Her Name

         Her name meant “lucky” in Hindi. And she was. She had survived. She had been found. When a plane crashes hundreds of miles from anything, a two-year-old child is lucky to make it out alive, and to be where she was now, twenty years later, with a ticket in her hand, on her way to America. She stood there, surrounded by natives and tourists, not knowing how she was supposed to feel. She imagined that she should be nervous. Yet for her first trip outside of the monastery, she was doing rather well. She hadn’t lost anything, or become lost herself, though it was increasingly more evident as time went by that Sajjan was not appreciating his carrier. She reached her hand inside the cage that was just large enough for the massive dog.
         “I know,” she said, scratching Sajjan behind the ears. “I don’t like it either, but they said you have to.” She spoke to him calmly in Hindi, which didn’t seem out of place in Bombay. She couldn’t help but wonder how it would sound in America. “I’ll be speaking English to you soon,” she said, and got the distinct impression that he wouldn’t care for that either. She parted ways with Sajjan long before she boarded the plane. She was lonely without him, and she knew he felt the same, which only seemed to make it worse. They had been nearly inseparable since they’d met four years earlier.
         She had been working outside, tending to her small herb garden, when one of the monks had come by. “Your presence is requested,” was all he had said. She had lain down her spade and followed the young monk. He led her to the dormitory of one of the Elders, turning to her and bowing as she passed through the heavy yet simple wooden door. He was seated on a thin, straw mat, as he usually was. His white hair was long and pulled back, so as to be kept out of his way. On his knees, his hands rested, spotted and wrinkled from too many years of labor. His eyes were closed but, as quietly as she had entered, she knew he was aware of her presence.
         “Please, sit, my child,” he said, his eyes still closed. She knelt on the stone floor directly across from him as she always did whenever he requested to see her. She could feel the cold quickly seep through her finely woven pants. She bowed her head, as she’d been taught, so the cold stones could touch her forehead between her open palms. She sat up straight, still sitting on her heels.
         “Honored Teacher,” she said as she lifted her head, feeling the long, single braid of black hair fall noiselessly onto her back.
         His eyes finally opened. “I have something for you.” He stood quickly, far more quickly than a man of his age should be able to, and moved to the back of the chamber. He lifted the lid from a small wicker basket in the far corner and removed, with great care, a small, furry, animal. “It seems it was abandoned,” he said, replacing the lid of the basket. “I thought it would be best for you to care for it, since you know better than any other of my students what it is like to be alone.” He sat again in the same way he had been when she entered, and passed the animal across to her. She took it gently with both of her youthful hands and looked at it. It was looking around curiously with large, dark eyes, and it drooled a bit onto her pants. She looked back at the elder.
         “A puppy, Teacher?”
         “Yes,” he said. “I will bond it to you and it shall be your companion for the rest of its days. If you will have it.”
         “I will,” she said, turning her gaze back to the dog in her hands. “Thank you.”
         She was remembering it now with a smile where she stood among the crowds of people. The bonding had gone very well, and more quickly than any had expected. The elder had bid her to stand and, laying a hand on both her and the small puppy, muttered words in a language she had never heard. Even he had seemed surprised by how quickly she and her new companion had reacted to it. Only a minute had gone by when the puppy and the girl stared at each other with a sort of recognition and familiarity.
         He ushered them back outside and into the cloister where, standing in the sunlight of the afternoon, she said, “I think I will name you Sajjan. Will that be all right?”
         But what does it mean? asked a small voice inside her head. It was not a specific language, but was more an understood series of emotions and sensations. The puppy was looking up at her with large eyes.
         “It means ‘gentle-hearted,’” she said, rubbing the soft fur on top of the dog’s head.
         I would like that, the young voice replied. What is your name?
         “Syona,” she said. They were never spotted apart.
         Until now. Now she stood, alone as she hadn’t been in four years, with more people than she’d ever seen, heading for a continent where she’d never been. Her flight was announced and she followed the mass of people onto the plane, her knapsack with all of her possessions was slung over her shoulder. She had open seats to either side of her, which she appreciated for such a long flight. Traveling forward to a new place, Syona had time to think back on the past.
         She couldn’t remember the crash, or even arriving at the monastery for that matter, but she remembered when they named her. It had already been two years and the Elders were reluctant to send her away, despite the protestations of some of the younger monks. She couldn’t remember why she was allowed to stay, but she remembered what they said.
         “Syona Gyan,” one of the Elders said, placing his hands upon her small head. “Lucky Enlightenment, for that truly is your path.” She hadn’t understood what he meant by that, and even eighteen years later it wasn’t much clearer. After that moment, her life was training. Her teachers told her always, “There is power in the mind and there is power in the body. Only when you attune them both will you see the makings of the world.”
