Hannah Tennant-Moore - Wreck and Order

“It’s not a shirt.” The words drop out of my mouth like bricks. “It is a swim costume.”

“Proper attire, please,” he says.

“It is proper attire. It is a Sri Lankan swimming costume and we are in Sri Lanka.” I enunciate loudly, hoping the other Sri Lankans at the pool will hear this absurd interaction and come to Suriya’s defense. But they’re all wearing Western swim trunks and sleeveless bathing suits. I wait for Suriya at least to speak to the man in Sinhala, but she’s already removed her feet from the water. “We did not know this rule,” she tells the attendant in slow, perfect English, her arms crossed over her chest. “Thank you.”

“You can borrow one of my bathing suits,” I say, joining Suriya on the pool deck. “Let’s just go back to the room and change.”

“A bathing suit like you dress? No. Maybe in your country, I dress that. But in a place with Sri Lankans — no no no. You swim with Rajith.”

But as soon as Suriya pulls her pants back on and settles on a lounge chair in the shade, Rajith walks up to her and pulls her hand. She explains, gestures toward the pool, smiles, urges. He shakes his head. She leads him forcefully to the water’s edge, places his hand in mine. He looks up at me, his face waiting to know how to feel. “The water is good,” I say. He probably understands some English. “Come and swim.” With each step down, his grip on my hand tightens. On the last step, he stops and says, “Ne.” Of course. He must not know how to swim. So we stay on the bottom stair, hopping lightly, water up to his chest. I long, shamefully, to be alone here, swimming laps, floating on my back, ordering a piña colada, stretching out in the sun and letting the contents of my mind dissipate. Soon Rajith, too, longs for something different. He walks to Suriya. They decide to go back to the room for a little while.

“Should I come with you?” I offer. “We don’t need to stay at the pool.”

“No, El, you stay here,” Suriya says. “Enjoy your swim. We will be back soon.”

Relieved and guilty, I float on my back and then stretch out on a lounge chair. A middle-aged Sri Lankan woman wearing rhinestone sunglasses approaches me. “Are you a sponsor?” she asks.

“A sponsor? Of what?”

“The young woman and her child. My husband and I were noticing you and we would like to offer our congratulations. You are so brave. We also sponsor poor children, but only in our home.”

“They are my friends.”

“It is so kind of you to take them here.”

“Believe me, I’m no one’s sponsor.”

She fakes a laugh to cover her confusion and bids me a good day.

—

Suriya returns to the pool carrying both Rajith and the newspaper packet filled with curry that she made yesterday morning. Oh no. She cannot be planning to eat that here. “Rajith needs to take a meal,” she says.

“Me too.” I hurriedly pack my things. “Let’s check out that café over there.”

“The restaurant is so much money, El. I think it is waste. We have our food.” She sounds tired. I brought her here so that she could finally rest.

“Don’t worry about the money. Let me treat you. That’s what a vacation is for.” My voice is bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, the long-ago sound of my mother urging my father out of bed on his bad days. I take Suriya’s hand and steer us to the café next to the tennis courts.

Inside are several patio tables, two of which are occupied by single men drinking beer; a chubby-faced bartender chatting with a white couple sitting on barstools and drinking an icy blue beverage out of long, bright straws; Christmas lights flashing over three rows of liquors.

“No,” Suriya says, standing in the doorway.

“Hello, madam!” the bartender calls out. “Come in, please.”

“Do you serve food?”

“Of course, madam, whatever you like.”

“No,” Suriya repeats, holding the door open, refusing to take one step inside.

“Don’t you want to see the menu?”

“No.”

So I follow her back out. “What is wrong with that café?”

“For my whole life, if someone asks me ‘Have you been inside a bar?’ I must answer no.”

“That wasn’t really a bar. It was also a restaurant.”

“El. There are people inside that room sitting and drinking beer. They are committing no other activity.” She shakes her head, lips pursed. “I cannot eat in that place.”

Rajith is growing fussy, complaining, tugging at Suriya’s hand. I give up.

