South Haven

1. Heavy Sleeper

He missed his mother. He ached for her while he watched television during the month of June. He got to watch a lot of television that month, as Mohan Lal had allowed him to miss his final weeks of classes at Robert Treat Elementary School. The pain didn’t go away in July, during his hellish trip to Delhi. He felt an especially acute longing as he knelt on the cool marble of his uncle’s hot bathroom, puking his guts out into the narrow, too-tall toilet bowl. He had made the mistake of having a Nirula’s pizza and milkshake with one of his cousins, things his mother would have counseled him against eating. His father stood over him in that sour, steamy bathroom and said, “Be brave, son,” occasionally rubbing Siddharth’s back, which made him feel even worse. Afterward, Mohan Lal didn’t put a cold cloth on his forehead, like his mother would have done. His father didn’t pat his head in just the right way, somewhere between gentle and firm. When Siddharth whined about the pain in his stomach, Mohan Lal said, “You made a choice to have that pizza. Now live with the consequences.”

In August, he still longed for his mother. He wished for her to magically reappear while he was brushing his teeth or pouring gasoline into the lawnmower. But he devoted much more of his mental energy to his father, for Mohan Lal was doing so many baffling things. He was drinking. Not like in the movies, but more than before. He drank two or three whiskeys every night, and when he kissed Siddharth goodnight, the bitter odor of alcohol lingered over the bed once he’d left the room. When Mohan Lal kissed Siddharth goodnight, he sometimes said nice things like, “I’m a lucky man to have such good sons,” or, “You’re a wise boy. A sensitive boy — like your mother.” But the things Mohan Lal said could be scary. Once, he said, “Siddharth, my only reason for living is you two. If it weren’t for you boys, it might also be my time to leave this earth.” The night he said that, Siddharth lay awake tossing and turning. Each time the house creaked, or the rhododendron bush outside his window quivered in the wind, he mistook these noises for the sound of his father committing suicide.

Throughout the autumn of his fifth grade year, his father was having trouble waking up in the morning. In fact, Mohan Lal didn’t get out of bed at all on his first day of fifth grade, fifth grade at a brand-new elementary school, so Siddharth had to get ready all by himself. At least Arjun had left out some clothes for him, a pair of corduroys that were too tight now, a striped red T-shirt that was beginning to fray around the collar.

A few weeks later, there was a rainstorm one morning. He tried to wake his father up, so that Mohan Lal could drive him to school. But the man wouldn’t budge. Siddharth kept on shaking him, and his father kept on asking for five more minutes. Eventually, Mohan Lal got out of bed, and father and son went out to the driveway. Siddharth made his way to the backseat of their rust-colored Dodge Omni, where he liked to sit in the mornings. He’d always had trouble opening the Omni’s doors, but now he was older and could do it all by himself. He lifted the tricky handle, up first and then out. The door opened, but then it quickly slammed shut. Mohan Lal revved the engine, and Siddharth looked on in shock as his father sped down the driveway and up Hilltop Drive. Fortunately, the cleaning woman was there to let him back into the house. He sat in the formal living room with his head pressed into the window, wondering if his father would ever return.

Eleven minutes later, Mohan Lal pulled back into the driveway. He hugged Siddharth tightly and kissed him numerous times. He said, “Don’t ever do that again.”

“I won’t,” said Siddharth.

He made sure not to cry, so that his father wouldn’t worry about him. He never told Arjun what had happened that morning, because the last thing his brother needed was another reason to hate their father.

The autumn after Siddharth’s mother died, Arjun was always angry with Mohan Lal. When Mohan Lal instructed the boys to tell the people who called for him that he wasn’t home, Arjun scoffed at him. He said that Mohan Lal needed to stop avoiding people who were trying to help him. When his mother’s friends dropped in with CorningWare dishes full of rajma or tuna casserole, Mohan Lal greeted them at the door and said he was running late for a meeting, so that he wouldn’t have to invite them in. One time, Mustafa, the manager of Mohan Lal’s favorite Italian restaurant, came over with a tray of eggplant parmigiana. As Mustafa stood on the front steps ringing the doorbell, Mohan Lal switched off the television and shushed Siddharth with his finger. Mustafa simply left the food outside the door and drove away. Soon all of these people stopped coming over altogether, and Arjun wasn’t happy about it. He told Mohan Lal that he needed to set a better example for Siddharth. Mohan Lal said, “Mind your own business, Arjun. Remember, I’m your father.”

A part of Siddharth felt good when he saw his brother taking charge. But he also understood his father’s behavior. He could relate to Mohan Lal’s need for privacy. The Connor boys kept on calling him to see if he could come over, but he always said no, that he had too much homework. Sometimes they would come by after school and ring the doorbell, and Siddharth would hide in his bedroom closet until they went away. He didn’t want to hang out with them anymore and swore that he would never return to their house. Their house was his least favorite place in the entire world.

Though Siddharth understood his father’s need for isolation, what worried him was Mohan Lal’s temper: The man’s fights with Arjun were getting worse and worse. Each day, Mohan Lal returned home from Elm City College with news of another fight with his dean. He was even fighting with Barry Uncle, his distant cousin and best friend. His first fight with Barry Uncle had occurred the day before the funeral. Barry Uncle had been going on about the need for a pandit to preside over some rituals — to say something spiritual for the sake of Siddharth’s mother. When two of Siddharth’s aunts who had flown in from India agreed, Mohan Lal lost it. His face went red and he started trembling. He said, “Jesus fucking Christ, Barry. Keep your Brahmin charlatans away from my family. Take your fucking Hinduism and shove it up your ass.” Siddharth had never heard his father say fuck before. Hearing this made him seem like a stranger, like some sort of child abuser. In such moments, Siddharth couldn’t help but think that his only real parent was his mother.

* * *

The big fight with Barry Uncle had occurred in August, after Siddharth’s trip to India with Mohan Lal. Over Little Caesars pizza one night, Barry Uncle said, “Boss, have you thought about the lawsuit?”

“Please, Barry, not now,” said Mohan Lal.

Arjun said, “Dad, she was my mother. I deserve to hear this.”

When Mohan Lal widened his eyes at Arjun, Siddharth cringed. He knew what those eyes meant. They meant that if Arjun said another thing, Mohan Lal was going to go ape shit. He was going to shout, or raise his hand behind his ear — things he had always done, but with much more frequency now.

Siddharth was relieved when Arjun got up and went to their bedroom. Unfortunately, Barry Uncle kept on going: “Listen, Mohan, we’re in America now, and that’s the way things work here. That truck driver, he won’t pay anything. But this guy’s insurance company should pay up.”

Siddharth felt it was his responsibility to step in. He said, “Barry Uncle, trust me, it’s not like we need the money.”

“Boy, your father isn’t exactly M.S. Oberoi. He’s got mortgage payments. You two boys will go to college one day.”

Siddharth wanted Mohan Lal to say something to defend their family’s honor. He wanted him to tell Barry Uncle to mind his own business. Mohan Lal seemed strangely calm though. He ate a couple bites of pizza. He downed his whiskey, then sighed. Siddharth didn’t see what was coming, and he jumped in his chair when Mohan Lal slammed his fist into the table. The plates shook and the glasses jingled.

Mohan Lal stood up. “Barry, you’re an ass,” he said.

“Easy there, boss,” replied Barry Uncle. “Take it easy.”

“Dad!” said Siddharth.

Mohan Lal pointed his finger in the air. “Leave, you bastard. Get out of my house, Barry.”

Barry Uncle stood up and placed his hand on Mohan Lal’s shoulder. “Come on. Let’s change the subject.”

Mohan Lal switched into Hindi, or maybe it was Punjabi — Siddharth couldn’t tell the difference. All he knew was that he wished his father would stop shouting at his best friend. But Mohan Lal wouldn’t stop.

Barry Uncle grabbed his briefcase and rushed toward the front door. He said, “I know you’re upset, boss. But you can be a stubborn ass sometimes.” He then got into his Honda Accord and sped down the driveway.

After the fight, Barry Uncle tried calling a few times. Mohan Lal either hung up on him or told the boys to say he wasn’t home. Soon Barry Uncle stopped calling. One evening Arjun said, “He’s, like, your only friend, Dad. You need to talk to him.” Mohan Lal called Barry Uncle a swine. He said he wouldn’t speak to him for as long as he lived.

Siddharth didn’t know what to make of Barry Uncle. There were little things he liked about him. He let Siddharth change the gears of his car, and he let him take little sips of his whiskey. But Siddharth was well aware of his mother’s feelings for the man, and he began to wonder if Mohan Lal had banished him out of loyalty to her. In that case, he was definitely on his father’s side. He was glad to see the last of Barry Uncle.

2. A Just War

As they drove to Deer Run Elementary School on that chilly February evening, a light snow wetted the windshield of their rust-colored car. His stomach gurgled with dread, which mounted as they approached the town center. Soon they were passing the Carter Family Horse Farm, which was adjacent to South Haven’s public library. Over the past few months, Mohan Lal occasionally picked him up from school, and they would get donuts and eat them in the library parking lot. They parked as close to the horses as possible, and Siddharth got out of the car and laced his fingers through the chain-link fence. One of the ponies, which had a blond mane, sometimes came over and licked his fingers, and they started referring to it as Buddy. Whenever they visited Buddy, Mohan Lal remained in the car, sipping coffee from a Styrofoam cup and listening to reports about the aftermath of the Gulf War. Siddharth stood outside alone, inhaling the musky air, staring at the desolate fields and graceful horses. He occasionally looked over his shoulder to check on his father, who responded by blowing him a kiss or just smiling. Siddharth felt good in those moments. He hadn’t said a word about them to anyone — not to Arjun, nor to Ms. Farber, his school psychologist. He hadn’t even said anything to his only friend at Deer Run, Sharon Nagorski.

It was thanks to Arjun that he had enrolled in Deer Run Elementary back in September. Arjun had said he needed an after-school program now that they were a single-parent family, and Deer Run was the only South Haven school that had one. That term—single-parent family—made him feel like punching a wall. It was a term that should have applied to the people on television, not to real people who he knew and loved.

At first, Mohan Lal was dismissive of Arjun. But he later said that Arjun had a point and instructed him to handle all of the arrangements. Siddharth looked on as his brother pretended to be their father and phoned the principal of Robert Treat Elementary, where he had attended first through fourth grades. Once all the arrangements were finalized, Mohan Lal told Arjun that he was proud of him for sorting everything out. He said that one day Arjun would make a good father.

“Yeah, thanks,” said Arjun. “One day you might make one too.”

Siddharth said, “Take it easy, Arjun. He was just trying to be nice.”

The rest of the summer, Siddharth had dreaded the prospect of beginning at a new school, but once the year actually started, he saw that transferring definitely had an upside. At Deer Run, he was no longer the little brother of the great Arjun Arora, straight-A student and flag bearer. At Deer Run, he was no longer the kid with the dead mom. The problem was that at his new school, he was the new kid, a nobody who people avoided. At his new school, he only had one friend, Sharon Nagorski. The other kids called Sharon a loser. Luca Peroti and Eddie Benson called her “Sharon, the Friendless Wonder.”

Mohan Lal pulled into Deer Run five minutes before the PTA meeting was supposed to start, parking beside the derelict tennis courts. For Siddharth, being at school for the second time in one day was a prison sentence. But accompanying his father had still seemed like the best option. Arjun was putting the school newspaper to bed, and Siddharth wasn’t in the mood to be alone. More importantly, going with his father meant he could prevent him from doing something stupid.

As they navigated the slushy asphalt, he clutched his father’s woolen overcoat. That way, if Mohan Lal slipped, Siddharth could break his fall. When they reached the school’s entrance, they dried their winter boots on a large red mat inscribed with the word Owls. Owls were the Deer Run mascot.

Mohan Lal muttered, “Owls? This is a place of learning, and owls are the stupidest of birds.”

Siddharth rolled his eyes. He saw a sign that read, PTA Meeting in Cafeteria, and led his father in that direction. As they walked, he told himself to look on the bright side, just as Arjun was always telling him. His mother used to say the same thing. The bright side was that he would get to show his father where he stood in line for chocolate milk and foot-long hot dogs. The bright side was that he would get to show him where he ate lunch with Sharon Nagorski. To Siddharth’s surprise, the positive thinking did the trick, loosening him up.

The cafeteria had dizzyingly tall ceilings, and twenty tables with attached orange benches. One of its walls contained a glass case displaying student artwork and class pictures. Another wall was made almost entirely of windows. It looked out onto a blue Luciani Carting garbage dumpster and two flagpoles, one for the blue state flag and the other for Old Glory. Mohan Lal dashed in front of him and headed to the back of the room, near the spot where you cleared your lunch tray. A little stand had been set up there, with two coffee urns and a tray full of pastries. He made himself a cup with cream and sugar, then picked up a glazed donut. “Eat something,” he said. “We’ll have dinner later tonight.”

“I had a big lunch,” said Siddharth. He was waiting for his father to ask him a question about school — about where his classroom was, or which was his lunch table. As soon as his father asked him a question, he would tell him everything.

Mohan Lal chose an empty table, far away from the other people, from the wooden podium that had been set up on the other side of room. Siddharth scanned the cafeteria. He felt stupid when he didn’t see any other students. Thankfully, his teacher Miss Kleinberg was also missing. He spotted Mr. Grillo, the mustached school principal. He was wearing a three-piece suit, as usual. Larry, the old janitor, was hunched over a broom and chewing on one of his fat cigars. He always had a cigar in his mouth but never actually lit them. All the other parents were chatting. They seemed to know each other, and they seemed to be having fun. Siddharth wished his father knew how to make small talk with the other parents. Most of them were women, but there were a few men, dressed in jeans and sweatshirts. Mohan Lal had on a cardigan sweater over a ribbed turtleneck. He looked like a dinosaur compared to these other guys.

Mohan Lal tapped him on the shoulder.

“What?” said Siddharth. His voice was harsh, but he was actually relieved. It was happening. His father was finally asking him about school.

“Where is that woman?” asked Mohan Lal.

“Which woman?”

“That shrink lady — that psychologist.”

“You mean Ms. Farber? Why would Ms. Farber be here, Dad? This is for parents — parents and teachers.”

Mohan Lal shrugged. “She should be here. She was the one who told me I should come.”

“You talked to Ms. Farber? When did you talk to Ms. Farber?”

A woman with black hair went up to the podium and said, “Excuse me, everybody. I think it’s time we get started.”

He poked his father in the arm. “Dad, you talked to Ms. Farber? When did you talk to Ms. Farber?”

Mohan Lal widened his eyes and put a finger to his lips.

Siddharth shook his head and stared up at the pockmarks in the tiled ceiling. He felt like an asshole. He felt like his father had betrayed him.

