The Paler Shade Of Autumn Read online

  They travel from location to location, discovering as much of Patna as is possible in a single day. As night falls, a beautiful orange glow from the lava coloured orb on the horizon transforms the city. They drive, welcoming the fresher afternoon air that cools their body through the open doors of the three-wheel taxi, through the city of neon lights, back to the hotel.

  Exhaustion settles over Autumn like a weighty blanket. A blanket she shares with Thor, though he won’t dare admit it. They eat dinner in the restaurant, blood-shot eyes, long, slow blinks, reminiscing about all they saw and what tomorrow holds. Over the day, the wall has receded from around Thor, his superficial shell has fallen away, leaving quite an intelligent and thoughtful man behind, whose real name, he finally admits, is David. After dessert of pistachio honey-cake and ice-cream, David walks her to her room.

  “Thank you for a very enjoyable day,” she says, as they linger at her door. He takes two steps closer. His eyes slide from her thighs languorously up her body until he meets her eyes again.

  “It doesn’t hurt that you’re an absolute babe.”

  She crinkles her brow. “Don’t ruin it.”

  “I know how we can make it a whole lot better, but it involves the both of us getting naked.”

  She cringes and shoves her key-card in the door. “Goodnight, David,” she says, pushing down on the handle and marching into her room. She shuts the door in his face. A loud bang sounds on the door, followed by a throaty shout, “Prick-tease.” David’s footsteps taper away as he stalks back to his room. Autumn rolls her eyes and sighs; regrets ever thinking that he is intelligent or thoughtful. If he even attempts to spend the day with her tomorrow, without an honest apology first, she will punch him.

  Chapter 2

  The massive size of the Patna Junction Station is something to be marvelled at, let alone the quantity of people crammed along the platform that seems to stretch forever. The trains here are so long, up to twenty-four carriages, necessary when there are thirteen million passengers transported everyday throughout India.

  Autumn looks around at her company, still finding it hard to confront the broad gap between rich and poor. On one hand there are formally dressed men in tailored pants and shirts, and families with women in colourful clothes adorned in beautiful gold ornaments, while others—men, women and children, with twisted hands, filthy rags and dirty feet—sit on the soiled platform or are interspersed among the other travellers. For the first time in her life, she no longer begrudges the Australian taxation system and its socialistic stance to see that no Australian citizen is left to starve or steal to survive.

  Pilgrims and Buddhist devotees are present in the hundreds from a broad array of cultures. And the high-toned banter that floats around the platform offers a comforting familiarity when the voice is of an English origin. The upkeep would be tremendous with so many people trampling through the station day in day out, so Autumn can excuse the lack of cleanliness; however, she can’t extinguish the subtle anxiety of being among an alien swathe of humanity, loud and chaotic, in such a small space.

  The long blue train pulls up at the station and Autumn grips her ticket, along with David’s arm, despite his lack of apology. They see where they are seated on the chart pinned on the outside of the train and join Westerners, mainly, and well-to-do Indian passengers in the seated, air-conditioned carriages, while all others squash into the general section. Though the platform is bustling, inside the train is relaxed, at least where they are seated.

  She sits back and lets out a heavy sigh. “I couldn’t do this every day. It’s stressful,” she says to David.

  “You’d get used to it.”

  “I don’t know about that.”

  He smiles and then looks to his lap, like a small boy who has been found eating all the chocolate eggs before Easter. “I’m sorry about last night, Autumn.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  He nods. “Thanks.”

  The two hour trip is pleasant enough, as is the auto-rickshaw ride from the Gaya train station to their ultimate destination: Bodh Gaya. Bodh Gaya is noticeably lower on the chaos scale, more peaceful than Patna and Gaya. Autumn wonders if the palpable relief she feels settling in her mind is due to the ancient spirituality ingrained in the soil, the atmosphere, but knows the lower population and remoteness is the real culprit.

