*
The end of dinner was refreshing, much less shaky than its beginning. They had, against expectation, enjoyed an enlightening time overall. Ranjana was surprised to see that Harit had a personality. She knew many Indians who existed merely as auxiliary characters. They reacted to others passively and held their beliefs like canned goods that they might consume later, perhaps years later. There was survival but not life. Harit, for all his reticence predinner, for all the nervousness that he exuded, had become someone to like. He had asked questions. He had stepped outside of himself. He had been bold enough to ask after her husband—Ranjana realized as she slung her purse over her shoulder that neither he nor Teddy knew what her husband’s name was—and Ranjana had found, in those knowing glances, a true connection with him.
Whether or not this was because they were both Indian was uncertain. After her disorienting night at FB, Ranjana knew that her connection to Achyut was tenuous, and she knew instinctively that Teddy saw her as a means to an end more than a friend. Harit, however—he had the honesty that both Achyut and Teddy were missing.
This was not, she believed, a homophobic reaction. She had not absented Achyut and Teddy because they were gay; in fact, Harit himself could even be construed as effeminate in his movements. It was the intent of Harit’s behavior that she preferred. He wanted to do the right thing. At any given moment this evening, he had wanted to do the thing that would most please his companions. It was commendable.
They were in the lobby of the restaurant. “What do you say, kids? A nightcap?” Teddy asked, pulling his jacket as closed as it would go. Though already rotund, his stomach showed the addition of their meal.
They had met at eight to accommodate Harit and Teddy’s work schedule, and it was nearing ten now. Ranjana could not stay out. “I must get home. My husband will be home from tennis soon.” She deliberately withheld his name. There was something to be said about mystery for mystery’s sake. It was one of the few truly notable things that Roberta had said when leading their writing group.
“Well, it was a great pleasure, my dear,” Teddy said, presenting his hands so that Ranjana could place one of hers in them.
Ranjana, just to see that look of unrest on Teddy’s face again, dove a handshake forward and watched him flicker to receive her movement. “A great pleasure to meet you, too,” she said.
“Are you on Facebook?” Teddy asked while she was already turning to Harit.
Ranjana puffed out a laugh. “I have an Internet-savvy son, Teddy. So, no.” (A lie.) She turned to Harit and switched to Hindi. “Ji, wonderful to meet you.”
“Do you have an e-mail address where we might reach you?” Teddy continued. Ranjana realized that if she had given her e-mail to Teddy the other night instead of her phone number, he would have already located her Facebook profile. He was a voracious social animal whose age would not prevent him from having a firm footing online. In fact, it would spur him on. She did not really want to give him her email address, but Teddy was nothing if not persistent.
Ranjana opened her purse to pull out a small notebook and pen, but Teddy plucked one of La Ronde’s cards from the nearby hospitality stand and gave it to her. She wrote, “Mrs. Chaudhury, [email protected],” and handed it over to Teddy.
“Thank you, Teddy. Shukriya, Haritji,” she said. Then she swerved out of the restaurant and to her car.
*
Teddy asked Harit if he wanted a nightcap, but Harit cut him off with a pointed Teddy. Teddy nodded, the type of nod that went up and down and sideways in quick alternation.
“I gotcha, dear,” Teddy said.
“But I had a lovely time, Teddy. Thank you.”
“You two really seemed to hit it off.” They were at Teddy’s car now, flanking it and speaking over the roof.
“I cannot remember the last time that I met an Indian like that.”
Teddy opened his door and unfettered the locks. They both slid into the car.
“Like what, exactly?”
Harit thought. “She seems very … American.”
“But she’s not even on Facebook.”
“I don’t mean like that. I mean that she really lives here. She belongs here.”
As he spoke these words, Harit heard how American they sounded in and of themselves. The rhythm of them, what they conveyed, was American. The sense of belonging itself—it was something that preoccupied so many people in this country. It was why every immigrant he knew felt a social obligation not only to belong but also to know, to the exact emotional fiber, where he belonged. That had been the basis of his anxiety during dinner—determining where he’d belonged at the table and at the restaurant. Now he just had to figure out where he belonged everywhere else—at home, at the store, and beyond.
When they pulled up in front of Harit’s home a few minutes later, Teddy said, “We will have to do this again soon.”
“If Ranjanaji wishes to see us again, she will be in touch with us.”
“No, dear, that’s why I got her e-mail. I’m going to send her a message when I get home.”
Harit wanted to challenge this. He wanted to explain to Teddy that it wasn’t proper. He was already trying to imagine what the interaction would be between Ranjana and her husband, the professor. A man accustomed to problems and solving them, finding weaknesses and correcting them. It would be so easy for him to detect the slightly suspect behavior of his wife. Indeed, Harit was now assuming that Ranjana had detected in the evening the same kind of comfort that he had experienced. And he was assuming that she carried in her body the same tingling that he felt as he bid Teddy good night and walked up to his house in the dark. Interactions like this evening’s, which made you feel appreciated and listened to, had no other result but to change your life for the better.
But as Harit turned the key in the back door, he found his comfort overtaken by the oppression of his home.
*
Mohan was not yet back from tennis. The silence was all the more pronounced following the rattle and hum of the evening. Ranjana wanted to call him on his cell and find out just how long he would be; she felt a great urge to write, if only about the evening and not about the supernatural, but she also didn’t want to begin if Mohan was due in the door five minutes from now. Then again, it had been so long since she had phoned him like that. They had not shared a sense of urgency—apart from being parents to Prashant—in years. To call Mohan would be to disrupt this long-standing state.
She picked up the phone and called him anyway.