by Diksha Basu
“You’ve given that a lot of thought. I have no idea what kids eat.”
“My brother has twin daughters in Melbourne and I miss them more than I ever thought I would. They’re the one reason I think about moving back—those two nieces. But they barely know who I am so I can’t change my entire life for them. But if the kids were my own, I could.”
He put his feet up on the sofa.
“Burritos,” Rocco said. He nudged Tina’s thigh with his toe. “That’s the Mexican sandwich.”
It was tortas, actually, Tina thought, but sometimes it was best to let men believe they were right.
* * *
—
THIS MAKES SENSE, SUNIL THOUGHT, as Tina and Rocco climbed into the backseat of his car. Tina was wearing large brown sunglasses and holding a flask that she was sipping out of. This woman should not be cavorting around on bridges late at night with dark-skinned men. Not that Sunil was judgmental, not at all. He believed women should do mostly whatever they pleased—in fact, he was currently in the market for a wife and his only requirement was that she not eat non-vegetarian food. He would not even mind if she used to eat non-veg as long as she was willing to give it up for him. That’s what he had told Gracey, whom he had met last weekend—her aunt knew his uncle and they thought they might be a suitable match. Gracey worked as a housekeeper in Dwarka and had a bright smile and of all the women he had met so far, Gracey was the one who interested him the most. When they met she was wearing a dark blue sari and a gold chain around her neck that contrasted with her dark skin. Sunil always preferred dark skin even though so many women were forever talking about Fair and Lovely and skin lighteners. Anyway, when he had mentioned the non-veg issue to Gracey at their meeting, she had laughed and said, “Here we are having our first meeting and you’re busy planning the menu for our anniversary party.”
None of the other women had spoken so freely at their first meetings. Sunil was equally scared of her and drawn to her, and he had a worrying feeling that if he ended up married to her, he would be eating meat by the end of the first week.
“Sunil, we’re going to a shop in Mehrauli,” Tina said. “I’m not sure exactly where it is but I’ll find it on my phone once we get close.”
“Yes, madam,” Sunil said, pulling the car onto the driveway and toward the main gate of Colebrookes.
“And this is Rocco,” Tina said. She still didn’t know if she was meant to introduce people to the help. Probably not other Indians, she reasoned, but white people were forever trying to pretend the help were friends. It was something to do with their guilt, she figured.
“Can we stop for a coffee on the way?” Rocco asked.
“No, I have an appointment. I’m sure you can find somewhere to have coffee while I’m getting fitted,” Tina said. “And I told you to take a flask.”
“That’s not the same. I like the ritual of buying a coffee even if it’s a waste of money,” Rocco said.
Tina nodded. They were paused at a traffic light. Outside Rocco’s window, a large DTC bus stood filled to the brim with people. A young woman with headphones on was staring blankly out of the window immediately behind him. Her hands were covered in fading henna.
“Are you seeing anyone?” Rocco asked.
Tina looked straight ahead and said, “I was. Andrew. In New York. But we decided to go our separate ways. It wasn’t really working out. Although I knew that from the start. I think I got stuck in it because I was kind of bored. I should have taken up skateboarding instead.”
Above, the red-light numbers counted down from 120. Traffic signals in Delhi were long. And it wasn’t entirely out of boredom that Tina had started dating Andrew. It was, at least partially, because his stubble reminded her of Rocco.
“Most relationships develop out of boredom. But it’s true, skateboarding would have been a better option.”
“See, but skateboarding comes with so much baggage. Like you can’t just be a skateboarder and wear normal clothes and listen to pop music and not have skateboarding become your whole identity. Why is that? Why does skateboarding have to replace your entire personality?” Tina said.
“True,” Rocco said. “I would be absolutely shocked if you told me you were an avid skateboarder but I’d just nod along if you told me you went biking on the weekends. Or what if you were really into hacky sack?”
“I am,” Tina said. “On the weekend I wear one of those metal chains and keep my wallet attached to my belt loop at all times.”
“I can picture it.” Rocco laughed. “But I say fuck the whole package that comes with skateboarding and just do it. Apparently, learning new things makes new paths open up in your brain—the actual architecture of our brain changes—and your usual anxieties and thoughts and stuff have new directions to move in so you get a real restart. I’ve been trying to learn Hindi ever since I got here. And I also took a pottery class.”
The numbers were down to the single digits now, and Tina made fleeting eye contact with the woman with the headphones as the bus pulled ahead of them. The lights turned green. The car started moving right as a cow ambled onto the street and Sunil honked and swerved around it. Stupid cow. If he hit a cow, he would definitely get pulled out of the car and beaten up. He was Hindu too and went to the temple every weekend. Well, almost. But the whole cow thing was getting a bit out of hand these days.
“Maybe I could learn how to apply henna,” Tina said. “I could set up a little stall at Smorgasburg and paint people’s hands and charge them twenty dollars. Or I’ll wear a sari and a bindi and charge them fifty.”
“You know how to tie a sari?” Rocco asked.
“I do, actually. My mother taught me when I was a teenager. I don’t even need safety pins to hold it in place,” Tina said.