  Bodh Gaya is a pretty little town, which when lush from the rains would be beautiful. The town is flat and surrounded by fields dappled with monasteries housing monks from many different cultures, and local inhabitants who have caught the entrepreneurial bug, setting up temporary eateries and shops. The rickshaw parks outside the main temple, Mahabohdi. This temple is one of the four holy sites relating to Lord Buddha, the place where he gained his perfect insight. In the Mahabohdi grounds stands a descendent of the Bodhi tree: the tree under which Buddha reached his enlightenment. It stands beneath the searing heat, year in year out, beckoning believers and the curious alike to gaze upon its outstretched arms.

  To find the dimensions of this place that houses pure spirituality, she must look past the lines of beggars and rows of children that border the fence—faces dirty and limbs deformed. She must look past the hordes of makeshift shops selling pendants, rugs, ornaments and statues, all bearing the symbols the many forms Buddha has transpired to over the centuries. She must look past the lined, sundrenched faces of the old and meek to uncover what it is that draws so many from all around the world to this Mecca.

  “What is your plan for the day, Autumn?” asks David, looking quite pale, perspiration beading across his forehead.

  “Are you ok?”

  David screws his face up and shakes his head. “I’m not sure I feel one-hundred per cent to tell you the truth. I don’t think I should’ve eaten those cucumbers on the train.”

  She peels her backpack from her shoulders and retrieves a bottle of water, unscrews the lid and offers it to him. “Here. Keep yourself hydrated.”

  He takes a long pull of the water, his hand trembling. “This heat doesn’t help. It’s like walking straight back into an outback Australian summer.” He bends over and wraps his arms around his stomach. “I need to find a toilet.”

  Autumn nods and peers around. She points towards the temple. “You’ll have to go in. There will be some in there. I’ll wait for you here.”

  He crumples his body again. “No. Don’t wait. I’ll be a while.” He marches off towards the temple’s compounds. “I’ll text you.”

  Autumn sighs. Ahead of her is a long, dusty path bordered by peddlers. She wanders along the narrow channel, towards the temple, to inspect the trinkets on sale. Some of the makeshift, transient vendors are seated on rugs, their goods laid out before them: rings with the plump, gold Buddha on their face, two-inch high metal and sandalwood statues, and Buddha pendants. Others stand behind benches swathed in dusty blankets holding their array of knick-knacks.

  Autumn inspects thumb-sized Buddha statues; thinks she should buy one as a memento of her journey and, concurrently, support the local vendors whose sole income is what they sell to the pilgrims and tourists. It is evident during her short stay in India that foreigners provide a healthy percentage of sales. Her white skin and western clothes are to Indian beggars and vendors what the red cape is to a bull. They charge and plead, beg and bargain, to the point where polite no-not-todays and no-thank-yous have evolved into blunt NOs!

  Today, around her shoulders, Autumn has strung a large scarf in an effort to not only blend in a little more, but to stave off the excessive ogling. In and around Patna yesterday, many, many men (the streets are abounding with them) would point and nudge to their fellow companions and stare as she walked past them. It has never occurred to her before that her meagre C-cups could produce such a stir, to an extent even David thought excessive. So far, the scarf hasn’t proven to help in her quest for obscurity, but it does feel like a quasi-shield while David, her human swat, isn’t here to help her deal with the onslaught.

&n
bsp; Autumn grasps the statue between her thumb and forefinger. She inspects it closer: a smiling Buddha painted in gold and robed in red. His swollen belly protrudes from the rest of his rounded body. Knowing what she knows about Siddhartha Gautama’s life—his years of self-denial, hunger and starvation—and knowing what she knows about his time under the ancient fig, fighting the demon of desire, where he eventually gained enlightenment and was elevated into Nirvana—this gold statue seems to contradict all of that. But where on earth has commercialism not bastardised something that is, in essence, quite pure? Regardless though, she bargains a fair exchange for the statue and continues down the sandy corridor of makeshift stores.

