“DO YOU KNOW where the ladies’ room is?” asks Belinda.
Liz looks at Matthew immediately, and they smile but somehow keep from laughing. A warmth spreads across Matthew’s back, through his stomach, and into his scrotum; it’s the physical manifestation of happy memories. He and Liz have laughed about the bathroom here many times, on many happy visits. Of course, if it’s true that Liz never loved him, then she couldn’t have been as happy as she seemed to be. She must have been faking it sometimes, maybe all the time. No, that couldn’t be so. They were happy times. Liz’s not loving him didn’t make them less happy, not at the time. Later, when she decided that she didn’t want to go on living with someone she didn’t love, yes, but not earlier, not always. There were many happy moments, there must have been.
“Go around this corner,” says Liz, pointing, “and go through the door that leads into the kitchen. Turn left at the dishwasher and then go straight toward the door that leads to the alley. Just before you get to the alley, there’s a door on your right. That’s it.”
Belinda wrinkles her brow and grins. She puts on a good-sport look and shrugs. She leaves. Matthew pours tequila. He and Liz raise their glasses and burst out laughing.
Through the door that leads to the kitchen, Belinda sees, directly ahead of her, the dishwasher, a wiry Haitian, stripped to the waist, laboring at a huge pile of dishes in a trough of galvanized metal. Water is spilling in a thin stream from one corner of the trough. The man turns as soon as Belinda comes through the door. The look in his eyes is wild, almost terrified. Belinda has the impression that he may be in fear for his job. Clearly he’s falling behind the diners; they are dirtying the dishes faster than he can wash them. Panic, that’s what she sees in his eyes. How can he keep up with the pace of eating? Where have all these people come from? Why must they eat so fast?
“A gauche, à gauche, allez à gauche,” he says. He seems to try to smile, but the expression he produces looks more like a grimace.
“Thank you,” says Belinda. She takes a step and feels her feet sliding out from under her.
The dishwasher’s eyes widen. “Careful! Careful!” he cries.
Belinda, though she feels herself falling, tries to smile, tries to reassure him that everything will be okay. She grabs the edge of the doorframe and catches herself. She notices the marks of her slide on the floor, watches her feet scribing arcs in the soapy, greasy water. Helpless to stop herself, she rotates backward, out the door, into the dining room, stopping when her feet strike the carpet. She catches sight of Matthew, looking at her over Liz’s shoulder, surprised. She launches herself back into the kitchen. Does she hear laughter behind her? She picks her way across the floor, holding her hands in front of her in case she begins to fall again. She turns the corner and is now in the kitchen. It seems to be about twelve feet square. She tells herself that it must actually be larger, that it only appears so small because of the clutter. Five people are trying to cook in this tiny room. Here the tile floor has a coating not of soapy water, but of oil so even and glossy that it seems deliberate. Two men are laboring at a tandoori oven, shouting ceaselessly while they work. They seem to be exhorting the oven to cook faster. They glance up at Belinda for the briefest of instants and shout at her in much the same manner as they have been shouting at the oven, but with smiles. They jerk their heads in the direction Belinda has been told to go and go back to shouting at the oven. Three other men seem to be running foot races from one corner of the kitchen to another. Surely they must be engaged in some useful occupation. Ahh, they are. They’re making up plates, mounding rice on platters, scooping curries from enormous black pots, shouting among themselves and occasionally at the tandoori bakers, lifting scorching bread from pans of hot fat, and while they are doing all of this they don’t fall down. Belinda is amazed. Why don’t they fall down? She can barely make forward progress across the floor. This is a friction-free floor, she thinks. Little by little, taking mincing steps, she makes her way to the alley door. It’s wide open, but the heat of the kitchen is so great that Belinda barely feels the cold air. An enormous white Lincoln is parked in the alley, right beside the open door. An Indian woman is sitting on the back seat, watching a small color television. At Belinda’s right is a wooden door, faded green. She knocks, softly. The men in the kitchen call out at once:
“It is free.”
“It’s all right.”
“Okay!”
“Go right in.”
“No one is there.”
She realizes how closely she has been watched. She smiles at the men and nods, opens the door, closes it, latches it, raises her skirt, pulls her panty hose down, and squats over the toilet. She’s in a tiny room, once a closet. There was barely room for the toilet, but a sink was installed by cutting a hole in one wall and building a niche that must, she realizes, project into the kitchen. The door doesn’t close fully. It’s open an inch or more. She can hear the bustle of the kitchen and supposes that everyone can hear her urinating.
When Belinda returns to the table, Matthew and Liz try, for just a moment, not to laugh, but they can’t contain themselves.
“Interesting,” says Belinda.
[to be continued]
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