There’s a handwritten sign on the door of the private room:
I ignore the sign, and I open the door.
The guru isn’t there.
Instead I find Sally meditating in the middle of the room with her eyes closed. She’s wearing a giant skirt, fabric spilling onto the floor around her.
“Ohhh—”
Sally moans loudly, and her head swings from side to side.
I start to back out the door, when something under her skirt moves. It takes a moment to understand what I’m seeing. There are two colors, the white of the skirt around Sally’s waist, and the blue of the fabric peeking out beneath it—
The blue fabric moves, and Sally moans again.
“I’m looking for the guru,” I say.
“What?!” she says, and her eyes pop open.
She jumps up, and I see a flash of her bare legs, then two other legs as the yards of blue fabric pull away from her. A head pops out as if being born from between her legs.
The guru’s head.
He blinks as his eyes adjust to the light in the room.
Then he sees me.
“Sanskrit,” the guru says.
I turn and run.
Ohhhh—
I can still hear Sally moan in my mind.
I race past the stinky yoga women’s shoes and out the front door of the Center. I’m ready to run home, but my stomach clenches and I think I’m going to throw up, so I turn into the alley between the Center and Le Pain Quotidien restaurant.
I double over with my hands on my knees, trying to breathe, trying not to throw up. I smell baking bread from the restaurant, and it makes me gag.
“Sanskrit, why did you run?”
I turn to find the guru standing at the head of the alley. He looks at me innocently, as if he’s confused by my reaction.
“That was disgusting,” I say.
“Not disgusting,” he says. “But unfortunate. It was not meant for your eyes.”
“Don’t talk to me like I’m a child.”
“You’re not a child. I know this,” he says.
“The least you could do is lie, tell me it wasn’t what I thought it was.”
“I don’t lie,” the guru says. “But it might not have been what you thought it was.”
“I thought you were in love with my mother. Why would you do that with someone else?”
“I do love your mother.”
“So she knows about this?”
“She knows I love people.”
“Mother Teresa loved people, too. She didn’t have sex with them.”
“You’re right.”
“So Mom doesn’t know,” I say. “Yet.”
The guru holds up his hands, trying to calm me. But I won’t have it.
“You said we could go to India! We would start a new life together.”
“We can,” the guru says. “The invitation stands. Is that why you’ve come? To tell me what you decided?”
He smiles. He steps towards me.
“What have you decided, Sanskrit?”
“I’ve decided you can go to hell,” I say.
“How do you know you can trust the guru?”
That’s what I ask Mom when I get home. I want to tell her what I’ve seen, just blurt it out the minute I get into the kitchen, where she’s arranging arugula leaves on a plate, but I think that would be a mistake. Mom might accuse me of lying to her, making things up to ruin her life.
“How can I trust him?” Mom says.
She holds out an arugula leaf for me to take a bite.
“I’m not hungry,” I say.
“Please try it,” Mom says.
I open my mouth and let her put it in.
“How does it taste?” she says.
“It’s spicy.”
“How did you know it was okay to eat?” Mom says.
“That’s a weird question.”
“How do you know it wasn’t poisoned, for instance?”
“You’re freaking me out, Mom.”
“How do you know?”
“Because you gave it to me. You’re my mother.”
“Mothers go crazy. You see it on the news sometimes, how they drive into a lake with their kids in the car.”
“Remind me never to drive with you again.”
“I’m just saying you ate it because you trust me. You know me, and you trust me. It’s as simple as that, right?”
“Maybe.”
Mom smiles, puts more arugula on the plate. “That’s how I feel about the guru.”
“What if he did something to make you feel differently?”
“Like what?”
“Like something.”
Mom looks concerned.
“What are you telling me?” she says.
I try to find the words, but I can’t.
“Nothing,” I say.
Mom puts down the tray and comes over.
“You’re worried about me,” she says. “I think that’s sweet.”
She hugs me tight.
“What are you doing?” I say.
“I’m hugging my son,” she says, like it’s something she does all the time.
It doesn’t stop at the hug. She keeps her arms around me, pulling me close to her. She plants a kiss in my hair.
“Cut it out,” I say, and I twist away from her.
“You’re too old for a hug?”
“Not too old,” I say. “It’s just weird.” Mom rolls her eyes at me, then goes back to her salad.
I watch her moving lettuce around on the tray, cutting cubes of baked tofu to lay around the perimeter. She hums softly to herself as she does it.
Softly.
Ever since Mom met the guru, her energy has changed.
She’s softer now, more open.
She sings to herself. She dances around the house. She’s nice to me.
That’s when it hits me: Mom’s happy.
If I tell her what I saw at the yoga studio, she’s going to hate me. That’s if she even believes me.
I consider not saying anything. I could leave Mom alone, let this all happen like it’s going to happen. If God is really in charge like Herschel says, then I can let him take care of it, can’t I?
But what if he’s not in charge and I let my mother go to India with a guy who is cheating on her?
I can’t tell her, but maybe I can show her.
A plan is coming together, a way I might be able to get my mother back. But I’m going to need Sweet Caroline’s help.
“We’ve got a surprise for you, Mom.”
I’m listening in on the phone as Sweet Caroline talks to Mom.
“What kind of a surprise?” Mom says.
“If I tell you, it’s not a surprise!”
Sweet Caroline doesn’t know what the real surprise is, but this is part of the plan we worked out last night. I took her aside for a sibling meeting and broke the news to her. I didn’t tell her about the guru sleeping around, only that he wasn’t giving up on Mom.
“You said you’d get him to leave Mom alone,” she said.
“He was going to, but he changed his mind,” I said. “But he promised.”
“People don’t always keep their promises,” I told her.
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Sweet Caroline said.
She said it like some tough kid in a movie about runaways, and I almost hugged her. Which of course would have been a mistake. “I’ve got another idea,” I said.
“Tell me what I should do,” Sweet Caroline said. And I laid out the plan. At least her part of it.
That’s what got me to this place. It’s early afternoon, and I’m on a street south of Olympic, close to Santa Monica College. It’s not a bad neighborhood, but it’s nothing like Brentwood. Small houses, some of them with bars over the windows. That’s how you know the quality of the neighborhood in Los Angeles. Check the first-floor windows.