The Old Weight of Love

A wrinkled menu from Punjabi Place sat out on the counter, tucked between a cutting board and the stovetop. In poor handwriting, a short list of ingredients had been written next to palak paneer, denoting the ingredients for homemade tikka masala sauce. Some of the ink had rubbed off from handling, but all of the ingredients were still legible. 

     Navya squinted at the ingredients. They were all correct, and even though tikka masala wasn’t even close to her favorite “Indian” (tikka masala was more British-Indian but whatever) dish, the sentiment was there.

     Cumin seeds, cinnamon sticks, and cardamom pods popped in canola oil on the stovetop. Navya’s mother, when she made tikka masala from scratch, roasted everything in the oven: the tomatoes, onions, cinnamon, cardamom, cumin, and garlic. Navya supposed the pan method gave off a better aroma and didn’t borderline burn the spices, but a part of her was irritated by it. 

     She should be happy about this, and she was. Her girlfriend was trying to do something special for their year anniversary, despite the fact that they were juniors in college and both broke as spokes. Gia was a good cook. Honestly better than Navya’s mom but Navya couldn’t say that aloud. Her grandmother was an Italian immigrant with an incredible sixth sense in the kitchen and never needed to measure a single ingredient. Gia had a leg up in Asian cooking that a lot of white people didn’t, so Navya shouldn’t micromanage. But goddamn, did she want to.

     “Hey, okay, the hovering? Nuh-uh,” said Gia as she set the blender on the counter. “I can feel the hovering beginning. Not doing it. Nope. Shoo.” She flicked the kitchen towel at Navya.

     “I wasn’t hovering,” said Navya. “It smelled good, so…”

     Gia rustled the pan with the toasting spices, flicking them over, and a cloud of rich sweetness flooded the galley kitchen. The tightness in Navya’s stomach grew, and she stepped away. She opened the fridge and grabbed their last can of beer. “Can I have this?” she asked, holding it up.

     “I don’t care,” said Gia without looking over to see what it was. “Just don’t drink the wine—the bottle in the brown paper. The Stella I don’t give a shit about. It’s almost gone anyway.”

     “I’ll just have this,” Navya said. She popped the tab and wandered into the living room where Gia’s cat, Summer, was playing with a squeaky dog toy. He would pounce on it, it would let out a dying-animal rush of air, and Summer would run away, his fluffy orange tail puffed. She navigated around him and sat on the couch.

     Summer hopped up on the couch and sat next to Navya, not snuggling, just chilling. She gave him a scratch between his ears, and he closed his eyes and tilted his head back. She could hear the cheap rice cooker lid clacking as the water began to boil, and the old portable radio they’d found while antiquing crackled, modern music sounding old as time through the staticky interference. Navya sipped the beer and leaned her head back against the couch. The scent of toasting spices had filled the whole apartment. The sizzle and pop of tomatoes and onions hitting the pan flooded through the house, followed by the rich acidic smell. She could hear her mother shuffling around in the kitchen, mumbling in Telegu.

     “Navya!” her mother finally shouted.

     Navya fought back a groan and stood, the back of her thighs sticking to the plastic cover on the couch. Summer hopped down with her. She walked into the kitchen and started taking down the plates; she set them by her mother who stood over the stove, still stirring the masoor dal.

     As Navya set the table, Summer twined between her legs, meowing for his dinner. Navya’s mother’s face pinched. “That cat,” she muttered.

     Right. Navya should feed him, but where was the cat food? She peered into the pantry where they kept the litterbox, but that was gone too, replaced by big canvas sacks of rice and dried split lentils. “Gia, where’s the…” Navya said as she turned around.

     She squinted. The sun was bright, even through the ugly paisley curtains of the cafeteria. A cold cup of coffee in a foam cup sat in front of her, and a piece of toast with gleaming butter wilted next to it on a paper plate. Across from her, a woman leaned forward in a squeaking folding chair, her hands clasped in front of her. “Where’s the what, Amma?” she asked patiently though there was a waver to her voice, sad and thin.

     Panic clawed at Navya’s throat, desperate to spew across the table. Who was this woman? Where was Navya? She looked down, freezing when she saw gnarled hands in place of her own. This must be a nightmare, an incredibly lucid one, but the knowledge didn’t still her shaking hands.

     “Amma?” the woman said.

