A Time to Dance(24)

            Wipe my face dry with the back of my hand.

            Unlock the door.


Paati casts a look at the crumpled heap of clothing.

            Picks up a skirt. Examines it.

            “I could let out the hems,” she offers.

            “Your skirts can be lengthened quite a bit.”

            “Thanks, Paati. Thanks so much. Thank you.”

            She pats my cheek. “You tell me

            when I should shorten them back.”


I nod

            sure she’ll never need

            to shorten my skirts again.





CRIPPLED





Pa begs to escort me to the bus stop

            although I’ve been riding the public bus to school

            alone every day since I was ten.

            He worries

            drivers won’t stop long enough

            for me to get safely in and out.

            He wonders if we should arrange a taxi.

            As if we can afford taxis on a daily basis.

            I reason with him. “We’re at the end of the bus route.

            The bus is always empty when I get in.”

            Ma says, “Veda, please, we don’t want you—”

            “You don’t want me doing things by myself anymore?”

            That gets me my way.


When I arrive at the bus stop,

            a little girl bounces over, her pigtails bobbing.

            She addresses me politely,

            calling me older sister—akka.

            “What happened to your leg, akka?”

            She looks too young

            to realize her question is rude.

            “Accident.” I thrust my crutches as far ahead as I can,

            distancing myself from her wide-eyed curiosity.

            A man with a pencil-thin black mustache

            leans out of a window.

            “What happened to your leg?”

            My throat hurts as if a thorn’s stuck in it and I ignore him.

            The bus’s steps look steeper than I remember.

            I hesitate on the ground,

            trying to picture Jim standing next to me,

            his cheerful voice teaching me how to climb on crutches.

            An old woman

            greets me from her usual place in front,

            “Girl? How did you lose your leg?

            An accident? Or a disease?”

            “She’s not telling,” the man says.

            “So rude she is being. In our day we always

            answered our elders.”

            The woman sighs. “Very true. Very true.”

            As fast as I can,

            I get away from them, to the back of the bus.