         “I don’t understand,” she would complain whenever the training seemed beyond her. Thinking back on it from where she sat a few miles above her country, she realized that she didn’t know how she realized it, but she knew when she did. It had only been a year since it happened when she was introduced to Sajjan. I must have been seventeen, she thought to herself. Has it been that long?
         It must have been, a familiar voice replied.
         “You’re right,” she said, her voice scarcely more than a whisper.
         She leaned back in the uncomfortably padded chair and closed her eyes. She could see her younger self in the cloister of the monastery. She had been kneeling in the center of the enclosure with one of the more experienced brothers behind her. In his hands was a sword, and wooden though it was, the strikes that had been issuing from it all afternoon had left a mosaic of purple, yellow, blue, and green welts on her shoulders, arms, and legs. On every downward swing, Syona pushed herself to either the left or the right, desperately trying to will her tired body out of the sword’s path, but she was never fast enough. No warning was given to her prior to each strike—she simply had to know when the monk behind her would swing.
         “Again!” he barked at her every time she was struck. “Again!”
         “But how am I supposed to know when?” she asked, still kneeling. But the monk behind her swung rather than answered, and the wooden sword caught her squarely on the head, sending her sprawling across the grass. The dull thud resonated through the cloister as Syona pushed herself onto her knees and shot a glare to the man with the sword.
         “Don’t turn around!” he commanded. “Again!”
         Syona settled herself back onto her heels, the growing bump on her head creating a steady, rhythmic pounding in her ears. She closed her eyes. She concentrated. She focused. She listened to the rhythm of her blood. She slowed her breathing, timing it with the pounding. She saw the whole of the cloister imprinted on the back of her eyelids. She was ready. He wasn’t going to get her this time. But the swing didn’t come. She tilted her head to glance behind and her eyes widened at the sight of the sword’s wooden edge inches away from her head. It wasn’t moving. Nothing in the courtyard was. From where she knelt, she could see Sajjan playfully bounding after a squirrel that was racing up a nearby tree—frozen in time, just like the monk behind her and, more importantly, the sword aimed at her head. The colors were so much more vibrant, she noticed. The grass had never seemed so green, the sky so blue. Everything had a faint glow and she knew in an instant what everything she was looking at was made of. The tapestry of the world had seemingly unraveled before her eyes. She saw and knew more in that instant than she had ever thought possible, but what was most important to her at the point in time, was that she knew exactly what the brother behind her was thinking about her. She didn’t appreciate it.
         Turning to face ahead once more, Syona set her left palm on the ground in front of her and, in a flash of motion, brought her feet out from under her, twisting her body upwards at an angle. She let the torque and force carry her legs over her, her torso bending to follow. As she did, her bare feet hit the flat of the wooden blade, sending it out of the frozen monk’s hands, clattering against the far wall of the cloister. She flowed with the momentum, her body rolling in mid-air, until she sent her feet to meet the grass, straightening her back as she landed in near silence.
         Whatever spell had been cast was broken as her feet touched the sword, and now the bewildered monk was unarmed and staring at her where she stood directly in front of him, as calmly as though she had simply stood up. The brother pressed his palms together and bowed deeply to Syona before scurrying to retrieve his weapon and inform the Elders of her success. Sajjan, now bored with the squirrel that had been eluding him, plodded over to her and tossed his bulk into the grass at her feet.
         Did you win? she heard in her mind.
         “I think I might have,” she said, bending on one knee to rub the dog’s thick fur.
         Was it fun?
         Momentarily forgetting about her bruises and bumps, Syona said, “Yes. It was.”
         A hand touched her shoulder and Syona’s eyes opened sharply revealing a woman smiling down at her. “Miss?” she said in too-friendly English. “Miss, we’ve landed.” Syona glanced around the plane and found she was the last one there.
         “Excuse me,” she said as she stood, throwing her knapsack over her shoulder. She wandered down the enclosed ramp, her thinly-soled shoes making very little noise on the worn carpeting. She retrieved Sajjan from baggage claim and brought him outside immediately to let him out of the carrier. She stepped into the California air and was instantly bombarded with an unfamiliar ambiance. The air felt dense to her, the thick grey clouds leaving a stench in her nostrils that she could taste. Car horns hollered back and forth to each other in communication and the concrete was unnaturally hard beneath her feet. She opened the wire grating of the carrier and Sajjan bounded out, clearly happy to be free. The screeching of a car’s breaks, however, sent him dashing back inside, nearly upending the plastic box.
         Why are we here? he pleaded.
         “I’m not sure,” she replied with brutal honesty. She reached her arm behind her and pulled a white envelope from her knapsack. Lifting the flap, she unfolded a worn piece of paper from inside. On it was written:
         Corner of Crenshaw and Hyde Park Blvds, Los Angeles, California. March 10, 2005. 8:00am.
