The next six hours unfold.
As I drove out of the parking lot, I couldn’t stop crying. I couldn’t believe that my mother was involved in this plot against me. The grief. I turned off my phone, in case I was being tracked. I kept checking my rearview mirror to make sure no one was following me. A few miles later, I stopped at a gas station to fill up the tank. I bought Gatorade, cigarettes, and a Kit Kat bar. I had a long drive ahead of me.
I got on the highway heading north. I couldn’t decide what to do. Did I go back to my apartment in Los Angeles? Amma and Acha had the address. They could find me there. It wasn’t safe. But I had a head-start. They hadn’t planned on me leaving Amma in San Diego. I figured if I could get to my apartment fast enough, I’d have time to pack everything I needed to go on the run. I’d extend the rental car for a few days and drive somewhere far away. I’d disappear.
But that would mean I would have to leave my two siblings. The thought rent a hole in my chest. My younger sister and brother. They were innocent in all this. They deserved so much better. I would have to leave them with my parents. Would they be safe? I had to make sure they would be okay. I needed to let them know about our parents. Even though I was risking being tracked, I pulled over to the side of the road to turn on my phone and call my sister. I have no memory of what I said, only that I told my sister that she needed to be strong and take care of our little brother.
Halfway to Los Angeles, I realized again that I couldn’t disappear without getting answers. Whatever had been implanted in my head would stay there no matter where I went. There was no escape. I needed to talk to Acha. Again, I pulled over on the side of the road. This time, I called Acha. I was abrupt. I didn’t want to hear his excuses. He knew what he had done to me. “Acha, you need to book a ticket today and come to Los Angeles.”
“What are you talking about, Anjana? I can’t just pack up and come to Los Angeles like that. I have work.”
“I don’t want to hear it.” My words cut ice. “Just get a plane ticket and come to Los Angeles.”
I hung up the phone. Pressing my head against the steering wheel, I began to sob. What was happening to me? Why had I left my mother in a parking lot? What if she really had no idea what was going on? Oh, the pain. Eventually, I exhausted myself. I wiped the tears off my face. I was going to go back to San Diego.
I pulled off at the next exit, then got on the southbound lane. But as I drew closer to San Diego, the doubt crept back in. I couldn’t chance it. I turned the car around. Los Angeles. San Diego. Los Angeles. Three more times, I would do this. My ability to make decisions had left with my other reasoning faculties.
In the second to last turnaround, as the sun started to go down, the car radio started cutting out. I began hearing static in the middle of songs. The further north I drove, the more static appeared on all the radio stations. As I neared Los Angeles, the music cut out entirely. Radio silence. I turned the volume up high. None of the stations worked.
Something was trying to communicate something to me. I was not making the right choice. Music, I realized, would be the cost of going back to Los Angeles. I turned the car back south again. As I drove, the music started coming back in spurts. Tears streamed down my face. As I looked out along the roadside, I could tell that some of the words on the big billboards had changed. Something was speaking to me in code. It was telling me that I was on the right path. I stopped sniffling. Maybe what had happened to me was enlightenment. Maybe my parents had nothing to do with it. Maybe I was being shown a path.
I followed the signs, the flashing arrows, the green lights until I found myself in a small town called San Pedro. The Father, I erroneously translated. I needed to resolve the tensions I had with my father. The powers that be had given me an opportunity to work out these issues right here, right now.
Nighttime. When lonely men came out to walk the streets.
Cruising down the main road, I stopped the car to ask the men that I saw if they knew the directions to the interstate. I had a few of them draw me maps on napkins the way I remember my father used to do whenever he helped someone who got lost. I came across an old man who was limping, who reminded me of my maternal grandfather. A shame that he had to walk home. Another lesson that I needed to be taught. I offered him a ride back to his place. He told me about his difficult relationship with his sister. When I dropped him off, I gave her some unsolicited advice: don’t suffocate the old man. She asked me where I got off talking to her that way when I didn’t even know them. I shrugged my shoulders and got back in the car.
Round and round, I drove the streets of San Pedro, but I couldn’t find my way out. I tried using the GPS on my phone, but the directions didn’t work. The radio had gone silent again. I was doing something wrong. Then I knew. I wouldn’t be able to leave San Pedro until I called my dad.
