Balance of Fragile Things Read online

  When he bent toward the first group of blue bottles, something crunched in his back pocket. He pulled out the nuisance, an envelope. One quarter of its face was covered in stamps, and the rest displayed the gaudy handwriting of someone who had recently learned English.

  It was another letter from his father.

  Please respond was written in bold on the back of the envelope near the adhesive lip. Paul’s heart sank. Even from across the world, his father could make him feel inadequate. Paul’s father had been nicknamed “Papaji” decades earlier by a British-educated head of their Punjab village as a term of endearment. Even when relatives attempted to use the common “Dadda” or “Daddaji,” the man scoffed and protested, demanding to be called Papaji by all. Paul had yet to open any of the letters, and they were beginning to pile up. He wondered what Mr. Sardar Harbans Singh wanted so desperately that he’d felt the need to mail one letter per week for the past two months. Paul wanted to leave India and his father behind him—that’s why he’d come to America years earlier. The letter rustled when he shoved it back into his pocket. The sound was familiar, like wind rushing through wheat.

  At least there aren’t any snakes here in this village, he thought. This barely comforted him. He looked at the sinkhole and imagined a monstrous basilisk jutting through the surface and swallowing the construction workers. The bell on the convenience store door jingled him back to the present, and he returned to his position behind the counter.

  “Marlboro Mediums.” A gruff teenager stared at Paul’s crimson turban as if it were a second head and handed him a wad of crumpled dollars.

  Paul sized up his customer with a pointedly critical squint and ran his fingers through his beard in contemplation. He saw his torn jeans and stringy blond hair; he saw a blue jacket with a license-plate-shaped patch on the lapel that read Joe. He saw his buddies waiting for him in an old Mazda outside. Joe smelled as if his backpack were filled with garbage. Who would let their child leave the house looking like this? No shower? No clean clothes? Paul couldn’t understand, even after twenty years of living in this little town, what went on, if anything, in parents’ heads to just give up on their offspring. He told Maija the other day, These kids smoke like it is some sort of privilege. And their parents think they can blame our little stores for selling to minors? Their precious children dress like no-good beggars on the street. And here they have been given so much. Paul lifted a pack of cigarettes from the display and slid them across the counter without taking an eye off the grungy kid.

  “I’m eighteen, man.”

  “And I’m not your father, samajhna?” Paul turned his back to his customer and mumbled, “And don’t read the warning label.”

  “What did you say?”

  “Have a nice day.”

  As he got the kid his change, Paul reread the form that the corporate Kwicki Fill office sent last month, which stated the four Ks of customer service: kindness, konsideration, kalm, and kare. Paul didn’t find the misuse of the letter K particularly funny, but since his station was just a drop in the Kwicki Fill bucket he had to post the list where he could see it at all times. His religion’s use of the letter K was meaningful, not vulgar (kaccha, kesh, kangha, kirpan, and kara). By the time he finished reading the list, Joe had already disappeared into the Mazda. The car coughed black smoke out of its tailpipe as it cut off an old lady turning into the station.

  The green Salem Lights clock read two-thirty. Paul looked outside and saw his fifteen-year-old son walking past on his way home from school. He decided Vic looked more like a twelve-year-old, but his growth spurt would surely be on its way. This was going to be his big year. He looked at Vic, who had his backpack on and his tidy jacket zipped up all the way. Now, that’s how children should look. They should be proud to be seen, not filthy and smelly, he thought. But today there was something different: His patka was dirty, and his nose was no longer symmetrical.

  Vic waved and kept walking.

  “Oi, puttar, where are you going? Come here!”

  Vic stopped before crossing the road construction and turned toward his father.

  “What happened? Come inside!”

  “I tripped and fell at lunch.” He moved slowly toward his father.

  Unlikely, Paul thought. “Who did this?”

  Vic’s lips tightened until they turned white.

  Paul put the back in a minute sign on the door, then inspected his son’s face, bruised and broken as it was, just like his own had been after a fight. “Assholes are a dime a handful.”

  Paul took him quickly into the unisex bathroom inside the station and locked the door. After washing his hands, Paul straightened his son’s back and brought him closer to eye level. He placed his large hand flush against Vic’s nose.

