“Good morning,” he whispered. His eyes were open.
“How do you feel?”
“Different,” he said. “I’m waiting for the sun.”
“Tell me what you see now.”
He shook his head a little. “Not much. Light gray, dark gray. Sky, water, trees. Maybe.”
“That’s good. Just take it slowly.” She leaned closer to him, but he did not look at her.
The eastern sky grew lighter, gray transforming into soft golds and pinks as the ragged lines of the clouds emerged from the gloom.
“Do you see it?” she asked.
He nodded. “I see it.”
The edge of the sun crept above the edge of the world and the lake flashed with the first bright glares of pink and gold as the clouds blazed softly like frozen fire across the sky.
“I can see the sun,” Rama said softly. “I can see the trees and the water.” He turned his head toward her and a faint smile curled the corner of his mouth. “I can see you, too. You have beautiful eyes.”
Asha smiled at him, but he turned away again to stare at the lake.
“But I can’t see Vina anymore. She’s gone. She’s gone forever now, isn’t she?”
“Yes, she is. But she’s been gone for a long time now, Rama. You’ve been holding on to a memory, to a dream. But this is a new day. A whole new life for you.” She held out her hand to him.
His lip trembled. “But she… I can’t… I can’t live this life anymore, not without her. I’m sorry.” He unfolded his arms to free his hand and she saw the glint of sunlight on the tiny blade as he thrust it into his neck.
“No!”
Asha watched him fall back into the grass. Rama shivered and sputtered as the blood flowed from his throat and mouth, his wide eyes searching the dawn-streaked skies while his hands pawed at the ground. She leapt up and clasped her hands over the wound, squeezing and pressing with all her weight, shouting over and over, “No! Rama, no!”
9
The sun was high in the late morning sky when Priya finally said good-bye to the families who lived by the lake. It had only taken Rama a few seconds to die, and it had only taken a few moments longer for everyone to come running out to see what was happening. Asha tried to remember exactly what had happened, and how, and why, but the thoughts refused to come together in her mind. The only image that materialized was the shape of the little blade. The shape of a steel scalpel.
My scalpel in his hand.
And then there had been the long, cold hours of standing beside the palash tree and watching the women tend to the body, watching the men burn the body, listening to Priya chanting softly, her voice echoing across the cold waters. Asha leaned against the tree and stared up at the fiery orange flowers.
Priya stood beside Asha with Jagdish on her shoulder and her bamboo rod in her hand. “We don’t have to leave right this minute if you’re not ready.”
Asha looked out across the lake at the grebes gliding across the water. “I’m ready now.”
The nun touched Asha’s arm. “It’s all right to grieve.”
“Why would I grieve? He wasn’t mine, not even when we slept together. He was always hers. I didn’t have him before, and I don’t have him now. So his death doesn’t change anything.” Asha began walking away. “It doesn’t change anything at all.”
Chapter 4
1
Asha strode along the mountain path, only rarely pointing out the odd tree root or rock underfoot. Priya followed a few paces behind with her bamboo rod in hand and the little mongoose Jagdish perched on her shoulder. The blind woman never stumbled and never once complained about the pace or the path.
“How much daylight is left?” the nun asked.
“Too little.” Asha poked a sliver of ginger into the corner of her mouth and began chewing. “We may not reach the next village before nightfall. I’ll try to find someplace sheltered from the wind for us to sleep.”
They walked on. Asha minded the setting sun as she followed the path down the rocky hillside into the forest. Brittle brown leaves crunched softly underfoot as the fading daylight filtered through the yellow and crimson leaves overhead. Few scents remained to tell of the summer bounty and now the forest smelled only faintly of earth and decay, laced with the light fragrance of the white lotuses blooming in Priya’s hair.
“Asha?” The nun petted the mongoose on her shoulder as she swept the path ahead with her bamboo rod. “If you had a glass of water, and the level of the water was half the height of the glass, how would you describe the glass?”
“Half empty.” The herbalist glanced back. “Is that supposed to tell you something about me? That I only see the negative, the void, the failing, the disappointments in life?”
The nun nodded. “When we ask that question of children, yes. But I already know that you are a pessimist. I asked the question for a different reason. I wanted to point out to you the great deception of the mind, the deception of western philosophy.”
“And what deception is that?”
“The illusion of duality,” Priya said. “It’s a natural error, but the rise of the Ahura Mazdan Temple in the west has spread it far and wide, as far as my temple in Kolkata and probably your family’s home in Kathmandu. The Mazdans see the world in terms of opposites. Creator and destroyer, light and darkness, good and evil. They’ve been teaching this philosophy since I was young, and now it is common for people everywhere to see the world in such terms. Large and small, hot and cold, young and old. Everything must be labeled such, everything must choose a side, as though the entire universe were preparing for a great war.”
“Your point?” Asha continued down the path, deeper into the forest, deeper into the shadows. The air grew steadily cooler.
“My point is that there is another way to see the world. A better way.”
“Then how do you answer the question? If the glass is not half empty or half full, then what is it?”
Priya smiled. “The glass is larger than amount of water it holds.”
Asha sighed. “It’s the same thing.”
“No, it isn’t. When you say that the glass is half empty, as you did, you are focusing on the half without water and ignoring the half that is full. But if you say the glass is half full, you make the same error, ignoring the half that is empty. If you are to see the world as it truly is, then you must see both halves of the glass at the same time, both empty and full. Thus, to describe the glass properly, you must describe all of it at once, which is to say that the glass is larger than its contents. Do you see the difference?”
Asha ducked under a tree branch. “Is that really better? I mean, who cares about the glass? The whole point of the glass is the water. Without any water, the glass is useless.”
Priya stopped abruptly, frowning. Then she ducked under the tree branch and continued on. “I’m just offering you another way to look at the world. A way that isn’t tied to your own feelings, a way of thinking outside the self. Dispassionate. Open-minded. I worry about you. If you spend your life only seeing the darkness, you may come to believe that darkness is all that exists.”
