Bollywood in Theaters
Puck and I had spent most of the morning reading. After awhile, two canker sores required me to pause. When I returned to the living room, Puck had my small antique rocking chair turned completely around to the window, legs crossed, chin propped in his hands, staring.
“What are you doing, buddy?”
“Watchin’ bugs.”
He began to point out fruit flies on the inside of the screen. Reminded me of Rose in her heyday of catching bees, barehanded.
By the time Puck and I arrived at the Big House, it was going on seven o’clock in the evening. Puck had escorted over his large box of Legos, already showered and in his jams. El Oso would work till nearly ten.
Carrie-Bri passed out some chocolate chip cookie dough, practicing with batches in the kitchen. Cookies are a miserable art to learn. In my humble opinion.
Rose was already there. She was taking Irish and myself to the Chesterfield AMC for the new Bollywood film: “Bobby Jasoos.” I think it was at this point that belly-dancing was mentioned. Puck ran from the room, yelling.
“Puck! What is it?”
“Belly-dancing!”
“Do you even know what that is?”
Momentary silence.
“It means taking off your shirt and dancing!”
Ah; clarification.
It was a small audience. I’m pretty sure we were the only three white girls in attendance.
“Now, we can’t laugh too loud,” Rose warned us as we walked in. “Because they probably won’t think it’s very funny if we do.”
I don’t think they did, either. For some reason, we were always laughing when the rest of the audience wasn’t. And then when everyone else thought something was hilarious, we didn’t so much. Even with subtitles. So we hoarded the giggles – Carrie continued to text me score updates from the Cards in Milwaukee – and whispered dumb comments back and forth. Well, Rose and I did.
“Wow. He’s sooo sexy…”
“Yeah! … On opposite day!”
And then of course those glorious probably slightly lost-in-translation song lyrics such as:
“You are my purest mistake.”
Or, in English this time:
“Sweety, don’t you see… I am dancing for thee.”
It was a good one. Walked out sometime after ten under a hair-less-than-full white moon.