         There was no signature or address. It had been handed to her by one of the Elders at the monastery with the message, “Your training will soon be complete.” She had taken the letter without question and prepared immediately for her journey. She reread the letter again, searching for some hint as to what it could be about. The Elders had always been fond of enigmatic lessons, but having to fly halfway around the world because a letter said to was a bit much, even for them. Syona folded the note and placed it securely in her pocket.
         “Whatever the reason,” she said, tying a makeshift leash around Sajjan. “We have to be there tomorrow.”
         A few of the more well-traveled brothers had offered to make travel arrangements for Syona. She realized shortly after getting a yellow cab to stop for her how grateful she was that all she had to do was tell him the name of the hotel. She enjoyed the car ride and commented more than once on how fast things moved in the US. She exited the cab when he came to a sudden stop in front of a small building badly in need of renovation. She handed the driver a couple of the green bills that had been folded in one of the pockets of her knapsack and pulled a very grateful Sajjan from the backseat. The building, with a half burned out sign that read “The Sleepy Time Motel,” seemed deserted with the exception of one or two cars parked haphazardly in front of it.
         Walking through the door, a bell rang to announce her presence. Syona turned excitedly to examine what had made the sound while Sajjan gave a yell far too high pitched for a dog of his size and tried to hide himself behind her legs. She was scratching his head when a man appeared through a beaded curtain, rubbing his hands with a dishcloth.
         “What can I do for you?” he asked impatiently. Syona approached the counter and placed her hands on it. She was amazed at the smooth, brown and blue marbled surface and drew her hand across it once or twice before speaking.
         “I have a room,” she said, finally lifting her large eyes to meet his. “I was told you have my name. Syona Gyan. I have never been here before,” she added, eager to use more of her English.
         “That’s nice,” the man said, wholly uninterested by the whole thing. He found her name on a list and handed her a key. “Third on the left,” he said, pointing back out the door she’d come in. Syona stepped back into the sunlight with Sajjan in tow and walked along the outside of the building, stepping over bits of debris and rubble, until the number on the door matched the number on the key. Once inside, Sajjan flopped himself into a corner of the room, clearly happy to be somewhere with four stationary walls that didn’t ring or buzz or screech or honk. The room itself was a little dingy and there were unidentified stains on nearly every surface, but after so much traveling, Syona hardly had it in her to explore anything anyway. She lay down on the bed, which creaked a bit under her weight, but creaked even more when Sajjan joined her. She was asleep almost instantly, with a blanket draped over her as best as Sajjan could manage it with as little drool as possible.
         No light could penetrate the heavy smoke-stained curtains, but Syona knew it was just past dawn. She ate some of the food she had packed from the monastery and welcomed the taste of home. Re-braiding her hair in the bathroom mirror, Syona spoke calmly to Sajjan.
         I don’t like this, he said, lifting his rear leg to scratch behind his ears.
         “It’s not that bad, is it?”
         I don’t like not knowing where we’re going.
         “I don’t like it much either,” she said, tying the length of rope around his neck.
         And I really don’t like that, he said, fidgeting against her as her slender fingers tied the knot. He shook himself when she finished, sending hair and a bit of slobber everywhere.
         “I know,” she said, taking the end of her home-made leash in her hand. “But I told you what could happen if you just run around.” He didn’t have a response for that.
         Syona asked the man at the front desk to call a taxi for them, and within a few minutes, one arrived. “Can you take us to…” she removed the folded letter from her pocket. “Crenshaw and Hyde Park, please?” She didn’t know what these were names for or even if it was somewhere nearby. The driver recognized the names and took off without hesitation. After about twenty minutes of sudden turns, sharp stops, and a whimpering dog, the car came to rest in front of a large commercial building with a neon sign that read “SuperScience Unlimited.” Syona once again paid the driver who sped off immediately. Sajjan, sitting on the cement curb, looked from the building to Syona and back again.
         We’re going in there?
         “Yes. Why shouldn’t we?”
         Just checking. His oversized paws thudded softly on the pavement as he approached the building with Syona holding the leash only a few steps behind. At the double set of glass doors, he looked up at her. After you.
         The door slid open easily on greased hinges. Only a few fluorescent bulbs offered
any light to the windowless space. Syona and Sajjan wove between empty shelves encased in dust, following the sounds of voices in a distant room. All of the voices and even a few languages were unfamiliar to her, her small steps echoing beside Sajjan’s as they walked down the linoleum hallway. At the end of the hallway, the volume reached its peak and Syona was able to wander into the room more or less unnoticed.
         It was a large open space, possibly converted from a warehouse, and it was filled easily a hundred people. Different languages whirled around her as she skirted the edge of the room, hoping to overhear something about why everyone was here. Sajjan walked by her side protectively, sniffing the air occasionally and letting out a low growl whenever anyone stepped a little too close. More people filed in and the smell of bodies reached a crescendo. Finally, a man in a black pinstripe suit stepped up to a little platform that Syona had just now noticed at one end of the room.