A motorcycle was driving alongside them now, a little boy wearing sunglasses and standing in front of his father, who was driving. Behind the father, the mother sat sidesaddle, her sari pallu covering her hair, a small baby clutched in one arm. Only the father was wearing a helmet but he was using it to hold a cell phone in place against his ear, Tina noticed. The baby was wearing a yellow bonnet and a large black dot was on her temple to ward off the evil eye.
“Well, a sari is easily one of the sexiest items of clothing. Not on old aunties who secure the waist up high past their belly buttons, but on women like you,” Rocco said.
“Stop flirting with me, Rocco,” Tina said. “You had your chance.”
“Flirting? Not a chance. I’ve got my eye on a model I met last night who won’t talk to me. Who was the guy you were meeting last night?”
“I think I want to date an Indian guy,” Tina said.
“I knew you were off doing something shady,” Rocco said. “You’d be willing to move here if you met someone?”
Tina leaned her head back on the seat and took a sip of her tea. It was still hot and hurt her lip. She licked it and said, “I guess, I don’t know. Maybe. I feel like I’m from here even though I’ve never lived here.”
In middle school, Tina had calculated and figured out that she had been conceived in India. At the time, the information horrified her—not only because it meant her parents had had sex at least once but because it shook her childhood belief that she was fully American. What did it mean to have been conceived in India? That night she took a pair of scissors to her jeans and cut them into shorts, the edges frayed, like all the thin white girls in school were doing. She showed them to her mother, expecting to be scolded, but instead her mother said, “If you wanted cut-off shorts, you should have told me and I would have just bought you a pair.”
“What does it even mean to be from somewhere these days?” Rocco asked. “My parents were diplomats so I grew up all over the place so I never really had a cultural identity. Australian, if I’m pressed, I guess, but I’m definitely not your usual Aussie and could never live there. London, maybe. Bu
t that’s another one of those cities where you can be anything and that’s too many choices in a way.”
“Was it difficult for you when you first moved here?” Tina asked.
“No more or less than moving anywhere. I had to figure out the customs and how to use public transport and how to buy moisture absorbers for my cupboards every monsoon but that’s all part of the fun of moving to a new place,” Rocco said. “Every place is kind of similar in ways now anyway. Like, I often grab coffee at Starbucks in the morning and meet friends at Soho House at night. I’m on Tinder. I don’t use it much, though.”
“Are you dating anyone?” Tina asked.
Rocco looked over at her. He pulled out his phone, opened his pictures, and showed her a picture of a beautiful older Indian woman, thick black hair, red lipstick, large solitaire diamonds in her ears.
“I do my fair share of ill-advised dates because of boredom. Including one with the mistress of a builder in Bombay. Being the mistress to a mistress is a whole new circle of hell. Her married boyfriend came over unannounced one morning while I was there and Ramona told him I was her trainer. Never mind that I had a cigarette dangling out of my mouth.”
“I wish I at least had stories like that,” Tina said.
“You should come to Bombay. Ramona constantly complains that her boyfriend has multiple other girlfriends in addition to his wife,” Rocco said. He put his phone away. “I’m kind of hoping this week away will naturally end things with her. It’s starting to feel a little gross. Does your mystery date from last night seem promising?”
They were on an open road now, trees lining the whole street. Big, white homes with huge lawns ran along beside them. Rocco looked out of the window and Tina watched him, so at ease in this car and in himself, and she felt—what?—admiration, maybe? Envy? It was similar to what she had first felt for Andrew. Andrew was so sure about who he was—he played lacrosse in high school and his college girlfriend’s name was Stephanie and she played soccer. Once, when talking about his father’s ideas about immigration he had said, “My parents can be pretty conservative about immigrants. I tried to explain to him that people come here because they’re desperate—like how you’re here because you can’t be in India, you know?”
“That’s not why I’m here,” Tina said.
“But he doesn’t get it. People should be allowed to apply for legal asylum here, you know. Just follow the rules but it should totally be allowed.”
“But that’s not why I’m here,” Tina repeated. “That’s why some people are here, but I’m just here because I’m here.”
Tina had never understood why white people in foreign countries had the luxury of being called expats while brown people were all labeled immigrants. Seeking asylum was one thing but what if you were dark skinned and wanted to live in America because of a preference for the country? Like her parents, who came over to study and stayed, the way people often stay on in places they study and associate with their entrance into adulthood. Or because that was where you were born and it was the only home you’d ever known. Like Tina herself. Sometimes she’d envied the narrowness of Andrew’s world. She was always daunted by the choices life presented, whereas his were limited to a much smaller number.
Tina looked over at Rocco again. He held his palm out of the window, fingers spread wide to let the breeze flow through.
“You could have moved anywhere in the world but you moved here?” Tina asked.
“I did indeed. And I question it all the time, don’t get me wrong. I’m not some hippie India freak who does yoga. Every few months I think I’ll pack up and move somewhere else but then I don’t and I get more and more settled. And work is going well. At some point, if you haven’t found the wife and the kids and all the other traditional markers, work becomes your idea of home.”
“My work is about India but based in America,” Tina said.
