The Nine-Chambered Heart. Janice Pariat

we awake, we’ve overshot our destination by three hours and must make our way back on a rumbling local bus.

      When we arrive at the town in the mountains, we disagree over where to stay.

      ‘This is too fancy,’ I hiss into your ear at the hotel that charges five hundred bucks a night.

      ‘Where do you want to go then?’

      ‘Somewhere else.’ I don’t add ‘cheaper’.

      ‘We’ve just spent twenty hours on the road and you want to walk around some more?’

      ‘This is the first place we’ve looked at.’

      And so we do, but everywhere else we look for cheaper, you detest. Too dirty. Too small. Damp walls. And so we end up back at the place where we started.

      ‘I’ll pay for both of us,’ you declare.

      And that annoys me even more. ‘It’s not about the fucking money,’ I say. It is, but it also isn’t, and I know you won’t understand.

      That evening, when an unquiet calm has settled, we head into town. Almost immediately, we’re accosted by a sad, red-eyed rat of a peddler who walks next to me asking if I want some hash.

      ‘Ignore him,’ you say, but it’s too late. I’ve already said, ‘How much?’ I couldn’t help it. It’s instinctive.

      He names a price, insane as it is, and then won’t leave us. You don’t say a word but I can feel your anger, hot and silent. When the rat pushes the hash into my jacket pocket and then pretends like I’m the one not paying up, I get really mad. I give him his thousand and then throw the stuff into the nearest dustbin.

      ‘Okay I’m sorry, all right?’ I offer, but you stay quiet.

      We find our way to a rooftop restaurant where backpackers are sitting on cushions around the edges, drinking beer. The walls are graffitied, and lanterns dangle from bamboo poles. Our moods improve after some food. We start making conversation again. You dig your socked feet under my thigh to keep warm. I tuck a strand of hair behind your ear. Night falls thick and fast, and the mountains behind us disappear into darkness. The alcohol warms us. Someone passes us a joint. We sit closer. Then a guitar is brought out from downstairs.

      ‘Who can play?’ shouts the owner.

      You pull up my hand.

      And the night passes by in a blur of song and music, and faces and smoke. People gather around me, bottles in hand, glasses glinting like stars. My voice, and their voices, and ours, rise over the rooftops. There’s a woman with long, dark blonde hair, wearing a Tibetan jacket, smiling at me. A boy with an earring passing me spliff after spliff. We sing endlessly. The songs we all somehow seem to know. It’s one of those moments when you feel music will make everything all right, and the world isn’t such a shitty place after all. If we just keep singing, it will all stay the way it is, frozen in that moment.

      The next day, you’re gone.

      I wake up alone in the hotel room. A crumpled, slovenly mess. The bed, not me. Although I don’t feel well either. Across the sheet, emptiness, a pillow. I call out to you. Maybe you’re in the loo. I call you again. I heave myself up and check, now stung by fear and worry. Your side of the bed looks slept in, I think. Anyway, how can one tell? I’m sure we came back together. Am I? Yes, I think we stumbled back together at dawn, me glowing in the aftermath of performance. For a real, live audience. I feel I’ve never played better, or more skilfully. I remembered lyrics, and manoeuvred my way through complicated chord progressions. When we reached our room, I groped you drunkenly, I remember, from happiness, lifting your sweater, moving my hands over your breasts, kissing your neck. I think you pushed me away. I must’ve tried again before slumping asleep.

      Now, in the late morning, it comes back to me in flashes.

      I’m not sure where to start, but I head out. The guy at the reception is clueless when I ask if he’s seen you. The town is small, but feels endless when I step outside. I walk down to the main road, the one flanked by matchbox clothes stalls, still-closed restaurants, and women in shawls selling steaming dumplings. Maybe you were hungry and came looking for food. Maybe I’ll find you standing by one of these makeshift street-food vendors, eating momos. ‘Here,’ you’ll say, holding one out to me. Your eyes, as usual, will be rimmed by the kohl you didn’t clean off, your hair bundled untidily into a bun. Suddenly, your absence feels like a stab in my stomach. I must find you. Somehow my feet make their way to where we were last night. Up the stairs, to the rooftop restaurant, which is all but deserted apart from a group of trekkers eating breakfast. Oddly, I can’t remember where you were while I was playing the guitar. Next to me, of course. Or was that the lady with the dark blonde hair and the Tibetan jacket? She was very friendly. At one point, hadn’t she asked me to show her how to strum?

      In half an hour, I feel I’ve exhausted all possibilities and walked that main road to death. I’m beginning to waver now, between anger and fear. Why the fuck are you doing this? What if something happened to you? I’m hungry and hung-over, and the weed has left a bitter, burnt taste in my mouth. I wolf down a plate of dumplings and then feel guilty. I shouldn’t waste any time. I must find you. When I think I’ve run out of options, I walk down the road that takes us out of town, towards the highway. Here too are shops and a sprinkling of small eating joints. I pass one that’s placed higher than the rest, on a raised platform, with outdoor tables and chairs.

      Sun Moon Café it’s called, and I think that’s the kind of place you would like.

      There’s someone sitting outside, reading. It looks like you. It is you.

      I yelp in relief. You look up at me, and turn back to your book. ‘What the fuck,’ I mutter, as I run up the steps.

      ‘Where were you?’ I say. I realize it’s a stupid question even before you reply.

      ‘Here.’

      ‘Why did you leave like that?’

      You shrug.

      ‘I was worried, man.’

      I hear you mutter something.

      ‘Is this about last night?’

      ‘What do you think?’

      I hate it when you do this. Turn the question back at me. I’m only trying to figure out what the fucking matter is. I care enough to do this. Why isn’t that good enough? I take a deep breath, trying to keep the glimmer of anger at bay.

      ‘Something about last night upset you … except I don’t remember much …’

      You snort, in laughter, disdain.

      ‘What, man?’

      ‘So convenient.’

      ‘We drank a lot …’

      ‘Yes, we did. Except that still didn’t make me throw my arms around some blonde stranger.’

      ‘I was showing her how to strum!’

      ‘Oh, is that what you call it, you wannabe rock star?’

      I am struck, at this moment, by how precisely we know how to hurt the ones we love.

      It doesn’t go on for long, this argument. Mostly because I think we’re exhausted, or at least I am. And also, no matter what, I’m relieved to have found you.

      We return to the city without a river. Something has changed. We are closer, yet further apart. That doesn’t make sense, but it does. Our quarrel revealed how much we care for each other, but it wounded deep. Here I am, a fucking contradictory wreck. I look to you to feel good, but I realize that if I give someone that power, they can also make me feel like shit about myself. You never say ‘wannabe rock star’ again, although other hurtful things are hurled around the room. We are knife throwers in a circus. Bring on the clowns, and the little dog in a big bow that jumps through hoops. Sometimes, I think I am all of them rolled into one.

      It is worse because I have