I follow Suriya back to the lounge chairs by the pool. She unwraps tepid two-day-old curries whose stench overpowers the wafts of chlorine and sunscreen. Rajith takes eager handfuls of Suriya’s cooking. She drops a large ball of food onto her tongue and then gestures to the pool attendant with her dirty hand. “Now he will tell me I cannot eat in this place,” she says. But he just watches us with the same disdain he reserved earlier for the domed, cloudless sky. I’m hungry and dig in, too. An enormous white man wearing a Speedo that sprouts long, curly, blond hairs dives into the pool. A small girl in a party dress complains to her mother in French that it’s too hot outside. A hummingbird dips in and out of the arbor marking the entrance to the bathhouse. The Sri Lankan girl in goggles performs a perfect crawl stroke from one end of the pool to the other. Out of soggy newspaper, we eat handfuls of sticky red rice and fatty curries. I can’t stop eating, even though my stomach contracts around each bite of the old food, grown viscous and clumpy on our travels.

—

Suriya takes a long shower again that afternoon, emerges with rouged cheeks, wearing the towel like a sarong, her knee-length black hair soaking the rug. I invite her to sit on the edge of the bed with me. Her face is open and easeful, until she sees the tightness in mine. “What is it, El?”

“I’ve decided that I need to travel on my own.” Terrible phrasing. “I mean that I need to spend some time alone now. It’s been so good to be with you here, but I just—” I pause and wait for her to help me. She stares. “I am not really good at being with people. I wanted to show you a vacation. But now I need to be alone and quiet. Go somewhere and meditate, I think. And work on my translation. My French works.”

“So Rajith and I go home. No problem. Thank you for showing me a vacation. You are so kind. I understand it is difficult for you.” She stands up and rummages through her bag with her back to me.

Carrying clothes folded into perfect squares, she returns to the bathroom. I watch her narrow, downy calves until they disappear behind the closed door. I actually allowed myself to believe Suriya and I were changing each other’s lives. The angelic, impoverished Sri Lankan and the privileged, self-destructive American join forces and set their small worlds to rights. A heartwarming tale.

—

At the foot of the small mountain that supports the Royal Resort, we wait for buses going in opposite directions. Rajith is bouncy and talkative, taking my hand and telling me things I have no hope of understanding. I thought I would have time at the bus stop to properly thank Suriya for being such a good host, to explain how much her friendship means to me and how impressed I am by the way she moves through the world, tell her I’ll miss her and will try to come back soon. But my bus comes right away. My skinny arms enclose her skinnier frame. Her body is hot and stiff. I step back and hold out two ten-thousand-rupee notes. “I can give you more if you need.” She shakes her head side to side, takes the bills, puts them in the breast pocket of her dress, bites down on her lip. I hug her again. Her arms remain limp at her sides.

I heave my pack onto one shoulder and fumble for the other strap, feeling a pang of such emptiness that I cannot wait to be alone on the bus, just another tourist. “Nangi, please tell your brother and your parents thank you for me. And Nangi, I can’t tell you how—” The bus starts to pull away. “Go, go.” Suriya gestures frantically. I leap onto the bottom rung of the steps, practically shouting, “Colombo? Colombo?” An adolescent boy wearing bleached jeans and a gaudy necklace meets my eye and nods. I push my way through the thick mass of flesh in search of a place to stow my bag. The bus lurches into a pothole. I swing backward and nearly crush an infant with my pack. The mother presses the baby to her bosom, her hand clamped over its head. “Sorry, so sorry,” I say. There is no Sinhala word for sorry. She looks at me steadily through narrowed eyes. I should not be traveling in her country for the equivalent of a handful of pennies. I have been blessed with birth in America. If I can afford a plane ticket to this country, it is my duty to pay for a private driver. But I’d rather stay home than watch Sri Lanka pass by through tinted glass. I don’t care how many babies I have to take out in the process. No, no. I do hope your son’s head is okay. And I’m so glad you don’t know English. Or telepathy. “Sorry,” I say again, aloud, sincere, heavy with the weight of myself now that Suriya is gone, now that I’ve sent her away.