  An old woman of no more than five feet stands behind a stall. Her head and body are draped in a green sari; wrinkled face the only skin exposed. Laid out on the table are saris of all different colours and sizes. Autumn stops at the table and runs her fingers along the silken materials in pinks, greens, yellows and reds. She stops on a sky-blue sari with gold brocade around its edges and raises her eyes to the aged woman. The woman is already peering at her, meeting her gaze directly, despite her eyes appearing blinded—the pupils faded from what once was brown to mother-of-pearl.

  Autumn gasps at the sight, but collects her composure and smiles. “Namaste,” she says, a gentle tremor finding her voice. She points to the sari on the pile.

  The old woman opens her mouth and crackles, “One thousand rupees.”

  Autumn nods, a quick movement. This woman with pale-eyes, wide and dead-like, scares her. She doesn’t dare to bargain—one thousand rupees seems like a fair deal for a silk sari and a quick getaway. She plucks the money from her bag and thrusts it towards the old lady. Autumn flinches as a wrinkled brown hand appears from underneath the sari, twisted fingernails, ten centimetres long. As she pushes the money into shaking hands, their skin collides and Autumn stumbles backwards a wobbly step. The contact, the imagery exchanged, is like being shanked with a dagger, the blade twisting and slicing as it pushes through her forehead and then out again.

  Her heart is beating so hard she feels it in her ear drums. Autumn snatches at the sari, but is caught as she tries to retract her hand. The old lady clenches her hand in her steely grip and doesn’t let go. Images, thoughts, emotions bleed from the old woman into Autumn: horrible, despicable images of death, murder, disease, trickery, painful debilitating hunger; the nadir of despair. Young babies floating along a river, bloated stomachs; women dying on the streets of filth and stench; children gripping their bellies in ravenous hunger; young girls heartlessly, brutally raped.

  Autumn twists and squirms; tries to pull away from this exchange of misery, the dross of humanity, where death is a release rather than something to be despaired. She feels the emotions invade, the pain spread its insidious fingers, and the revulsion gouge at her and fester in her mind. Hot tears sting her eyes and she blinks; lets them roll down her face. Her hand throbs, as though her fingers are being crushed into oblivion. She cries out in pain, in fear. She twists her body, trying to break the connection of hand-on-hand. Now she is the one begging; begging the old woman to let go. The old woman with her vacant bleached eyes, which contain the emptiness of a lifetime of dark and murky memories, every one of them flowing directly into Autumn’s mind to be assimilated and become hers for evermore. But the woman only glares and mutters in the common tongue, “Cursed. Cursed. Cursed.”

  “Help!” Autumn screams. “Help me!” She tosses her head from side to side, looking for someone, anyone, anything.

  No-one. No helping eyes meet her; they all look away.

  She must fight. There is no other option. She raises her left arm to throw her fist at the old woman’s face and, if that doesn’t work, to claw at her arm. But like a divine being sent from Shiva, a man is at her side, lashing the woman in the Indian tongue and she, at last, unclenches her bruising clasp. The image-flow disconnects and relief drops Autumn to her knees. She rests her head in her hands and bellows out long, hard sobs; tears, dense, falling down her flushed cheeks and forming pools in her hands.

  Her saviour lifts her from the waist and helps her to her feet. “Come on,” he says, voice urgent. “Let’s get you away from here.” She doesn’t fight him as he places his arm on the small of her back and pushes her through the hordes of people, away until the faces grow less dense, until it is only her and him walking across a field towards the shade of a tree. Autumn gasps in air, tears still wetting her cheeks, unable to quieten the pictures the old woman thrust upon her and the words that spewed from her throat, “Cursed”.

  The man is a silent companion until the tears subside and Autumn finally lifts her eyes from the browning grass beneath her feet and looks at him. “Are you feeling better now?” he asks, widening his eyes.

  She realises he is Australian and the recognition provides so much comfort in this country filled with strangers and unknowns. Her shoulders relax and she exhales a long lungful of air. That they are from the same country is something familiar, and familiarity she craves in this moment. Autumn sniffles and pulls the scarf off her shoulders. She uses it to wipe her tears from her face and her runny nose.

