When he spoke on the subject with his friends, he did so moderately so as not to reveal his secrets. Delighted and jealous, his audience would shout out the names of specific stations and ask what their latest prices were. Mohan had all of the numbers memorized. Seeing his friends grin into their tumblers of whiskey, he treasured this knowledge. He was proud that he had put in the effort to earn it.
The owners of the stations all knew him. Many of them shouted at him for parking on their blacktop, standing in front of his car, and scratching his pencil into his notebook, but he would just shout back, “Saving money is not a crime!” before slouching back into the front seat and driving to the next station. A part of him felt remorse for antagonizing the fellow South Asians who ran the stations, but he also felt a sense of injustice about their practices: if he had played fair and square and made his way honestly in American, then they should be expected to do so, too.
His madness was informed by math. After many years of simply recording the figures for his own knowledge, he began to have his students take the data and interpret patterns in the numbers. And they did, even though they were chemistry students and not statisticians. They were able to see that the stations worked in a specific pattern, the numbers dropping at every other store to keep people guessing. It wasn’t just something from Mohan’s imagination, a theoretical system that he kept trapped in his brain. It was a legitimate trap of checks and balances, a group of men feeding each other’s coffers and families. This was unacceptable.
For many, many years, Mohan had been wary of using the Internet to solve his problems. He associated the Internet with that one-time Hollywood actress whose name was like his—Lohan, which people pronounced either “Low-HAN” or “LOW-en,” the latter closer to the pronunciation of his name—and he thought it to be a foolish, dangerous place. Although he was a scientist, and although he had seen men of his generation amass their fortunes by bending the Internet to their will, he saw his status as a chemist as hallowed, loftier in its bonds and formulas than the nutty code of computer engineers. Recently, though, upon noticing his wife’s behavior, he had relented. It was useless to resist the knowledge that could be uncovered by typing a few words into a thin, clear box and hitting ENTER. Not using the Internet was the same as pretending that he didn’t notice his wife’s actions: she was driving around, traveling to places that were eating up their gas. (Of course Mohan kept track of how much gas they both used, not least because he was guilty, too. Every mile that he spent driving among the gas stations, keeping track of their prices, was a lost mile of gas, even if it was in service of eventual savings.)
He would use the Internet now—Lord, would he. Mohan went to the university library, and in forty-five minutes of research, he was able to see that the gas stations were owned by subsidiaries. In five more minutes of research, he was able to see that these subsidiaries were linked by a holding company owned by one family. In one more minute, he wrote their names down and placed an anonymous call to the police about their price-fixing.
He parked at a Dunkin’ Donuts near the intersection where those four stations faced off—the Sunoco and Marathon, the Shell and Mobil. He went inside the store to get two glazed doughnuts and a hot tea. The owner, Kailash, served him quickly but with a smile; he knew Mohan’s usual order and didn’t miss a beat. Mohan went back to his car and watched.
He had used the Internet as if he were a detective. He wanted to use it again to figure out what was going on with Ranjana. He loved her dearly. Couldn’t she see that? No, she couldn’t. She was sick of him—he knew this. He always prepared himself to be kind, but he found himself reacting with defiance instead of kindness every time he spoke to her. It was too difficult for him to tell her the truth:
Now that Prashant is gone, I need you. I want us to do things together. I want to sit on the couch with you and drink some tea and watch the original version of Lagaan. I want to drive to one of those glassy new restaurants and perhaps have a bottle of wine. I want you to forget that we were married to each other by our families and appreciate me for who I am.
I want to go to the bedroom with you and undress and not feel ashamed, look at each other’s bodies and see that no, we’re not what we used to be—maybe we were never what we thought we were—but we’re here now, and we can try. I’ve done my research. I’ve looked up things that I never thought I’d look up. And I’ve even forced myself to consider doing those things, trying them without disgusting you entirely.
I’ve studied how to be good to you there, in that room, with nothing but our nakedness and our determination.
Half an hour later, Mohan watched as a police car approached. Which station would it choose? It was the Shell. A fitting symbol—the conch-like announcement of a fallen dynasty. Mohan let himself snicker for a few moments, then drove home. He didn’t want to miss the nightly news, when he’d see one owner, then another, then another, then another in handcuffs, all of their heads bowed, the gold watches on their wrists glinting in the winter sun.
THEIR BAGS WERE PACKED, and they were facing each other, clones of themselves reflected in the dresser’s mirror. In Teddy’s stillness, Harit could see the handsomeness that was normally masked by layers of moving, jesting flesh. Teddy’s eyes moved from Harit’s glasses to the tufts at his hairline, then to the lightly wrinkled folds of his neck. Outside, a fast winter wind made its way among the tall buildings.
Their reflections moved toward each other and hugged. Harit’s nose was nestled in the soft crisscrosses of Teddy’s houndstooth jacket. It smelled of sharp cologne and something soap-like.
“You know I adore you, but you don’t know what you’re doing,” Teddy said. He had said this several times already. He had said it last night when Harit pulled away from that first embrace on the bed and touched his lips to Teddy’s. Teddy had gently pushed Harit’s head back onto his shoulder and demurred. It wasn’t right to take advantage, he said.
“You’re right,” Harit said now. “I don’t know what I’m doing. But that doesn’t mean that I don’t want to be doing it.”
He kissed Teddy again.
He was surprised when the tip of Teddy’s tongue emerged and found its way onto his. Harit felt the tension rush back into his body, but Teddy had his arms around him, always gentle, and Harit leaned into the roundness of Teddy’s stomach and let his head tip back. He had never known how complex the movement of tongues could be; he had never had anything move his tongue for him. It tasted unlike anything—it was as if he were tasting himself—but he enjoyed it. So much, in fact, that he enjoyed it for an hour more.
*
“I insist. You drive. Ranjana and I will take the backseat.” They were all standing outside Cheryl’s car.