* * *

“Welcome, everybody,” said the black-haired woman at the podium. She was wearing a jean jacket. Her curly hair rose upward, not down. She tapped on the microphone, then started speaking. “Most of you know me already. I’m Joe Antonelli, David’s mom. And Joey’s. And Ricky’s. Mindy’s too.” Everyone let out a snicker, and Mohan Lal laughed as well. Siddharth was glad. At least his father could laugh when he was supposed to.

Mrs. Antonelli thanked John Faruci for the coffee and donuts. “Let me tell you,” she said. “Faruci’s is the only place in town where my mother would have bought her groceries.” She asked everyone to hold off on refreshments until they adjourned, and Mohan Lal took the remaining half of his donut in a single bite, using the collar of his turtleneck to wipe his mouth. Siddharth put a hand to his forehead and peered down. He hoped that no one had noticed his father scarfing his food. He hoped that nobody here knew about his visits to Ms. Farber. He didn’t mind visiting her in the “retard room,” as Luca Peroti called it. He didn’t mind, as long as it was private.

Mrs. Antonelli stared right in their direction. “I’m pleased to see we have a newcomer tonight. Welcome.” She flashed a wide smile. “What’s your name, sir?”

Siddharth swallowed.

“Greetings, ma’am,” said Mohan Lal. “My son is a new student here. I’m Dr. Arora.”

“We’re so glad you could join us,” she said. “Ah, and I see you’ve brought your boy.”

Siddharth shrunk in his seat.

Mrs. Antonelli thanked everyone for last week’s baked ziti dinner, then provided the results of December’s canned food drive. Everyone clapped, and a man in a checkered shirt and baseball cap stuck his fingers in his mouth and whistled. Siddharth recognized him. He was Eddie Benson’s father. Siddharth turned to his own dad, who was sipping coffee and staring into space. Why did he bother coming if he wasn’t even going to pay attention?

Mrs. Antonelli cleared her throat. She said that with so many positive things going on, it was easy to ignore the harsher side of life. “I’m sure you all know what I’m referring to. Our boys are making such big sacrifices out in the Persian Gulf. And here we are, living the good life in South Haven. I find myself sitting on the sofa, staring at the television, and wondering what I can do. How can I make a difference?”

Mohan Lal leaned forward. Crap, thought Siddharth.

Mrs. Antonelli said she wanted to make a motion to use three hundred dollars of PTA funds to buy each Deer Run student a yellow ribbon. The students could fasten these ribbons to their mailboxes in order to show support for Desert Storm.

Mohan Lal’s eyes were now glued to the podium. Please don’t, thought Siddharth.

A woman with blond bangs raised her hand. She said that Mrs. Antonelli always had such wonderful ideas. The man with the checkered shirt and baseball cap — Eddie Benson’s father — was in agreement. “We’re all watching it from the couch,” he said, “but these kids — they’re actually putting their lives on the line for our freedom. Heck, I wish we could do something more — something bigger.”

Siddharth noticed his father begin to smile. He nudged Mohan Lal. He wanted to grab him and get out of there. A large woman with glasses stood up and said that the money could be better spent on an extra set of encyclopedias, or color monitors for the computers.

Mrs. Antonelli said, “We’re kinda short on time here, Laurie. Let’s table the encyclopedias until next time.”

It was then that Mohan Lal raised his hand. “Excuse me, Miss Joe?”

A vein in Siddharth’s neck started pulsing.

Mrs. Antonelli turned toward him, her eyebrows curved like the wings of a seagull. “Yes?”

“I hope you don’t mind, but I would like to add my two cents.”

Siddharth bit the inside of his cheek.

Mrs. Antonelli flashed her fake wide smile. “Absolutely. We would love it if you shared.”

Mohan Lal handed his empty coffee cup to Siddharth, then stood up. “Good evening, ladies and gentleman. I hope you don’t mind, but I wanted to share a few small thoughts.” He cleared his throat. “You all seem like such intelligent people. This is why it is all the more urgent for us to really think this through. Before taking action, we must think this through and ask difficult questions.” Mohan Lal grinned as he spoke, which infuriated Siddharth. His father was always moping, always fighting off tears. His voice would even crack when he said goodnight. And now he was smiling. Now? Here?

Mohan Lal kept on going: “Everyone here is an educated person, so you won’t mind if I ask you a hard question. Is this war in the Gulf truly just? Is this a war we should be actually be fighting? Because if we buy these ribbons, we are making a statement about this war.”

Siddharth dug his fingers into the back of his father’s brown trousers.

Mrs. Antonelli interrupted Mohan Lal. “Dr. . Arora, right? Dr. Arora, I don’t think I know what you mean. We are making a statement.” Her voice was now sharper.

Mohan Lal continued smiling and said, “Let’s review our history, ladies and gentleman. Who gave Saddam his weapons? Who gave him his money? We did. We did these things because it served our interests. Folks, I am a firm believer in the use of force. But if we support this war, what message are we sending to the world? What message are we sending our children?”

The room was totally silent for a moment, one of the longest moments in Siddharth’s life. But soon other parents started whispering. Soon people were scowling and yelling, and a chaotic uproar swept over the cafeteria. Siddharth tapped his forehead against the table. When he looked up, his father’s eyes were gleaming in a way they hadn’t for months.

Mrs. Antonelli banged a gavel.

Eddie Benson’s father stood up. He walked up to the podium and pointed at Mohan Lal. “With all due respect to him — Dr. whatever-his-name-is — everything that guy said, it’s. . it’s totally baloney.” Mr. Benson turned toward Mrs. Antonelli. “Pardon my French, but that’s a bunch of crap.” The entire audience started clapping, except for the large woman with the glasses who had wanted the encyclopedias. Mr. Benson removed his baseball cap and patted down his hair. “My cousin was in ’Nam, and when he got back, they spat all over him. That’s not gonna happen this time — not on my watch.”

After some more applause, the blonde with the bangs made a motion to spend six hundred dollars on the ribbons, not three hundred. That way they could buy two for every student.

Siddharth stood up and yanked his father’s arm.

Mohan Lal shrugged him off. “Let go of me,” he said.

He released his father and fled the cafeteria. He ran toward the car and wanted to keep on running. He wanted to run all the way home — but to his old home, the one where his mother had lived. For a moment, he wished it were his father who had gone. If he could, he would trade in his father for his mother. But he immediately regretted this line of thinking. He told himself that if his father were to die now, it would be all his fault.

* * *

Later that night, Siddharth couldn’t keep himself from relating the incident to Arjun. He made Arjun promise not to say anything, but as Mohan Lal was washing dishes, Arjun sat himself at the kitchen counter and started speaking about the Gulf War. “Dad, isn’t it America’s duty to protect innocent countries from tyranny? My history teacher says that if America hadn’t intervened in World War II, we’d all be living in Fascist dictatorships.”

“Son, listen,” said Mohan Lal. “Youth makes you naive. Yes, the Muslims need handling. But Kuwaitis aren’t Jews. And Bush? Your President Bush is no Churchill. He’s no Churchill, and he’s certainly no FDR.”

“Whatever,” replied Arjun. “That’s not the point.”

“Tell me, son,” said Mohan Lal, smirking again. “What’s the point then?”

Siddharth glared at his brother. “Guys, can we just drop it?”

Arjun said, “Dad, Siddharth told me what you did tonight.”

Mohan Lal turned toward Siddharth and raised his eyebrows. “What did he tell you?”

“It doesn’t matter what he told me. But you gotta start prioritizing your family. You gotta prioritize your family over all your crazy ideas and conspiracy theories.”

Siddharth said, “Arjun, don’t say that. Dad isn’t crazy.”

“Listen, Arjun,” said Mohan Lal, “I can do without advice from a child.”

“You’ve got two kids to put through college, Dad,” said Arjun. “You’ve gotta stop being so irrational. You’ve gotta stop pissing people off and just keep your head down — if not for your sake, then for ours.”

Mohan Lal’s eyes were now wide with rage. He raised the plate he was rinsing above his head. Siddharth leaped out of his seat and grabbed his father’s shoulder. “Dad, please!” he yelled. But Mohan Lal threw the plate into the sink, and it shattered into three big pieces and countless little shards.

Arjun hopped off the counter and kicked one of the iron kitchen chairs, then stomped to the other end of the house. Siddharth’s heart was pounding. He wasn’t sure what to do. He watched his father pour himself a whiskey and then followed him to the television. Mohan Lal sat down in the armchair and told Siddharth to put on channel thirteen. Siddharth obeyed, then went to check on his brother in their bedroom.

Arjun was sitting up on his bed. His head was resting on his Beatles poster, one in which they had facial hair and little round glasses. Arjun’s nose was swollen, and pink lines were now woven into the whites of his eyes. He was sucking on the coin that hung from his gold chain, a coin embossed with the image of King George VI, former ruler of the British Empire. These coins had been a gift from their maternal grandfather. Siddharth thought wearing a chain was too feminine, so his coin was in a safe-deposit box.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Arjun opened his mouth, and the coin softly thumped against his chest. “Why should you be sorry?”

He leaned his head on his brother’s knee. “Please don’t cry, Arjun.”

Arjun used his white undershirt to wipe his eyes. “Did you finish your homework?”

“Yeah. After school.”

“Well, you should read then,” said Arjun. “You know, every day you don’t read, your SAT scores are gonna go down. They’ll go down, like, ten full points per day.”

Siddharth knew this wasn’t possible, that if this were true, he’d end up receiving a negative score on the SATs. But he kept quiet. Arjun got up and grabbed a piece of paper. He wrote down some multiplication problems and handed them to him. Siddharth completed the math at Arjun’s tidy wooden desk. Then he left to check on Mohan Lal in the family room.

3. Slut

Back when she was still Sharon Miller, Sharon Nagorski had lived less than a mile from Siddharth, on Miller Farm. He and Sharon had attended first through fourth grades together, but they didn’t speak much during those years. He had his own friends, at least a dozen of them. As for Sharon, she was a loser. She was always staring at pictures of horses, always lugging around a big black case that contained her stupid trumpet. Like Siddharth, Sharon switched to Deer Run Elementary at the beginning of fifth grade. She didn’t transfer for the after-school program, but because her mother had gotten divorced. The only rental they could afford was on the other side of South Haven.

During the first days of fifth grade, he had caught Sharon staring at him once or twice, but he refused to meet her eyes. Her social status was definitely a problem, but the big issue was that she knew what had happened to him. She was the only kid in his new school who knew about his mother’s accident, and he didn’t want her to give him one of those fake sympathy smiles. Those smiles made him feel pathetic, like he was dying of AIDS. Like he was retarded. And he didn’t want her to say, I’m sorry. He’d heard those words ten thousand times, and they now filled him with loathing. Sorry was something you said for little things — if you cussed at dinner, or coughed without covering your mouth.

One day during the fall of fifth grade, it was pouring out, so they had recess inside. Siddharth was alone at his desk drawing. Without his realizing it, his sketch of a Beverly Hills dream mansion was slowly morphing into one of those ancient Delhi tombs. Those broken-down tombs smelled like piss, and they contained dead people, right there in public parks. But they had arches and domes and were the only pretty buildings in that ugly city. When he had gone to India the previous summer, his aunt’s driver showed him a tomb with dozens of rose-beaked parrots perched inside. The driver got one of them to sit on his finger, and Siddharth fed it little bits of fruit. That had been one of the only good moments during the worst summer of his life.

As Siddharth worked on his drawing, Sharon seated herself at the desk next to his and stared. He tried to ignore her, but she wouldn’t take the hint. Eventually, she broke the silence: “That’s cool. Is it a palace?”

“A palace? Nah, it’s just a bunch of lines.”

“Well, it’s beautiful,” said Sharon. “Who taught you how to draw like that?”

“I dunno.” Little bullets of blood pounded inside his chest. “I just figured it out.”

“Well, you’re talented,” said Sharon. “You could be an artist — an architect or something — if you wanted.”

Over the days that followed, they began eating lunch and doing group work together. They began wandering the field behind the playground during outdoor recess, sometimes catching and releasing tiny quarter-sized toads, sometimes sitting on the grass to play Uno or rummy. Sharon knew how to shuffle the cards fast, so that they sounded like fleeing pigeons. Sometimes they just talked. She told him about her parents’ divorce and her mother’s new jobs and boyfriends. She explained that her father could lose his temper, but at heart he was a real softie. Sharon’s father now lived in North Carolina and worked as a truck driver. He had recently bought her a new trumpet for a recital she’d be attending in New York City, at some famous music school Siddharth had never heard of.

Initially, his stomach burned when Sharon divulged so much personal information. He worried that if she told him so much, he might have to tell her what was going on in his own screwed-up world. But Sharon seemed okay with his silence, and he started allowing himself to sit back and get lost in the details of her complicated life. He listened carefully as she told him about her big brother, who knew how to program computers. Sharon said her brother would probably get a job at NASA one day, and Siddharth imagined him to be like Matthew Broderick in War Games. Sharon’s eyes lit up when she spoke about her aunt, a paralegal who lived alone in a Manhattan high-rise. Her aunt attended the ballet and the theater, and Sharon had spent four nights with her over the summer, when her parents were finalizing the divorce. She swore she was going to move in with her aunt on her sixteenth birthday.

Sharon also told him fictional stories, and he liked these more than the stories from her actual life. At first, she just related simple things, like the plot of a movie she had seen or a book she’d recently read, but as time went on, she started inventing her own stories. She told him the tale of a teenager who dropped out of high school to become a musician. The girl worked as a waitress in the Plaza Hotel, though she soon got discovered by a big producer. This producer eventually proposed to her, but the girl chose to remain alone. Siddharth objected to this outcome. He asked, “Why can’t this story have a happy ending?” Sharon explained that being alone can be the best thing in the world — especially for a woman.

When he listened to these adventures, he managed to forget about Mohan Lal and his mother and the fact that he didn’t have friends anymore — except for Sharon. She pushed him to invent some stories of his own, but he shrugged her off every time. He always felt too drained and embarrassed to come up with something. Eventually, she decided that she would be the one to tell the stories, and his job would be to sit down and draw them out.

“What do you mean, draw them out?”

“Duh, it’s called illustration,” said Sharon. “I’ll be the writer and you can illustrate.”

He was resistant in the beginning. Something about this game felt too childish — better suited to girls. But Sharon was persistent, and they soon had a smoothly running system. She told him her stories during lunch, and in the afternoon, while their teacher Miss Kleinberg was babbling about multiplication tables or Pilgrims collaborating with Indians, he secretly began his sketches, finishing them off at his boring after-school program. During after-school, most of the other kids played dodgeball or tetherball, and it was a relief to have something fun to occupy his time.