  She nods. “Thank you for helping me,” she says.

  “It’s ok. Never mind about that. I’m more concerned about how you are?” He nods towards her hand. “How is your hand? Do you need medical attention?”

  She lifts her hand, fingers out-splayed, and then balls them into a fist. She does this a few times, feeling her joints and muscles groan, but there is no real pain. He tentatively takes her wrist and inspects her hand, turning it this way and that.

  “There are no cuts, which is what I was worried about when I saw the length of those finger nails.”

  Autumn shivers and closes her eyes; fresh memories flash across the movie screen in her mind. When she opens her eyes, she can see the man is about to take her hand in his. She flinches away. “Don’t, please.”

  He lifts his hands in the surrender position, eyes cautious. “I’m sorry. I was just going to see if there was damage.”

  She nods, tears rimming again. “I know. I know. It’s just … I can’t.”

  “I didn’t mean to upset you, I’m sorry. I won’t touch your hand. I promise.”

  She nods as her shoulders slump. “I am cursed,” she whispers.

  “I’m not sure I’d give such credence to a strange old woman like her.”

  She looks at him. “I am.”

  “You’re not cursed. I’m certain of it.”

  “You don’t know me.”

  He looks away for a moment and then turns back to face her. “No. I don’t know you. But even so.”

  Autumn takes her bag from her back and flings it onto the grass. She plonks down beside it, the man following suit, and retrieves a bottle of water. She gulps it down, not bothering that water is dribbling down her chin and onto her lap.

  “That woman is cursed,” he says, adamantly.

  Autumn nods. “Yes. She is cursed. To have a life like hers, to see the things she has seen, the destruction, the agony and the pain. She is cursed.” She allows some silence before she asks, hushed, “Because I am able to see all that she has seen and now have made that part of her a part of me, do I share the curse as well?”

  The man peers at her for a long moment, his eyebrows lowered, eyes probing, then shakes his head. “You’re not cursed, because you can rest easy as it is not a life you have had to bear, only see.”

  Autumn takes a deep breath in and brings her shaky hands to her water bottle, downing another mouthful. She stares at her feet, trying to push the memories away from sight. The man picks a piece of grass from the ground and spins it between his fingers.

  “Do you mind if I ask you a question?”

  His voice reminds her of his presence and when she raises her head she actually sees him as though for the first time. Before he was a solid shadow, a nebulous structure of strength who had taken her from the lifeless eyes of the old woman and led her, unse
eing, to the refuge of this quiet space under a tree. Now, as her mind begins to restore a vague sense of equanimity, he has substance, takes on form, and she is shocked because he is utterly gorgeous. She opens her senses to him, seeing his buttery brown eyes, dark brown hair hanging loosely around his ears and neck, long overdue for a cut. His face possesses a strong, square jaw with a long, masculine nose and full lips. He is tall and lean, shoulders broad, skin tanned an Australian copper and complimented with a few freckles.

  “Um,” she answers, shaking her head. “What did you say?”

  “I want to know how it is you could see that old woman’s life?”

  Autumn’s eyes widen.

  “You said that you can see all that she has seen and I want to know how that is possible?”

  She glares at her drink bottle and internally berates herself for having even given the hint that she has such ability. Her gift of insight is not something she shares with people, especially men she doesn’t know one thing about. “Bloody old witch,” she whispers, focus still on her water bottle.

  “Are you ok?”

  She nods and finally lifts her gaze to his. “I didn’t mean to share that information with you.”

  “I see,” he says, eyes narrowing.

  She can’t quite look away from those eyes, compassionate and warm, the colour of melting caramels. “I don’t even know your name,” she says.

  His lips curl up slightly at the corners. “My name is Jet.” He extends his hand. She glares at it, outstretched before her, but after all that has happened she cannot take his hand in hers. He retracts the gesture after the moment passes.

  “And you are?” he asks.