the bear

it was because of her hair. yellow blonde, halfway down her back. she wore it up while she was there, because it was so hot, because she had to bathe using a bucket and therefore washing her hair was a chore she rarely was up for tackling. but also because the attention she got was so focused, so directed that it was almost hostile. from everyone-- men, their eyes leering and gropey; women, their gazes accusing. the children that lived in the hollowed out enclaves of the hills in the village would sit and wait for her to pass on the narrow path after dawn, as she was on her way to breakfast. at first they sat on the molded mud steps, silent and awe struck. they had not yet been inundated with images of america, with the notion of blondeness, of sexuality, of whiteness, but still they knew to look. still they knew that her hair was there for looking. as the days went on, they became braver, running in front of her and smiling. she smiled back, sometimes she knelt down and spoke to them in her fragmented, lopsided hindi. they looked at each other and giggled in delight. as this ritual continued they added the final stroke- they reached out and touched it. it felt like theirs, smooth, straight. some days she would wash it before bed and wear it down, and on these days their eyes reacted as if they had been given the moon on a popsicle stick- it was too much, it was too wild, too dreamlike. they held handfuls of it to their appled cheeks, they ran their fingers through it, they tossed it over her face and watched with pleasure as it fell right back into place. they could never get enough.
she hired a driver to take her to the taj mahal. in the car were other westerners, an older british couple and a single man from california who was a high school teacher. she slept most of the way, missing all of the punjab region and waking only when the traffic jams, in which cars, motorbikes, rickshaws, elephants, and humans became a massive, pulsing tangle. they arrived as the entry gates to the palace were opening, and she was glad to beat the crowds and the heat.
she had expected to be disappointed, as she usually was with architectural wonders and other things that were unilaterally considered perfect. but when she saw it she understood. it was too beautiful to bear. and it only became more glorious the closer to it she got. the marble used to construct it reminded her of fair skin- almost translucent, fragile. yet it composed this giant, this fortress, this strong declaration. she wandered around and around it for hours. the crowds began to get thicker and thicker and as more people came, she got more attention. women asked her to pose in pictures with their husbands, their faces pleading and thrilled. at first she did it, standing in between a father and son, but as soon as the camera clicked there were more people begging to get a peice of her. groups of men followed her up and down stairs, around the miles of balconies surrounding the structure. some were young and curious, others older and purposive. she tried to rake the fear out of her system- she was in a very public place, and the people looking were only doing it because she was a novelty. she doubted any true desire, or any active longing. and she understood her part of the blame. she understood that this was not just something happening to her, but rather something happening as a result of choices she made. not covering her head. being blonde, and loving being blonde, to begin with. going there, shrouded in her americanness, in her womanness, in her whiteness. not knowing how, or if, she should be doing something differently.
soon though she did become uncomfortable. there was one group of four teenage boys, who were being followed indiscreetly by a group of their female peers. every corner she rounded they were there, conspicuous and looking her in the eye. their gaze wasnt eager like the children's had been, or excited like the wives of the dumpy, shy husbands. their gaze was the same as men on the street where she lived in america, the same as men in bars or in cars as she crossed teh street. it had nothing to do with novelty, or curiousity, or her celebrity status as the only blonde in a sea of non-blonde. it was shrewd, ominous. it cut to the fear she was trying to avoid and it held it, throbbing like a heart, in the palm of their collective hand. they had the power to let it die on its own accord or to bite into it, letting it drip down their chins, and then toss it away. they recognized what all of the others hadnt, that though it would seem to be the opposite, she was at their mercy, as she always had been, as she always would be.
she left early, bought no souveniers, and waited by the van for the others to arrive, their faces peachy and damp.
she stayed awake on the ride back to the village. she was the kind of tired that had no immediate relief. like food poisoning, there is nothing to do but wait for it to pass, and do whatever it is at the moment that the body demands. she noticed, on this four hour drive, something that she had completley missed on the way there. every thiry miles or so, on the shoulder of the two lane highway that bisected the rolling, infinite landscape on either side, there would be a man and a bear. the heat boiled up and made them, in the distance, waving flags of color. the bear, always skinny, splotchy haired and rotting, was on a leash and as the car approached the man would lead the bear out into the middle of the road on his hind legs, and make him dance. the driver would have to pay the man in order for him to allow us to pass.
the bears looked drugged, dying. its eyes were washed up jellyfish in the sand. its mouth, perpetually ajar, was foaming and desparate. though she assumed that the bear was intended to threaten the driver into giving money, she saw the handle of a gun sticking out of the man's pants, every time. the man, the bear, and everyone in every car that passed, knew that the bear had nothing to do with it.