A Time to Dance (9 page)
Authors: Padma Venkatraman
Paati and I go to the Shiva temple near our home.
She walks slower than usual.
We pause in front of a small vacant lot
so she can catch her breath.
“Paati, are you feeling unwell?”
“Just age catching up with me,” she says.
An old beggar, almost bent in two,
shuffles out of a ragged tent in one corner of the lot.
He holds out hands skinny as a chicken's feet.
Paati drops a coin into his palms.
“God bless you,” he says to her.
Then he turns to me. “And you, too,
so you aren't a cripple in your next life.”
Outside the temple wall,
Paati takes off her slippers.
I don't.
I'm not sure I want to limp in.
“Angry with God?” Paati says.
“Why shouldn't I be, Paati?
Why did He take away my leg?
Why did He make that man so poor?
Is God punishing us for sins we committed
and bad Karma we built up in a past life?”
“I don't believe in a punishing God,” Paati says.
“I believe in a compassionate God.
To me, Karma isn't about divine reward or retribution.
Karma is about making wise choices to create a better future.
It's taking responsibility for your actions.
Karma helps me see every hurdle as a chance to grow
into a stronger, kinder soul.
When I was widowed, I was angry and scared
but I used my anger to act braver than I felt.
Everyone believed my act and soon I believed it, too.
I truly became a brave and strong teacher.
Maybe when you feel angry,
you should try pretending you're onstage,
let anger fuel you into acting a part from a dance-story,
a part that could help you.”
I leave my lonely slipper
next to Paati's pair
and follow her.
Inside the temple, the scent of sacred camphor
mixes with the acrid smell of bat droppings.
My eyes flit to the dark corners of the cavernous ceiling,
where bats hang upside down.
There are no dancers
on this temple's walls.
Here, even Shiva
stands still.
Paati surrenders herself to prayer, neck bent, eyes closed.
Sensing Paati's conviction He exists,
I feel some comfort.
But I wish I could find a way
to worship that would fulfill me,
as Paati's firm faith in prayer seems to fill and strengthen her.
For a moment, my childhood memory of the deity
in the temple of the dancing God
blazes so fiercely I feel the heat of the flames
He holds in one of His four arms.
I miss
the blissful ecstasy of the dancing Shiva
I saw.
Whose music I heard
as a child.
At the bus stop, I hold my head high.
I'm not a bride of long ago
being forced into marriage with someone she doesn't know.
I'm not a widow of long ago
whose world is circumscribed to a circle at her feet.
I'm the granddaughter of a woman
who was brave.
Who used her anger.
Who told me to treat the world as my stage.
I hold myself as straight as I can on crutches.
Pretend I'm the legendary Queen Kaikeyi,
whose strength in battle impressed King Dasharatha
so much
he begged for her hand in marriage.
I stare down the first nosy stranger
who questions me.
He's a lowly subject
of the kingdom I rule.
The bus
is my royal chariot.
I return every curious glance
with my imperial glare.
No one dares pester me.
On my way out of the bus,
I poke through the crowd with my crutches.
The old woman who sits up front jerks her chin at me.
“You there. Girl.
When are you going to tell us how you lost your leg?”
My regal stance must not scare everybody.
I bare my teeth in a too-wide grin.
“Crocodile bit it off.”
My sarcasm is lost on her.
She bends toward me.
“How exactly did that happen?”
“Like this.” I thrust my face next to hers, open my mouth
and snap it shut. Crocodiles don't growl, but I roar, “Grrrr.”
The woman shrieks and
a ripple of laughter spreads
as I stride down my royal staircase.
Maybe I was mean. But if it's won me peace, it's worth it.
Paati's right. It's all a matter of how you deal with things.
And Chandra's right.
I'm strong. Even if my body is weaker.
My crutches tap out a victory march.
I strut,
tired but triumphant, toward school.
“Is this my leg?”
A foot stuck on a metal pipe
all-too-visible through the transparent plastic “leg”
that doesn't match
the curve or the skin tone of my real leg.
“A trial limb. The clear plastic lets me check the fit.
You can practice with this
until the more modern one is ready.”
Jim shows me a “silicone sleeve” that looks like a sock made of gel.
The sleeve fits over my residual limb.
A pin at the bottom of the sleeve
clicks to reassure me the leg is on properly
and clicks again when I take it off.
Jim's added soft straps above my knee for extra security.
“Ready to take the first step
toward your shining future?” Jim says.
Feeling as nervous as if I'm about to go onstage
for another dance competition,
I rise.
My body weight isn't even.
