Living Room Floor | 1970
Chapter 1
“Sarita?”
Sara lay on the floor, chin on fists, trying hard to comprehend the words she read, but they slipped away like sand through fingers, like water. Their eyes met for a second before she turned back to the book of red cloth. It was frayed around the edges, and tattered, but a treasure to her.
When she looked up again, with that look so hers, he had no choice but to go in the room and hear what she wanted to know. She always wanted so much.
“What is it?”
“It says here that life started with light.”
“What is that?”
“The science book from the encyclopedia.”
He scanned the page over her shoulder. “What do you want to know?”
“How life was made. I thought God made life.”
In the silence that followed she already knew he would not give her an answer, or worse yet, give her the one she didn't want: wait until you’re older.
“Where did he come from?”
“From the light, it says right here—”
“Who made the light?” She lay still, looking at the words, hoping for more, for something. For everything. “If there was nothing, no space, no light, where did that light come from?” No matter how she tried, she was unable to visualize nothingness.
“Keep reading and you may find out. I have to check on the boys outside.” He left his eight year-old inquisitor, but halfway down the hall realized she needed more than that. He returned to the doorway and whistled.
She loved whistles and tried to blow out their sound but only air and giggles came out.
“If you don’t find the answer, know there aren’t answers for everything. One day you will see that some things are not meant to be understood.”
She bit her lip beyond pain and watched him evanesce, silently crying inside, wondering why.
Vienna, Austria | March 05, 1995
Chapter 2
“Five years, more would be better, but five at least and you will be able to accomplish anything.”
“Like what?” Sara flipped her hair to one side and curled it behind her ear.
Paolo looked above her head to avoid her altogether, careful not to let the tables turn. Sometimes she could tell what was on his mind, before he put it into words, by just looking at him.
“Like anything. I will send you places you have dreamed of going, push you to do things you never imagined you could.” He leaned back on the chair and lifted the front legs, his eyes on the ceiling. “You’ll be great.”
“I’m not now?”
“You’ll be different.”
“What if I don’t want to change?”
“We all change, Sara.”
“You sound sad.”
“No, cara, that’s the way you hear.” He let the chair down. “I wish I could speak to you in Italian.”
“Go ahead, do.”
He laughed and leaned over, elbows on knees, the loosened tie swinging in between. “But it wouldn’t mean much to you.”
“Try it, I may surprise you. And besides, sometimes what you say in English,” she wrinkled her nose, “doesn’t mean a thing to me.”
“Am I wasting my time?”
“It depends on your expectations.”
“I tell you, thirst and wonder and one day you will be a master.”
“A master at what?”
“At anysing.”
She didn't correct him then, but drank the words he spoke in earnest. His mobile rang and he excused himself to go into another office.
Though no one had ever spoken to her like that, she knew exactly what he meant. She has always asked questions and yearned for answers, thirsted and wondered; spent hours lost in thought, her mind riding a wave, then another, going on a tangent in order to gain facts and truth, yet spilling hunger in her path when they weren’t found, making the void wider. Disappointed at the failure of not getting the knowledge she craved, she surrendered to any and every challenge, but in the inmost part of her the need would remain.
She looked at him through the glass walls. Could he answer all she has never asked?
Barcelona, Spain | February 25, 1996
Chapter 3
Loud and bustling Barcelona settled her mind the moment the cab merged into traffic. It circled around avenues and statues, and plazas and crowds, so she barely noticed when they arrived at The Majestic — a refurbished 1920’s hotel across from Casa Batlló, one of Gaudí's architectures in Passeig de Gràcia.
The afternoon and evening melted one into the other while she walked the ancient streets. At ten o’clock, perfect Spanish dinner time, she met Turner Madison in the lobby. They shook hands.
He looked at her lightly, preferring the décor in the lobby. “Are we eating here?”
“I found a tapas bar somewhere else while I roamed, I'd rather go there if you don’t mind.” Sara looked in his blue eyes, for a moment taken back to a rickshaw in India.
“That’s fine.” He opened a hand to have her step ahead of him.
They talked of flights and airports and Spain in general. Ten minutes later, they sat at a bar with nothing more to say. She ordered the tapas.
“So you were here last year?” It was obvious he didn’t want to talk, but she was not about to sit there without saying a word.
“Yes.”
“For how long?” She licked her fingertips and sipped fresh orange juice. “I thought you weren’t traveling much.”
“I was here on vacation and did Michael a favor.”
She pushed the sleeves halfway up her arms and looked out the window. Dinner was quiet, the place loud.
When they left the restaurant, she turned to go in the opposite direction of the hotel.
Turner held an unlit cigarette in his hand and looked at Sara as if he didn’t want to look at her at all. “The hotel is this way.” He pointed at the sidewalk with his chin.
“I want to see Plaza Catalunya at night, it is not far. I’ll see you tomorrow.” She waved goodbye and buckled her jacket as she went, her black hair swaying under the lamplights.
The next day they worked non-stop. Miss Díaz had set up four presentations on top of the two-hour lunch, after which Turner started to pronounce her name, Eugenia, without making them laugh. She has a great sense of humor, wild red hair that looks like it’s on fire, and soft manners.
