“Keep your voice down,” he whispered, putting a finger to his lips.
He crept up to the window, peered through it, turned and beckoned me after him.
When I got close enough, I could hear indistinct voices muttering to one another from inside the cabin. And then I looked through the window myself.
There were four people in there, huddled together in the semidarkness. They were dressed in crumpled, torn dark suits. Their scalps were either bald or shaven, the dead-pale skin pockmarked by craters and sores.
Three of them had their backs to me but I could just make out the face of the fourth, a woman, much older now than when last I’d seen her. She was facing me but staring vacantly into the distance with black-rimmed eyes.
Celia Waters.
I heard a snatch of dialogue: “The fear of masks removed…”
And then I turned away, and hurried back along the path, making straight for the taxi.
Kelsey was at my elbow.
“It’s the same old thing all the time with them,” he said. “Over and over again. Like the tide coming in and out.”
Skins Smooth as Plantain, Hearts Soft as Mango
Ian Muneshwar
The beast in the folds of Harry’s gut had no heart and it did not need one for his was strong enough to keep them both alive. It had neither heart nor mind nor eyes to see; it was only lips and teeth and fingers like needles that slipped inside his tongue and his bowels and even those places he did not know he had. Those unfilled hollows made its gums throb with an emptiness that might have been desire.
That night a man came to the house whose face Harry remembered from the dimness of a childhood memory. His thinning hair was combed forward over the shining dome of his skull, and the line of a moustache traced the contours of his upper lip. He sweated with an unnatural persistence from the pock-like pores on his cheeks.
“You remember your Uncle Amir,” Father said, a statement.
Harry’s eyes flickered over to Mother, who stood just behind Father, her arms crossed over her stomach. The way she sucked her tongue over her front teeth told Harry all he needed to know: this man was no brother of hers.
Uncle Amir smiled. His teeth were too large for his mouth; when the smile faded, his lips still didn’t cover the thick, yellowed ends.
“It’s good to see you again, Harry. It’s been a while.”
His English was excellent, almost unmarked. He reached a hand out, and Harry took it.
“Dinner must nearly be ready,” Mother said, pulling away. “Come, Amir. Majid’s been cooking all afternoon.”
The dining room was at the end of the hallway, behind a heavy hardwood door. The table was set for four. White candles stood in pewter holders; Mother’s best plates—white and blue chinoiserie shipped all the way from London—sat perfectly centered before each empty chair. The tablecloth had begun to yellow—because of the humidity of Guyana’s summers, Father would always say, jovially cursing the tropics.
Father sat at the head of the table, striking up a conversation with Uncle Amir, and Amir immediately took the chair to his right. Harry cursed inwardly; this meant he would need to sit next to Mother.
Father took the white linen from under the fork and knife, shook it open, and placed it neatly on his lap. Everyone else did the same.
The cook, Majid, burst in from the kitchen, shouldering the door open, dinner balanced on the trays in his upturned palms. Harry had been listening to Father talk about work—a tedious monologue about the rising price of equipment for the mill, which had Uncle Amir nodding in vigorous assent at the end of every sentence—but his attention drained away as soon as Majid laid the plates on the jaundiced tablecloth.
It was a richer meal than what they had most weekdays: two large tilapia, one leaned against the other, their meaty sides slit open and stuffed with lemon wedges and sorrel; plantain baked until its edges had crisped, caramel-brown; a steaming bowl of channa spiced with cumin and ginger and topped with rings of sautéed onion—
—and back he came with still more plates: a pie of beef and goat (Majid’s poor facsimile of Father’s favorite: steak and kidney pie); okra roughly chopped and fried in ghee—oh, he could smell the fat!—and mango, sliced thin, spread like an orchid in bloom.
Harry reached a fork out to the tilapia, and Mother swatted his hand away.
“We have to say grace,” she scolded. Then, raising her eyes to Uncle Amir: “Would you mind?”
Uncle Amir recited a short, elegant grace, thanking Father for giving him and the others at the mill such fulfilling work. Father nodded thoughtfully, and the meal began.
Harry went at once for the fish, taking a whole tilapia for himself. He cut it open just down the middle, pulling away that sweet, flaky meat with his fork before lifting out the spine and troublesome ribs—he’d come back for those later. He scarfed down the fish skin and all, gratefully swallowing and immediately returning for more. The beast rumbled pleasantly in his stomach, its jaws receiving the food Harry chewed for it, its snakelike throat slicked by Harry’s saliva. He returned to the tilapia’s charred head and used the point of his knife to carve out its fleshy cheeks. He especially loved the salt, the sweetness, and the softness of the cheeks—next, the eyes.
He only slowed when he noticed, after a few more throatfuls of fish, that Mother was pinching him under the table. She had dug her fingers into the skin just below where his shorts cut off, twisting the fat on his thigh.
“Harold,” she hissed, mouth drawn. “You’re eating like an animal again.”
Harry put his fork down, pulled his leg away, and wiped his mouth with the napkin. He ignored the heat of her stare, the nettle of her prying, meddling eyes, and focused on his plate.
“That’s settled then!” Father broke away from a conversation with Uncle Amir that Harry hadn’t been listening to. “Harry, my boy, you’re coming to see the mill tomorrow. How about that?”
Harry lifted a slice of the pie off of the serving dish.
“Sure.”
He ate a heaping forkful. It was wonderfuclass="underline" the goat was soft, savory, fatty; the salt and animal juices and hot water crust all came together on his tongue. The beast pushed up, stretching open the base of his esophagus, unfurling its own eager tongue.
Mother put her fork down as she watched, then pushed her full plate away.
“You’ll be lucky to have your father’s job one day,” Uncle Amir said, wiping his moustache with the crisp edge of his napkin. “You have a few years yet, but it’s never too early to get started at the family business.” He gave an ostentatious wink.
Mother excused herself, saying she was beginning to feel nauseous, and Majid came to clear the plates. As he did, heaping dirty silverware on top of plates balanced expertly up his arms, Uncle Amir came and sat next to Harry.
“I have something for you,” he said. “Something you might like too, Reginald.”
Father leaned in, his curiosity piqued. Harry swallowed a mouthful of plantain.
Uncle Amir removed a thin magazine from his briefcase and placed it on the table in front of Harry. It was an old copy of The Cricketer. A player posed heroically on the cover, his bat pitched at a perfect angle, his eyes on an unseen ball spinning into the distance. Beneath the picture it said: FRANK DE CAIRES DOES IT AGAIN!
“Good lord.” Father reached for the magazine. “This was your mother’s, Harry. She had a dozen of these, back when we were together. She loved this man. Worshipped him. What was his name?”—he spoke it slowly, savoring the syllables—“I never thought I’d see this again. Do you know, Amir, did Bibi ever get to see him play?”