Read Online Blue Jasmine by Kashmira Sheth - Free Book Online

chickpeas hit her foot before rolling away. She fell. “O bapre!”
    I ran to the house and opened the door while Pappa carried Mommy into the house. She cried in pain, and even though we applied ice to her foot, it swelled up. Pappa rushed to Mrs. Milan, and she drove Mommy to the emergency room. Pappa went with them while I stayed home with Mela.
    The car was barely out of the driveway when Mela asked, “When will Mommy come back?”
    â€œSoon,” I said.
    I was afraid to be alone with Mela in the house and so I kept busy. I put away the groceries while I talked to her. She was getting hungry, so I made her a cheese-and-tomato sandwich. “I don’t want cheese-and-tomato sambich,” she said.
    â€œDo you want a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich?”
    â€œI like peanut butter,” she said.
    I made her a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich. She took one bite and made a fish face. “I don’t like it,” she said, pushing her plate away.
    â€œYou just said you like peanut butter.”
    â€œI don’t like jelly with it and I don’t like peanut butter on bread. I like peanut butter on celery.”
    â€œWe don’t have any celery,” I said. “What do you want?”
    â€œ Rotli and vegetables.”
    Many times I had rolled Indian bread, rotli , and a couple of times I even had made the dough, but I’d never cooked it on the stove. “Eat a sandwich now and when Mommy and Pappa come back you can have rotli and vegetables.”
    â€œNo,” she said and stood there pouting.
    â€œDo you want chocolate pudding?”
    â€œYes. Pudding! Pudding for dinner.” She clapped.
    So Mela had chocolate pudding and I tried her peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich. The peanut butter kept getting stuck in my mouth and throat, and I had to take a sip of milk and swoosh it around to gulp the sandwich down. After two bites I threw it away and ate a tomato-and-cheese sandwich. I was glad that I had tried a peanut-butter sandwich at home and not at school. It was always easier to try new things at home when no one was watching.
    â€œWhen will Mommy and Pappa come home?” Mela asked as she licked the last spoonful of pudding.
    â€œSoon,” I said.
    After five minutes she asked the same question, and I gave the same answer. All of a sudden she began to cry. Not a soft cry, but a loud cry, as if someone had slapped her hard. “Mela, please. Don’t cry,” I said.
    â€œI want Mommy!”
    â€œShe’ll come.”
    â€œNow. I want her now.”
    The evening was falling slowly. Mommy and Pappa had been gone for three hours. I wondered if Mrs. Milan was back. I called her, but no one answered. Mela and I walked to her house and knocked on the door. There was no answer. We knocked again, still no answer. We walked back to our house. By now everything was dark inside. I turned on all the lights, making the kitchen and the livingroom bright. Mela and I snuggled up on the couch and I told her a story about the brave rabbit that went into the abandoned house and lived there by himself. It was Raju’s favorite story, and he used to beg Dadima to tell it to us over and over again. How I used to protest that I didn’t want to hear that story, I thought! And now, if by magic Dadima and Raju could be here, I would listen to that story a hundred and one times.
    Mela was quiet. I looked at her. She was asleep.
    What if Mommy and Pappa don’t come back? I thought. What would Mela and I do? I wished we were in India with everyone; then I wouldn’t mind Mommy and Pappa leaving us, because we wouldn’t be alone. I wished we were still a whole snow cone and not a broken-off lump that was melting away fast.
    The phone rang. It was Pappa. “Seema . . . Seema, is that you? Where were—where did you go? I tried—I called a few minutes ago. Why didn’t you—Are you all right? Is Mela all right?” His words were