the kitchen, calling out to each other. Dad had always watched the news while dinner was being cooked. In his chair, somebody had placed a quilted blanket and the side table where he used to rest his whisky glass had been removed. These shifts in details were little and mundane but they pronounced his absence loudly. She switched the channel to BBC. Immediately, both Mum’s and Mindi’s heads poked through the kitchen entrance.
‘We were watching that,’ Mum said.
‘Sorry,’ Nikki said, but she was reluctant to change the channel back. The presenter’s voice brought a wave of nostalgia: she was eleven again and watching the news with Dad before dinner. ‘What do you think about that?’ Dad would ask. ‘Do you think it’s fair? What do you think that word means?’ Sometimes when Mum used to call her to help set the table, Dad would give Nikki a wink and reply loudly, ‘She’s busy out here.’
‘Can I help with anything?’ Nikki asked Mum.
‘You can heat up the dal. It’s in the fridge,’ Mum said. Nikki opened the fridge to find no obvious signs of dal, just a stack of ice-cream containers with faded labels.
‘It’s in the Vanilla Pecan Delight tub,’ Mindi said.
Nikki picked out the container and put it in the microwave. She then watched in horror through the window as the container’s edges melted into the dal. ‘Dal’s going to be a while,’ she said, opening the door and removing the container. The noxious smell of burning plastic permeated the kitchen.
‘Hai, you idiot,’ Mum said. ‘Why didn’t you put it in a microwaveable container first?’
‘Why didn’t you store it in one?’ Nikki asked. ‘Ice-cream tubs are misleading.’ It was a suggestion stirred from years of crushed hopes from searching Mum’s fridge for dessert and instead discovering blocks of frozen curry.
‘The containers work just fine,’ Mum said. ‘They’re free.’
There was no rescuing the dal or the container, so Nikki disposed of both and stepped back to the edge of the kitchen. She remembered lingering here the evening after Dad’s funeral. Mum was weary – travelling back to London with Dad’s body had been a bureaucratic and logistical nightmare – but she refused Nikki’s offers to help and ordered her to the sidelines. Nikki asked Mum about Dad’s final hours. She needed to know that he hadn’t died still angry with her.
‘He didn’t say anything. He was asleep,’ Mum said.
‘But before he went to sleep?’ Perhaps his last words contained some hint at forgiveness.
‘I don’t remember,’ Mum said. Her cheeks were high with colour.
‘Mum, surely you can try—’
‘Don’t ask me these things,’ Mum snapped.
Seeing that forgiveness was a long way off, Nikki had returned to her bedroom and continued her packing. ‘You aren’t still going to leave are you?’ Mindi asked, standing in the doorway.
Nikki looked at the corners of boxes jutting out from under her bed. Piles of books had been pushed into Tesco recyclable bags, and her hooded jacket had been taken off the hook behind the door and rolled up to fit her suitcase.
‘I can’t live here any more. The minute Mum finds out I’m working in a pub, I’ll never hear the end of it. It’ll be that same argument all over again. I dealt with Dad ignoring me. I’m not going to stay here while Mum gives me the cold shoulder as well.’
‘You’re being a selfish cow.’
‘I’m being realistic.’
Mindi sighed. ‘Think of what Mum’s going through. Sometimes it’s worthwhile to consider what’s best for everyone, not just yourself.’
On this advice, Nikki stayed for another week. But upon returning from errands one day, Mum would find Nikki’s room bare and a note on her bed. I’m sorry, Mum. I had to move out. Her new address was listed below. She trusted that Mindi would fill Mum in on everything else. Two weeks later, Nikki gathered up the nerve to call Mum and to her surprise, Mum answered. She spoke stiffly to Nikki and gave minimal responses (‘How are you, Mum?’ ‘Alive’) but that she responded at all was a positive sign. During their next phone conversation, Mum had an outburst. ‘You’re a selfish, stupid, idiot girl,’ she sobbed. ‘You have no heart.’ Each word made Nikki flinch and she wanted to defend herself but wasn’t it true? She had left them at the worst possible time. Stupid, selfish, heartless. Words that Dad had never used to describe her. Afterwards, purged of her anger, Mum began to speak to her in sentences again.
The kitchen was thick with a spice-filled smog now. Dinner was ready. Nikki helped to bring out a serving dish brimming with chickpea and spinach curry. ‘So,’ Mindi said once they settled into their seats. ‘Tell us about this job.’
‘I’ll be mentoring women to write their stories. The workshops are twice a week. At the end of the term, we’ll have a collection of stories to put together.’
‘Mentoring. That’s the same as teaching?’ Mindi asked.
Nikki shook her head. ‘It’s not so much teaching as facilitating them.’
Mum looked confused. ‘So there is another teacher there that you’re assisting?’
‘No,’ Nikki said. The impatience crept into her voice. ‘Finding your voice isn’t something which can be taught, at least not in the traditional sense. People write and then you guide them.’ She looked up to catch a smirk passing between Mum and Mindi. ‘It’s hard work,’ she added.
‘Good, good,’ Mum murmured. She folded a roti and drove it across the plate, scooping up the chickpeas.
‘It’s a great opportunity,’ Nikki insisted. ‘I’ll have a chance to do some editing as well, which I can add to my CV.’
‘So do you think you want to be a teacher or an editor?’ Mindi asked.
Nikki shrugged.
‘They just sound like two very different things, being a teacher or working in publishing. You like writing as well. Are you going to contribute to these stories as a writer?’
‘Why does it have to be defined?’ Nikki asked. ‘I don’t know what I want to be, but I’m getting there. Is that all right with you?’
Mindi held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. ‘It’s fine with me. I’m just trying to find out more about what you’re doing, that’s all. You don’t have to get so defensive.’
‘I’m doing something to help empower women.’
Now Mum looked up and she and Mindi exchanged a look of worry. ‘I saw that,’ Nikki said. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Aren’t the majority of your students going to be temple ladies?’ Mindi said.
‘So?’
‘So be careful,’ Mindi said. ‘It sounds like a class for beginning storytellers but if you think you’re going to change their lives by tapping into their personal experiences …’ Mindi shook her head.
‘The