By the end of fifth grade, Sharon’s stories got even better. As usual, her characters were runaways, musicians, and farmers. But these people started falling in love. They started fooling around. Men sucked on women’s necks, and women licked the earlobes of their boyfriends. In one of her stories, a farmer hooked up with a schoolteacher who had come to buy carrots at his farm stand. Siddharth hoped that this man would bring his hand to the teacher’s breast, but he knew better than to say so out loud.

As Sharon narrated her souped-up stories behind the playground, he sometimes found himself developing an erection, and he had to yank his T-shirt toward his knees on the way back into the brick-faced school. But these boners were nice, and he began looking forward to them. He started spending more time on his illustrations, creating characters who could have gone in real comic books. The men he drew wore old-fashioned hats and trench coats, like the actors in his father’s black-and-white movies, and the women had beauty marks, bobbed hair, and tight-fitting tops. His mother had once taught him how to make an object seem more spherical, by smudging pencil marks with his finger, and he found that this technique could make a woman’s chest leap off the page.

* * *

The following year, Sharon Nagorski wasn’t in his sixth grade class, and he was both relieved and disappointed. He was relieved because some of the other kids had dubbed him a loser just for being friends with her. But he also knew Sharon was his only real friend at Deer Run Elementary. Without her sitting next to him, his school days would be long and lonely. At least they would still have lunch together. He had Sharon at lunch, and he had her at recess too.

During recess, the pair normally sat as far away from the other kids as possible. On a crisp and cloudy Monday in late September, however, they opted for a small patch of sun that was a mere fifty feet from the baseball diamond, where Luca Peroti and his notorious posse were playing kickball. The ground was moist after a day of hard rain, so Siddharth tore out a few pages from his sketchpad for them to sit on.

Sharon was telling him a story about two kids who had run away from home and were sleeping in the stalls of the New York Public Library bathroom. These kids climbed atop the toilets to conceal their legs when the guards came by early in the morning. They made friends with strangers, who sometimes bought them donuts from a snack bar, or cups of hot chocolate with little marshmallows.

“So these kids,” asked Siddharth, “are they, like, boyfriend and girlfriend?”

“They’re brother and sister,” said Sharon. “Are you even listening?”

He stopped sketching and stared at his overweight sixth grade teacher, Mr. Latella, who was chatting with the principal. Mr. Latella had a whistle around his neck and a short-sleeve shirt despite the unseasonably cool air. “But do they meet anybody?” he asked Sharon. “I mean, maybe one of them is fooling around with a librarian?”

She glared at him. “Do you want me to stop, Siddharth?”

“Chill,” he said, avoiding her light-blue eyes. “Keep going.”

As she recommenced her tale, he placed his sketchpad on the ground and leaned back, propping himself up with his palms. He stared at the slender oak trees that surrounded the playground; their tall tips were starting to yellow. A group of girls and boys was playing tag, and he was envious of how often they got to touch each other. The kickball boys seemed to be having the most fun. Eddie Benson, the blond-haired pitcher, was laughing hard at Luca, who was at third base and miming some sort of an animal, possibly an orangutan.

He knew that if Eric Connor or Arjun were in his grade, they would be friends with Luca Peroti and Eddie Benson. But he was stuck with Sharon. A couple of weeks earlier, Luca had called her a ho, probably because of the short shorts she was wearing. All the girls had been wearing short shorts, but for some reason Luca only picked on Sharon. Sometimes Siddharth wished he could tell Sharon to leave him alone. But he knew she was only partly to blame for his social situation. The real problem was him. The real problem was his personality. It was his defective personality that made Mohan Lal sad all the time. It was his defective personality that had made Arjun move so far away from home.

Arjun was now a freshman at the University of Michigan. He claimed he had chosen Michigan because they were offering him a huge scholarship. He said he couldn’t turn down all that money now that the family had only one income to rely on. Siddharth believed this on most days, but sometimes he had the feeling that Arjun was lying. In some moments, he thought Arjun had chosen Michigan because he needed to get away from them. Two days before leaving for college, Arjun had said, “I need to move forward, Siddharth. But Dad — he doesn’t want to. What about you? What do you want? I’m not convinced you’re committed to your own happiness.”

Some withering yellow leaves wafted by his feet. They crackled when he stepped on them. Sharon kept on telling her story, but he wasn’t paying her much attention. He tried thinking more positive thoughts, just as Arjun had instructed. He thought about his father, who had seemed a little happier lately. Mohan Lal was waking up earlier. He had begun cooking decent things once or twice a week — lasagnas and his famous tacos — just as he had promised while Siddharth was sobbing on the endless car ride home from Michigan. A few weeks earlier, Mohan Lal had signed a book contract with Walton Publishers. They had read one of his articles on ethics in marketing and commissioned him to write a textbook. Since then, he was still drinking Scotch every night, but a pale yellow glass, not two amber ones. Since then, he had even resumed calling old friends in California and Oklahoma. He complained to them about the bastards in the Congress Party, about the idiocy of the Gulf War. The only person he wouldn’t speak to was Barry Uncle. Siddharth still couldn’t decide whether this boycott of Barry Uncle was a good thing or a bad one.

Eddie Benson started hollering on the kickball field, which snapped Siddharth out of his trance. “We gotta live one!” Eddie motioned for his fielders to back up. “Dave’s a shrimp, but he can kick like a beast!” Eddie rolled the ruby-red kickball toward home plate, where David Marcus was standing poised. David swung his leg back and made contact, and the ball soared toward third base, where Luca Peroti was standing. It flew over Luca’s head and bounced in the outfield. Then it rolled by Siddharth and Sharon.

“Great,” said Sharon.

Luca charged toward the ball, right in their direction. “Yo, you blind?” he yelled. “Grab that shit!”

Siddharth’s heart was thumping, and his mouth was suddenly parched. He sprang up and jogged toward the ball, then bent down to scoop it up. By the time he got back to Sharon, Luca’s large frame was casting a shadow over their spot.

“What’s up, ladies?” said Luca. He was wearing a hooded sweatshirt and nylon soccer shorts, his boxers sticking out from underneath them. “Planning the wedding, are we?”

“You’re hilarious, Luca,” said Sharon.

Luca smiled, bouncing a hand off his spiky hair. “A nerd and a loser — it’s a match made in heaven.” He peered at Siddharth. “Kid, you’re giving me that look again. You wanna bang me or something?”

Siddharth tossed him the ball, hoping Mr. Latella would blow the whistle and end recess early.

“Nice throw,” said Luca.

He wasn’t sure if Luca was being sarcastic or actually paying him a compliment.

The kids on the baseball diamond emitted a series of shouts and whoops, but Luca just stood there smiling.

“They’re waiting for you,” said Sharon.

Luca started shaking his head, then reached down and lunged for Siddharth’s sketchpad.

Sharon leaped to her feet. “Put it down, Luca. Give it back.”

Siddharth tried to move, but his legs were frozen. Luca held the sketchpad over his head. Sharon jumped for it but couldn’t reach. She kept on hopping, and Luca dodged her hands.

“I’d stay back if I were you,” said Luca. “You’re gonna wanna stay back.” He started thumbing through the pages, and his smile reappeared. Siddharth caught a glimpse of his multicolored braces.

Luca said, “Damn, shit isn’t bad.”

“That doesn’t belong to you,” said Sharon.

Luca held one of Siddharth’s sketches close to his face. “Nagorski, I always knew you had it in you. I mean, this stuff is kinda kinky. This is kinda hot!”

Siddharth glanced down at his beat-up Nikes, unsure of what to do. Thankfully, Mr. Latella blew his whistle. Luca chucked the sketchpad to the ground and ran toward the baseball diamond, where he was greeted with shrieks and high fives. Siddharth and Sharon lined up by the brick wall in preparation to return to class.

“Jesus Christ, Siddharth,” said Sharon.

“What?” he said defensively.

“Why didn’t you say anything?”

He scoffed. “What was I supposed to say?”

“You could’ve stood up for us. You could’ve told him they were yours.”

* * *

As Siddharth rode the bus home, it started pouring again. That’s the way September had been — days of rain with only glimpses of sunshine. The shouting and laughter of the other kids ricocheted against the vehicle’s metal walls, but he was happy to be alone. He hugged his arms and pressed his knees into the veins of the vinyl seat in front of him. He was worried about what would happen if Luca told everybody about the drawings. Being a nobody was one thing; being a freak was an entirely different story. At least it was a Monday, and his father would be home. At least he didn’t have to stay at his stupid after-school program, where he had too much time to think bad thoughts.

Soon he was the last one left on the bus, which was barreling toward the blooming cornfields of Miller Farm, with its dilapidated barns and rickety farmhouses. Sharon had lived in one of these houses before her parents’ divorce. Siddharth’s mother used to say that Miller Farm milk was overpriced, but she’d gone there with an easel and canvas a couple of times. He wondered if Sharon’s mother had ever talked with her while she was painting. The bus driver took a left from Miller Avenue onto New England Lane, and Siddharth looked forward to hugging his father and watching some television.

Now they were back in his own neighborhood, where he had lived ever since he was a baby. He knew almost everyone here — the D’Angelos, who lived in a gray Cape Cod and owned a used-car lot, and Mr. Iverson, who rode a Harley and had fought in Vietnam. Mr. Roderick Connor, Timmy and Eric’s dad, was a Korean War vet. He lived in the neocolonial right behind the Aroras. Arjun had forced Siddharth to hang out with the Connor boys last fall, but they always ended up doing something that made him feel bad. Timmy once said, “I’m hungry. Maybe we could have those pizza bagels that your mom — I mean your parents — used to make.” Siddharth didn’t mind this slip-up; it was the way Timmy acted afterward that bothered him. He got all awkward and sweet, and even let him win at checkers.

The bus squeaked to a stop at the top of his street. He hoped his father would be waiting for him so that he wouldn’t get drenched on the walk home. The bus driver grunted goodbye, and he stepped out onto the road. All he encountered was a soup of mud and leaves by the sewer grate. A drenched squirrel was cowering on the horizontal branch of a dogwood. Siddharth pulled his hooded Michigan sweatshirt over his head. He loved this sweatshirt. Though he loathed sports, he obsessed over anything involving his brother’s Michigan Wolverines. He’d started watching Michigan football games on Sunday, just so that he could discuss Desmond Howard’s performance on the phone with Arjun. He plodded down the hill, weaving through an obstacle course of earthworms. He was relieved to see Mohan Lal’s vehicle parked in front of the house, the new Dodge minivan that they had bought to deliver Arjun to college.

The Aroras had a four-bedroom, single-story ranch with robin-blue shutters and stained wooden shingles on its exterior walls. The house had small, dark rooms, but his mother had tried to spruce the place up over the years. She’d hired a contractor to install a skylight in the family room and brand-new appliances in the kitchen. She had Mohan Lal and Barry Uncle get rid of the acrylic paneling that lined the corridors. Siddharth had been excited about her plans to tear down the wall between the screened-in porch and the family room. He’d gone with her to look at new carpeting and light fixtures, but then the accident happened.

He pushed open the front door and found that the family room was empty. With his backpack still on, he scurried through the kitchen, passing the laundry room and the guest room to get to his father’s office. Ever since Mohan Lal had signed the contract with Walton, he was always in there. Siddharth sometimes woke up in the morning to find his father awake in his office from the night before, typing with two fingers on his new computer, or babbling about Maslow into his microcassette recorder. When Siddharth complained about the situation to his brother, Arjun told him to be more supportive. “You’re gonna have to keep Dad on track. Mohan Lal is a lazy man, so you’re gonna have to help him focus.”

He pushed open the office door, but the room was empty. He scrutinized his father’s messy desk. Piles of books and papers formed a small city beside the computer. He was relieved to see a coffee mug next to the keyboard, not a whiskey glass. He picked up the mug and placed it in the kitchen sink, then ran toward the other end of the house, to his father’s bedroom. Pushing open the door, he saw a mummy-shaped lump on the bed. That lump was Mohan Lal, and he was almost certain that it wasn’t moving — that his father had stopped breathing.

“Dad,” he said. He went up to his father and shook him.

“Son,” said Mohan Lal, his voice scratchy. He coughed, then propped himself up. “Welcome home, son.”

Siddharth was relieved, but irritated. “It’s the middle of the afternoon, Dad.”

“Your father was up late working last night. He needs to catch up on his sleep.”

“Dad, it’s not normal to sleep in the middle of the afternoon.” He was about to leave, but Mohan Lal called him back. Siddharth paused, wondering if his father was going to ask him about school today. If he asked, Siddharth would tell him all about Luca and Sharon.

Instead, Mohan Lal said, “Son, come back and wake me in another ten minutes.”

Jerk, Siddharth thought. He headed to the kitchen and opened a bag of Doritos, then topped them with cheese and microwaved them. He poured out a Coke and sat by the round kitchen table on a wrought-iron chair that had been reupholstered by his mother several years earlier. After he finished his snack, he picked up the cordless phone to call his brother, though as usual, Arjun wasn’t home. His roommate said he was at the library, but Siddharth knew he was probably out drinking beer or screwing some girl. That was what people did at college, according to Sharon.

His mind returned to Sharon and what had happened today. She was his friend, and he’d acted like a coward; he would have to make it up to her. His heart was thumping rapidly — he needed to calm down. He needed to watch something. He threw on The Karate Kid, one of his favorite movies. He had seen it almost twenty times but still liked anticipating what would happen. He had discovered that rewatching a light movie could allow him to stop imagining certain things over and over, like the image of glass from the windshield piercing his mother’s eyeballs, of her seat belt slicing her neck. Movies allowed him to stop thinking about lots of things — if she had thought of him before she died, if she knew that it was all coming to an end.

* * *

As he rode the bus to school the next morning, he felt that it was going to be a bad day. Luca was going to say something to them, and then he would have to stick up for Sharon. He would defend his friend, even though Luca would mock him. Even though Luca would call him a faggot. Fortunately, the morning was totally uneventful. Nobody at school said anything to him, and he felt like he was invisible — even to his teacher, Mr. Latella. Sometimes he minded being invisible, but today it was a good thing. As the hours passed, he told himself that he’d blown everything out of proportion. He told himself that everything was totally fine.

He felt calm and contented as he plunked his tray of soggy pizza and chocolate milk onto his lunch table. While Sharon ate one of her peanut butter and marshmallow sandwiches, he asked her about her trumpet lesson, and if her mother and brother had made up yet. But she only responded with nods and one-word answers. He got nervous and started talking about his own life for a change. He told her about Mohan Lal’s book contract, explaining that his father would soon be a famous author. He told her that once they were rich, they would probably buy a house in Fairfield or Woodford, that his father would trade in their minivan for a Mercedes.

