‘Oh, hello,’ I say cheerfully. ‘What’s your name?’
Her dark, almond eyes widen with surprise, perhaps even alarm. No doubt they teach her what they used to tell the African American slaves— A room with you in it must seem empty.
‘My name is Somchai,’ she says, bowing her head deferentially. Her voice is barely a whisper.
‘Come and try this, Somchai. I’d like you to taste it and tell me what is in it,’ I invite expansively.
She looks confused and shoots a worried glance at Helena.
‘Oh! Don’t worry about Helena. She won’t mind,’ I dismiss airily. ‘I’m sure she wants to know what she is eating too.’
Somchai comes forward timidly. ‘I don’t need to taste. I can tell you what all the different dishes are.’
‘Oh, that will be nice. Do, please.’
‘What you have just eaten is a coconut hotcake. It is like a mini pancake with different sweet fillings.’ She points to the dish not with her forefinger but with her hand made into a small fist and the thumb jutting out to form a polite pointer. ‘And this one here is fried shrimp with glutinous rice. This one is taro root mixed with flour and turned into balls. That over there is called golden threads. They are strings of egg yolk quickly, quickly boiled in sugar syrup. Next to it is grass jelly. That one there is money bags: crispy, deep fried pastry purses filled with minced pork, dried shrimp and corn wrapped in cha phlu leaves.’
I nod as if I am fascinated by her descriptions while she works her way down the table and starts on the covered dishes warming on the sideboard. Rice field crab cakes served with green papaya salad, salt beef dumplings, fermented pork neck sausages with ginger, tiny banana leaf cups filled with ant and chicken eggs, grilled cuttlefish stuffed inside jackfruit, and yuck… Fried silk worm pupae.
‘Wow! What a feast,’ I cry, my voice unnaturally shrill and bright. ‘There is too much here for two. Would you like to join us, Somchai?’ Without giving her the chance to answer, I instruct genially. ‘Come on. Pull up a chair beside me.’
Helena gasps, which gladdens my heart no end, but poor Somchai suddenly looks terrified. A small animal getting crushed in the middle of two fighting elephants.
She shakes her head slightly. ‘Thank you very much. It is too kind of you, but I have already eaten.’
I take pity on her. ‘Oh, that’s a shame. Never mind then. Maybe next time.’
Somchai shoots another nervous glance at Helena.
And Helena takes that opportunity to take control of the situation. ‘That will be all. You can go now,’ she dismisses coldly.
I turn to look at her. Her mouth is a thin, disapproving line.
Somchai bows from the neck first in Helena’s direction and then in mine. Then she scuttles away as quickly as she can, never to be seen again. As soon as the door closes, Helena looks at me.
‘Are you quite finished?’ she seethes quietly.
‘As a matter of fact, yes,’ I say, and sweep upward regally.
‘Sit down, Lana,’ Helena grates. ‘You’ve made your point. There is no point in carrying on with this childishness.’
It occurs to me that she started it, but I obey. She is right. Some kind of truce needs to be declared.
‘How do you have your tea?’
Now that Somchai has been dismissed, I realize that we are going to have to serve ourselves if we are going to eat and drink. I stand, and picking up the teapot, take it over to her. Carefully, I fill her tea cup while she steadfastly keeps her eyes on the tea pouring into her cup. I can smell her hairspray.
‘Thank you,’ she says, and I cease pouring.
‘Sugar?’
She shakes her head.
‘Milk?’ I enquire innocently.
She looks up at me then, her eyes sharp, cunning as a crocodile. ‘Thank you.’
I glance at the empty jug stationed beside her beringed hand and watch her hand spasm into a fist. Returning to my side, I fill my cup silently with tea and put two sugars into it. Then I return the milk from the bowl back into the jug, and taking it over to her and positioning the jug above her cup of tea begin pouring. She raises her hand to indicate when she has had enough. I take the jug back to my end of the table and sitting down pour some milk into my cup. Silently I stir my milk.
‘I have an issue to take up with you.’
I raise an eyebrow.
‘I’m not happy about that creature you have taking care of my grandson.’
My mouth hangs open with astonishment. I snap it shut, as mad as a cut snake. Now she has gone where she definitely shouldn’t have. ‘That creature happens to be my best friend, and I will thank you not to refer to her as such again in my presence.’
‘That woman with a neck that looks like a public lavatory wall is your best friend?’
The arrogance and snobbery is breathtaking. I take a deep and cleansing breath before I dream of answering her. ‘Has she done anything that makes you believe she is unfit to care for your grandson?’
Her eyes flicker insolently. She has done that on purpose to provoke me. The white, perfectly manicured fingers of her right hand are resting delicately on the table top. The air conditioning hums like a lazy insect. It is actually too cold in this room. I’m starting to get chicken skin on my arms and legs. I wonder if she has turned it up on purpose. No wonder she is wearing a turtleneck sweater.
I come to the conclusion that one of the things I detest and deeply resent most is being in a freezing hotel room with my mother-in-law.
‘Well,’ I say quietly, ‘I’d rather be her than a bloodline snob, any day.’
She smiles cynically. ‘Are you sure? You seem to have done everything in your power to…catch a bloodline snob in your net.’
‘By some quirk of fate I find myself married to one, but I can assure you I wouldn’t want to be one of you.’
‘You don’t seem to understand. Our bloodline can be traced back to antiquity, beyond recorded history. We, the thirteen original families, have been in power since time immemorial. We are born to lead. It is the design of the current paradigm. Our bloodline is a privilege. You cannot join the family. You must be born into it. There is no other way in. So you can never be one of us.’
She stops and takes a delicate sip of tea and I stare at the sheer hubris of the woman.
‘And just so you are aware, breeding is case specific, depending on the role required. There are no ‘unapproved’ unions. Our families always intermarry between houses. In all my time on this earth I have never seen or heard of a family member breaking this code.’
‘Your son just did.’
She carries on as if I had not spoken. ‘In the rare instance of a child being born in…well…difficult circumstances, that child will be raised in accordance with the family rules, but away from either of its parents. To serve the family.’
My heart hammers in my chest. ‘Is that what you have planned for Sorab?’
Her words chill me to the bone. ‘Everybody serves the family. One way or another.’
‘Well, Sorab is not. He is my son and I will die before I give him up to the “family”.’
Swollen with vanity she sits at her fine table and smiles knowingly, but I know how to prick her. ‘Did you know what your husband was doing to your son?’
She doesn’t pretend not to understand. Her eyes flash with anger. ‘You must be very proud of yourself. Rising up from the lowest rung of society, snaring a man such as my son and now presuming to sit in judgment of me. How old are you?’
‘Twenty-one.’
‘And you think you know how everything works, do you?’
How clever she is. Suddenly I am under attack again. ‘I know fathers shouldn’t abuse their sons,’ I say.
She scowls and flushes with rage. ‘Abuse? How dare you? Who said anything about abuse?’