New York City | April 12, 1996
Chapter 4
On the pavement, before descending into the tracks of our destinations, we run oblivious to our surroundings as they evolve yet remain the same; listen to fleeting words, allow traffic lights to change in order to hear what someone says in the privacy of the streets, inhale the scent of flowers sheltered under tents and breathe in their fragrance, far from where they first saw sun, far from everywhere. We take in that breath, giving up what we don’t see, what we do.
The city was in a hurry, the afternoon and skies changing as a breeze whistled by, moving branches, spurring the clouds to gray. Aproned clerks shoved flowers and fruit indoors.
Sara walked along Sixth Avenue and listened in on a private conversation until the men turned a corner on 38th and left her in midair.
She ran into the office and held the door against the wind blowing through the showroom windows. There was fabric everywhere, swatches, bolts, pictures and magazines, draft paper. She kicked off her heels and walked to the kitchen counter, set the kettle on the stovetop, and fingered through tins of tea.
The offices of World’s Arc overlooked 6th Avenue and lower Manhattan. Granite and stainless steel made up an impeccable minute kitchen. Noise from the streets abounded, echoes drifted along the glass doors and leather furniture. On sunny days, the setting sun glistened through the stained glass windows in hues of gray, scattering diffused light into the room and walls. That day, all was gray.
Sara and Paolo renovated and furnished the space. It was quite a find. He let her pick the purple, red, and black chairs with yellow bands around the backrest — the colors of the dishes she bought against his pleading that she please buy white china from Italy. Offered to fly her there for that purpose alone. But she reasoned for getting her way. Her chair, shaped like a guitar and pearl in color, unlike anything else in the office, served as fuel for debate. The one thing they agreed upon was the geometric print carpet. They discussed and over-analyzed every aspect of the office. Paolo wanted a warehouse element, to allow the air ducts to be part of the space, the hustle of traffic to come in through the windows and drift across the room, the overpriced lights and desks.
The offices were sparse, yet whimsical and inviting, but Sara cared for none of it. She commuted three hours by train and lived in the city as little as possible, then left it without a thought.
She was, and always would be, a beach bum.
Ahmedabad, India | May 17, 1995
Chapter 5
A different driver picked me up early and we rode with less urgency than yesterday, though the madness on the streets was more or less the same.
An old woman pushed a tray on wheels full of teacups and saucers. I wanted to ask the driver to stop so I could get different sizes and styles, but then became fixated with the oxen beside us and when I turned back the lady was gone. The driver swerved and honked non-stop, seemed to be going in circles to get me to work fast. We passed an Ophthalmology Center where I would not have entered to beg for water if fraught with thirst. That was based on outward appearance only, I had no idea what it was like inside. Sometimes I can be so superficial.
We spent the day taking fabric apart and matching colors on screen. Mr. Mandhi didn’t come in the office but walked by often and without pretense looked in on us as if we were children.
Dinner at the hotel was delicious, even if spicy for me. The waiters brought me a tray with small vessels filled with rice, sauces, soup, and vegetables. And a glass of coconut water.
New York City | April 11, 1995
Chapter 6
Sara read a contract and two days’ worth of mail by 9 a.m. The offices were in order, the phones silent. She put her feet over the newspaper on the desk and slipped off her shoes. On a shelf, an old Charlie Brown book stuck out of place, enticing her. She didn’t know anyone from Branches but Michael, and the decision of who would be going to the Far East had been delegated to the Branches’ Marketing group. The meeting had been rescheduled twice and she was about to make a presentation by herself to people she had never met.
Resting her head back she stared at the cursor on the screen, then left her high heels on the TRAVEL section of the paper and walked to the window.
The smell of salt and clam cakes pervaded the hollowness inside, far away from beaches or oceans and the north Atlantic waters where kids ran away from their mothers and dove in without consent. While the morning bustled below, she gave in to a beach day last summer, the bubble she had tried to avoid closing in until a fire truck siren invaded her retreat.
9:45 a.m.
Sara pulled out the Charlie Brown book to have a read before the people from Branches arrived.
The elevator stopped on the 20th floor opposite the doors to World’s Arc.
“Have you seen their software, Turner?”
“No, but this better be worth our time. We’re cutting it close for the meeting in Asia at the end of the month. I don’t know why I agreed to this.” He held the elevator open for Susan and looked at the massive black doors. “Do we always wait until the last minute for high-profile projects like these?”
“Not usually. World’s Arc is in, but Michael’s going out on a limb and choosing who goes and when,” Susan knocked softly, “handpicking us all. I haven’t been told I’m going yet.”
Turner caressed the fingerprint of the wood on the door, traced the pattern with the tips of his fingers. “Have you been here before?”
“No, only Michael has.”
There was a knock on the door and she placed the book, along with Lucy’s five-cent advice, back on the shelf, then put on her heels and folded the newspaper into a drawer.
Chapter 1
BLOSSOMING
Chapter 2
A FABRIC IS WOVEN
Chapter 3
IN FLIGHT
Chapter 4
LOOSELY BOUND
Chapter 5
STRETCHED AND SPREAD OUT FROM STRANDS
Chapter 6
of CORBUSIERS & MASTERS
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