, and as your grandmother always said, being a gardener is the best job in the world,” she finishes on a chirp.
Aban finds herself alone amongst the crowd once more. The people swirl around her as she digests the fact that everyone is here because of her grandmother. But as she looks around, she realizes that although it’s her grandmother -- Grandma -- who brought them here, it’s El they want to see. It’s El who attracts them in that annoying way of his. He stands there, holding a large wine glass half-filled with ruby liquid, sipping and laughing and chatting, surrounded by people, young and old, women and men, all listening, all questioning in turns, all conversing. His mouth moves, but she doesn’t hear his words. She can see the faces of his listeners. They’re soaking in what he’s saying and being stimulated into more conversation. They cannot get enough. Yet after a bit, the closest ones leave for the dining room table to join other circles of conversation so that the ones behind can move in closer and the ones outside can become part of the circle. But with all these people, how can there be enough food?
Suddenly, her chest grows hot, her teeth clench, her forehead hardens, her eyes sharpen.
She’s being told how wonderful Grandma is, a grandmother Mom and Dad had let her believe was dead, a grandmother they didn’t like, whom they’d said outright was a disturbing presence not good for her. She was a child! And they'd lied to her! Instead, strangers got to meet her. She gets to hear from strangers all about her grandmother, how they're missing her, grateful they knew her, making it worse. That just proves Mom was right, there is no God. A real God would've made sure she'd met Grandma. If Mom was right about that, maybe she was better off not knowing Grandma. Maybe these strangers are the liars.
Mom and Dad took care of her, protected her, knew what was best for her, gave her the best things in life. They taught her the truth. They were right. But...but...she doesn’t know her own grandmother. All these strangers do.
Who is right?
She searches the people’s open faces, seeing their eyes crinkling happily, their bodies leaning into each other, seeing a careless pleasure in life, something she hadn’t seen in her home, something she doesn’t know. Yeah, she felt good about contributing to her causes, but was it pleasure? It was not this...this...thing that seems to be rising from...from deep within all these people. It wasn’t these friendly smiles she sees here. It wasn’t light like this.
What is she supposed to do?
She hugs herself. It’s not like Grandma will rise from the dead, and she’ll have a second chance at getting to know her. And why did El make so little food? She’s hungry, and there won’t be any left.
She shoves her way through the crowd, unheeding of people blurting, “Hey!”
El looks her way. “It’s time Aban.”
“Time for what?” she yells over the heads of the people in front of her.
He doesn’t answer. The crowd parts and melts away, leaving Aban and El staring at each other almost nose to nose as Els moves toward her.
“Why?” she yells at him.
“I cannot answer that. Only they can tell you why they made the choices they made.”
“You act like you know everything!”
“People have to speak for themselves. I will not substitute myself for their misdeeds, and I cannot make things all better with a bandage.”
“Why not?!”
“That is not my way.”
“It should be.”
El shakes his head with regret, “Though it may seem like it should be, in this world people have free will to think the things they do, to say the things they want to say, to act out their thoughts. They have the ability to control them, to channel them into better thoughts and actions. They have the ability to think about how their actions will affect another. People can reflect on their real motives, and they can see consequences. Many choose not to. Your parents chose not to; they liked being right.” El’s voice hardens, rises, “And no one, no being, can save them from themselves and the rightness of their ways. But their unpleasantness, their bad choices, and the hurt they cause another, will not go away. They will ripple out from them and be reflected back to them. They cannot skirt their own accountability." El pauses. "But with your complicity and ignorance, they have succeeded up until now.”
“It’s not my fault! It's not fair!”
“No. It isn’t. But they chose to listen to their own voices, their own ideas of what is right, feeling righteous in their choices. They chose to ignore a wiser voice. Their own voices became louder to drown the voices of your grandmother and whom she listened to, and they stopped seeing anyone else’s perspective, including yours. They saw only their own point of view.”
“Who’d she listen to?”
“The gardener in the garden.” El pauses for Aban to ask who that is, but she doesn’t. He suddenly grows impatient and exclaims, “Listen Aban! Listen well! The gardener waits for those who knock on the gate. Many see the wide front gate, but few are they who enter the garden by the vine-covered narrow back gate close to where the gardener stands patiently. Many want to plant the easy impatiens and marigolds. Fewer want to plant demanding thorny roses and vines, apple trees and cedars. Fewer still submit their roses and vines to hard pruning to produce good fruit. You will know these few by their fruit. Fruit reflects that which grows it. Diseased trees, trees with growing rot in the middle, dead trees cannot grow good fruit. Those who refuse to see and hang onto the diseased trees, waiting for a miracle, saying that the disease does not exist, saying it’s God’s fault, or their neighbour’s fault, will produce bad fruit. Those who refute the wise advice of the gardener will produce bad fruit and not even what’s left will be saved for carpentry wood but must be burnt. Those who walk away abandon the garden to certain death.
“But your grandmother, she heard; she obeyed; and she was ruthless. She pruned hard. Yet she pruned only what was rotten, bringing light and air to the healthy branches. And she produced good fruit. Look around you at the transformed lives you see -- they are but a small planter of what she wrought. Can you say the same?”
“I’m only twenty, you know.”
“Yes. I know. But there are people here younger than you, older than you, who met your grandmother early in her life and in her dying days, heard and acted on her words. Whose words have you acted upon? Whose words have you listened to? And whose words are the truth? You ask for fairness, but you haven’t asked the ones who harmed you to justify themselves. You want another – you want me – to speak to you for them, to make it better. But I cannot. They must speak to you for themselves.”
Aban sends her eyes in every direction but El’s. She glimpses the table between the backs of the people standing talking in front of it and faces El abruptly. “Why did you make so little food? I thought you were going to have a dinner party. There won’t be any left.”
“Is anyone hungry?”
“I am.”
“Then eat.”
She stomps to the table. El is so...so...talking in stupid words that make no sense. The people part, not wanting to be knocked about. Aban glares down at the table. There is plenty of food left. How can that be? All these people have gone up to the table; even now several are helping themselves to salad or bread, holding glasses filled with lemon-coloured liquid, clear water, ruby wine, or tea-coloured drinks. Ice clinks in their galsses as they gesture animatedly. She frowns. Where did they get the glasses from? She’s so thirsty, and the cold drinks look good. Not the wine though.
“Good iced tea,” the one next to her smiles at her. “I got it from the kitchen. El puts pitchers in the fridge so they’ll stay cold. And the ice is in the freezer. I can get you some if you want. You must be Aban. I’d recognize you anywhere even though the picture she had of you was when you were a little girl. She saved my life, you know, then introduced me to El. I knew him right away when we first met. I mean, he was like a familiar, old friend as soon as we met, one who expects a lot from you but gives so much in love and trust. she was like that too, but more like a grandmother." Aban swallows hard, but the woman carries on unnoticing. "I can tell you stories about her you wouldn’t believe. Grab some food and come with me out back where it’s cooler and quieter, relatively speaking, that is," she chuckles. "C'mon, let’s talk.”