Loom: A Novel

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78 Spr aw led on t h e grou nd and making snow angels, I close my eyes against the blowing snow. Above me, a blanket of swirling white. A hulking figure I must seem, seen from up high, stuffed in winter clothing. I lick the snow off my lips. Sandwiched between a good layer of it and, deep beneath me, the damp sleeping earth, whose sluggish pulse I can almost feel. Whose sleep I don’t mind, even though I can barely wait for spring to get my hands on the tightly closed bulbs and the young shoots of grass. Who wouldn’t be tempted to surrender to the ice and wind? I will be here when the earth returns. Not in Scarabee, but still waiting, on the lookout for the earth to wake up. Yes, I will wait in California. Studying to be a horticulturist, as I was always meant to be. Even before my grandmother gave me the withered fig and told me that planting a fig tree was like planting a miracle. Before I knew fig trees didn’t survive in the north without a great deal of pampering and covering up in the cold months with burlap, which must have meant one thing: the cold climate was deeply resistant to miracles; and so I slept at first with the seeds under my pillow, waiting for the day when I would have the skill to sow wonders and create what nature herself was loath to give of her own free will. My grandmother in the meantime teaching me Arabic songs, and me, a child still, guessing at the yearning in the melody, flinching a little with its sorrow at the same time I molded my voice and words to my grandmother’s. Feeling in my own heart a mysterious tie with a past I preferred represented only by my grandmother, who was so much more tolerant than my parents and, when she talked, a great deal more fun to be around. 79 Meant for horticulture before I pulled the can of poison from my aunt’s hand and told her she was doing a horrid thing, killing those poor, innocent plants for the sole reason she didn’t like the way they looked. I convinced my aunt to put down her poisons and simply pull the offending weeds. I know my aunt keeps a bottle of weed killer hidden in the garage, just in case. Berkeley is not my choice because a fig tree can grow there unhindered , saturated with sun and mild breeze, but because it’s as far as I can get from Scarabee. I imagine myself on campus, walking into a world ruled by gardeners, strolling down gravel roads, clippers at the ready, snipping off scraggly shoots, invigorating where I find listlessness, evermore the beautifier. I went as far as to have it carved on my body, a clover the size of a quarter above my navel. A declaration of love. My parents will scream murder. I will stare at them coldly, a bag slung over my shoulder, my hand upon the doorknob. Clover sprawls in clusters over the lawn, sending my aunt a little over the edge. I am appalled that weeds must be punished for their vigor. I wonder how I will tackle them as a master gardener. I let them mix with the grass but pull them out from among the flowers and the vegetables, where they can take over. I see the problem of weeds as a great moral dilemma. For now the earth is covered with snow. People who like snow see variations. The way it cleaves to the trees, how far down the branches bend, the angle of their submission. And here and there, icicles like so many jewels, a gaudy spectacle. I loved the snow when I was a child. With Shirley I made dementedlooking snowmen and had snowball wars. And even then, I felt the urge to turn my back on the creaking heaters and the hot cocoa waiting in my mother’s sanitized house, and break away without a second look. With my aunt Josephine, I took turns jumping from the top porch stair and landing with a thud, the snow growing more compact with each leap. We promised to try out the neighboring airport for parachuting lessons, but we never made good on our promise. My aunt said she was not afraid of flying as long as she knew the landing would be...