I tried using my phone, but the call wasn’t going through. I finally pulled into the front gate of an oil refinery, stopping at a security station awash in fluorescent lights. I told the guard on duty that my phone was dead, that I needed to call my father to let him know I was alright. She was kind. She offered me the telephone. With a flood of relief, I dialed my father’s number one more time. He picked up. He sounded worried. I started crying.
“Acha, I don’t know what’s happening to me. Can you please just come to Los Angeles? I need to see you.”
“Yes, molae, I already booked the tickets. Don’t worry. I am coming tomorrow.”
I nearly collapsed. He was coming. My Acha was coming. I had been wrong. He hadn’t done anything to me. There was something greater at play. He was coming, and he would know what to do with everything that had happened to me. I hung up the phone and asked the guard on duty how to get to the interstate. She pointed at the road I had turned off of.
“Take a right at the next stoplight. You’ll see the signs right there.”
I pulled out onto the road, numb with disbelief of how close I had been to the highway. But there was the stoplight and there were the signs. It was time for me to go home.
When I finally made it back to my apartment, I slept for the first time in 72 hours. I woke up six hours later, wide-awake. The sore spot on my forehead throbbed. I checked my phone. Amma had called a few times. Acha had texted me a few hours ago to let me know he was on his way. I did the calculations in my head, factoring in the time change. With a rush of energy, I realized that Acha must have already reached LA. I grabbed my key card and ran downstairs, barefoot, in the same clothes I had worn yesterday. I pushed through the lobby door into the cool, gray morning. I looked up and down the street. I didn’t see my father. I remembered then – I hadn’t given him my address. He must have gotten it from Amma, but she might have given him the wrong address by accident. What if my father was here but couldn’t find me? I padded down the sidewalk. Maybe he was right around the corner waiting with his suitcase. But I didn’t see him. What if this was another test? Like the one in San Pedro? What if I was supposed to ask people if they had seen him? What if that would lead me to my father?
I marched down the sidewalk with purpose, strange sight with my rumpled turquoise shirt and black skirt, no shoes, hair bouncing. I asked a homeless woman walking by with her cart if she had seen my father. She looked at me quizzically. “How would I know what your father looks like?”
I was stumped. I didn’t have my phone with me to show her a photograph. Then it clicked. “He looks like me, just taller and broader, short gray hair.” She shook her head. No matter, I just had to keep asking, the same way I’d kept asking in San Pedro. Further up the street, I asked a man who was my father’s age if he had seen my father. Again, he said no. Then I stopped a young man who was getting in his car if he had seen my father. Another no. As I walked to the corner of an intersection, I saw the way the flocks of birds were moving from phone wire to phone wire. They stopped on the phone wires at the corner diagonal to me. I needed to go to that corner to find my father. I crossed the street with surety. As I stood under the mass of birds huddling, I looked back across the sidewalk I had just walked. I had completed my mission. My father was not here yet, but he would be here soon. I walked back to my apartment.
When the phone rang again, I picked up, heart thudding. “Amma, I’m sorry…”
She cut me off. “It’s okay, Anjana, I know that you didn’t mean to do it. It’s okay. Listen, Acha is coming in a few hours. Is it okay if Bindu Aunty drives me up to Los Angeles too? That way we can all be together.”
I chewed my lip. “Yes, Amma, that would be okay. But I want to see Acha first. I need to talk to him first. Understand?”
Amma, relieved, blurted out. “Yes, yes, that’s fine. Are you in your apartment right now? Are you safe?”
“Yes, Amma, I am in my apartment and I am safe. Something happened to me yesterday and I need to talk to Acha about it. He’s the only one who will understand, so just make sure you don’t come here without him, okay?”
“Okay.”
“I’ll see you in a little while, Amma.”
I was relieved. She hadn’t seemed mad at me.