     “I’m fine,” Navya finally replied, fear squeezing her tone into an irritable hiss. Her voice sounded like the dusty scratched record player Gia had gotten from her grandparents’ will when they had passed from COVID-19. She sounded nothing like herself. Panic—simmering beneath her tongue. Scraping her teeth. She swallowed back nails.

     The woman leaned back, and Navya relaxed slightly. The panic eased if only a bit.

     Navya studied the woman’s face: her deep brown eyes, her thick black hair woven into a braid, her long lashes coated in mascara, and her soft chin. Something about her was deeply familiar. The old weight of love was baked into Navya’s bones. The woman had called her Amma, and it clicked. This was her daughter, but why didn’t she know her own daughter’s name?

     “Sorry, Amma,” she said. “Do you want to eat your toast?”

     Navya wasn’t hungry. How could she be? Her stomach pitched like a boat in a storm at the idea of eating. “No,” she murmured.

     “Okay. That’s okay, Amma.”

     “You’re my daughter.”

     A beat of silence. The woman blinked away blossoming tears and said, “The oldest one. You and, um, Mom adopted two. Teria’s my little sister, but she lives in Busan with her partner.”

      “Oh,” Navya said. She looked around, seeing old folks finishing their breakfast and scrolling through their phones with trembling hands. She was in a home. This had to be a nightmare; she had barely turned twenty-one. She was with Gia. Gia had an apartment alone near Ohio University’s campus because her rich mom paid for it, and Gia had a cat named Summer, and Gia had asked the waiter at their favorite Indian food place how they made their tikka masala sauce so she could make it for their two-year anniversary (because, even though Navya would never admit it, the paneer tikka masala was her favorite thing.) Did she end up marrying Gia? She couldn’t imagine herself doing it, not with how her mother was about white people. She had to marry a nice Indian girl, but Gia had been a nice change of pace from the closeted girls from high school. Out to her parents and unafraid to hang a pride flag in the outside window of her apartment. “Your mom… what was her name?”

     Navya’s daughter looked down at the table. Her shoulders curled into her chest, and every part of her appeared limp with grief. “Sora,” she said.

     The name stirred a breezy memory. It brushed by her, deep brown hair tickling her chin and a laugh plagued with snorting tracing down her neck. “And what’s your name?” Navya asked quietly.

     A soft choking hiccup jostled Navya’s daughter, and Navya’s own throat contracted. Navya’s daughter managed to keep her cheeks dry. “Maihima,” she said.

     “Maihima. That’s a unique name, but it suits you. It’s very beautiful,” Navya murmured comfortingly. The lilt came to her naturally as if she were used to singing lullabies and cooing when children scraped their knees learning to ride a bicycle. “I’m sorry that… I’m sorry I’m here and that it hurts you to talk to me.”

     Maihima held out her hand, gesturing forcefully. “Stop,” she said. “Stop. Amma, I—I’m fine, Amma.”

     So Navya stopped. She glanced at that side piece of toast again, noticing a big fat fly had landed on it. The fly rubbed its legs together and then took off. It disappeared into the fuzzy glow of afternoon sunlight.

     Finally, Maihima took a deep breath and spoke again, “I have to pick up Sara from soccer practice. I came to see you because I… I don’t know, I hoped that new medicine had helped.”

     “What new medicine?” Navya asked. What was she sick with? She felt fine, if not a little achy, but she was damn ancient. A little creaking was expected. 

     Maihima checked her watch and stood, gathering her purse. “The Alzheimer’s medicine, Amma. It’s a new one. The FDA finally approved it, but it’s been in the works for almost three decades. You found out about it right before Ammamma passed,” she said. “You told me to put you on it when it was approved. Don’t… don’t tell me you want me to take you off of it again, okay, like you did last time? I don’t… Look, I have to go. I’ll come visit you with Sara and Max next week, okay?”

     Frozen by the sudden influx of information, Navya accepted Maihima’s robotic kiss on the cheek. Then, Maihima was leaving, flapping away in a pair of brown flats. Navya forgot to watch her go out the door.

     “Ready to go back to your room, Mrs. Navya?” asked one of the orderlies watching from the hallway. 

     Navya’s eyes had already glazed over again, and she reached behind her, not realizing she was patting the back of her wheelchair and not the orderly’s hand. “Already put on the movie, Sora. Just waitin’ on you.”