  “Brace yourself. This will hurt, but only for a second, puttar.”

  Vic leaned against the tiled wall.

  “Don’t worry; I’ve done this to myself twice.” Paul rested his large hand across Vic’s nose and, in one quick movement, he thrust it back to center of his face.

  Vic screamed. Tears poured. Paul handed his son a towel for the tears and blood. Paul removed the stained patka and took out a white handkerchief from the back pocket of his brown slacks.

  “Puttar, you need to cover your hair and keep it clean. Otherwise you’re going to have to wash it like the Americans, okay? There are ten gurus, Vic; the first one brought us peace and education, but Gobind, the tenth, brought the Khalsa.”

  He spoke of the sacrifices the gurus had made to better their lives, and how this unshorn hair, this kesh, was a symbol of his connection to their martyrdom and willingness to protect those who were unable to protect themselves. He tucked the handkerchief around the braid that was wound into a bun at the very top of Vic’s head, took a pin from his own turban, and bisected the small yet adequate pile of hair and fabric.

  “Puttar, you will stand up to the págals that have been tormenting you. Yes, you will fight back.” Paul’s hands dug into Vic’s shoulders a little too deeply.

  “Papa, just—”

  Paul took out his knife and held it to his son. “Sometimes the only way to protect yourself is to make others fear you first.”

  Vic put his hands in his pockets. The ancient-looking blade glimmered dangerously.

  “Take it.”

  “No.” Vic’s voice cracked.

  “Look”—Paul put the knife on the counter and sucked in his stomach—“I want you to remember that running only makes them chase you faster. They are like hyenas. Stand your ground. Aim for their weaknesses: their knees, their necks, and their feet. It’s not the biggest one that you should attack first but the smallest. Once they see you defeat one of their own, they will back off.”

  “Papa?” Vic motioned to the door.

  “Yes, puttar?”

  “Um, nothing.” Vic cleaned his glasses with the edge of his shirt.

  “Okay then. Now go home; your mother is waiting. Where’s your sister? You’re supposed to walk with her.”

  “She has play practice.” They reentered the store.

  “Oh, achchhá. She’s your responsibility, you know.”

  “I have to study, Papa. I have an exam tomorrow.”

  Paul held Vic’s face in his hands. He looked forward to the day when his son would become a man. It was difficult for Paul. How could his son—the son of an ex-boxer, an ex-farmer, and an ex-warrior—allow someone to break his nose? This was not possible. He thought of his Papaji, with the shotgun slung over his shoulder and his knife at the ready to cut whatever needed cutting. Vic’s snake was this bully, and Paul was going to help him stand up to him regardless of the consequence. They would both have their day, and the other kids would fear his name: Varunesh Dzintar Singh. Paul’s eyes glowed, his large nose tingled, and his calloused hands pressed the cheeks of his son just a little too firmly.

  “I will make you stronger, puttar. Tonight I will show you how to fight.” Paul beamed; Vic looked terrified. “Okay t
hen, chaliá. Go home and see your mother. I will be home later.”

  He watched Vic maneuver across the construction and turn onto their street, a cul-de-sac. He noticed that Vic bounced on his toes just a little bit. That would not do. Not for his son. Paul would teach him how to walk, talk, punch, and box. He would show him how to have honor. Paul opened the cabinet under the cash register and caressed his cricket bat; he’d never used it, not once since they’d moved here. He had wanted to whack many of his customers on the noggin several times over the past week, but it wouldn’t have been right. But defending oneself, yes, that would be acceptable. The bell on the door jingled, and an old lady entered.

  “Hi, Paul. How’s life treating ya?”

  “Living the dream, Mrs. Carmichael, as always.” He gave her his million-dollar smile.

  Mrs. Carmichael, an octogenarian, walked around the convenience store, checking the expiration dates on each bottle of milk before pouring a small cup of coffee and topping it off with the freshest milk, which she then returned to the refrigerated section.

  “That racket outside is going to raise the dead!”

  “You’re telling me.” Paul stretched his arm out and looked at the foreman through the inch of space between his pointer finger and thumb. Then he squished the man in the distance.

