Chapter Twenty-Nine

“Read me your speech, Chanie.”

“Okay, Mr. Tanji. But only if you tell me why you did this for me.”

“Because I had something to offer you.”

“But I was a hooker.”

“And I am a man who foolishly bought hookers. That doesn’t mean we are disqualified from being better people or from living better lives.”

“How can I thank you?”

“You can be great, my sweet girl. That’s how.”

Think about my offer, Chanie …

I remembered that night. That was the night that Dan and Esther had left the note on my door telling me that they prayed for me. That I mattered. And then Mr. Tanji had found me pacing up and down the curb while Brenda and Milos stalked me from a few feet away. He’d held my hand while he drove us to the Sawridge. He’d listened to me talk and ignored the relentless beeping of his phone to ask me questions. Like I mattered. I’d told him everything that night: about my first rape, the arrest, school, the beatings, drugs and alcohol, the essay contest. The essay contest! That’s when he’d said, “Let me make you an offer, Chanie.”

I’d accepted his offer. Since then, we’d met twenty-one times. He’d said, “Twenty-one is my lucky number.” We had a routine: he’d pick me up, take me to the Sawridge, order dinner, and then we’d get to work. He brought the books that he said had changed his life: The Bhagavad Gita, The Upanishads, The Dhammapada, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, The Way of the Bodhisattva. He also brought books by his favourite authors: Eknath Easwaran, Pema Chodron, Thich Nhat Hanh, Sharon Salzberg, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, and Jack Kornfield.

The books swelled with highlights, tape flags, and folded corners. He said, “These words and teachings are sacred. They deserve to be read mindfully.” The pages showed the art of his soul through colours, notations, and symbols in the margins. “It’s these markings that will tell you everything about the man I really am.”

I’d read everything he’d told me to and made notes of my own. I’d asked him a thousand questions. He’d said, “You’re lucky to be getting so much information so quickly, Chanie. Like SparkNotes.”

“Let’s call them Chai Notes,” I’d said. “They’re spicy like you!”

Mr. Tanji had laughed. He’d said, “My sweet girl. I will talk about our readings, show you great speakers, and tell you my greatest successes and failures before my audiences, but I will not read your essay or hear your speech until the night before. It has to be that way in order for it to truly be your accomplishment.”

“Will it ever be ready?”

“Trust me, my sweet girl. All writing is eventually ready at some point. Maybe not for the writer, but for the reader. Trust the process.”

“Why did you help me?” I held the cue cards in my hand. “Come on, Mr. Tanji. I’m not reading it until you tell me why.”

“Chanie. I am a very rich man. But I haven’t always been popular. I was often bullied as a kid. Anyway, I used to have a lot of self-esteem issues. Imagine a brown kid wearing a turban in junior high! I have a good job, but I made my money in stocks. Total luck. Didn’t know what I was doing. I got really drunk one night and told my buddy to invest my whole inheritance. Big inheritance! It could have gone the other way. I am very lucky. When I hit it big, I did all the stupid things I thought rich men did. Drugs, hookers, trips to Vegas, always buying rounds.”

I’d never seen weakness in him. He’d always seemed so powerful. On top of it. Like nothing could make him falter. Mr. Tanji commanded the room, whether on the news or navigating his rowdy friends through drunken nights.

He sighed and reached for a Pellegrino. “Do you remember the last time we were together before I found you again? Those two morons Amal and Amal were with me. And that silly Amal kept insisting on kissing you. You pleaded with me to make him stop, and I laughed at you and told you that I’d give you more money.”

“I remember,” I said. That was the first night I’d ever had sex with Blue and the night that Perry had died.

“You said, ‘It’s not about the money!’ And I said, ‘Of course it is.’”

“It’s okay, Mr. Tanji.”

“It’s not okay, Chanie. When you looked at me, your face looked broken. That’s when I realized you may have had higher expectations of me. The hurt on your face — it made me have higher expectations of myself.”

“That’s behind us now.” I smiled, but his face looked dark and sad.

“Chanie, when I met you, you should have been playing with dolls, not selling your body on the street. I knew I couldn’t save you then, but the essay gave me an opportunity to help you save yourself.”

“I used to have a crush on you, Mr. Tanji. I used to imagine us slow dancing in a ballroom, like a prince and princess.”

“What a sweet girl. I’m no prince, Chanie.”

“You’re my prince, Mr. Tanji.”

“And you changed my life, sweet girl. I’ve never bought another round of drinks or a hooker since that night with the Amals.”

“Come on … Really?”

“Really, sweet girl. You never know how you affect someone’s life. We can choose to be awakened by others or remain in a dull sleep. Chanie, you awakened me.”

“I’m really going to miss you.” I felt my nostrils flare as tears came to my eyes.

“Don’t cry, Chanie. I’ll never be very far. But, Chanie …”

“Yes.”

“Please call me Ali from now on. That’s what my friends call me.”

“Okay, Mr. Tan— Ali.”

“Now, let me hear your speech!”

I took a few deep breaths but couldn’t speak.

“Remember! Keep your eyes up. Let the audience see the life in you,” Mr. Tanji prompted, his eyes alight, passionate, expectant, waiting.

He’d never lit up that way when I used to work for him. I’d done strip shows, lap dances, and sex shows. I’d been naked in front of him a hundred times or more. I’d played out fantasies and pretended to be a cheerleader, nurse, teacher, French maid, or whatever suited his fancy. I’d danced nude on top of pool tables at private parties and pole danced in his buddy’s basements. But I’d never been intimidated until now because that had been Jade. Jade’s body, not Chanie’s. He was waiting for Chanie. My mind. My spirit.

“Remember, Chanie. Anyone can recite an essay. In order to touch your listeners’ hearts, you must show them your truth.”

“Okay, Mr. Tanji.”

He smiled and sat back in his chair. “Any time, sweet girl.”

I took a big drink of water and started reading from my cue cards. “Who told you that you have to be average? Mediocre? That you couldn’t be what you wanted to be? You have to believe in yourself, no matter what challenges …”

I rambled through the speech, making eye contact as often as possible. I waved my hands the way I’d seen Pastor Terence Travino do in his TV sermons. I paced back and forth. Dull. Flat. Regurgitated. Great content! No life, no vitality, no truth. The words were not my truth; they were bits and pieces of my notes and wishes.

It was 10:00 p.m., and I had twelve hours until I had to give my speech at City Hall. I had one person in the audience, and he looked bored. I dropped the cue cards to the floor and danced a little jig.

Mr. Tanji laughed. “Your speech is very sound, Chanie. But where is your heart?”

“Not on these cue cards.”

“Well, we better get you a big chai latte, so you can get to work.”