“The perfect metaphor,” Rocco said.
“Made even more perfect by the fact that I’m not accomplishing anything at work.”
They stopped at another traffic signal, and on the sidewalk near them, a brass band of about a dozen men in white uniforms were gathered, holding their instruments, a big white horse at the front, making their way to some celebration or wedding, no doubt. Stray percussion sounds rang out.
“Look at that,” Rocco pointed at the band and said. “I love Delhi—the roads in Bombay are so congested. In Bombay all the sexiest cars just inch along next to rickshaws. I swear the fruit sellers push their little carts along faster than the traffic moves.”
They left the band behind and started moving again, and Rocco opened a small bottle of Bisleri water that Sunil had kept for his passengers and poured the water into his mouth without touching his lips to the bottle. He had mastered the Indian art of drinking water without contaminating the bottle; he even knew how to swallow with his mouth wide open and facing up.
“You drive here?” Tina asked.
“I used to. I bought a used BMW that I drove around in for a while but it got so banged up from small bumps and the AC kept conking out and the maintenance was just a disaster. It wasn’t even worth the hassle of selling so I gave it to this guy in my building who had a baby but no car. They were taking the baby everywhere on their little two-wheeler and it didn’t look safe. At the time I thought it made me a hero but now that car’s a real hassle for them. It’s like gifting someone an elephant and then expecting them to be grateful,” Rocco said. He put the window down and the wind ruffled his hair. He continued, “The other day I saw them all getting on their two-wheeler and I swear they looked like they’d been caught out and tried to avoid eye contact as they swerved out of the building and down the road. I probably put them in a more dangerous situation by trying to gift them the car.”
* * *
—
AS THEY EXITED THE Sabyasachi showroom with two assistants behind them carrying bags, they came face-to-face with Sid and a young woman.
“Tina ma’am?” Sid said. “Sorry, Tina.”
Tina felt silly about the two men standing behind her holding large carry bags with Sabyasachi embossed onto them. She turned to them and quickly said, “Just put them in the trunk or the front seat or wherever.”
“I got it. We can probably hang the longer ones up in the front and carefully put the rest in the trunk,” Rocco said and walked off toward the car with the two assistants following.
Prem, the assistant carrying the more cumbersome of the bags—the woman’s purchases—was irritated. He wanted to be a designer but he knew he was going to remain stuck being the assistant made to carry the bags. He had once suggested changing the embroidery on a lehnga and the assistant designer had rejected the idea to his face, but then made the changes and claimed they were her own. But then the lead designer took credit for her changes and the assistant designer had been furious so at least there was that karmic justice. Ever since then he had stopped sharing his clever design ideas, but he didn’t know how else to prove his worth. Another year of this and he’d have to apply for a government job. His parents were going to stand for only so much and no woman would marry an aspiring designer with no real prospects.
“You were shopping there?” the woman next to Sid asked, staring at Rocco going to the car.
“This is?” Tina asked Sid, looking the girl up and down.
“I’m Divya.”
Divya had eyes that sparkled with ambition. She was wearing black pants and a black, long-sleeved T-shirt. She was skinny, with long black hair, a portion of which was dyed red. She was wearing a black backpack and looked, in many ways, like she belonged on a train in New York City. She had the swagger of knowing the streets of Delhi in a way Tina, or even Shefali in her driver-driven cars, never would.
But she also looked, obviously, like she belonged to Sid’s world. How did she know this, Tina wondered. How could she tell by lo
oking at Divya that they had grown up with different means? Was it the material of her clothes that gave it away? Or the skinniness of her limbs that revealed that her body had matured without enough full-fat milk? Tina, on the other hand, was what Indian aunties condescendingly called “healthy.” That same deprivation could turn this Divya woman into a model if the right person saw her.
Divya, meanwhile, was busy watching Rocco and Sunil help the two store assistants put the bags into the car. She had heard that each lehnga at Sabyasachi cost as much as a house, and here this couple were filling a car full of bags. The white man must be rich, Divya thought. She looked at Sid. Sid made her laugh but jokes don’t pay bills. They had met on Facebook when Sid had commented right below Divya on a picture of two stray dogs, beaten and bloodied. Sid had liked her comment calling for an investigation and added a comment saying the perpetrators of this crime should face the same fate as the dogs as punishment. Divya wasn’t sure she agreed but when Sid sent her a private message, she replied and then he replied and then they kept messaging each other, and gradually moved the conversation to WhatsApp, and Divya had sent him a topless picture one day, and now they were meeting in real life for the first time.
“How do you both know each other?” Tina asked Sid.
Divya snapped out of her reverie and said, “College. Sid is the cousin of one of my friends from college and I’m showing him around while he’s in Delhi.”
Her parents would never allow her to date so she had decided to maintain this lie no matter who she spoke to because you never know who knows whom. For all Divya knew, this woman was visiting the home where her mother worked as a maid and somehow her mother would overhear something or other and piece things together and get furious and work even harder to get Divya married off to someone else. Her mother was forever piecing things together and getting furious.
“How do you know each other?” she asked Tina, pointing her chin in Rocco’s direction.