  “One day they’re going to dig too deep and find what they’re looking for.”

  “Eh, what do you mean?”

  “Oh, you know.” She slurped her hot coffee. “Every town keeps their secrets in the ground. You’ve heard the rumors about PMI, right?”

  Paul’s blank look said it all.

  “Never mind. Hey, am I going to win that trip to Mexico this week?”

  “Guaranteed—I see it in your future.”

  “Did your wife tell you that? Then it’d mean something. Otherwise, I’d think you just want a cut of my winnings!”

  Mrs. Carmichael placed the correct change on the counter, took a sip of her coffee, and tucked the scratchers in her purse. “Keep the change.”

  “Have a nice day.”

  “All righty. See you next week, Mr. Singh.”

  Paul Singh knew two things: One, he would train his son to defend himself; and, two, he would find out if his psychic wife could see what was written on lottery tickets.

  Maija

  Empress of Multitasking, Goddess of Kitchen and Garden, Countess of Costco—in her mind, Maija Mazur Singh listed all the appropriate titles that she could stitch on her zip-up cardigan’s lapel. On this, her day off, she’d cooked, cleaned, and learned a few things—and it was only the afternoon, which meant she still had time to appraise her children’s secret lives before they returned from school.

  Maija had managed to concoct a beautiful sauerbraten and had even remembered to add a few extra peppercorns to quench Paul’s incessant need for spice. To Maija, it seemed he had long burned all the taste buds from his tongue, that the little buds had all waved their white flags after decades of interpreting the scorch of raw chili peppers. Paul claimed capsicum was good for his gums, and Maija wondered what good gums were when the tongue was collateral damage.

  She’d also baked an Alexander cake and glazed it to perfection. She’d vacuumed the house and even spent an hour watching Montel Williams’s self-help parenting program. Maija felt as if she could do it all, at least when she was the only one at home. The other inhabitants, her family, made getting things done difficult. No matter what she did or how hard she tried, she could not control everything; she was far from all-knowing, and she had not been blessed with strong parental communication skills. She had the sight, that was certain, but she rarely saw futures for her family, which was even more frustrating and led to her snooping. Instead of inquiring about Isabella’s female changes and Vic’s experiences at school, Maija held it in. Birds and bees remained bottled up, and they stung and ate each other. Since she couldn’t discuss these difficult topics, she was forced to infiltrate their personal things and read them like runes.

  Maija inspected the shoebox that she’d found tucked deep beneath Isabella’s bed. It was, of course, more than a box—it was a portal into Isabella’s brain, and Maija, mother of no words, parented as she mushroomed: once in a while and when no one was looking. She told herself it was out of love, but deep down she knew that entering dresser drawers and lifting dust ruffles with the intention of unearthing clusters of fleshy chanterelle fragrant with teen angst was necessary. Maija’s mother, whom she called Ma while almost everyone else referred to her as Oma, wouldn’t have even paused before looking, Maija reassured herself. If she’d bothered at all.

  Oma’s interest had always been, in Maija’s eyes, in the lives of others. After Papa had passed away, it was as though Oma’s identity as a mother had vanished along with her identity as a wife, leaving Maija alone. When they had first immigrated to Cleveland through the sponsorship of a Latvian Baptist church, Maija would go through Oma’s things in hopes of feeling closer to her. Sneaking Oma’s cameo around her neck had comforted her as she’d fought through the Ohio school system’s remedial classes with disabled students, students branded as “slow” and other immigrants who struggled with the English language.

  Oma would open this box and say that everything in her house was hers anyway, Maija thought as she sat at the foot of Isabella’s bed. But still she hesitated.

  She could still hear Montel Williams telling mothers that snooping was not right. His eyes had glimmered, his teeth had glistened, and his hairless head had glowed. Though she knew Montel meant to defend teen privacy to an audience of mothers, his piece only motivated her to scour Vic’s and Isabella’s bedrooms for secrets.

