Strangers at the Feast by Jennifer Vanderbes Read Free Book Online

Across the aisle a middle-aged woman intently turned the pages of a mass-market thriller beneath her reading lamp, occasionally glancing over at Priya, who carefully tore pictures of perfume bottles from the in-flight magazine while frowning at the flashing wing lights. Ginny had expected Priya to be terrified, flailing at the rumble of the beverage cart, crying during takeoff. Instead it was Ginny who was sickened by nerves, a thick tangle that had amassed when, weeks earlier, she’d stood before an Indian district court and won guardianship of a seven-year-old girl.
    In the taxi to Ginny’s apartment, Priya’s excited breaths left an oval of steam on the window as she gaped at Manhattan, the gleam of towering glass and metal, sharp and spiky, like a forest of cutlery.
    Ginny chattered nervously, explaining how it had all once been farmland, that just three hundred years ago it had looked like parts of India.
    Finally, with relief, Ginny lifted their bags and stepped into her apartment. Then, like a fugitive, she bolted the door. Priya pattered around the furniture, eyeing paper clips, bookends, letter openers, pens, scissors, thumbtacks. She climbed precariously onto Ginny’s elliptical trainer. Oh God, thought Ginny, the place was a death trap. There were no bars on the windows. And what on earth was tucked away in all her drawers? Expired antibiotics, bottles of melatonin, condoms?
    She grabbed Priya’s hand. “You must be ravenous.”
    The refrigerator light caught Priya like a paparazzi flashbulb. Slowly, she stuck her hand inside to feel the cool bare shelves. She touched a jar of chutney, and extracted the lone withered carrot Ginny had forgotten to throw out.
    “Let’s just order Chinese.”
    After dinner, Ginny bathed her, working the wet washcloth over her spine, the sharp ridges ancient and fishlike. Ginny soaped her shoulders and elbows, her stomach. She gently lathered shampoo in her hair and felt small scabs on her scalp. She slowly combed out all the knots and tangles, wrapped Priya in a thick purple towel.
    Ginny pulled out the hair dryer and blew it on her own hair. “See? To dry your hair so you don’t catch a cold.”
    But Priya winced at the hot air.
    “God, sorry. We’ll let it dry the old-fashioned way.”
    When Priya finally fell asleep, Ginny phoned her mother. She hadn’t told anyone yet about the adoption—or rather, the pending adoption—and as she watched Priya curl up in the stiff white I ♥ NY T-shirt she’d bought at JFK, her chest rising and falling peacefully, she seemed like the most exquisite decision Ginny had ever made.
    “Mom?” she whispered. “Did I wake you?”
    “Oh, Ginny, I’m glad you called. I was looking at my organizer and I wanted to make sure you sent a present to the twins. It was a shame you weren’t at the birthday party. Everybody asked, ‘Where’s Ginny?’ They really couldn’t believe you’d want to go to India of all places, and for so long, and then nobody heard from you! Marty Cooper said something about a coworker getting typhoid there. Anyway, a present is important. But not something from India. Not a souvenir, a genuine present.”
    Ginny walked the cordless over to Priya, to remind herself that she was real: she touched her toes, watching her leg bend reflexively.
    “Sure, I’ll get them a present.”
    “Why are you whispering? Ginny, I can hardly hear you. Oh, wait, and this must mean you are back from India! Oh, thank goodness. Is your apartment okay? No trouble with that house sitter, I hope. We just had an awful row with our lawn people, and your father says he’s going to mow the lawn himself. Arthritis be damned.”
    “Everything is fine. I’m tired, though.”
    “You will remember the present?”
    “Good night, Mom.”
    Ginny climbed into bed with Priya and draped her arm over her. Her bee-stung lips parted and Ginny could smell toothpaste on her warm breath. Traces of strawberry shampoo rose from her scalp. Her long