“Great,” said Sharon, arching her dirty-blond eyebrows. “I’m real happy for you.”

He finished his pizza and wiped the grease from his lips with a paper napkin. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw someone approaching. His stomach tightened, and he grabbed his neck. Shit, he thought. Fucking shit. It was Luca Peroti, and Eddie Benson and David Marcus were following behind.

The three boys sat down at an empty table nearby. At first they just sat there snickering, but then Luca started coughing. Siddharth could tell it was a fake cough. He smiled at Sharon and rolled his eyes, but she kept her gaze fixed on her plastic cup of pudding.

Luca mumbled “slut” loud enough for both of them to hear, and the other two boys started coughing too. Eddie coughed and said, “Sharon.” Then miniscule David Marcus coughed out the word “Is.” Luca kept on going with “slut.” “Sharon.” Cough. “Is.” Cough. “A slut.” Cough.

He told himself that everything would be fine, but he couldn’t untangle his neck muscles. He turned to Sharon, whose face was bright red. She said, “Get a freaking life, Luca.” The three boys chuckled. Siddharth wished she hadn’t said anything. He wished she had just remained silent and let the moment pass. He noticed that her lips had begun to quiver and realized that now was the time. The moment for him to act had arrived. But he couldn’t move. All he could do was grasp his neck and stare at Sharon. He noticed she was wearing hoop earrings today, not her usual silver studs. His mother had once said that hoop earrings were cheap. He wondered if Luca was right about her. Maybe she was a slut.

Luca and his crew restarted their chanting.

“Just leave us alone,” said Sharon. “If you had a life, you would leave us alone.”

Eddie removed his baseball cap and started looking around. “I thought I heard something,” he said. “Must have been a fly.”

Luca said, “Kid, I think you’re right. It was that slutty fly over there. I think she was talking about your mom.”

Both of Sharon’s fists were clenched. “Jesus, Luca. For God’s sake, I didn’t even do anything.”

“Yeah, right,” said Luca, still laughing.

“Those drawings,” she said. “They aren’t even mine.”

Siddharth couldn’t believe it. Was she betraying him?

“Sure,” said Eddie. “They belong to some other slut.”

Sharon turned to Siddharth with teary eyes, her lips pursed. He clutched the table and readied himself to speak. Yes, he had to do it. He had to do the right thing. For Sharon.

“Say something,” she whispered.

“Yo gaylord,” said Luca, “you gonna save your girlfriend?”

“He’s not gonna save anyone,” said Eddie. “This kid’s dad is a commie. That’s what my pop told me. I bet Siddharth’s a pussy too.”

Siddharth swallowed again, and the air went down his throat like little bits of metal. He hated Mohan Lal, but he hated Eddie more.

“Siddharth!” Sharon stood up, her eyes going wide.

“Shit,” said Luca, clapping his hands, “I think they’re breaking up.”

Siddharth gritted his teeth. Those shitty stories and those shitty illustrations — they were all her fucking idea in the first place. He suddenly realized something: he wasn’t even twelve years old, and he already had too many people to worry about. He didn’t need to worry about someone else. He didn’t need to worry about Sharon.

“What?” he said, throwing his hands in the air. “What do you want, Sharon?”

She broke into a jog and headed toward the exit. The lunch monitor yelled after her, but she kept on going.

4. My Father’s Tree Houses

Siddharth daydreamed as Mr. Latella droned on about an upcoming independent book project. Students would have to read a novel by themselves, and they would respond to it by creating an art project or a five-page report. Upon hearing this news, the class let out a collective grumble. “This is baby stuff, guys,” said Mr. Latella. “They’re gonna eat you for breakfast in junior high.” Alyssa D. raised her hand. She was one of the hot girls. Her bangs had been sprayed into a blond tidal wave. Alyssa asked the teacher if she could read To Kill a Mockingbird, and Mr. Latella said he would be impressed if she could manage such a big book. He gave her a high five, her reward for saying something that pleased him.

Siddharth gave his head an almost imperceptible shake. Alyssa D. was an ass-kisser — what his father called a brown-noser. Mohan Lal had told him to avoid brown-nosers. Siddharth turned toward the window and stared at a few ravens sipping water from a puddle on the crumbling tennis courts. A dream from last night was looping in his mind. In it, his mother had returned from the dead. But she had cancer and would only survive for three more months. When Siddharth started crying, his brother punched him in the arm. “This is objectively good news,” said Arjun. “It’s good news, and you should be grateful.”

Over the past two weeks, Siddharth had had several bad dreams, and his life had become painfully lonely. After the incident with Luca Peroti, Sharon had started sitting at a new lunch table on the other side of the cafeteria, which contained a mixture of girls — girls who seemed younger than their age and talked about horses, and girls with tight shirts and too much hairspray who hooked up with older boys from West Haven. When Mr. Latella noticed Siddharth eating alone, he made him sit at a table with freaks like Bobby Meyers. Bobby was practically a midget and had lots of acne, and he always dressed as if he were attending a dinner party. His grandfather was from Russia, so people called him a commie too.

Siddharth could have hung out with Bobby during recess, but he usually preferred to remain alone. Sometimes he got a special pass for the library so that he could read or draw. Occasionally Mr. Latella let him stay inside and do things around the classroom, like staple portraits of Jackie Robinson and Ronald Reagan to the rear bulletin board. As Siddharth completed these chores, Mr. Latella lectured him. He said that it wasn’t healthy for young people to be so solitary, which made Siddharth want to punch him in the face. But he just shrugged, explaining that being alone gave him a chance to think. Mr. Latella told him that a sixth grader shouldn’t spend so much time thinking.

The crows outside leaped from the tennis court to a rusty fence that was slowly collapsing. As Mr. Latella babbled on about the independent book project, Siddharth sat at his desk wishing he could go back in time, like in one of his favorite movies. If he could go back in time, he would do the right thing with Sharon. He would tell Luca Peroti the truth about his drawings. A few days earlier, he had tried calling Sharon to apologize. Her brother said, “Hang on a sec,” but then came back to say that she wasn’t home. As Siddharth recalled the phone call, anger smoldered inside of him and burned away his remorse. Screw Sharon, he thought. He decided he was glad about what he had done. He was glad that her parents had gotten divorced. She deserved that — for being such a bitch to him.

A loud bang went off near his right ear.

He jumped in his chair, and his eyes flashed open. Everything was blurry for a second, and he struggled to remember where he was. He turned his head to find Mr. Latella standing a few feet away from him. He had no idea how long he’d zoned out for. He had no idea why his teacher was staring at him. He swallowed, tried to moisten his mouth, but his tongue felt like one of the crinkled leaves outside the window.

Mr. Latella’s hairy, ringed fingers were grasping Siddharth’s desk, and he was breathing hard. Like an angry bull. “Earth to Siddharth,” said Mr. Latella. “Where exactly are you right now, Mr. Arora?”

He shook his head to straighten out his mind. Everyone’s eyes were on him, and he needed to do something. He needed to prove that he was normal. What if he pushed Mr. Latella’s hand off his desk? What if he said something funny — that there was a girl outside who was so slutty that she was fooling around with a black crow?

“I asked you a question,” said Mr. Latella. “Do you have any ideas for a book?”

“A book?” he whispered. Alyssa D. caught his eye. She was smiling. Did she want to help him? No, she was holding her chin. She was holding her chin to keep from laughing.

“For your independent book project?” Mr. Latella wheezed between his words. “The one we’ve been discussing for the last twenty minutes?”

Come on, he told himself. Think, you idiot.

Mr. Latella gripped his fat, red neck and put one of his wingtip shoes on an empty chair. “You’re in sixth grade now, Siddharth. Do you really think this type of behavior is appropriate?”

Bastard, thought Siddharth. The classroom was silent for a few seconds — seconds that felt like hours. He closed his eyes, hoping that his teacher would vanish. But when he opened them, Mr. Latella was still glaring at him. His mind returned to the concept of time travel. If time travel were possible, he would go back to last July, when there was no school. When his brother was still at home. No, he would go further back. He would go back to his mother’s last day on earth. He would intercept the call from the hospital and say that she wasn’t home.

Luca Peroti shouted, “Hey, Mr. Latella!”

“Not now, Luca.”

“But I have a question.”

“What?”

“What about Playboy?” said Luca. “Can I read a Playboy for my project?”

Siddharth relaxed for a moment. Was Luca trying to help him?

Mr. Latella’s mouth was wide open, but the wall phone buzzed before he could reprimand Luca. He took the call, then pointed at Siddharth and snapped his fingers. “Today’s your lucky day, mister. Ms. Farber wants you — on the double.”

Luca said, “Yo, Siddharth, have fun in the retard room.”

The entire class broke into laughter.

With his eyes fixed on the floor, Siddharth grabbed his backpack and left the classroom.

* * *

He sipped some water at the handicap fountain, then grazed his fingers against the smooth cinder-block walls. He palmed the cold steel of a bright red fire extinguisher, wondering what would happen if he pulled a fire alarm. Today he wasn’t in the mood for Ms. Farber. He didn’t feel like hearing about the different stages of grief. He didn’t feel like hearing about the way death changed your relationship with the people you love, so that grieving people have to mourn twice — for the people they lost, and for the people who are still living but will never be the same again. Today he wasn’t in the mood for any of that bullshit.

The first time he saw Ms. Farber was at the beginning of fifth grade. Mohan Lal hadn’t told anybody at Deer Run Elementary about Siddharth’s mother, but his teacher, Miss Kleinberg, sensed there was some sort of problem. She thought he was too quiet, so she referred him to Ms. Farber. Ms. Farber had called him and Mohan Lal into her office, and she asked them if Siddharth’s mother was a fluent English speaker. She said, “I know you’re a professional, Dr. Arora. But what about your wife? When one parent doesn’t speak the language, it can have a serious impact on the child’s vocalization.”

Despite that dreadful initial encounter, over the past year Siddharth had actually enjoyed some of his visits to Ms. Farber’s office. Since their initial meeting, he had been to her office eleven times. Sometimes they talked about simple things, like his favorite television shows or what he was reading at school. Ms. Farber asked him whether he missed his family in India, about the differences between his two schools. He told her that his old school was better, but that all schools sucked. India was dirty and poor, though his father’s older brother was rich. This brother had two drivers and had just gotten cable television. When Ms. Farber asked him how his father was doing, he usually lied. He told her that Mohan Lal was going on three-mile walks every day, that he cooked a three-course dinner every night.

Ms. Farber sometimes asked him to draw pictures. She usually let him draw whatever he wanted, so he made mountains with ponds and evergreen trees, just like his mother had taught him, or he sketched cubes and bowls and then painstakingly shaded them in. One time, she asked him if he would be willing to draw a picture of his family, so he’d made a quick sketch featuring him, Mohan Lal, and Arjun. He thought that their bodies and clothes had come out realistically. Their facial features, however, were the work of a child. Ms. Farber held up his sketch and smiled. She told him he was very talented, and that she also liked to draw. “Honey, do you mind if I ask you something?” He shrugged. She said, “Is someone missing from your picture? You don’t have to talk about it, but I think someone might be missing.” He had wanted to say, Duh, what the hell do you think? — but he just looked down and bit a piece of skin from the inside of his mouth.

He took his time walking down the hallway to her office. He paused outside her door, hypothesizing about what they would talk about. Had she heard about his fight with Sharon? Had she found out about the illustrations he had made for her stories? If she’d been told about them, she would think he was some sort of pervert. When he peeked in through the glass pane above her doorknob, it felt as if someone had kicked him in the groin. His father was right there in Ms. Farber’s office.

Mohan Lal was sitting on a tiny student chair at the reading table; his knees jutted upward, almost to the level of his thick black bifocals. Siddharth prayed that he was either dreaming or hallucinating. He bit down hard on his tongue but didn’t wake up. This was real. And the fact that his father was at school could only mean bad things. Either they’d found out he was a pervert or something was wrong with Arjun.

As he stared into Ms. Farber’s office, he was astonished by what was happening. Ms. Farber was leaning her head back and laughing. He had been imagining the worst, but Mohan Lal was grinning. He was grinning and talking and gesturing with his hands, the way he used to tell jokes at dinner parties — the way he used to discuss politics with Barry Uncle when they were drinking. Saliva flooded Siddharth’s mouth. Bitter saliva. It tasted like battery acid.

He pushed open the door. Mohan Lal turned toward him and waved.

“Good morning, Siddharth,” said Ms. Farber, flashing her toothy smile. He liked her, but he didn’t like that fake smile. She was wearing a white jacket with puffy shoulders. It looked weird, or maybe Oriental, and the shiny scarf around her neck seemed foreign too. Mohan Lal was wearing a tweed jacket with leather patches on the elbows, and a yellow tie that Siddharth and Arjun had given him on Father’s Day three years earlier. Mohan Lal patted the empty chair beside him, and Siddharth took a seat. He scrunched up his face and gave his father a look that was supposed to convey several questions. What the hell is going on? How could you do this to me again? Is everything okay with Arjun? Mohan Lal winked at him, then turned to Ms. Farber.

“You really said that, Dr. Arora? And they really believed you? I tell you, you need to write that one down and send it to the New Yorker.”

Mohan Lal grinned at her. “If I did, people would think it was a fiction.”

Ms. Farber shook her head and smiled. “Well, thankfully, not everyone in this country is quite so ignorant.”

“Of that I am certain,” said Mohan Lal, pointing his right hand toward Ms. Farber. “And you can’t blame the people. They only know what they are taught by media.”

“Oh, you’re being too nice,” she replied. “I mean, tree houses? Come on. How could they think that about such a well-spoken man?”

Siddharth breathed deeply to calm himself down. Why couldn’t his father talk right? Why couldn’t he remember to put the word the before media?

Ms. Farber said she would love to travel to India at some point. She had always wanted to see the Taj Mahal and Jaipur. Mohan Lal said she could visit anytime, that she would be his family’s honored guest.

“That would be lovely. As long as I don’t have to stay in one of their tree houses.” She let out a laugh, then placed a hand over her mouth. Siddharth hadn’t seen her laugh like this before, a dimple appearing on her left cheek.

Mohan Lal smiled for a moment, then grew serious. “Actually, my brother is quite a wealthy man. He has a retinue of servants that would wait on you hand and foot.”

Siddharth examined a black-and-white photograph on Ms. Farber’s perfectly ordered desk. It showed a lady holding a baby. The photo was ancient, at least from the sixties.

“Oh, yes,” said Ms. Farber, “Siddharth has mentioned him.” She leaned back in her chair, flicking her auburn curls behind her shoulder. “Don’t tell me — is he some sort of maharaja or something?”

Siddharth folded his arms and tried to shoot his father a look. All this India talk was making him sweaty.

