Bone white moonlight bathed the cement floor. On a hand-woven palm-frond mat, an Indian man in his thirties clad in nothing but a sarong sleeps soundly. The shadows of the palm oil trees dancing in the white dance about him.
The man snored lightly, and never stirred as another long shadow slid into the room. A jet-black cobra entered, carving a slow path towards the foot of the mat. A long square of banana leaf lay at the man’s feet. On it; a saucer of milk and a de-shelled hard-boiled egg. The snake wove its way and came to a full stop by the egg.
The cobra slithered around the egg, on and off the banana leaf, coiling about it as it rolled the egg around with the tip of its nose. Its eyes bulged and like some diabolical shapeshifter, the cobra unhinged its jaw and sucked down the egg. With the oval of the egg still halfway down its body, it slid to the saucer and lapped at the milk.
The milk swirled against the pink of its tongue, its fangs glistening. It never noticed the man stirring. He slowly came to and propped himself up on his elbows. The man regarded the cobra not with fear, but with terror.
“Pop?”
The cobra stopped mid-lap. Paused. It slowly lifted its neck, unfurling. The man didn’t flinch.
“What do you want Pop?”
Arun’s eyes snap open and squint against the California sunlight that floods the bedroom. He could see Mid-Wilshire stretch out from the bed. High above the chaos unfurling below. All he heard was the hum of the central air, set to a consistent sixty-nine degrees Fahrenheit.
He gathered his sarong, pulled on a ratty tee that said “Who’s your mamak?” on it and wandered over to the kitchen. A clinical affair of muted slate greys and cream. He touched one of the recessed panels and the door gently opened revealing a massive fridge with five shelves. Ruthlessly organized.
The top shelf brimmed with multiple rows of pre-packaged bulletproof coffee. The one below, stacked with meal prep. Then a shelf of meat products, followed by vegetables, and finally fruits. The door itself was filled with bottles of sparkling water, green juice, and cold brew coffee. All the trimmings of a California cliche. Easy, organic, pathetically divorced from the realities of where food and produce came from.
He grabs a bottle of cold brew, shut the fridge and sat on the stools by the counter that looked out over the traffic. Cars jostled with the buses, people crawling all over like insects invading space that didn’t belong to them. He swigged the bottle, then choked as too much went down his throat. He coughed, cleared his throat and -
“Call from Dr. Gadri.” He glanced up at the speakers in the ceiling.
“Answer.”
A soft chime, and then the crackle of the other end of a call.
“Arun?”
“Hey doc.”
“Hey. Your results are in. Do you have time today? I’d like to come walk you through some of the results.”
“Everything OK?”
“There are a few things I’d like to go over.”
“Google what’s my calendar like today?”
A pause then - “You have no appointments today.”
“You heard that doc?”
“Yeah - how about one pm?”
“Works for me. Anything you can tell me now?”
“No need to panic. We’ll talk later.”
Dr. Gadri hung up.
Arun finished his coffee and sat there lost in thought as his fingers drummed an old beat subconsciously. Despite what Dr. Gadri had said, Arun knew that something wasn’t quite right. Typically the reports would just be sent directly into the app.
He decided not to worry about it till the appointment. The dream had faded now, though his father remained on his mind. His father who he’d taken what seemed like a lifetime to escape from. The man he’d moved halfway across the world to get as far as he could from.
He hated that he’d become a cliche; the estranged son who didn’t want to live in the shadow of his father. Here he was, as far West as one could get. Any further and he would be back in the East. There were days when he wistfully wondered if he could have cut it out there, found a way to carve out a quiet life. Then he remembered the heat, the feeling of being a third-class citizen, and the complete lack of control that would eat him up on the inside.
But more often than not, he thought about his mother. Where she was, what she was doing, what her life was like now. His memories of her were all jumbled and hazy these days. There were moments where he’d catch a sliver of her laugh in his mind, or a ghost of a song she used to sing to him as a child, as he drifted off to sleep.
Some days he tries to search his mind for why he chose not to go with her. He had been given a choice; leave with her and start a new life or remain with his father. He chose to stay with his father which turned out to be the biggest mistake of his life. He wished he could tell her that.
He drove to Gadri’s still pre-occupied with the past, letting the autopilot do its job. He sat there, thinking about how long it had been since he had heard from his father. He often wondered if the man was dead. How would he know? Who would know to tell him?
The car parked itself and Arun stepped out, wincing a bit as the reflection of the sun on the all-glass facade of the building hit his eyes. In all the years he’d been coming here, he was still one of the few patients of color. The place was so expensive all your saw was old white people and start-up bros. The majority of other Asians he encountered were the doctors and medical staff.
He was greeted as soon as he stepped in by those new Boston Dynamics robots who then escorted him to the private waiting room reserved for members with subscriptions to the concierge service. It looked more like the lobby of a fancy hotel than a medical waiting room.
He poured himself some iced tea and sat down. There weren’t many other people in the room, and the unspoken social contract here was “keep quiet and keep to yourself”.
The robot returned to indicate that Dr. Gadri was ready for him and escorted him to the far side of the wall where the outline of a door suddenly lit up and the panel swung open inwards. Arun stepped through into Dr. Gadri’s office, the panel hissing shut behind him.
“Take a seat Arun.”
Dr. Gadri smiled and motioned for him to sit down across from her.
“Bad news I take it.”
Dr. Gadri pulled up some scans of his chest and abdomen.
“How are you feeling?”
“Fine.”
“So we’re looking at your chest and abdomen. Can you see the darker sections?”
“Cancer?”
Gadri looked at him funny. “Why would you think that?”
“Because when your doctor asks you to come in its normally cancer.”
“It’s not cancer.”
Arun shifted in his chair uncomfortably.
“It’s not cancer but it is something we need to talk about. I’d like to run more tests so we can understand it better.”
“Stop calling it “it” - what is IT?”
“We don’t know. What we do know is that it is spreading. Fast. And it’s not something we’ve seen before.”
Arun stared at her.
“Arun?”
“I’m still confused.”
“You have something that looks and behaves like a virus but it’s not a virus we’ve encountered before. We don’t know how to treat it yet and we don’t know what it will do to you.”
“And you couldn’t share this via the app or over the phone because?”
Gadri nodded, acknowledging the humor. “I understand that it seems strange and overwhelming. Here is what I’m proposing; I’d like to get a bunch of labs done. We can do them here now, or I can have a bot come to your home and draw them there.”
“Send the bot.”
“I also want you to reach out to any family you have. Typically with something like this it is hereditary. Someone in your family has, or knows someone who has had this. I’d like for you to see what you can find out.”
“Am I dying doc?”
“Arun I think it’s too early to even - “
“No bullshit doc.”
Gadri sighed. “Do the labs. Go see your family. I don’t know how much time you have.”