I tried lying in bed for a while, but I simply had too much energy to stay put in the apartment. My eyes fell on a box of items I was planning on donating. A sudden flash of inspiration. I could create a sort of infographic, a visual display of a person’s basic needs to live a fulfilling life. It could be a part of my thesis. A work on efficiency, waste reduction, and relationality. I dragged the box to the elevator, then down to the steps that led down from the lobby to the sidewalk. I started sorting through the clothes, toiletries, and knickknacks. I laid them out on the staircase in triangles of varying sizes. Yes, yes, it was all making sense. I turned on some music and began working feverishly. A puzzle, a big, meaningful puzzle. As the morning progressed, people started coming down to the lobby, stopping short when they saw what I was doing. I kept running up to the door, asking them politely to use the garage exit. See, I was working on a project for my program. Most of them were accommodating, but a few were greatly irritated. Someone called the cops on me.
Two police officers arrived right when I had reached the bottom of my box. One officer stayed by the car, while the other approached me. I walked over, smiling bright, apologetic. They were confused, a little thrown back, but my explanation that it was part of a project for school must have been satisfactory. They told me what I was doing was fine as long as it was all cleaned up by the time they came back around to check in thirty minutes. I assured them that I was nearly done, that I would return everything to where I had brought it from.
After I finished my project, I took pictures of everything before I packed it all away in the box. I felt proud. I felt accomplished. I wanted to share it with someone. Kannan. I called him three, four times, but it kept going to voicemail. Sigh. It would have to wait. I dragged the box back up to my apartment. I sat on my dear grey couch. Nothing to do now but wait for Amma and Acha to arrive. Nothing to do but rest.
I made myself a hot cup of chaya. I cut up some fruit, made myself a plate with nuts and honey and yogurt. I made an omelet. I savored every bite. I drew myself a hot bath. I oiled my hair. I made a face pack. I put on a record and swayed to the notes crooned. As I pampered myself, I grew aware of another presence in the apartment. It had to be Kannan. Whatever had happened to me yesterday morning must have happened to him too. That was why we were now telepathically connected. I talked with him in my head. I showed him my apartment, my books, my posters, my journals, my keepsakes.
An hour later, Amma called. She was downstairs. She was coming up. I asked her where Acha was. She said he was coming too. Finally. Everything would be resolved. Acha would be able to help me.
Knock, knock, knock.
There was Amma, looking so small, phone in hand. I threw myself on her.
“Amma, I’m so happy you’re here.”
Amma looked distracted. She kept looking around me, everywhere but me.
“Are you alone, Anjana?” she asked. “Are you okay?”
Yes, yes, I nodded. “Where is Acha? Is he parking the car?”
Amma shook her head. “He’s coming, Anjana. First tell me, are you okay? What have you been doing?”
The walls began to tilt. Something was not right, but I couldn’t tell what. I couldn’t stay upright. “Amma, I’m going to lay down until Acha comes, okay?”
She nodded, but she was still distracted. She kept looking at her phone. I didn’t like that. It made me nervous. Was she reporting my behavior to my father, to the IT company that had implanted this thing in me?
I closed the door to my bedroom and lay down. I kept thinking about how my mother looked when I’d let her in. A suspicion. My father wasn’t actually here. He’d lied about coming to Los Angeles to subdue me. Amma was only here to monitor me. They’d tricked me. I sprang up from the bed.
“Amma, tell me where Acha is right now.”
Amma jumped. She had been in the kitchen making chaya. She was worried, stuttering.
“Acha isn’t here yet. He’ll be landing at the airport in half an hour.”
Aha. It was all a ruse. I had been very explicit. Amma was not supposed to come before Acha. Now Acha wasn’t here, but my mother was in my house. What was this trickery? The spot on my forehead throbbed. Oh, this wretched thing! I wanted it out. I wanted my golden light experience gone.
The anger bubbled up. “Why did you lie to me when I asked you earlier? I told you I didn’t want to see you before I saw Acha.”
Amma was shaken. She tried to explain. But I didn’t want to hear it. Why didn’t anyone ever listen to me? I had been wrong. Acha had lied to me. He wasn’t coming. He just wanted to keep me trapped.
“Get out!” I shouted. “Get out of this apartment right now. I don’t want to see you until I see Acha.”
Amma did not want to leave me. She had to keep me monitored. She had to report back to Acha what she observed. The experiment was clearly out of control. I was out of control. I needed to escape. I couldn’t escape. No matter where I turned, I couldn’t escape.
“Get out, get out, get out.” But Amma wouldn’t leave me. She stood there poking at her phone. She wouldn’t listen to me. She never listened to me.
