Bu Dayaji stood just behind and to the right of Pak Dayaji’s chair. Over the decade of their marriage, Indayani had come to lean there against his chair. Her eyes waited on the visible profile and parts of him as he blew gently across the saucer of coffee. It was black, with one teaspoon of sugar—she knew. Her anticipation was directed at his reception of the fried banana, his favorite sweet. The recipe had been refined over the years. But today she had prepared it with care usually reserved for holidays: thin strips of bread latticed over thinly sliced banana. She thought of the slices she had rejected and given to the chickens, which received them eagerly. But she knew he never ate until after his first sip of coffee.

He had been in the field since dawn. He was flooding the two large plots in preparation for seeding. The earth wall of one large plot had dried to cracking. His smile opened as his nostrils flared to bring in more of the coffee's aroma. He looked down into the saucer. The dark brown took his mind to the muddy deluge of the collapsing wall. He leaned forward and placed the saucer on the table beside his cup. Leaning back, he sighed, closing his eyes, and worked to focus on a memory of Indayani’s hands sliding over his skin. His smile returned.

The slow, deliberate motion of his eyelashes drew her attention. After a few moments, when the lashes had not parted, she knew the fried banana would be cold before he tried one. If she could reheat one or two—but the bread would be hard and dark after a second bath in the oil. She told herself she should have thought to save one batch to cook when he became ready.

It was never that she didn't know. They had lived these mistakes many times, now. It was the excitement of the moment, this time. When the idea to make the indulgence came to her, the thrill of a holiday en-wrapped her, and the joy she knew it would have given him held her.

She tried to imagine what he was thinking about, if anything, as she covered the food for later.


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The ordering of the Desa Cycle was crafted using sequences generated by Random.Org

disclaimer: This work does not reflect the United States Peace Corps, the United States government, nor the government of Indonesia.