Free The Girl in the Garden by Kamala Nair Page B

discs skimmed its surface. A snow white bird that looked like a peacock wove in and out through a grove of pomegranate trees, which were set aflame by clusters of deep orange blossoms. I had seen blue peacocks before, but never a white one.
    An Ashoka tree stood at one edge of the garden, as if on guard, near the door. A brief wind sent a cluster of red petals drifting down from its branches and settling on the ground at my feet. A flock of pale blue butterflies emerged from a bed of golden trumpet flowers and sailed up into the sky. In the center of this scene was a peachstucco cottage with green shutters and a thatched roof, quaint and idyllic as a dollhouse. A heavenly perfume drifted over the wall, intoxicating me—I wanted nothing more than to enter.
    Then I was no longer looking into the garden, but into an eye—brown and inquisitive, like mine, pressing against the other side of the keyhole. I fell backward, then looked again, wondering if in my excited state I was imagining things. The eye had vanished, and the garden sat still and beautiful again.
    “Hello? Anybody there?”
    I must have imagined it, I told myself, when nobody answered.
    But just as I was about to calm down, without any warning, the eye came back, then receded, revealing a face, a terrible face, illuminated by the bleeding sunset light. I did not register the shape of the face, or what hair, if any, framed it. All I saw was a large splotchy pink mark, like a bruise, spreading across the surface of pale skin, and a jagged mouth that had a triangular gash cutting into the upper lip. The open mouth merged with the nose, revealing a set of yellowish teeth.
    I screamed, a harsh sound that wrenched my gut, and amplified the screams that sounded from the other side of the door. I leaped to my feet and sprinted back through the trees, numb to the sting of branches and thorns needling my arms and legs, scathing, as if to say
I told you so, I told you so
. I could hear the sound of blood beating, like wings flapping, in my ears, and my heart thundered. My stomach was heavy, full of stones, dragging me down. I ran and ran until I reached the wall at Ashoka, and flung myself over it, back into the safety of the yard.
    Everything was still and dark, except for Ashoka, whichwas lit up and inviting, oblivious to the horrors that lurked so near. Something warm and wet was trickling down my leg and pooling in my sandals. Stopping to catch my breath, I stuck my hand under my dress and saw that it was covered in blood.
    “Amma! Amma!” I ran toward the front of the house.
    Amma was standing by herself on the verandah, her features contorted in anger. “Oh my God, Rakhee—where have you been? I checked your room and you were gone. No one knew where you were. I was worried sick—”
    “Amma, I’m dying, I’m dying!”
    The anger melted from her face, and the last thing I remember before I fell into the darkness was Amma’s arms cradling me.

Chapter 7
     
    R ain was falling and red shadows smoked across the face of the moon. Lying on Amma’s bed, I felt scrubbed and clean, dressed in an unfamiliar floral gown that covered my feet. Amma was sitting next to me, thumbing through a slim, tattered book—I looked at the title; it was called
The Poems of Mirabai
. I rubbed my eyes with my fists. Waves of memory ebbed in and out, blurred photographs at the edges of my mind.
    Amma washing me as if I were a wounded cub. I heard her crying, “My baby, my baby.”
    My body wrenched with nausea, and the sound of vomit splashing into a metal pan.
    Sadhana Aunty spooning a bittersweet syrup down my throat.
    The fever clinging to my skin.
    The stone wall, birdsong, the enchanted garden, running faster than I had ever run before, my hand covered in blood.
    The face. That awful face.
    I shuddered. Amma put down her book and laid a cool hand across my forehead.
You’re safe now. It was all a dream
, I said to myself.
Just a dream.
I repeated it over and overagain, and as my