I was desperate. I wanted her gone. I needed to be alone. Except of course I wouldn’t be alone because I realized right then, there must be cameras in the apartment. Amma must have installed them those two nights we spent in the apartment before going down to San Diego. It had been a set-up all along. And for what? The experience I had? Did they think that was something they could just take from me? I would never give it up, never, ever. It was too precious. Everything was over between me and my parents. I never wanted to see either of them ever again.
“Get. Out.” Still Amma did not budge. What would get her out of the apartment? If I threatened suicide. I pulled open the freezer, yanked out a bottle of rum.
“If you don’t leave right now, I will drink all of this. Is that what you want?” I shook the bottle at her. She jumped back. “Don’t you want to keep me alive?” I popped the cork and put the bottle to my lips. Still she didn’t move. She wasn’t convinced. I had to escalate it.
Shaking, I put the bottle down on the countertop. I pulled open the kitchen drawer. I grabbed a knife, serrated and flimsy, but a knife, nonetheless. I pressed it against my wrist. A threat she would listen to. Above all else, they wanted to keep me alive.
“If you don’t leave right now, Amma, I will kill myself.”
With that, Amma was out the door. I collapsed on the floor, exhausted. How could I escape this now? Amma would call Acha. The company responsible for the implant would swoop in and take me away. I could hear her on the phone right outside my apartment, reporting how badly I was behaving, how I needed to be taken in. Oh no, no, no, I had done it all wrong. Acha had tricked me. He wasn’t coming to Los Angeles. And I had let Amma in the apartment.
Sobbing, I picked up the bottle and the knife. I went to my bedroom and lay down on the bed. I pressed the knife to my wrist, but I couldn’t break the skin. I knew I couldn’t slice open my veins. And I couldn’t drink all the alcohol. I couldn’t kill myself and I couldn’t escape. Oh, what was going to happen to me? What was going to happen to me?
Three pounds on the door. The SWAT team coming to extract me. I leaped out of bed. They couldn’t find me with the knife. I hid it in my nightstand, then lay back in bed, terrified. This was all spinning out of control. Acha must have sent them to take out the implant in my head, end the experiment. I closed my eyes. Maybe, if I could just fall asleep, I’d wake up and this nightmare would be over.
The front door opened. Three pounds on my bedroom door. They were coming to get me. I wasn’t going to let go of my secret no matter what. They could kill me, they could rape me, I wouldn’t give in.
The door opened. I kept my eyes closed. Footsteps. Four, five people. Someone was talking to me, asking me questions, but I didn’t open my eyes. I didn’t open my mouth. Hands grabbed my arms, my legs. I was lifted off the bed and placed in a chair in my living room. I sat hunched over, eyes closed. They asked me questions. I didn’t answer. They were trying to trick me into giving them the information they wanted. But I wasn’t going to give it them. Unlike my father, I was a person who cared about ethics and morals.
But they were persistent. They kept asking questions until I just couldn’t take it anymore. Finally, I opened my mouth.
“I am not going to tell you anything. You can kill me, you can rape me, but I am not saying another word.”
Every time they asked me a question, I answered with the same response. I began to grow agitated. Acha must be watching all this unfold on the cameras Amma had planted in the apartment. I was enraged. How could my own father and mother do this to me? My responses grew louder and louder. Someone reached out a hand to touch my shoulder, to calm me down. I lost it. I started rocking back and forth in the chair, slamming its legs on the hardwood floor. Hands descended on me. I started yelling. I felt a pinch in my left shoulder.
When I woke up, I was strapped to a gurney. They were taking me away. They had captured me and now they were going to torture me until I gave them what they wanted. A ruthless grief came up from my heart through my throat. I started wailing.
“Acha, Acha, how could you do this to me? How could you do this to your eldest daughter? Your mother will never forgive you. Ammooma will never forgive you.”
Over and over again, tears falling from under my closed eyes. As they wheeled me onto the emergency transport, I started screaming, thrashing my body. They were taking me away. They were taking me away. Acha had betrayed me. He had betrayed me again and again. I couldn’t bear the tragedy.
Another pinch in my left shoulder. I descended into darkness.
Originally posted on a now defunct personal blogging website.
