IN THE MIDST OF HIS COLLEGE LIFE, Prashant could not help but recall the fumbling of his high school years: a succession of forming crushes and being crushed, then finding new crushes. He came to understand that a guy like him—most guys, in fact—lived in a world of soiled sheets, soiled tissues, and damaged egos. The ones that didn’t were obvious winners, guys who excelled at sports or who had been blessed with heads of hair that belonged in J.Crew catalogs and who could attract real girls to fulfill their desires. Eventually, he and his Indian friends had to admit that if they were going to make it with anybody in high school, they were going to have to aim for a one-off encounter with an Indian girl.
This girl could not be one of their district but someone removed, an interloper whose school system didn’t intersect with theirs. If the girl’s family appeared only rarely at their regular gatherings, then the threat of retribution (should the situation prove a failure) was not as much of a danger. Therefore, blasphemously enough, he began to think that a “function” during Diwali or Holi would make the best opportunity. Typically, these took place at a nearby community college, bringing together different Indian families from various parts of the state. These functions featured an assortment of “performances”—mostly dances by girls decked out in saris and dupattas and lots of makeup. For a situation that was far from ideal, this was as ideal as it got.
A few of the performances included boys. Prashant had been blessedly freed from the responsibility of performing a long time ago, but a couple of his friends—chiefly, Sanjay and Gaurav—still got badgered by their mothers into joining a dance number. Prashant always took pleasure in seeing his friends flinch as one auntie or another applied makeup or an extra sash to his costume. At the same time, it was perhaps more of a punishment to be in the audience, sandwiched between his parents and forced to watch every act. They were excruciating, the countless dances, the same moves—and often the same songs—used again and again. If insanity were truly doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, then en masse Indians represented the most dangerous of psychotics.
A Holi function held during his sophomore year of high school: after about four hours of pounding feet, slapping hands, clacking sticks, feeble applause, and the audience’s constant talking, Prashant emerged from the auditorium with almost his whole body asleep. The one part that wasn’t asleep—never, in fact, seemed to rest—was looking forward to this after-performance respite, when it might actually find some release. Prashant found an inconspicuous bathroom on the other end of the building and rubbed one out in a stall.
Afterward, he went to the lobby, where a huge buffet had been erected. Gaggles of Indians cut each other in line just to get a plateful of food, after which they would go off to some corner to gossip with people they saw only twice a year. Prashant found his crew easily enough. Sanjay and Gaurav had already doffed their headdresses and sashes but still wore kurtas and half-erased eyeliner. None of the guys had the energy to chide them for their girly attire today; the river of punch lines seemed to have run dry.
“I’m so not in the mood for this shitty food today,” Sanjay said. “Who wants to make a Chipotle run?”
There was never a time when they didn’t want to make a Chipotle run, so fifteen minutes later, they were huddled around a stainless steel table at that establishment, their mouths gnashing at dripping, lettuce-laced burritos that took Sanjay’s and Gaurav’s lipstick off better than any napkin or tissue. They knew that their mothers would be furious if they found out that they’d ditched the prasad for this place, but there was something about the camaraderie of fast food that fused them together way more than any shoddy religious get-together.
“See anyone promising?” Vipul asked. His family was strictly vegetarian, but in recent months, he had introduced meat into his diet, like a desi version of taking up smoking. A string of pulled pork dangled from his burrito like crushed sinew from a giant’s mouth.
“Did you see that girl Sandhya?” Sanjay asked.
“Totally,” said Gaurav. “She is ridiculous. She doesn’t even look Indian.”
“I know—that’s hot,” said Vipul.
“Do we know anyone who knows her?” Prashant asked. He had definitely noticed her. She was a passable dancer onstage, but it was actually her indifference toward dancing that made her so attractive. She seemed like the kind of pretty girl who impressed parents but who probably lit up a joint from time to time and could hang just fine with the guys.
Vipul confirmed this. “I heard that she parties with some of those douche bags—Nikhil, Avinash, Roshan. I think she sticks around for the weed.”
“Who’s got some, by the way?” Gaurav asked. He was still wearing his kurta, as was Sanjay, and Prashant felt embarrassed sitting with them. There were now so many Indians in their area that kurtas and salwars were pretty standard sights, but Prashant still felt odd sitting with two guys whose pajama bottoms were so tight that their junk was visible.
“I’m out,” Vipul said. “Smoked the last bit I had two nights ago. I could call Chalaak.” Chalaak, whose name meant “cunning” in Hindi, was their dealer, a rare Indian high school dropout who dated white girls exclusively even though he insisted on blasting bhangra music. He worked part-time at an Indian video store to put on a convincing front, but he made thousands of dollars by supplying people like Vipul with steady fixes. Thankfully, Prashant knew another one of Chalaak’s customers: Gori, Seema Auntie and Satish Uncle’s daughter.
“Gori’s always packing,” Prashant said. “I saw her sitting by herself in the auditorium, totally baked out of her mind. She’ll probably cough it up for us easily enough.”
This all seemed perfectly logical to them: exhorting the drug services of one girl at a religious function so that they could impress another drug-inclined girl in attendance. They found Gori soon thereafter, seated in the same place where Prashant had seen her. She was a chill girl, barely interested in anything but pot, and there was a laid-back inflection to everything she said. Most of the guys suspected that she was a lesbian, but Prashant somehow knew that this wasn’t the case. His friends just couldn’t accept the fact that a girl like this didn’t find them attractive. Prashant assumed that she had some good-looking guy of indeterminate ethnic background whom she hung out with when she wasn’t at home.
“Yo, Gori,” Prashant said as he slid next to her in the auditorium. There was a tabla-and-harmonium duo performing for the lunchtime crowd. “You packing?”
Gori snickered. “I’m doing just fine, thanks. How are you?”
“Sorry,” Prashant said. “Sorry. How are you doing?”
“I’m just fucking with you,” Gori said. Her voice was deep, gravelly, and she was twisting a tangle of her hair between two fingers. She was clad almost exclusively in sweats; her parents had clearly given up the idea of getting her into traditional garb for events like this. “Here you go,” she said, producing a long cylinder in which religious incense was normally kept.
“Really?” Prashant said, mocking her choice of transport.