Money · The Long Way Down to Morning · Pulse Beat
The money ran out on a Tuesday. She had expected it, and it still felt like stepping onto a stair that was not there. Rent, a bill from the clinic, the bank in Kochi writing to say the instalment on…
The money ran out on a Tuesday.
She had expected it, and it still felt like stepping onto a stair that was not there. Rent, a bill from the clinic, the bank in Kochi writing to say the instalment on the loan had not arrived. Her mother, it said, had been paying it. Her mother had been paying it for three months.
She called at once. The line crackled, and her mother's voice, thin and bright, said it was nothing, that she was sewing wedding blouses now, that they paid very well.
"Amma. How much have you paid?"
"Don't worry about that."
"How much."
A silence. "Anika. Listen. Your father signed that paper because he believed in you. I am not sorry. Not one rupee. Don't you dare be sorry for me."
She hung up, and sat for a long time on the edge of the bed, and then, because there was nothing else to do and she could not stand the sound of her own breathing, she took the violin down from the wardrobe, and opened the case, and did not touch it. It lay there in the cloth like a sleeping animal. She closed the lid.