“You should have your tea,” Dr. Narunn suggests in a desultory tone. “And also something to eat to sustain your strength through the ceremony—”
The physician stops abruptly, looking up the steps of the prayer hall. “We have a visitor,” he says after a moment. “In a white dress and a big floppy sun hat. A foreigner, I think, from the look of her clothing.” Whenever they’re together the doctor has taken it upon himself to describe those things at a distance. “She’s walking up the steps of the vihear.”
“Someone we know, Venerable?”
But Dr. Narunn doesn’t hear. He stands up, straightens his robe, and, most curiously, checks his appearance, then takes a step forward. “I’ll see if she needs any assistance . . .”
Teera dashes up the steps of Hotel Le Royal at a speed that feels to her more like flying, her sandals grazing the red carpet draping the center of the expansive staircase. She keeps her head bowed to avoid eye contact. People come and go, a continuous traffic up and down the stairs. Some greet her as she passes, their familiar tone indicating they recognize her as a fellow guest. From a couple of steps above, the general manager pauses in his chitchat with others to offer—“Salut! ?a va?” Teera returns his greeting, using the bit of French she knows, but doesn’t slow her steps to allow for conversation. At the top, she turns and gives one last wave to Mr. Chum. She can see he’s worried. He doesn’t want to leave her like this, but he’s forced to move his mud-splotched Camry to make way for a shiny black Mercedes pulling into the arcade of the hotel driveway.
Since fleeing the temple, Teera has encased herself in silence. During the entire drive back to the hotel she shut him out. She hopes he doesn’t think her muteness has anything to do with him, that she’s dissatisfied with his service or his driving. The past, surely he knows, is tricky terrain, riddled with potholes and pitfalls and unmarked graves. No matter how vigilant you are, you can find yourself in a head-on collision and, amidst the shock and reverberation, catch in the periphery of your vision a phantom of your deepest longing. In the memory of Music Master . . .
Teera tilts her woven sun hat forward to hide her face and sails past the doormen dressed in their silk pantaloons and high-collared tunics, each holding a door open for her. They give a slight bow but refrain from saying anything, clearly sensing she’s not in the mood to stop and exchange pleasantries.
She panicked. She’d simply panicked. At Wat Nagara, a monk came up behind her on the steps of the prayer hall to greet her, and just as she turned to face him, she caught sight of the stupa, her father’s name glittering in gold on its white dome. Teera felt the wind knocked out of her. She couldn’t speak. Instead, on impulse, she pretended she was a foreign tourist who didn’t know the language and bolted away, leaving the monk completely nonplussed on the steps. Outside she pleaded with Mr. Chum to go, startling him with her emotive outburst, her voice quaking to a breaking point. Please let’s leave—please!
As they screeched away, the car wheels stirring up water and mud from the puddles left by the recent rains, she glimpsed through the open entrance the whole dedication. In the memory of Music Master Aung Sokhon and family who lost their lives. She was utterly unprepared for the devastation, the summary of her loss in that finite phrase. She’d planned this first visit to the temple without letting the abbot or anyone know. She’d even taken care to enter discreetly through one of the smaller side gates, asking Mr. Chum to wait outside by one of the main entrances in front. She wanted to be alone with the ghosts, to seek communion with her loved ones. Instead she came face-to-face with her aloneness, saw it reflected wholly, indelibly, in the engraved invocation.
Teera hurries now through the lobby with its elegant teak furniture and art deco pieces, its gleaming marble floor and high ceiling, a wall boasting two large black-and-white photographs of Jacqueline Kennedy during her historic visit in 1967. When she passes the corner reception bar, Devi, a pretty young waitress she’s come to know well, is busy decorating fresh juices with orchids to welcome new arrivals. Teera is tempted to ask for a stiff gin and tonic to loosen the tension in her neck and shoulders. But before Devi looks up, Teera steps into the adjoining veranda, where a couple and their son are enjoying afternoon tea and cake in the air-conditioned coolness. “Papa, Maman, regardez le lézard!” the little boy exclaims. Teera has seen them before, a Cambodian-French family, and the way the little boy says “Papa”—round and solid like an embrace—makes her want to weep.
The family smiles at her as she passes, but she’s unable to reciprocate, certain that if she lets go of a single muscle, her entire being will unravel.
She pushes open the set of doors and takes the few short steps down to the covered walkway between two swimming pools built to look like a bridge across water. The spacious, blossom-strewn courtyard—bordered by the four colonial-style buildings and shaded under a canopy of giant monkey-pod trees—seems like a world far from the rest of Phnom Penh.
She reaches the rear building and turns right into the warmly lit hallway, the wooden heels of her sandals clicking against the polished black-and-white checkered tiles that remind her of the floor of her childhood home. When she arrives at her room, she fumbles with her key and lock. One of the cleaning girls, noticing her agitation, rushes over and unlocks the door for her. Teera nods her thanks and quickly enters her room. She hangs the “Do Not Disturb” sign outside, closes the door, turns the lock.
Without flicking on the light, she walks into the bathroom, sheds her white cotton dress and sun hat, steps into the claw-foot tub, and, turning the shower knobs, lets the water crash down on her. She weeps, alone and naked in her sorrow.
The monks have emerged from their cramped shelters to take advantage of the lull in the rains, their blurred silhouettes like streaks of turmeric or cinnamon powder scattered across the temple grounds. On a grassy patch between the ceremony hall and the Old Musician’s cottage, a group of them engages in a soccer game, robes hitched up to keep the hems from soiling as they roll and kick the worn ball. Nearby another group gathers in a circle with one player in the middle bouncing a shuttlecock on the side of his foot, then projecting it high in the air for another player to receive and continue the choreography.