She answers straight away. And just like that time before, I’m at a loss for words. But not Yael. Not this time.
“What’s wrong? Tell me.”
“Did you get my email?”
“I haven’t checked it. Is something wrong?”
She sounds panicked. I should know better. Out-of-the-blue phone calls. They require reassurance. “It’s nothing like that.”
“Nothing like what?”
“Like before. I mean, nobody is sick, though someone did break an ankle.” I tell her about Jeroen, about my taking on his part.
“But shouldn’t this make you happy?” she asks.
I thought it would make me happy. It did make me so happy this morning. Hearing about Lulu’s letter made me happy this morning. But now that’s worn off and all I feel is her recrimination. How far the pendulum can swing in one day. You’d think I’d know that by now. “It appears not.”
She sighs. “But Daniel said you seemed so energized.”
“You spoke to Daniel? About me?”
“Several times. I asked his advice.”
“You asked Daniel for advice?” Somehow this is even more shocking than her asking him about me.
“I wondered if he thought I should ask you to come back here.” She pauses. “To live with me.”
“You want me to come back to India?”
“If you want to. You might act here. It seemed to go well for you. And we could find a bigger flat. Something big enough for both of us. But Daniel thought I should hold off. He thought you seemed to have found something.”
“I haven’t found anything. And you might’ve asked me.” It comes out so bitter.
She must hear it, too. But her voice stays soft. “I am asking you, Willem.”
And I realize she is. After all this time. Tears well up in my eyes. I’m grateful, in that small moment, for the thousands of kilometers that separate us.
“How soon could I come?” I ask.
There’s a pause. Then she gives the answer I need: “As soon as you want.”
The play. I’ll have to do it this weekend, and then Jeroen will come back or I can quit. “Monday?”
“Monday?” She sounds only a little bit surprised. “I’ll have to ask Mukesh what he can do.”
Monday. It’s in three days. But what is there to stay for? The flat is finished. Soon enough Daniel and Fabiola will be back with the baby, and there won’t be room for me.
“It’s not too soon?” I ask.
“It’s not too soon,” she says. “I’m just grateful it’s not too late.”
There’s a hitch in my throat and I can’t speak. But I don’t need to. Because Yael starts speaking. In torrents, apologizing for keeping me at arm’s length, telling me what Bram always said, that it wasn’t me, it was her, Saba, her childhood. All the things I already knew but just didn’t really understand until now.
“Ma, it’s okay.” I stop her.
“It’s not, though,” she says.
But it is. Because I understand all the ways of trying to escape, how sometimes you escape one prison only to find you’ve built yourself a different one.