Pappu Ailo

In 2006 I enrolled at the Culinary Academy of Austin. I was still at Dell. Classes ran Monday to Thursday, 4:30 to 10 in the evening. If you were not in uniform by 4:35, you were marked tardy.

I left the office at 4 and drove like a maniac.

Mamma was working too. She would come home and handle everything — daycare, dinner, bedtime. Alone. Every Monday to Thursday for a year.

Bedtime was the hard part.

It never worked.

You would not sleep, पिट्ल भात (pitla bhaat). You would wait.

When I walked in at 11, one of two things would happen. Some nights you would hear the door and say “Pappu ailo” (पप्पू आयलो) — Pappu is back — and I would sit with you for a few minutes, ask about your day, and you would be out. Other nights you would just see my face. That was enough. Just that I was home.

Mamma would shake her head and laugh. “I have spent the whole evening with her and she refuses to sleep until she sees you. Not fair.”

You were three, maybe four. Mamma was the one who had been there all evening. I just walked in at 11pm smelling of whatever we had cooked that night.

And there you were.

Just to see my face.