Sex Kittens and Horn Dawgs Fall in Love by Maryrose Wood

tells me you are pilgrims, searching for enlightenment?” she asks.
    “Shashti is my Indian name,” explains Jacob.
    “You search, but already you are wiser than many who call themselves teachers,” says Dervish, “because you don’t chase false images. You search for the truth. You search for love.”
    “We’re, uh, doing a science fair project,” says Matthew.
    “Of course,” she says. “And you love each other?”
    Apparently, neither Matthew nor I know what to say to this, since we basically just stammer and go “Uh” while pulling at our damp socks.
    “Of course,” Dervish repeats, as if we’ve answered. “Such a strong connection. The past lives are many, many. And what can Dervish tell you about love that you don’t already know?”
    For a split second I wonder what it would be like if I started to refer to myself in the third person. Sorry, Mom, Felicia has no intention of cleaning her room! What can Felicia tell you about dust bunnies that you don’t already know? “We would like a specific example of two people falling in love,” I say. “We want to know how it happens, so we can design experiments that will recreate the phenomenon under laboratory conditions.”
    Matthew looks at me admiringly. I realize I’m starting to sound like him. Does love do that to people?
    Dervish nods and turns to Jacob. “Play for me, Shashti. Tales of love require music.”
    Jacob strums his sitar. It makes a pleasant, twangy sound, almost like a banjo, but as he begins to play it takes on a voice all its own, with sliding, complicated melodies in the high strings and a rhythmic droning underneath.
    Dervish reaches for a small drum and starts to play along with Jacob—I mean Shashti. She strikes the drum with all the parts of her hand in turn, the palm, the fingers, the fingertips, each strike making a different sound. The drumming makes me want to clap along with the music, but I don’t, since I don’t want to miss a single syllable of what Dervish is going to say.
    “I call my song ‘The Tale of Tenzin and Dervish,’ ” says Dervish, speaking in time to the music.
    “Hai!” Jacob cries out. It sounds like a little yelp.
    “I call my song ‘The Lovers on the Mountain,’ ” Dervish singsongs.
    “Hai!” yelps Jacob. “Hai! Hai!”
    Is he choking? I start a quick mental review of the Heimlich maneuver, but then I realize this is the sitar-player equivalent of shouting “Rock on!” to the singer.
    “I call my song ‘The True Language of Love,’ ” chants Dervish.
    Matthew has closed his eyes. He’s leaning back on a big purple-orange-golden pillow and looks relaxed and peaceful. I decide to close my eyes, too.
    Jacob sways and plays. The chord underneath stays constant, but the music is continually changing nevertheless. And now, Dervish begins to sing her long-awaited Raga-Saga of Love.
    Unfortunately for us, it’s in Hindi.
    And yet, while she sings and Jacob plays, a whole story unspools in my head, like a dream but clearer. It’s about me and Matthew. We’re climbing the side of a mountain. He slips, or maybe I’m the one who slips. Arms stretch out across a great chasm; we reach out to each other. . . .
    Dervish has another student, so there isn’t time to get a full line-by-line translation of her song, which was made up on the spot in any case and would be difficult to reconstruct. But the quick summary she gives as she shows us out of the house goes something like this:
    Many years ago, she was trekking in the mountains of Nepal with a Sherpa guide named Tenzin. In a sudden storm, both of them lost their footing and nearly slid off the side of the mountain. Somehow they scrambled back onto the trail, but Tenzin had broken his left ankle and Dervish had broken her right big toe. By lashing their injured legs together, three-legged-race style, they were able to make it back to base camp, and there, on a slippery slope of the Himalayas, they became passionate lovers until their