Mohan Lal wouldn’t meet his eyes though. He said, “Actually, he’s in the gun business. But my great-great-grandfather, he was what you could call nobility — the equivalent of your dukes and earls. They hung him on the banks of a river — a wide and beautiful river that is now a cesspool.” He paused to rub his chin. “They stripped him of everything — his land, his title. His dignity.”

Siddharth didn’t actually mind these stories, but his mother had called them exaggerations.

Ms. Farber leaned forward and her chair let out a little whine. “Was it the British?”

“Yes, you’re very astute,” said Mohan Lal. “Mrs. Farber, my ancestors wouldn’t conform to the English tax codes, so they were eliminated.”

Siddharth noticed that something green was stuck in the gap between Ms. Farber’s yellowed front teeth. Underneath the reading table, her left shoe was off, and her white stockings had a hole near the big toe.

She turned to Siddharth and smiled. “Well, honey, I guess that means you have some royal blood in your veins. Prince Siddharth. It has a nice ring to it.”

Mohan Lal patted him on the shoulder.

All of a sudden, Ms. Farber sat upright in her chair. She put on her tortoiseshell reading glasses and opened a folder, then asked Siddharth how things were going.

“Fine, I guess,” he said.

She made small talk about school for a minute. Then she asked him if he’d been feeling especially sad lately.

He shrugged.

“His marks have been excellent,” said Mohan Lal. “I’m very proud.”

Siddharth wanted to elbow his father in the gut.

Ms. Farber explained that Mr. Latella was impressed with Siddharth’s intellectual capabilities, but he was concerned about his social situation. He had been a little antisocial lately, and he seemed to be having trouble interacting with boys. As Siddharth absorbed all this bullshit, a bubble of cold air inflated inside his lungs. He decided that Mr. Latella was the biggest bastard in the entire world.

Mohan Lal stared up at the ceiling, then placed his hands underneath his thighs. “Ms. Farber, I don’t know what’s happened. So many kids used to call my son. Boys, girls — everyone.”

She smiled and nodded. “Siddharth has made so much progress over the past year. I’m really quite proud of him. But it’s no surprise that he’s a little isolated after all he’s gone through.” She launched into a speech containing terms like grief and depression, and Siddharth now felt as if someone had him in a chokehold. For the rest of his life, nobody would ever let him just be sad. When he was unhappy, they would always bring it back to his mother.

“Siddharth,” said Ms. Farber, “what about sports?”

“What about sports?” he said.

She explained that Mr. Latella thought it would be a good idea if he got involved with some sort of team or played some kind of sport.

Smiling, Mohan Lal grasped his shoulder. “His older brother is the sporting man. This one is his father’s son.”

Shrugging off his father’s fingers, he recalled what his brother used to say about sports. If Siddharth didn’t play sports, according to Arjun, he would never learn how to be a team player. He would never learn how to be a regular guy and would end up like Mohan Lal.

“What about something else?” said Ms. Farber. “A musical instrument maybe?”

Siddharth needed to defend himself. Music was for losers. Like Sharon. “I like to draw,” he said. “I draw all the time.”

“I know you do, honey, and you’re very good. But tell me, Siddharth, who do you draw with?”

“Nobody, I guess.” He thought he liked Ms. Farber. Now he wasn’t so sure.

“Exactly. How about something more active? Something a little more interactive?”

He turned to his father for help, but Mohan Lal’s eyes were fixed on Ms. Farber.

“I know,” she said, thumbing through the pages of her leather planner. “How about karate?”

He wanted to tell her to shut up. But the fact was, karate didn’t sound half bad.

Her face was suddenly beaming. “Why didn’t I think of it earlier? Dr. Arora, the martial arts can be very good for young people. Tae kwon do has had such a positive impact on my own son.”

Mohan Lal said he would have Siddharth search through the yellow pages for a karate class as soon as they got home.

“Oh, we can do better than that,” she said. With a bony finger on her planner, Ms. Farber jotted a number onto a yellow square of paper. Her honey-colored eyes gleamed as she handed it over to Siddharth.

As he grasped the note, he felt the tightness in his lungs begin to slacken.

5. Nice Work, Bodhisattva

Siddharth was too excited to fall asleep the night before his first karate class. Over the past few days, he’d watched The Karate Kid several more times, and as he lay awake in his bedroom, he fantasized about winning a tournament like the one in the movie. A sea of uniformed fighters would carry him on their shoulders. Arjun would finally be proud, and Luca Peroti would be friends with him. He pictured himself kissing a blonde — a real one, not some slut like Sharon Nagorski.

In school the next day, he couldn’t focus on Mr. Latella’s booming voice. He was grateful when the teacher gave the class forty-five minutes for silent reading. He wondered if today was somehow lucky for him. He didn’t have to take the bus home or stay at his fucking after-school program. He fished out his copy of Call of the Wild from his messy desk; Mr. Latella was making him read it for his independent book project. Siddharth predicted the novel would be childish and boring, but after the first couple of pages, he was hooked. He couldn’t believe he was actually enjoying something recommended by a teacher.

This story had him riveted, as if it were a movie, and he felt like he had something in common with Buck, the canine protagonist. Both he and the dog had been separated from the people who made them happy. He sat alone on a swing during recess, reading the novel while Luca and his crew played kickball and Sharon played cards with her new gang of hos and losers. Later, when he told his teacher how many pages he’d read, the man said he was impressed. Mr. Latella gave him a high five for the first time all year, and Siddharth found himself smiling. He wondered if he’d been wrong about the guy. After all, if it hadn’t been for Mr. Latella, Ms. Farber would never have suggested karate.

Mohan Lal was waiting in the parking lot at three fifteen, and as Siddharth buckled himself into their minivan, his father’s appearance squashed some of his cheer and optimism. Mohan Lal was wearing a khaki suit, and Siddharth noticed an ink stain near the lapel. There was a time when his father used to spend half an hour ironing his clothes every night, but today he looked rather wrinkled. His bifocals sat crookedly on his nose, and a few of his wispy gray hairs were sticking straight in the air. He looked old, much older than anyone else’s parents. Old people got things like Alzheimer’s. Mohan Lal kissed him on the head. He hoped for his father to ask him something about his day, but before they’d even cleared the Deer Run parking lot, Mohan Lal was going off about his latest conflict with his boss, the new dean of Elm City College.

For the past year, his father had become embroiled in an all-out war with the dean, who the college had brought in to save it from bankruptcy. Today, Mohan Lal told him how the dean was now claiming that students were dropping his classes because they had a hard time understanding his accent. “Bloody bastard,” said Mohan Lal. “What’s wrong with the way I talk? I speak proper English — not like that corporate stooge.”

As Mohan Lal steered through the wooded suburban streets, he made Siddharth help him with his pronunciation of certain words. Siddharth struggled to get his father to say volatility, not walletility, to insert an r into the third syllable of university. Eventually, he lost his patience, saying, “Jesus, Dad, you’re not even trying to sound American.” As soon as the words came out, a cold guilt took hold of his stomach. He knew that Mohan Lal was a single parent. He knew that he was supposed to make his father’s life easier — not harder. “Anyway,” said Siddharth, “the dean obviously feels threatened. He’s threatened cause you’re smarter.” It was Sharon who had taught him that mean people were actually just insecure or threatened. “Trust me, one day they’ll be sorry they took you for granted.”

Smiling, Mohan Lal squeezed his knee. “Fret not, my son. Those fools will get what’s coming. My book’s gonna fix them good.”

Siddharth turned up the radio now that he had done his duty. He was sick of hearing about the stupid book. Far ahead of the van, the sky was crisp and blue, but charcoal clouds lingered over South Haven’s desolate town green and ancient meetinghouse. He told himself that karate was going to change his life. He’d be cool at karate, not the nobody he’d been during his thirteen-month stint at Deer Run. He glanced at the yellow leaves fluttering on the trees in front of the tiny public library. They glowed like gemstones. Most people thought these trees were birch, but he knew they were aspens. His mother had taught him the names of all the trees in South Haven.

They passed the fields where he’d suffered two seasons as an outfielder in the parks-and-recreation baseball league. Last winter, his brother had run special baseball training sessions for him on Sunday mornings. Arjun hit him dozens of grounders and pop flies, and Siddharth had to run and dive for them. When he missed one, he had to drop down on the frosty grass and do five pushups on his knuckles. If he missed two, he had to sprint around the house four times. If he missed three in a row, he had to stand against a wall and let Arjun pelt him with a tennis ball. The first time Arjun struck him, Siddharth fell to the ground and had to bite down on a clump of clovers to keep from crying. Arjun said, “You’re lucky, you know. Nobody was here to do this for me when I was your age.”

When they reached Boston Post Road, he got into the backseat to change from his corduroys into navy-blue sweatpants. He had tried to convince Mohan Lal to buy him a karate uniform, which the dojo sold for forty-eight dollars. But his father said he first had to complete an entire month of classes.

As they headed east toward West Haven, the strip malls got grubbier and contained fewer chain stores. Back in the day, his parents used to shop around here. He spotted a pet store where his mother had taken him to buy a ten-gallon fish tank. Beside it, there used to be a smelly Indian shop that sold spices, rice, and daal. The Aroras would laugh at the place’s slogan—So clean you can bring your American friends too. They were getting closer to their destination. Siddharth needed water, but there was none in the car. He started gnawing on the inside of his mouth, which helped a little, but didn’t stop his stomach from twitching and turning.

Mohan Lal took a right turn into the parking lot. “Son?”

“Yeah?” Siddharth wasn’t in the mood for nagging of any kind.

“Make me proud, son. I want you to kick some butt.”

“So now you’re not proud of me? Thanks, Dad. Thanks for always saying the right thing.” Then he sighed and grabbed his father’s shoulder. “Thanks for bringing me, Dad. Of course I’ll make you proud.”

He stared at the stores in the shabby, squat plaza. The West Haven Martial Arts Academy sat between a beauty salon and something called a VFW. Mohan Lal parked next to a sleek black Camaro. Arjun had always said that Camaros were cheesy, but Siddharth liked this one. Two thick racing stripes ran along the length of its body, and it had a personalized license plate, K-Chop. As they got out of the car, he worried that his father might do something embarrassing. He wished Mohan Lal would just drive off and let him deal on his own.

They walked by some white-haired men who were smoking and drinking coffee out of paper cups. One of them was wearing a cap that looked old-fashioned. European. He tipped it at Mohan Lal, who was holding the door open for Siddharth. Stepping inside the academy, Siddharth was immediately mesmerized by the place’s enormous trophy cases, which lined two walls of the slim, rectangular reception area. These cases must have contained at least a hundred trophies, and just as many medals and plaques. He vowed to win a prize for himself one day. He pictured himself bringing it into school and showing it off to Luca Peroti and Eddie Benson. They’d be begging him to join their kickball game. They’d forgive the fact that he’d once been friends with Sharon Nagorski.

Mohan Lal headed toward a window at the far end of the room, and Siddharth followed behind. A young woman was sitting on the other side of the glass. She had silver hoop earrings and was chewing gum. Mohan Lal handed her a check and she told him that he could stay and watch the class.

“No, thank you, miss,” said Mohan Lal. “I have to take care of a couple things at the office. You know, I work at Elm City College.”

He wondered if his father’s accent was especially thick today. Maybe the dean had a point. Mohan Lal signed a few papers, then patted him on the head and walked out the door. Siddharth took a seat on the long wooden bench that lined the room’s exterior wall, which was mostly made of windows. When he saw his father’s silver minivan pull out of the lot, he started breathing a little easier. A doorway separated the reception area from the actual studio, where a class was taking place. He peered in and saw that most of the students were women. Their instructor was a woman too. He hoped his new teacher wasn’t a woman.

With each passing minute, a new boy showed up wearing a karate uniform. Most had white belts, but a few had belts that were green or orange. Some of the boys had gold chains, and a few even had earrings. They greeted each other with high fives or silent nods. Siddharth hunched forward and massaged his crown of black wavy hair. Being here suddenly felt like a bad idea.

A tall boy with an orange belt walked in. He had on a long Sharks parka over his uniform and had a cool haircut, long and floppy on top and shaved on the sides. All the other kids seemed excited to see him. Almost every boy walked up to him and said, “Hey, Marc,” or, “What’s up, Marc?” either shaking his hand or slapping it five. This Marc kid sauntered over to the secretary’s window and said, “Yo, Katie, I was up all night waiting for your call. You doggin’ me or something?” Siddharth couldn’t make out her words, but he definitely heard laughter.

When the women’s class let out, he followed the other boys into the studio. They seated themselves in three neat rows, and he chose a place in the back left corner, close to the doorway. He scoped out the other kids through the mirrors that lined the front wall. They all looked at ease sitting Indian style, so he forced himself to keep his legs crossed even though it hurt. Above the mirrors were two flags, an American one and another that was either Japanese or Korean. Between them was a photograph of a chubby, bearded white man with a black belt. He was bowing down before a somber, gray-haired Oriental.

The other kids sprang to their feet and bowed as soon as the sensei stepped in from the locker room, but it took Siddharth a moment to follow suit. He was shocked: his new karate teacher was black. He had met other black people before, like the woman who had babysat for Arjun and then cleaned the Arora household until he was eight, and he had seen plenty of black people on television. But he had never had a black teacher. The sensei had a rounded three-inch Afro and black freckles, like Morgan Freeman in Robin Hood. His black belt had a red stripe running through its middle, which must have meant he was especially hard core.

The instructor said, “Listen up, my young friends. Today we have a new colleague, and I want you to welcome him with open arms.” He eyed Siddharth. “Son, I’m Mr. Stone. Why don’t you tell us your name?”

Siddharth responded, pronouncing the d’s incorrectly, to make it sound more American.

“Ah, a most holy of names,” said Mr. Stone. “Perhaps your presence will bring us a step closer to enlightenment.”

The first part of the class was disappointing. They had to do a bunch of stretches and punch the air while standing in place. Mr. Stone then led them through some boring “forms,” for which the boys completed a series of synchronized movements in different directions. Siddharth tried his best to mimic the others, but he was always a step behind.

Mr. Stone seemed to have a particular fondness for a kid named Gene-Paul, who had spiked hair and a tail that sprouted from his neck, and also for that Marc kid. He referred to Marc by his last name, Kaufman. He said, “Kaufman, my grandmother can punch harder than you,” and, “Kaufman, you’re supposed to be setting an example for everyone — not showing us what not to do.” Siddharth wondered if this was the Marc Kaufman. Last summer, a Marc Kaufman from Woodford had stolen the family Jeep and taken it for a joyride. He’d crashed it into a mailbox, one of those official blue ones, which made his crime a federal offense. It was Sharon who’d shared these details. Her father’s cousin, Randy Miller, had been one of the arresting officers.