  She imagined all the possible terrors stashed within Isabella’s box: marijuana (the devil’s weed), weapons (perhaps a gun), or, worse, the Pill. Like Pandora, whose all-gifted hands released the evils of the world and left poor Elpis, hope, in the jar, Maija opened the lid. She puzzled at the contents. If they were emblematic of her daughter’s inner self, they weren’t going to expose their secrets easily. She perused the items that belonged in the garbage: bottle caps, bits of string, paper clips linked together in a circle, a leaf, a ball of used rubber bands, Band-Aids, and gauze pads. Maija caressed the ordinary office supplies, searching for signs of rebellion. What did these items say about Isabella? It could mean she had a strange desire to collect dirty things; there was a term for that affliction—yes, hoarding. Or perhaps these were simply here to throw someone like Maija off a trail; she was a clever girl.

  Maija dug further, and under the odd collection of stickers she found the treasure of all parenting treasures: a diary. She opened the first page and shut it immediately. Then she slowly opened it again and flipped quickly through the whole book. She saw some sort of code: BFF, 2GTBT, 459, 4EAE, BTWIAILWU. None of these codes made sense to Maija. Was Isabella in trouble? The only codes that Maija knew were pharmacological: OTC (over the counter), QOD (every other day), PO (for the mouth), and BID (twice a day). She closed the book and tried to forget everything that had taken place over the previous few minutes. She wished she’d never opened it in the first place.

  The phone rang, and Maija jumped. In a rush, she rearranged the box the way she had found it and put it back under Isabella’s bed in the same place. Guilt and regret began to build in her heart. She wished she could forget what just happened and pretend that there wasn’t a code to decipher. It was her deepest flaw, that she could see the futures of others but not of her loved ones. What good was being a psychic at all? She shuffled her slipper-clad feet to the piss-yellow kitchen to the phone. The walls looked dreadful during the afternoon, when the fluorescent lights had to be turned on above the sink. “Summer Apricot, my dūre.” Maija rolled her Rs. “Curse you, Lowe’s employee who sold me this paint.”

  The phone rang a third time, and Maija picked it up.

  “Hallo? Yes, Paul, my dear, what did you say?” Her heart pounded in her chest. “No, I’ve never played the lottery. Well—” Maija s
quinted, hoping the adjustment would increase the acuteness of her large ears, which hid beneath piles of thick brown curls.

  “You want me to look at some lottery tickets? Why, darling? You know it doesn’t work that way.” She scrunched her nose into a button-sized embellishment between her two high cheekbones. Maija’s blue eyes were murky like the sea, and her hair, particularly on humid fall days like this one, would mat together like seaweed tossed in a ruthless current. But an ocean goddess she was not. She was no mermaid or undine. She was stout, like her favorite beer, which she drank warm.

  “Fine, yes, sweetie, I will look at them. Oh, bring home a gallon of milk, will you, dear?”

  She cradled the phone between her ear and shoulder as she stacked the mail in a neat pile next to the computer in the kitchen nook. There was a notice from Cobalt High inviting parents to join the PTA, a few coupons from Dante’s Hops and Pies, and another letter from India. “What? My putns! Poor Vicki. Okay, I will wait for him.” News that her son was coming home with an injury was upsetting. At that moment her heart raced, and the letter from India began emanating light. It flickered opal like a small galaxy. It was irresistible to Maija.

  “Uz redzēšanos,” she said, then hung up.

  This letter was different than the others from Paul’s father. She lifted it to the fluorescent light and looked at the thin piece of parchment folded into a square inside. Maija had never met Paul’s family because, he’d told her, they were poor and couldn’t afford the plane tickets from India. Paul and Maija had met in a pharmacy in Cobalt years and years ago. He’d crushed his hand while fixing his car, and he’d been getting antibiotics to ward off infection. She’d fallen in love with him after their first picnic date in the park, when he told her she was the prettiest girl he’d ever seen and then kissed her. He told her she tasted like strawberries. They were married in the Cobalt courthouse by a justice, and only a couple friends were in attendance along with Oma. Her day was far from the wedding she’d imagined, but they were in love. Yet every time Maija asked him about his family, Paul turned to ice. Once, he’d mentioned something vague about his father’s anger, and she took it to mean that his abusive nature had caused Paul to immigrate to America. Not knowing the details allowed Maija’s imagination to run without reins.