Flame Tree Road by Shona Patel Read Free Book Online Page B

and Biren was asked to bring Samir home with him. It soon dawned on Biren he would not be taking the boat back to the village with his friends. Instead—to his horror—he was expected to sit in the tasseled palanquin next to Sammy and be carried to his own house. The very thought of it made him wish he had never been born.
    He loitered under the tamarind trees in the schoolyard and kicked dirt while furious thoughts raced through his mind.
    Finally he approached the palanquin bearers. “My father has strictly forbidden me to ride the palanquin,” he told them in an authoritative voice. “I can show you the way to my house but you will have to follow behind me.”
    “But how will you walk? It is too far,” said one of the men. “It is much shorter by boat, we know, but Samir-baba gets nauseous in a boat, which is why we have to carry him everywhere.”
    Biren was tempted to say he got nauseous in a palanquin, but that would not work. “What do you think I am? A cripple?” he said loudly, hoping to shame Samir into sending the palanquin home. But Samir was already seated inside sipping sweet bael sherbet and eating stuffed dates.
    “Just follow behind me,” said Biren abruptly. He marched stoutly ahead and the palanquin bearers, habituated as they were to their own brisk pace, hobbled awkwardly behind him like a broken bullock cart.
    After a while Samir got bored and got down from the palanquin and skipped up to Biren.
    “Don’t walk with me,” Biren snapped, looking nervously around him. His plan was to pretend the palanquin had nothing to do with him, but to have Samir Deb in his pleated shorts and knee-length socks walk alongside was a dead giveaway.
    “Why?” said Samir in a high-pitched whine. “Why don’t you want to walk with me? Why don’t you want to be my friend?”
    Biren stopped in his tracks, almost causing the palanquin bearers to bump into him. “Because I don’t,” he said fiercely. “I don’t want to walk with you. I want you to stay two boat lengths behind me, do you understand?”
    One of the palanquin bearers gave a snort, which made Samir fly into a rage. He looked like a miniversion of his mother. “Shut up, stupid donkey!” he yelled, kicking a small puff of dust with his shiny black shoe. “And you donkeys stay two boat lengths behind me, do you understand?”
    And so the strange procession continued, Biren marching briskly ahead, followed by Sammy, two boat lengths behind, rounded up by the miserable palanquin bearers, for whom the lethargic pace was sheer torture.
    * * *
    When they reached the house, Sammy was hobbling and in tears. He removed his shoes to reveal two small, round blisters sprouted like batashas on his heels.
    Shibani shush-shushed sympathetically, sat him on her lap, wiped his tears with the end of her sari and made him soak his feet in cool rose water. Just to see Samir with his fat tears wobbling on his chin and being fussed over by Shibani filled Biren with intense disgust. Even three-year-old Nitin had grown past such infantile behavior.
    Shibani went into the kitchen to prepare fresh limewater.
    “Your mother is so beautiful,” Samir said in a mellifluous voice. He twirled his pink toes in the basin. “I want to marry someone just like her.”
    Biren went insane. “Well, you can’t !” he said fiercely. “She is already married to my father and she will be married to my father for the rest of her life !”
    Nitin, who was splashing his hands in the foot basin, looked up with big, scared eyes. He had never seen his brother so angry.
    Sammy tilted back his head to admire his toes. “I had an aunt once,” he said conversationally. He splashed a little water at Nitin, who darted away with a shriek, then tiptoed back to be splashed some more. “She used to be so beautiful. She had long black hair like your mother. Then my uncle died and she became very ugly. Nobody goes near her or talks to her anymore. Now she lives with the goats in the back of