With ten minutes left in class, Mr. Stone announced that it was time to spar. The other boys broke into pairs, facing each other in two neat lines. They leaned back on their right feet and brought their fists into fighting position. Siddharth looked down and thought about going to the bathroom or asking to leave early.

Mr. Stone placed his warm, strong fingers on Siddharth’s shoulder. “Kaufman, why don’t you break in the new guy? But go easy on him.”

Marc Kaufman was in a corner putting on padded red gloves. He punched them together and took his place across from Siddharth. Mr. Stone grunted, and all the boys started bouncing on their back legs, making blocks and punches. Marc just stood still and stared him down.

Siddharth definitely regretted being here. Wasn’t karate just another sport?

Marc flicked his hair out of his eyes and then made a kick, but Siddharth managed to step back and avoid it.

“Nice work, bodhisattva,” said Mr. Stone.

Flicking his hair again, Marc came in closer. He pulled his fist back, then landed a hard punch on Siddharth’s chest. He fell backward and hit the rubbery green floor.

For a few moments, he couldn’t breathe. He saw Mr. Stone standing over him but couldn’t hear what he was saying. Marc held out his hand, and Siddharth used it to pull himself up. He suddenly noticed that the other kids had all stopped fighting and were watching him.

“You okay?” asked Mr. Stone.

“I think so,” he said.

Mr. Stone started clapping. All of his students followed suit.

Siddharth wanted to smile but didn’t want to seem uncool, so he just kept quiet.

* * *

After class, he sat alone on the curb, using a stick to create a smiley face in the gravel. Only a few cars remained in the parking lot, and he was sitting close to a burgundy Saab 900. A gaggle of five or six boys stood by a green dumpster a few feet away from the black Camaro. They were practicing moves on each other and seemed to be having fun. He wished he were hanging out with them but would only go if they called him over. He grew bored with his gravel drawing and started rating the cars. If he had to drive one, his first choice would definitely be the Camaro, and his number two would be the Saab. Arjun would have chosen the gray Acura in the corner, even though it had a dent in its rear door.

Mohan Lal had told him to bring his jacket, but he’d refused. He rubbed his arms to keep himself warm and stared at the one-story building across the street, a bar called the New Warsaw Café. Above him, the setting sun had streaked the sky with pink and orange, and some seagulls were circling. One of them swooped down, snatching a piece of trash from the dumpster. A kid from karate class picked up a stick and chucked it toward the bird, and the gull leaped back into the air.

Mr. Stone emerged from the academy wearing sunglasses and a leather jacket. He patted Siddharth on the shoulder, saying that he had done well. Then he headed toward the Camaro, pushing a button on his keys that caused the car to squawk, and said, “Boys, if I find even a single scratch on her, what ensues will be unpleasant and nasty.”

The boys laughed.

Mr. Stone got in his vehicle and peeled out of the lot.

Cars kept pulling in, and boys kept leaving. Siddharth wondered when his father would get there. He was tired, but not the way he usually was. He felt kind of good actually. Soon the only other kid left was Marc Kaufman, who walked over to him and sat down on the curb.

“What’s up?”

Siddharth shrugged. “Pretty good.” As soon as he said those words, he bit down on the inside of his cheek again. Only an asshole would say pretty good when someone asks what’s up.

Marc bet Siddharth a dollar that he could hit the insignia on the hood of the Saab with a single stone. He chucked a rock but missed by ten inches. “You try,” he said. “Double or nothing.”

Siddharth picked up a gray stone that sparkled with mica but couldn’t bring himself to do it.

“Don’t worry,” said Marc, “it’s my mom’s.”

Siddharth took a deep breath and threw the stone, which landed an inch away from the target.

Marc whistled. “Close. Now we’re even.” He chucked three more stones, and the second two both clanked against the target. “By the way, I’m Marc.”

“I know,” said Siddharth.

“You know? Why, what did you hear about me?”

Siddharth shrugged.

“Well, don’t believe everything they say.”

A gull let out a cry and again dove for the dumpster.

Siddharth wanted to say something cool but didn’t know what. He threw a stone at the bird, and it soared back to the sky. “My name’s Sid.”

“No shit.” Marc held out his hand. “I know your name. My mother told me all about you.”

“Your mother?” Siddharth’s brow furrowed as he shook Marc’s hand.

Marc smiled, revealing a gap between his two front teeth. “That redhead? The crazy woman from your school?”

“Who?”

“Not too long ago, the famous Ms. Farber used to be Mrs. Kaufman.”

Siddharth stared down at his Nikes and noticed the beginnings of a hole near the big toe of his left foot. He felt a surge of loathing for Ms. Farber. She shouldn’t have been talking about him to other people. She’d said that everything they discussed was completely confidential.

“She told me what happened to you.”

Siddharth knew what he meant. He tossed another pebble at the Saab, this time with much more force.

“That must have really sucked,” said Marc.

Siddharth prayed that his father would get there soon. In a little while, he would be back home. He would throw on a movie. He wouldn’t have to come back to karate if he didn’t want to.

“Let me tell you,” said Marc, flicking his bangs out of his eyes, “divorce is no Sunday drive either. It’s the second-worst thing that can happen to a kid, after a parent dying.”

Siddharth had no idea that Ms. Farber was divorced. The truth was, she knew a lot about him but he barely knew anything about her. This fact seemed totally unfair.

A bell jingled, and he turned to his left. The front door of the beauty salon had opened, and Ms. Farber stepped outside. Siddharth had a rock in his hand; he wished he could throw it at her. Instead, he dropped it and waved.

She looked different, having straightened her normally curly auburn hair. She walked toward them smiling her big toothy smile, and his eyes honed in on the triangle of flat, freckled skin below her neck. She was wearing her gold chain with a star on it, the kind that you drew with two overlapping triangles. “Hi, boys,” she said. “Siddharth, how’d it go?”

He shrugged. “Fine. I’m not really that good.”

“Oh, come on,” said Ms. Farber. “I bet you knocked their socks off, honey.” She headed to the Saab and unlocked its front door. “I see you’ve met my Marc.”

“Yup.”

She winked at him. “I don’t know why, but something tells me you guys might hit it off.”

“Oh, yes, mother,” said Marc. He got up and dusted off his uniform. “Sid here is a splendid young fellow. We’re gonna get along just fine.”

6. Sleepover

The phone kept on ringing one Friday night in early December. First it was Arjun. He was calling with flight details for his upcoming trip home, the first one he’d make since moving out to Michigan. Then came a call from Ms. Farber’s son Marc. He said, “Yo, Sid, you’re spending the night at my house tomorrow.” Marc was a seventh grader at the Woodford branch of Eli Whitney Junior High. He was grounded for what he had done to the blue mailbox with his father’s Jeep, so he wouldn’t be allowed to socialize until summer. But Ms. Farber bent the rules of his grounding for Siddharth, who had already been to their house after karate on several occasions.

These first two calls put Siddharth in a good mood. Then the phone rang for a third time. It was Barry Uncle. Fourteen months had passed since Mohan Lal had had a real conversation with Barry Uncle. Eighteen months had passed since the last time they’d stayed up late drinking Scotch and eating pink pistachios, getting louder with each passing hour, talking trash about Gandhi and Nehru, calling them British stooges. Just the other day, Siddharth had remembered a joke Barry Uncle once told about a Sikh man who didn’t know how to use a modern toilet, so he wrapped his shit in a bedsheet and flung it out the window. This joke made Mohan Lal laugh so hard that tears started trickling from his light-brown eyes. Siddharth wanted his father to laugh like that again. He had Marc Kaufman now, and he wanted his father to have someone too.

He tried passing the phone to his father, but Mohan Lal gave him a wide-eyed glare, a look of death usually reserved for Arjun. Siddharth said, “Don’t look at me like that.” Mohan Lal told him not to stick his nose in other people’s business. Siddharth said, “Dad, it’s my business if you’re all depressed all the time. It’s my business if you’re gonna be such a loner.”

Mohan Lal raised his hand behind his ear. “What did you call me? Listen, it’s okay for someone at my stage to keep his own company. You’re the one I’m worried about. You’re the one who’s lost all his friends.”

That night, as Siddharth tried to fall asleep, he felt a strong sense of loathing toward his father. He wished the man had actually hit him. Mohan Lal had hit Arjun a few times, and Siddharth thought that something about the pain might make him stronger. As he tossed and turned, he made another wish. He wished that he could disappear for a few days, just so his father could get a small taste of life without him.

Waking up in the middle of the night, he suddenly regretted these horrible thoughts. He regretted saying such horrible things to his father. He imagined Mohan Lal all alone on the sofa, sipping Scotch and staring at the television, his eyes glassy and dazed. Meanwhile, Siddharth would be out having fun with Marc.

In the morning, Siddharth watched cartoons by himself and woke his father up at ten. He served them Pop-Tarts and orange juice for breakfast as a way of making up. As they ate in the dining room, Siddharth declared that he was canceling his sleepover.

“But you’ve made a commitment,” said Mohan Lal. “A man must honor his commitments.”

“Just forget it, Dad. You can’t force me.”

“It’s your life, son. If you want to ruin it, it’s your decision.”

Siddharth grunted. “Fine. But at least put on some real clothes. You’re not dropping me off in those stupid sweatpants.”

* * *

Before they left for Marc’s, he flipped through the TV listings and drew little stars next to programs that might interest his father. Mohan Lal told him not to bother. He said he would use the peace and quiet to work on his book. As they headed down Route 114 toward Woodford, Siddharth found comfort in his father’s words. Mohan Lal was supposed to be working hard on his book, but he’d barely devoted any time to it lately. Maybe it was a good thing that Siddharth was going out. Maybe he was actually doing his father a favor by hanging out with Marc. The van skirted Foster Farm, the second oldest farm in the country, and his fear and guilt began to fade. He was growing excited for his time with Marc Kaufman. The kid was undeniably cool, and it seemed that he liked him — or at least didn’t think he was a total loser.

For almost eight weeks now, the two families had been carpooling. On Tuesdays, Mohan Lal picked up the boys after their karate lesson, dropping Marc off in Woodford so that Ms. Farber could attend a meditation class at the Jewish Community Center. On Thursdays, Ms. Farber drove Siddharth straight from Deer Run to the dojo, picking up Marc from her house en route. Thanks to this arrangement, Siddharth got to spend one less day per week at his hellish after-school program.

He was jittery the first couple of times he walked toward Ms. Farber’s Saab in the Deer Run parking lot. What would people say if they saw him cozying up to the school psychologist? Would they think he’d gone crazy? And there were other worries too. It was one thing to talk about his mother in Ms. Farber’s office. But what if she brought her up on the way to karate? Fortunately, Ms. Farber just asked him innocent questions about his father’s job or his brother’s classes, or they drove in silence, listening to a Top Forty station or a boring program on National Public Radio.

When karate class was over on Thursdays, Ms. Farber dropped him off around five thirty, and he watched television and made himself pasta as he waited for his father to return from work. After a couple weeks of this routine, however, Ms. Farber said there was no reason for Siddharth to be spending so much time alone. She insisted that he have dinner with her and Marc when Mohan Lal had evening classes. She wasn’t a great cook, but Siddharth began to look forward to Thursday evenings.

In some ways, Marc and Ms. Farber’s single-story home was strange. She had started some renovations awhile back but never actually finished them, so parts of their house were in a state of limbo. Their formal living room had new wooden floors, but its walls had a few holes where you could see tangles of wire and copper piping. A bathroom beside the kitchen had a small sauna that wasn’t actually functional, and its oversize sink seemed like one that belonged inside a janitor’s closet. But Siddharth loved this house so much more than his own ordinary home. It was made of real redbrick, not shabby wooden siding. The place had a grand entrance hallway, with marble floors and an ornate chandelier. The bedrooms had tall ceilings, and most of them had bathrooms — even Marc’s. All of the house’s light switches were the flat modern kind, and Siddharth felt a small thrill whenever he pressed one.

His favorite part of the house was the basement. Unlike the Aroras’ dim concrete basement, this one was finished with parquet floors and gray carpeting. Marc had everything down there — ping-pong, bumper pool, and a floor piano like the one from the movie Big. On one of his first visits downstairs, Siddharth spotted the six-foot-long GI Joe aircraft carrier. He had seen thousands of commercials for it when he was younger and had wanted one so badly, but Mohan Lal called it a “made-in-Taiwan piece of crap.” His mother simply opposed such violent toys.

He asked Marc if they could play with it, and Marc said, “I guess we could do that. If we were, like, six.” Marc then walked over to the aircraft carrier and pulled out a plastic compartment that contained a stash of Playboys. From that day on, whenever they went downstairs, they just sat around comparing the breasts of centerfold models. Siddharth knew that his father would kill him for looking at the pictures, but he couldn’t get enough of them. He was particularly fond of a blond Miss April from 1984. She was wearing nothing except striped socks and an open pink bathrobe. He started thinking about her before falling asleep at night, pressing his erection into his springy mattress. Marc occasionally loaned Siddharth a magazine, or a picture of a naked woman, and when he got home, he tried copying these images into his sketchpad. Drawing these women was fun. But it also made him wonder if he was some kind of perv.

Usually, when Mohan Lal picked him up from Marc’s, Ms. Farber went out to the driveway to chat with him. At first, they just talked about the boys and karate, but much to Siddharth’s dismay, Mohan Lal started telling Ms. Farber stories. He told her about his student who had made it to America as a stowaway on an oil tanker, and how the son of the great Igor Sikorsky had once given Arjun violin lessons. Ms. Farber told Mohan Lal about her broken muffler and the junky Greenwich Village apartment she had once rented while struggling to make it as an actress. She discussed her dissatisfaction with the public school system, which piled her up with paperwork that got in the way of her actual work. In a few years, she said, she would quit her job and go into private practice.

“Why wait?” said Mohan Lal.

Ms. Farber folded her arms across her chest. She peered up at the sky. “Well, the bills for one thing. Insurance, taxes.”

Mohan Lal told her to make a good business plan and take a calculated risk. He said that it was a proven fact that the universe rewards risk takers. Siddharth was dying to tell his father to mind his own business. But he didn’t want Ms. Farber to get the wrong impression about them, so he just bit his lip and stared out the window. He also kept his mouth shut whenever Mohan Lal complained about his own job, which he did with more frequency as autumn turned to winter.

Mohan Lal wouldn’t shut up about his dean, and he even bored Ms. Farber with the details of the dean’s new book. In this book, the man argued that new advertising specifically designed for children would mold them into more productive citizens. Mohan Lal wanted to publish a paper refuting him, one that exposed the corruption of the FCC under the Reagan administration. “It’s the corporations,” he said. “The government used to protect youngsters from the Madison Avenue serpents, but then the corporations got into Reagan’s bed, and poof—everything vanished. Mark my words, Ms. Farber, there will be consequences. These bloody advertisers will undermine the intelligence of an entire generation.”

