Queen of Dreams Read Online Free PDF Page B

him. But my mother surprised me. Women need something of their own to make them independent, she said with unexpected vehemence. Something to give them a sense of self. Something to fall back on, if necessary. Had she sensed, somehow, what was to come? She’d given me a large sum of money, never explaining where it came from—enough to buy all the equipment we needed to get started—and offered to babysit Jona.
    Panic is contagious. What if we do lose the Chai House? I find myself thinking. My mouth fills with bitter fluid; my palms are clammy. All that time and money, all my hopes gone. But that’s the least of it. I’ll never be able to hide something this big from Sonny-the-hawk. It’ll give him what he’s been waiting for all this time— the chance to take Jona away from me.
    Belle dabs at her eyes. She’s struck by an idea, I can tell.
    “Let’s call your mom!” she says. “She’ll know what we should do.”
    “No!” I say, grabbing for the phone, but she’s already dialing.

    The line is busy.
    A disappointed Belle hands me the phone with strict instructions to call every two minutes until I get through. Then she goes to put away the rest of the muffins.
    Belle has been a great fan of my mother’s—maybe devotee is a better word—ever since my mother deciphered a dream for her. (I never knew the details—my mother maintains strict confidentiality about the people she helps. I suspect it had something to do with Belle’s beau of the moment, a young man who sported green hair, a razor earring and a perpetual scowl, and who shortly thereafter exited her life.)
    My mother had a similar mesmerizing effect on Sonny. At their very first meeting—long before he officially became my boyfriend—he decided that he was going to adopt her. (Or, more accurately, that she was going to adopt him.) He proceeded to worm his way into her heart by shamelessly using his charm (with which commodity he is excessively endowed) and bringing her gifts of exotic organic vegetables from the farmers’ market in San Francisco. He continues to visit her every week to have dinner and to tell her his many tales of woe (self-created woe, in my opinion), to which she listens with far too much sympathy. He brings back care packages filled with his favorite gourmet dishes—palak paneer, tandoori chicken, pooris—items that take hours of preparation time. I know this because he makes sure to call and tell me.
    When I go over, she makes me Chinese stir-fry, fifteen minutes from start to finish.
    Sonny and I have had a few altercations on this subject.
    “She’s my mother, in case you’ve forgotten,” I said to him once, after a call where he’d waxed eloquent about the wonders of my mother’s fish kurma. “Now that you and I don’t have a relationship anymore, don’t you think you should back off a little?”
    “Why?” he asked, all hurt innocence. “She’s still my mom, as far as I’m concerned. She’s also the best cook in the world and one of the few people who understand—and appreciate—me.”
    “Sonny, you wouldn’t recognize appreciation if it came up and bit you on the nose.”
    “Besides,” he continued with a dramatic sigh as though I hadn’t spoken, “in my heart, you and I will always have a relationship.”
    I hung up in disgust.
    Soon after, my mother phoned. She was angry, which was rare for her. “I can’t believe you’re jealous of the poor boy, lonely as he is. I can’t believe you want him not to see me.”
    “That tattletale! Just wait till I—”
    “There you go, jumping to suspicious conclusions. I’d like you to know Sonny didn’t say a word to me.”
    “Uh-huh, sure,” I said, using my best ironic voice, but strangely, I did believe her. My mother has a way of knowing things.
    “I don’t want him sponging off of you,” I added. I had to bite my lip to stop myself from adding, And how is it you cook him all that fancy stuff you never make for me?
    “He doesn’t sponge off