Tom Rachman - The Rise & Fall of Great Powers

He loved the idea of a celebration, but wanted no alcohol — didn’t want to dull anything now. Tooly abstained in solidarity, stepping into the liquor store, then out again with nothing. She prepared him a smashed-potato sandwich, not because it was the lunch hour but because it gave him pleasure. And who cared about time? That was mere conformism!

“Is it all right?” she asked, watching him take a bite.

“Oh, God.”

“What?”

“Oh, my God!”

“Is it terrible?”

“It’s delicious!” he shouted, turning wide-eyed to face her, though unable to orient to her.

“I’m so happy to hear that, Humph.”

“I love smashed-potato sandwiches!” he cried. “How did you know ?”

“Because I know you.”

“But how did you know?” He looked blindly beyond her. “How did you know?” Without waiting for an answer, he took another bite. “Delicious!”

After only one further mouthful, he fell asleep again, sandwich still gripped. He grunted when she tried to ease it from him.

Hurricane Irene was supposed to devastate New York City but had diminished into gales and heavy rain by the time it hit that Sunday morning. She went out to witness the wild weather, which always stirred her. Despite the evacuation order, the neighborhood wasn’t empty. There was even a café open. Two young Russian women served, conversing in their language with four male customers, all brazenly nonchalant in their defiance of public-safety warnings.

Tooly asked what damage there had been around here. They spoke of a few fallen trees and toppled power lines, and said the bay had overflowed. But nothing too serious. She bought a black tea and sat at the window, gazing at the empty intersection. A grocery store across the way was boarded up. The barbershop had its shutters down. A traffic light swung in the wind, changing colors without any vehicles to respond. Seemed almost unreal: the pelting rain, the chattering Russians behind her, Humphrey just around the corner, Duncan in Connecticut perhaps peering out the window at the storm, Venn in Ireland with wife and baby. Maybe Fogg was at World’s End, listening to the radio, dusting the stock. All these places at once.

With nearly her last dollar, she bought a croissant for Humphrey. When she returned, saying his name softly in case he slept, he remained still, because his heart had stopped.

HUMPHREY BECKONED HER to follow him out of the house. She reached for his hand, but it rose, resting on her head. “Your hair is wet from rain,” he said, as they walked down the alley. “Warm now, also.”

“Because of the sun,” Tooly explained, touching the hot crown of her head, sandwiching his fingers there and holding them for the entire walk to the main road.

The traffic — buses and tuk-tuks and motorcycles, fumes tickling her nose — overloaded her senses after weeks inside that house. He hailed a taxi and helped her into the backseat, flopping in after her and giving her address. Odd to hear him say “Gupta Mansions,” as if a character from this version of Tooly had wandered into the previous version. She watched him looking out the car window, his old eyes following each vehicle they passed, focus dragged along with it, then the next.

The taxi stopped at her street. “Very soon,” Humphrey said, opening the door on her side, speaking differently than he had, more seriously, “very soon you will grow up. Being small is hard bit of life. But you are nearly done with it. When you are grown, Tooly, you can be boss till the end. You are someone who must be boss of your life, not pushed around. So be careful.”

“I’ll be careful of trivial beings,” she suggested, to please him.

He smiled sadly. “Yes. Of trivial beings.”

“And the Moron Problem.”

“This also.”

She stepped from the taxi, watching him, unsure what was happening. “Are you going?”

“Good luck for your life,” he answered through the window.

The driver turned the cab around. Humphrey’s head was visible in the rear window as the taxi drove away.

She stood beside a pothole, looking into it, then stepped over and continued down the soi , past the fruit stall, past the tailor pumping his foot-pedal sewing machine, past the construction workers in bandannas.

It was Shelly who answered the door. She backed away to let Tooly in, bowed, hastened to her quarters. Paul was still away at work. Tooly found her bedroom tended and tidy, bed made, sheets tight. The apartment was air-conditioner cold, its thrumming units rippling the curtains. On the desk, her schoolbooks were lined up. She opened her book bag, looking for Nicholas Nickleby , but had left it behind. She took out her sketchbook of noses instead, yet couldn’t bring herself to draw more than a line, so left it on the desk. She jumped onto the bed, landing on her knees, mattress jiggling — her first proper bedding after weeks in the tent. She let herself fall flat on her face and lay still, her mouth dampening a patch of bedspread.

At the sound of Paul arriving home, she awoke with fright but did not move for several seconds. Finally, heart racing, she walked into the living room.

“Tooly.” He gaped at her, absently putting down his briefcase. “Tooly.”

She held still.

Paul reached out, and she extended her hand to shake his. He’d only meant to touch her arm.

“Did Sarah bring you?”

Tooly shook her head.

“Are you okay? You look so thin. Are you hungry?”

As they ate, he asked if she wanted to stay with him and that she could — he’d figure it out somehow. They could leave right now, move again. Did she want that? But these questions were too direct coming from Paul — she expected him to be otherwise, so didn’t know how to answer.

All fell quiet, like their meals of old. Just the tremors of his desire to speak. So strange after days of free discussion with Humphrey and everyone there, after all she’d done — drinking coffee each morning! cheating at chess! debating one of the Great Thinkers!

She asked to get down from the table, and went to her room. She hadn’t had a door for so long, and was unsure whether to use it now, if it would be rude. From the other room, he cleared his throat, as if to call her back. She knew where he’d be: seated stiffly on a chair, work folder in his lap, willing her to join him.

However, she found him otherwise than imagined. He lay on the couch, arm draped over his eyes. She stood beside him, looking at his shielded face. He reached over to draw his daughter nearer. But she turned, spiraling away.

On her balcony, Tooly gazed down at the lit swimming pool in the courtyard, a pane of blue glass. The shacks on the other side of the wall were dark. Lights from distant skyscrapers dotted the night.

She slipped out, ran down the stairs, passed under the jacaranda trees, beyond the saluting porter, up toward Sukhumvit Road, into the first tuk-tuk.

The destination she gave was Khlong Toey Market — she and Sarah had passed it that first night. Upon arrival, she handed the driver all her money, the tips from helping tend bar. She was on her own in a swirl of strangers, and looked for the alley. She tried one, but it was wrong. She walked up the next. All grew darker as she went. She closed her eyes, the better to listen for music and crowd noise. She heard only traffic, far behind her now. Tooly turned a blind corner. And there it was: the house. She crossed the concrete patio and tried the front door, which opened immediately.

All three of them stood there, their conversation interrupted. The way they regarded her — Venn smiling slowly, Sarah reaching for her cigarettes, Humphrey compressing his lips — it seemed that the discussion might have been about Tooly herself.