Having heard these diatribes hundreds of times, Siddharth sat there digging his fingers into his temples. Normal people didn’t use words like bloody or serpent. He wished his father would try to be more normal.

* * *

They pulled in front of Marc’s brick house just before noon, and the mere sight of it filled him with adrenaline. Mohan Lal said he would walk him to the door, but Siddharth told him not to bother. “I’m not five, Dad. Ms. Farber’s a busy woman. Leave her alone.” Kissing his father on the shoulder, he jogged up Marc’s front steps, where a few unread newspapers were stacked in a messy pile. Mohan Lal reversed out of the driveway when Marc came to the door. He gave Siddharth a high five and told him to take off his shoes. “Rachel finally mopped the floors. We don’t want her going ape shit on us.”

“Where is she?” asked Siddharth.

“My mom? Being a loser.”

Marc led him to the family room, which formed one enormous, uninterrupted space with the sleek, modern kitchen. He sat down to finish up a video game, something with guns and jungles. Siddharth didn’t mind video games, but there was no point in competing with Marc. So he just sat quietly, swallowed by the plush leather sofa. He stared at his new friend, who was frenetically pressing the controller’s buttons while jerking, rocking, and swearing. Marc was wearing sweatpants, but the cool kind with zips down the side. His bangs dangled over his eyes, which today seemed red and small. Had he been crying?

Marc defeated the second level of his game and threw his controller onto the rug. “Yo, let’s get the hell out of here,” he said. “I need to smoke something.”

Siddharth’s chest tightened with a mixture of fear and excitement. Marc had talked about smoking before, but he had never actually seen him do it. They walked down the corridor toward the bedrooms. Siddharth sometimes got lost staring at the paintings that lined this wide, carpeted hallway, many of which were Ms. Farber’s creations. Some of her paintings contained just a few splotches of color that had clearly been applied with a sponge, and they looked like something a child could have done. He knew that people considered this stuff art, but he’d never understood why. His mother had said that it was a case of the emperor’s new clothes. When Marc had once caught him gawking at the artwork, he said, “Yeah, Rachel’s a real Picasso. If this stuff starts selling, we’re gonna be loaded.” Siddharth had cocked his head to one side, unsure if his friend was joking. Marc grabbed his arm and gave him a shake. “I’m just fucking with you,” he said. “Dude, you gotta lighten up.”

Marc paused in front of Ms. Farber’s door and knocked. “What?” she said, her voice gruff and tired. Marc pulled the handle down and stepped inside. Siddharth remained in the hallway, his back up against a small patch of the wall that didn’t contain any paintings. He saw Ms. Farber sitting up in bed watching some soap opera. He’d been inside her bedroom a couple of times, when Marc needed money or was looking for a video. It had puffy pink curtains and shiny white furniture. Yet today it was dark. Ms. Farber was usually so neat and tidy, but he glimpsed clothes and papers strewn all over the tan carpeting. The oddest thing was that the room smelled like smoke. He felt like an ass for not having noticed that Ms. Farber was a smoker.

“Twenty bucks, please,” said Marc, the palm of his hand hovering near his mother’s face.

“For what?” she replied.

“To be a good host,” said Marc. “The young fella would like a little ice cream.”

She turned toward Siddharth. “Oh, hi honey.”

“Hello.” He waved and smiled, trying to give the impression that everything was fine.

“You’ll have to excuse me today,” she said. “I’m just a little under the weather.”

“Really, Rachel?” said Marc. He pulled an envelope of bills from her bedside drawer. “What do you got? A cold? A cough? I’m curious about the diagnosis.”

Ignoring him, Ms. Farber turned down the volume. “Sid, honey,” she said, “I need to rest a little. But help yourself to anything. Please — make yourself at home.”

The boys headed out to the garage, which never failed to mesmerize Siddharth. His own garage was disgusting and boring, filled with cobwebs, rusty rakes, and rotting firewood, but this one was spotless and contained numerous cool contraptions. Tools and saw blades hung from the walls, and the ground was filled with neat rows of hockey sticks, volleyball nets, and rollerblades. Marc had two bikes, a fancy BMX that he had built for himself and a ten-speed mountain bike that Siddharth usually rode. Marc started putting air into the mountain bike’s tires but after three pumps paused and gave him a look.

“What’s up?” said Siddharth. Marc seemed annoyed, and Siddharth wondered if he’d done something wrong. Marc opened his mouth to say something but then resumed his pumping. “What is it?” asked Siddharth.

“Nothing.” Marc was shaking his head. “But now you see what I gotta live with.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean my mom. She gets sick almost every single week. She should be in the Guinness Book of World Records—the only woman who gets her period four times a month.”

“Dude,” said Siddharth, “she’s your mom.”

“So? What’s your point?”

“My point?” Siddharth wanted to say so many things. He wanted to tell Marc that it was wrong to talk about his own mother like that — that he would regret it when she died one day. He wanted to know if something was really wrong with Ms. Farber. Was she really like this all the time? But he didn’t want to ruin his sleepover. “I don’t have a point. I just don’t wanna hear about her freaking period.”

* * *

A subtle wind tickled Siddharth’s ears as they rode through the sand-covered streets of Woodford. His nose started to run. He wiped it on the sleeve of his quilted blue jacket, which had once belonged to Arjun. It seemed like his day with Marc was going well. He just hoped he hadn’t messed things up by saying that thing about Ms. Farber’s period. They flew down a steep hill, and the combination of cold and adrenaline slowed his mind. He loved riding through Woodford, which was so much nicer than South Haven. It had more Jews than Italians, and they had much bigger houses. Their yards were the size of entire parks, and they contained trees that were as tall as the Twin Towers. The boys rode by Siddharth’s favorite home, which was separated from the street by a stone wall and remote-controlled gate. Its three stories had five large columns that made it look awesome — like the White House, or the mansion from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. A few minutes later, they arrived at a deli located in a red wooden building at a large but quiet intersection. They got off their bikes, leaning them against a dust-covered freezer in which bags of ice were stored.

Marc told Siddharth to wait with the bikes.

“This is Woodford,” said Siddharth. “No one’s gonna steal ’em.”

“Bro, you look like you’re ten. Just stay outside.”

Siddharth sat on a boulder at the parking lot’s edge, staring at the passing cars and thinking about his father. He hoped Mohan Lal was working on his book and not drinking or moping on the sofa. A disturbing image flashed in his mind. He saw his father lying in pain on the bathroom floor, and nobody was there to help him. Siddharth spotted a pay phone and wondered if he should call home — just to check on things — but by the time he decided this was a good idea, Marc emerged from the squat wooden shop brandishing a pack of five cigars. He lit one with a match, then handed it over. Siddharth had tried a cigarette before, in India, with his cousin, but he had never smoked a cigar. This one had a plastic tip. He brought it to his lips and sucked as hard as he could. The smoke singed his lungs, and he coughed until his eyes watered. Until his throat burned.

Smirking, Marc lit up his own cigar. “Dude, don’t inhale that shit. Just taste the smoke — savor it, then blow it out.”

Siddharth hunched forward, resting his hands on his thighs. He thought the cough was slowing down, and then it flared up again. He saw a cop drive by and felt a surge of panic. But the cop kept on going.

“Don’t waste that shit,” said Marc.

His throat still hurt, but he took another drag. This time, he made sure to keep the smoke confined to his mouth. It tasted kind of sweet. Another pull made him light and dizzy. He smiled.

Marc nodded. “That’s what I’m talking about. Shit, I needed that.”

The boys gave each other a high five. They kept on smoking in silence.

Eventually, Marc spit out a wad of phlegm and said, “That woman is a total maniac. Marc, I have a headache. Marc, I have a cold. Help me. Help, Marc. Make it all go away.”

Siddharth giggled at this scratchy, high-pitched imitation of Ms. Farber.

Marc’s face suddenly became serious, and he looked Siddharth straight in the eye. “A cold my ass,” he said. “Why do you think they got divorced?”

He wasn’t sure, but it seemed like his friend wanted an actual answer. “I dunno. Communication problems?”

“Yeah, but why? Why didn’t they communicate, Sid?”

Siddharth shrugged and puffed on his stogie.

“I’ll tell you why: Rachel’s a greedy bitch. So my dad got with someone else.” Marc smiled, but it wasn’t a happy smile. “Honestly, I don’t blame him. I’d do the same thing if I were him.”

* * *

Ms. Farber didn’t emerge from her bedroom that evening. For dinner, Marc made them turkey sandwiches, slicing onions and tomatoes and teaching Siddharth how to correctly apply mustard. You had to use the red piece of the plastic container to dab it onto the bread, and whenever possible, the bread had to be rye. Siddharth had never tasted rye before, but these were the best sandwiches he had ever eaten.

Late at night, they went into the guest room, which had a sofa bed, cable TV, and a VCR. Marc put on a porno, and Siddharth couldn’t believe what appeared on the screen. People were having actual sex. There were close-ups of men fingering women, of women giving blow jobs. Gigantic penises were thrusting into hairy vaginas. In one scene, four people were having sex at the same time. At first, Siddharth was a little disgusted. Then he started worrying about the size of his own puny dick. Soon all these thoughts vanished, and a strong erection was pressing into the zipper of his jeans.

“Dude,” said Marc, “I’m gonna go to the bathroom and take care of my boner.” When he got back, he was grasping a minibottle of whiskey, the kind of thing they handed out on airplanes. He cracked it open and held it out to Siddharth.

He shook his head. “Nah, I’m not in the mood.”

“Suit yourself,” said Marc, downing the whole thing in a long gulp. “Yo, the bathroom’s all yours.”

“Huh?”

“Don’t just sit there with a hard-on all night. Go and relieve yourself.”

He walked to Marc’s bathroom and turned on the light. He placed his hands on the granite counter and looked in the mirror. All the toothpaste stains on the mirror were nasty, but they reminded him of a sky full of stars. He spotted the beginnings of a pimple on his forehead. The pimple was pleasing; pimples meant he was normal. And his skin was light in tone, just a shade darker than Marc’s. He was Indian, but at least he wasn’t a dark one. The problem was that he would be twelve in a few weeks, and he barely had any hair on his balls. He put his hand down his pants and grasped his swollen penis. When he’d tried masturbating, it had never really happened — he had stroked and pulled, but nothing came out. He would die if anybody knew that his dick didn’t work. He would die if anybody knew that he was a freak who couldn’t jerk off.

He tucked his penis up into the waistband of his underwear and pulled his shirt over his crotch, then headed back to the guest room, holding up his hand for a high five.

“Dude,” said Marc, “get your cummy fingers away from me.”

Siddharth sat back down feeling contented. As far as Marc was concerned, he was normal. As far Marc was concerned, he worked just fine.

* * *

Upon waking up in the morning, Siddharth discovered that Ms. Farber was already in the kitchen. She was listening to classical music and flipping pancakes, and her face looked like it had gone back to normal.

“Morning, boys,” she said. “I hope you’re hungry.”

“Of course we’re hungry,” said Marc. “I’ve been living on cold cuts for three days straight.”

Smiling, she stacked some pancakes on two plates, which she placed in front of the barstools. Siddharth relished his breakfast. The pancakes contained canned peaches and walnuts, two things he’d never tasted before as far as he could remember. While he shoveled food into his mouth, Ms. Farber asked him if he might want to be a professor like his father. He said no, because professors barely made any money. He wanted to be rich. He wanted to own a DeLorean, Marty McFly’s car in Back to the Future. He wanted to own more than one mansion, like Donald Trump.

Ms. Farber laughed. “Well, I hope some of your ambition rubs off on my Marc.”

“Whatever,” said Marc. “I’m gonna work for my father.”

“Sorry, Marc,” she countered, “I’m afraid you have greater things in store.”

“There ain’t nothing wrong with scrap metal, Mom. Last time I checked, it pays your bills just fine.”

Siddharth didn’t know where to look. He gripped the back of his neck and peered down at some leftover gobs of maple syrup. “I better call my dad,” he said. “He can come pick me up.”

“Pick you up?” said Ms. Farber. “Marc’s father’s away, and we’ve got no other plans. You should stay, Siddharth. You boys can have a little fun. And Mohan can get some bonus time with his book.” She pulled a packet of green cigarettes out of a drawer. She lit one with a lighter that was meant for the stove. Smoke streamed out of her nose.

* * *

Later in the day, while Ms. Farber was reading on the family room sofa, Siddharth and Marc were back on the kitchen barstools, eating one of her bland lentil soups and watching MTV. A video by Bell Biv DeVoe came on, and Siddharth told Marc to turn up the volume. He loved this group’s dance moves, and their women had long legs and enormous tits. Marc said, “Screw that. This song is gay.” He said that rap was cool, but real hip-hop — not pussies like Bell Biv DeVoe.

Siddharth heard his father’s signature honk, one short beep followed by two long ones. He was about to get up, but Ms. Farber rose from the sofa and told him to finish his food in peace. She needed to have a word with his father. Siddharth’s stomach tightened. He hoped that she hadn’t found the Playboys. He hoped there wasn’t another problem with Mr. Latella.

She went out to the driveway via the kitchen door and returned a few minutes later with Mohan Lal, who kissed Siddharth on the forehead. He used the sleeve of his Michigan sweatshirt to soak up the saliva and turned to stare at his father, who was wearing a tweed jacket and his especially thick bifocals. This was the first time Mohan Lal had ever been inside Marc’s home, and Siddharth felt uneasy. This was his special place now, and he didn’t want to share it.

Ms. Farber placed a bowl of lentil soup in the microwave. “Boys, why don’t you keep watching somewhere else?”

“I thought TV was bad for you,” said Marc. “Should a kid who’s grounded really be watching so much television?”

“Scoot,” said Ms. Farber. “The adults have to look at some paperwork.”

Marc grabbed their dirty bowls and plunked them down in the sink. “What kind of paperwork?”

“My business plan.”

“Wait, you’re starting a business?” said Marc, walking toward the sofas at the far end of the room.

The microwave chimed, and Ms. Farber removed the soup. “Marc, why don’t we stop while we’re ahead?” She set the soup down in front of Mohan Lal, who was now on a barstool beside Siddharth.

Marc jumped onto the cushiony brown sofa and turned on Fox. “I mean, I thought a business had to, like, actually produce something. Last time I checked, psychologists don’t really make anything. They just talk. They talk and talk and talk until there’s nothing left in your head.”

Siddharth laughed, but he wished Marc wouldn’t give his mother any attitude in front Mohan Lal.

