They would go to the department store together, arm in arm, as if they were Americans visiting the grave of a deceased beloved, and while Mohan tried, in vain, to bargain on a clock, an end table, or a bookcase, Ranjana would wander through the store and marvel at the high prices. It was during one of these strolls that she encountered the glassy, flashy collection of TVs in the electronics department. Mohan found her standing in front of one of them. He had apparently called her name several times, but she was so engrossed in a football game—of all things—that she hadn’t heard him. They couldn’t afford a TV, of course, he said. They didn’t even have a telephone! Yet Ranjana couldn’t stop thinking of how marvelous it would be to have one in their home. Seeing a fancy TV up close made her recognize how much she loved to witness good storytelling and how it could be the very thing to make her new life here engaging. So she had marched up to the salesperson and implored him to give them a discount. “We know all of the Indian families, and they’ll see this beautiful TV and want one of their own. I can guarantee you at least a dozen more sales.” The salesperson looked astonished and impressed, and soon, Ranjana and Mohan were watching as their TV was carried into their living room by two able-bodied men. Mohan could not stop talking about how beautifully Ranjana had negotiated the TV’s way into their house. It was easily the most impressive thing that she had ever done. Although this thought troubled her, she also felt great pride in having pulled it off.
This was the kind of surprise that Ranjana wanted from Mohan. She wanted him to do something charming, something unprecedented and unpredictable, much as she was doing with Harit. She wanted him to drop whatever romantic conquest he was pursuing and direct some love toward her. She deserved it. She deserved to be a sought-after heroine.
But how could she forget? There very possibly was a sought-after heroine, just not her. Ranjana had noticed that Mohan was home less often. She had even checked the odometer on his car, the way that Mohan used to check the odometer on the Camry that they shared years ago, so obsessed was he with conserving as much gas as they could. He was driving somewhere now, in small increments. Driving to her. So, perhaps Ranjana couldn’t predict his every move, after all. Perhaps Mohan really had done something out of the ordinary and become a brazen hero—Monsieur Bovary—to someone else.
OVER FALL BREAK, when Prashant entered his house for the first time since leaving for school, he detected a difference in its smell. It wasn’t just the pungent film of masala and onions that covered every surface—something you could smell only after having been away from the house for more than a few days. The scent was stale; the ground floor had the air of a basement. It was as if his departure had sapped all sense of youth or energy from the house.
What surprised him most was that his mother’s behavior had prepared him for something livelier. The depression of the house seemed directly at odds with her disposition, which was noticeably elevated. This created a tense but still dreary atmosphere. No matter how many bowls of chaat or plates of samosas his mother set out, no matter how thoroughly his father scrubbed the bathrooms and puffed flowery air freshener through each room in atomized garlands, his parents nevertheless seemed out of sorts.
Ten minutes into his return—he had taken a Greyhound bus, of all things—his mother asked that he pick up Harit Uncle. This is how she referred to him—Harit Uncle—with no preamble or further explanation. Prashant had to ask her to explain, and she said that Harit Uncle was a new member of their circle. Prashant should have been used to hasty additions like this. His mother took pride in cultivating a catchall social world; the odd Indian had a tendency to creep into their crowd as she assumed the role of guide and adviser. There was Sita Kumar, a bumbling woman in her midfifties whose husband, Tipu, constantly licked his black lips; it was silently decided by their circle of friends that Sita Auntie was far too loud, and the strategy was to let her talk herself tired until another woman swooped in and changed the subject. There was the interloping Mahajan family, transplants from Kenya whose two young sons, Shawn and Ritesh, weirded everyone out with their inexhaustible, preternatural knowledge of physics and who clearly—at least to Prashant—suffered from an undiagnosed form of Asperger’s. Despite this, his mother gathered the Mahajans into the house like found treasure, and it was silently decided by their circle of friends that the Mahajan matriarch, Mina, was beautiful enough and fluent enough in Punjabi to socialize with them. (In time, Shawn and Ritesh, wise beyond their years, learned that they were going to be each other’s best bet for conversation, so they sequestered themselves in whichever corner was closest and discussed their equations in private.)
And now this Harit Uncle. Prashant found it odd that a man would come to visit them by himself, but he figured that Harit Uncle would be some old widower with burlappy jowls and hair like milkweed. Consider Prashant’s surprise, then, when the GPS led him to a mustachioed, middle-aged man in a blazer and tie waiting outside a small house. He wasn’t wearing a coat or a scarf, which was odd, given that there was a sharp fall chill in the air. Harit Uncle couldn’t have been older than fifty, and he seemed petrified to approach the car. He looked like someone checking to see if an animal were alive or dead. The whole awkwardness of the situation propelled Prashant out of his seat, and he found himself opening the door for Harit Uncle, marveling at the sheer volume of the man’s obviously thinning hair.
Prashant hoped that their ride together, albeit brief, would not be nearly as strange as he feared. He regretted driving his father’s Acura; its quiet maneuvering was usually enticing, but it rendered their situation eerily silent. (One of his snobby thoughts hit him: he realized that his parents were the only ones in their group not to have a Lexus or a Mercedes.)
To his surprise, Harit Uncle was the first one to speak.
“Beta, thank you very much for picking me up. I do not have a car.”
Harit Uncle had not said that he couldn’t drive. He had said that he didn’t have a car. Prashant wasn’t sure why he found this observation notable, but he did.
“It’s no problem.”
“So, are you enjoying school?”
“Yup. Yes.”
“And what are you studying?”
“Chemistry.”
“Chemistry. That is very interesting.”
Which was more than Prashant could say for this so-called conversation.
“I was never very good at chemistry in school,” Harit said. “I guess that’s why I never became a doctor.” He chuckled sadly, and Prashant felt instant sympathy for him. That’s all it took, evidently: self-deprecation. Prashant had become so agile with his own self-deprecation that he respected those who shared his tendencies. “Are you studying to become a doctor?”
The simple fact that Harit Uncle thought to frame this as a question indicated a larger understanding. Most Indians assumed outright that anyone who was studying chemistry was doing so for medical purposes, even when the person was the son of a chemistry professor. “I actually want to be a chemist,” Prashant said. “I’m fascinated by research.”
And then it just came out of him: “But lately, I’ve been thinking of switching my major to literature.”
He made this confession because Harit Uncle was like a blank slate. He knew virtually nothing about Prashant—aside from whatever pleasantries Prashant’s mother might have offered—and what did he care about some kid’s college concentration? It was a win-win: Prashant had confided something in him, and Harit Uncle’s raised eyebrows (even behind those ridiculous glasses) showed that he appreciated the confidence.
“Literature? That is something.” He pronounced the word literature with a grand lilt.
“We’ll see, though. I don’t really have to declare a major until sophomore year. What did you study in college?”
“I didn’t go to college.”
“Oh.”