I'm leaning on my strong left side, stunned by the effort it takes
to raise my fake leg slightly off the floor.
How much strength did I lose
when they sawed off the muscles I once had?
My fake foot is cold, hard, senseless.
I glance down to see if it's correctly stationed.
I take another wavering step.
My brain can command my artificial leg, but plastic can't reply
like muscles and nerves can.
Hunched over, watching my hesitant feet
I shuffle like the beggar Paati and I met
on the way to the temple.
“Trust your sense of touch,” Jim says.
“Walk like the dancer you are.”
Circling around the room with him a second time,
I straighten upâback and neck erect.
It gets easier. My third round already
earns me Jim's usual compliment. “Great job!”
I wish I could vent my joy
by leaping.
“Start slow, kiddo. Wear this limb a few hours at first.
Build up slowly to an entire day.
Tell me what this limb does and doesn't let you do
so I can modify the design we have in mind. Okay?”
I suck in my cheeks to keep from sighing with impatience.
The next time we retrace our route, Jim says,
“Back home, my patients can hold a guard rail.
Here, though, I'm all the guard you've got.”
I look at my hand tucked snugly in the crook of his elbow.
Sense the blond hair of his arm brushing against my skin.
Indian men don't invite ladies to hold on to their arms.
Feeling like the heroine of a Jane Austen novel
being courted by a British gentleman,
I giggle.
But my giddiness at being so near him
gives way to a spurt of anxiety when Jim says,
“Can you walk alone?
I need to see how your limb fits.”
He lets go of my arm. “Trust my leg, kiddo.
Your leg, I mean.”
“Our leg?” I suggest, surprising myself with my boldness.
Jim's eyes twinkle like the sea on a summer's day.
“As you wish, ma'am. Our leg.”
His grin sends warmth rushing up my cheeks.
I move slow and unsteady around the room,
feeling the intensity
of his gaze
as it travels over every bit of exposed flesh.
Observes
my every movement.
Jim looks
preoccupied. Assessing.
I want him to look
admiringly. Appreciatively.
I want him to look at me
the way young men looked at me
that evening after my dance competition.
GRACE
“I'm going to study,” I announce every evening.
Ma thinks I mean for my upcoming finals.
In my bedroom I study my reflection.
Attention focused on my feet.
After a million miles
a trillion minutes
walked with no thought at all,
I slow the motion down in my mind:
flex thigh, bend knee, lift ankle, straighten knee,
heel down, then the ball of my foot.
Bring my right foot down light enough
so it doesn't thud on the floor.
Lift high so it doesn't scrape or drag.
Match my left foot's pace precisely.
I must learn to walk gracefully first,
if I'm ever going to dance again.
DIAMONDS
My fake leg well hidden under loose salwar trousers,
I walk to Chandra's housing development, three roads over.
Her ma wipes her moist eyes with the edge of her sari
when she sees me, saying,
“Can't believe you walked here. On your very own.”
Chandra rushes over, followed by her pa and two older sisters.
The five of us chatter for a while,
just as we used to.
Her grandmother ambles over,
grumbles to me about her ailments.
I'm relieved
none of them treats me differently.
Chandra whisks me away for a private chat.
We sit on the back steps,
eating the spicy mixture of chickpeas, chili, and coconut
her mother cooked for us.
“Jim's so different from anyone we know,” I tell Chandra.
“There's not one continent on earth he hasn't traveled to,
as far as I can tell,
and he knows all about making limbs and about physiotherapy,
which is pretty exceptional, I think,
but he never shows off.”
Chandra raises her eyebrows. “You call your American doc
by name?”
“He's not exactly my doctor. It's like we're friends.
He even guesses my thoughts sometimes.”
“So he's cute?”
“Not cute.” Cartoon characters are cute. “He's . . . really manly.
Tall. Strong. He'd lift me out of the wheelchair easily,
no problem.
He's got brilliant blue-diamond eyesâ”
“Not cute, only drop-dead gorgeous?” Chandra squeals.
“Youlikehim, youlikehim, youlikehim.”
“Are you crazy?” I say. “He's probably thirty years old.
It's not like that.
Jim's really nice. That's all.”
“Don't get mad.” Chandra giggles. “I'm only teasing.”
She pops a chickpea into her mouth. “Just be careful, okay?
My eldest sister's been dating a boy on the sly.
A rich boy and not even our same caste.
She said she was flirting for the fun of it,
to pass time until my parents arranged a husband for her.
Now she's gone and fallen in love with him.
You and your docâit's a lot different, I knowâbut
he's attractive
and you're together a lot.
Don't lose your head over the wrong guy
like my sis.”