         “Ladies and gentlemen,” he said with a deep voice that rand with bravado. “No doubt you are wondering why you are here.” The room fell silent almost immediately as the crowd turned toward the man in the suit. “You are here because you are all special and unique individuals. And we sent for you.”
         “No shit, Sherlock,” someone in the front called. “Why?” A unified murmur began to swell through the group, but the man in the suit continued on, oblivious.
         “You have all tapped into something larger than yourselves. Rather than seeing reality for what it is, you have all devised, in your own ways, a method for seeing the world for the fabric it is stitched from. You are all magicians of a sort.” He held his arms open, palms up, as he addressed the mass of people who were now looking at one another with recognition and admiration. The man in the suit continued. “You have figured out a way to impose your will on reality, to change it as you see fit.” He paused briefly, dropping his hands to his sides. “In other words, you are anomalies.” The proud and cheerful hum that had been building since the beginning of the speech began to dissipate. “You are preternatural oddities. Your presence in reality is disruptive and must be eliminated.”
         Syona knew what was going to happen half a second before it did—it seemed everyone there did. But half a second was not enough time to react. Other men in black suits had filed in and along one side of the room during the speech and were now razing every moving thing to the ground with automatic gunfire. Syona dropped to the floor as the man in front of her fell forward, having been pierced more times in that instant than she could take in. The gunfire lasted longer than the screaming, and soon, other than the men in suits, little else was moving. Syona lay still, trying not to move, hoping the blood that now stained her face and shirt and hair could be mistaken for her own. But the men were walking methodically through the room, nudging bodies and shooting anything that moved. They were getting closer to her. She closed her eyes. Another shot. Close this time. Too close. She felt the kick in her ribs. She breathed in sharply.
         But nothing came. She lifted her head slowly, carefully. A man was standing over her, a gun pointed downward at her head, motionless. She pushed herself up with her arms for a better look. Nothing was moving. Droplets of blood were held suspended, hanging outside of gravity, their normally spherical perfection distorted by the force with which they had been given flight. Only one thought came to her mind: “I have a chance.” Syona gave a hard push with her arms and tucked her legs in, putting her feet directly beneath her in an instant. She turned to bolt toward the door, but stopped in mid stride and looked down at her empty hand.
         “Sajjan?” She spotted him quickly, crouching as best he could behind a body, trying not to be seen. Frozen in time. She cursed under her breath as she remembered what happened when she kicked the sword from the brother’s hand years before. Time moved again when she interfered with it. She turned to the man closest to her, whose gun was still aimed downward, the look on his face was that of someone merely doing their job. Without a second thought, Syona ripped the gun from his hardened grasp and took aim. She was better with her fists than with a weapon, to be sure, but this would certainly offer her an advantage in the current situation. The man gave a startled cry when he looked up and into the barrel of his own firearm. Bullets tore across the room.
         The man in the suit hit the floor a second before Syona did. The sound of their landings was muffled by those who had already fallen. The ceiling seemed so far away from her from where she lay staring up at it. The burning in her chest gave way quickly to an icy chill, and as the lights in the room brightened to an almost painful level, bleaching out all else, Syona could here barking and, a moment later, silence.

         “Your presence is requested.”
         Syona’s eyes snapped open and she dropped the spade she had been holding. It clattered to the ground. A monk was standing before her, looking at her expectantly to follow. She did so, hesitantly, looking back to where the spade now rested in the dust, wondering where the pain had gone. He led her to the dormitory of one of the Elders, turning to her and bowing as she passed through the heavy yet simple wooden door.
         He was seated on a thin, straw mat, as she knew he would be. His long, white hair was pulled back so as to be kept out of the way. On his knees, his hands rested, spotted and wrinkled from too many years of labor. His eyes were closed but, now more than ever, she knew he was aware of her presence.
         “Please, sit, my child,” he said, his eyes still closed. But her knees were already bending. She knelt on the stone floor directly across from him as she always did. She ignored the cold of the stone floor through her thinly woven pants. She bowed her head, as she knew she would, so the cold stones could touch her forehead between her sweating palms. She sat up straight, still sitting on her heels.
         “Honored Teacher,” she said as she lifted her head, the long single braid of black hair falling noiselessly onto her back.
         His eyes finally opened. “I have something for you.” He stood quickly, though not as quickly as she remembered, and moved to the back of the chamber where he lifted the lid from a small wicker basket in the far corner. He removed, with great care, a small, furry, animal.
         “Sajjan,” she said, before he could say anything else.
         “What was that, child?”
         Syona tore her eyes away from the small dog in his hands. “I think I will call him Sajjan,” she said. He smiled as he handed the puppy to her. “My name is Syona,” she said quietly into the dog’s ear. They were never spotted apart.