Ms. Farber slammed the dishwasher shut, rattling some plates inside. “Marc, it’s like your father’s sitting over there on the sofa. And trust me, I don’t mean that in a good way.” She walked over to a cardboard box below the kitchen window and started sifting through a stack of papers.

Mohan Lal spooned some soup into his mouth. “Mrs. Farber,” he said, “this soup is delicious.”

“Really?” She looked up at him over the rims of her reading glasses. “Wow, a compliment. I could get used to that.” She went back to her papers but then paused. “By the way, it’s Ms. Farber. But you need to start calling me Rachel.”

Mohan Lal swallowed more lentils in silence.

“Hey,” said Ms. Farber, “how about a glass of wine?”

Mohan Lal bit into a piece of bread. “Thank you, but I’ve been writing all weekend and now have to get to my grading.” The bread made his words hard to decipher, and Siddharth elbowed him in the thigh. He hated it when his father spoke with his mouth full. He noticed that Ms. Farber had placed her hand over her own mouth. Was she laughing at him?

“You sure?” she said. “I’ve got a lovely merlot.”

Mohan Lal turned to Siddharth. “Have you finished your homework, son?”

“Definitely.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course I’m sure.”

Mohan Lal told Ms. Farber that he would have half a glass of wine.

7. Snow Day

Ms. Farber left her job at Deer Run in the first half of January. This turn of events was upsetting. Siddharth wondered what it would mean for him and Marc. But things kept going strong with this new friendship, and Ms. Farber continued the karate carpool. It was upon her suggestion that the four of them made plans to attend a regional martial arts tournament in Springfield, Massachusetts. Marc had been nominated to represent the dojo in a sparring competition for the thirteen-to-fourteen age group, and Ms. Farber arranged for Siddharth to participate in an exhibition forms demonstration.

He was looking forward to a day trip with his friend, and also to the possibility of winning a medal to hang around one of Arjun’s many baseball trophies. But as the Sunday of the tournament approached, he began to grow anxious, knowing that he might mess up in front of the other kids, that his father might do something embarrassing. He lay awake remembering the previous year’s PTA meeting. It seemed inevitable that Mohan Lal would do something odd again, would say some strange, incomprehensible thing to one of the referees or Ms. Farber.

The morning of the event, the Aroras pulled into Ms. Farber’s driveway just after ten. Marc was already outside in his big black parka, waiting beside a dumpster filled with debris from his mother’s renewed program of renovations. Ms. Farber came out five minutes later wearing black jeans, a purple coat, and a furry cake-shaped hat. She pulled a steel thermos out of a brown paper bag and poured out a Styrofoam cup of steamy hot chocolate for each of them.

It was a cloudy, windy morning with sporadic flurries. Mohan Lal drove especially slowly, which seemed to annoy Marc, who kept saying he would be glad to lend a hand at the wheel. Siddharth forced himself to laugh. He wondered why his father had to drive like such a fairy. As they headed north, his mind drifted to Arjun. He felt guilty for admitting it, but he was relieved that Christmas break was over and his brother was back at college.

Arjun had definitely changed at Michigan. He had grown a goatee, which Mohan Lal said made him look like a pinko. More importantly, since Arjun had been away, he seemed to have started caring more about his friends than his family. During his two-week stay in South Haven, he was always out with his high school friends, or talking on the phone with some mysterious person from college. Siddharth once asked if he was speaking to his girlfriend, and Arjun told him to shut up and mind his own business.

When Arjun wasn’t busy with his social life, he was reading a fat paperback about India called Midnight’s Children. Siddharth couldn’t fathom why his brother would want to waste his time on a book about such a dirty country. This novel was a constant source of tension between Arjun and Mohan Lal. Arjun said that it proved that Hindus and Muslims were actually similar and showed the true tyranny of Indira Gandhi. Mohan Lal called it a bunch of lies. He called its author a British puppet. He said that Arjun should forget about this foolish literature and focus on his grades. Arjun had gotten As in history and English but a C in calculus. He claimed that his math professor had something against immigrants, but Mohan Lal told him not to make excuses for his own errors and imperfections.

Seeking to impress his brother, Siddharth showed him a pile of math quizzes on which he’d gotten 98s and 100s. Arjun, who used to sit around predicting his classmates’ grades and future salaries, now said that grades were just numbers and what really mattered was if you were learning. Siddharth then brought him his book report on Call of the Wild. He was particularly proud of the cover he had drawn for it, which showed Buck on his haunches by a river. It was one of the greatest things he had ever created. He had used watercolors to render the dog’s eyes a light shade of blue, and he had painted some red bloodstains on the animal’s muzzle. He had also sketched the feathers of a dead Indian by Buck’s paws. He almost cried when Arjun criticized the picture.

Arjun said that Buck was a hero, but Siddharth’s drawing had him looking like a savage. After reading Siddharth’s actual essay, Arjun decided to reread Call of the Wild. He finished it in a single sitting and then declared that Siddharth’s thesis was simplistic. Siddharth had argued that the book was a story about undying animal instincts, but Arjun claimed it was a novel about subjugation. The dogs represented workers, or maybe slaves. They had to band together to overcome their oppressors. “And one more thing,” he said. “You should have mentioned the book’s failings. Look at the way it portrays women. And the way it portrays indigenous people — it’s just pathetic.”

The absolute low point of Arjun’s trip was when he found some of Siddharth’s X-rated pictures at the back of their bedroom closet. He started yelling about how these images were disgusting and not even realistic. Siddharth confessed that he’d gotten them from Marc, and Arjun launched into a lecture about Marc seeming too precocious and being a bad influence. “By the way, isn’t he the son of your psychologist?”

“She’s not my psychologist,” said Siddharth.

“Whatever,” said Arjun. “It’s a little weird if you ask me — kind of unethical or something.”

* * *

Thanks to the snow flurries, Mohan Lal’s slow pace, and some bad directions, they didn’t make it to the municipal gymnasium in Springfield until three minutes after their designated registration time. Marc was shaking his head and muttering to himself as they scurried through the parking lot, which confirmed Siddharth’s prediction that having his father there was a bad idea.

Inside, an overweight woman with gigantic glasses insisted that registration was closed. Siddharth felt an unexpected surge of relief. Maybe they could all just get lunch and head home. Ms. Farber, however, wouldn’t take no for an answer. She bent toward the woman and whispered something in her ear, and the woman eventually agreed to make an exception.

Mohan Lal looked on, smiling. Later, he asked, “What did you tell her, Rachel?”

“Top secret,” said Ms. Farber, winking at him.

“Rachel, you should forget about psychology and go for politics.”

“Oh, I’m fine where I am,” she said. Her voice was harsh, but her whole face seemed to be smiling, not just her lips.

Siddharth’s forms exhibition was held in a large classroom that had been emptied of its desks and chairs and lined with thin gray matting. Upon seeing the other kids, who looked bigger, stronger, and more American, he bit down on the inside of his cheek and wished he hadn’t come. A dozen parents watched as he began making synchronized movements with five other children. He made a huge mistake within the first two minutes, kicking when he was supposed to block during Form IV, which threw the kid in front of him off balance. Siddharth thought he saw a stranger in a baseball cap snicker and shake his head, which made him even more nervous. He made numerous little mistakes for the remainder of his twenty-minute performance. In the end, he got a medal just for participating, and Ms. Farber gave him a hug and told him she was proud. Mohan Lal said, “Son, the world is yours if you want it.” Their words didn’t make Siddharth feel any better. He knew his medal was pathetic; it wasn’t worthy of being displayed alongside Arjun’s honors.

Marc sparred with fury, quickly defeating a string of four opponents to qualify for the semifinals. Siddharth yelled and clapped for him, and he was surprised to see his father cheering too. In the semifinal match, Marc received a foul for an illegal hit. He questioned the referee’s call and was issued another warning, which prompted him to kick over an empty chair. After that, the referee ejected him from the tournament. Marc hit himself on the head a few times and then walked over to his mother, who kissed him on the head.

“Honey,” she said, “what did we say about managing our tempers?”

“Temper?” said Marc. “Who the hell do you think I get it from, Rachel?”

When the foursome headed out to the parking lot, the sky was dark and the snow was coming down harder. Marc grabbed the scraper from Mohan Lal, chiseling ice from the minivan’s windshield like an expert. He told Mohan Lal to leave his wipers up in the winter so they wouldn’t freeze to the windshield. Siddharth wished his father knew about such things, but he told himself that they didn’t have snowstorms in New Delhi.

As the car heated up, Mohan Lal suggested they eat quickly, before the weather got any worse. He said he had noticed a McDonald’s by the Basketball Hall of Fame.

“Mr. A,” said Marc, “fast food isn’t gonna cut it with Rachel. My mom — she likes to be wined and dined.”

“Please, Marc,” said Ms. Farber. “And it’s Doctor Arora.”

* * *

With full bellies, they were soon back in the van heading toward southern Connecticut. The snowflakes were getting smaller and denser, and ghostlike whirlwinds of white were sweeping across the highway. Traffic slowed to thirty miles an hour as they approached the sleek skyscrapers of Hartford. Marc had his hand on his stomach and was complaining that it hurt, and Ms. Farber told him that nobody had forced him to have two hamburgers.

Marc punched Siddharth in the shoulder.

“Ow!”

“Snow day tomorrow,” said Marc. “Bet you five bucks.”

“Don’t count on it,” said Ms. Farber. “Seems to be letting up.”

“Get your eyes checked,” said Marc. “That’s ice that’s falling.”

“He’s right,” Mohan Lal chimed in. “The roads — they are quite slick, and they seem to be slickening.”

Siddharth winced, then peered out the window. The cars were now crawling, and the weather was getting worse. It didn’t matter that the traffic was bad, and that his father refused to talk like a normal person. He could have remained in the warm van all night long. He hoped that Marc was right about the snow day. He hated Deer Run, and he would have paid a thousand dollars to miss a single day of school.

Ms. Farber clicked her tongue.

“What’s wrong?” asked Mohan Lal.

She clacked one of her burgundy fingernails against the window. “Is that a mosque?”

Siddharth looked to his right and saw a large brick structure capped with a huge purple dome. It reminded him of the tomb in Delhi that he passed on the way to his aunt’s house.

“A mosque?” said Mohan Lal. “That building is American like apple pie.” He laughed. “It used to be a gun factory — the factory of Samuel Colt.” As they inched southward, Mohan Lal embarked on one of his trademark history lessons. The cowboys in the Wild West wanted to defend themselves against wolves and Red Indians, so New England entrepreneurs got rich manufacturing guns. Their factories needed cheap labor, so they brought in immigrants, people from Poland, Germany, and Italy. “These immigrants weren’t like people today. They knew how to save. They saved enough to open all your pizza places and pasta restaurants.”

Siddharth wished his father would stop talking, but he noticed that Ms. Farber was smiling.

“Think about it, Marc,” said Mohan Lal. “Every time you’re chewing your Wooster Street pizza, you’re actually ingesting the blood of a Red Indian.”

“Dad, you’re boring everyone,” said Siddharth. “And they’re called Native Americans.”

“Actually,” said Marc, “I like a little blood on my pizza.”

Traffic started flowing a little faster, and Ms. Farber sighed.

“Penny for your thoughts, Rachel?” said Mohan Lal.

“I was just thinking about my friend Rebecca, Rebecca Rappaport. She was travelling in Israel, and some. . some Moslem. . some Moslem blew up her bus.”

Marc scoffed at her. “Mom, you barely even knew her.”

“The point is, Marc, she died for no reason, and now her daughter’s gonna grow up without a mom. All because of some fundamentalist — some crazy Moslem fundamentalist.”

Mohan Lal slammed on the brakes, and everyone jerked forward. Siddharth looked out the windshield and saw a Camry skidding out. It banged into the concrete divider at the center of the road, then got back on the highway as if nothing had happened.

Mohan Lal put on his indicator and changed lanes. “The world is only now waking up to it, but India has had this Muslim problem for centuries.”

Siddharth couldn’t believe how relaxed his father seemed. Mohan Lal was usually a nightmare in traffic or bad weather.

Ms. Farber tilted her head. “Why is it such a. . such a violent religion?”

Siddharth had heard his father say similar things many times. When Mohan Lal had complained about the Muslims, Siddharth’s mother used to get annoyed. She reminded Mohan Lal that some of his best friends had been Muslims, that Muslims had eaten at her parents’ dinner table.

“Listen, Rachel,” said Mohan Lal, waggling his finger, “there is only one religion in the world that doesn’t perpetuate violence.”

“And which one is that?”

“Siddharth, tell her which one.”

“Buddhism,” grumbled Siddharth.

“Good boy,” said Mohan Lal.

“And the Hindus too,” said Ms. Farber. “Right? I mean, what about Gandhi? He was a Hindu. Wasn’t he?”

Siddharth didn’t understand why Ms. Farber always had to bring the conversation back to India. She loved to talk about her Israeli meditation instructor who had lived in Kerala for five years. She said she’d love to spend an entire month in an ashram, just focused on being.

“Gandhi?” said Mohan Lal. “That man was a traitor. A traitor and a charlatan.”

Twisting a curl of hair around her finger, Ms. Farber explained that she had been to Morocco once, right before she’d met Marc’s father. “The people there were so warm — kind of innocent really. But the way they treated their women — I just couldn’t stomach it.”

Mohan Lal said, “Name me a country where the women are well-treated.”

“Well, for starters, how about this one?”

“Excuse me,” said Mohan Lal, “but have we had a female president? Look at India, Britain — even Pakistan — they have all had female leaders.”

Marc snickered. “Damn, Rachel, I think you just got told.”

Siddharth laughed, but his mind was in another place now. A crisp, clear memory of his mother had formed in his mind. One evening several years earlier, the Aroras had been eating dinner, and she was telling them about one of her patients who was a Vietnam veteran. This patient was addicted to heroin, and he was missing an arm. Siddharth’s mother shook her head and said she hoped that human beings would see the truth about war. “Jesus, don’t tell me I’ve married a Gandhian,” Mohan Lal muttered. Siddharth wished his father would forget about Gandhi. Mohan Lal had come to America by choice. Nobody forced him to move here.

* * *

Marc had fallen asleep and was leaning against Siddharth’s shoulder. The weight of his body felt nice. Siddharth stayed as still as possible, mulling over the day. The tournament hadn’t been great, but he still felt calm and contented. In fact, he had a smile on his face. Here he was, in a snowstorm with Marc Kaufman, one of the toughest kids around. He wished someone from school could see Marc sitting so close to him, as if they were best friends. Brothers even. He wished Luca Peroti could see him. If Sharon could see him now, she might forget about everything that had happened. Siddharth suddenly felt a pang about Sharon. He wondered how she was doing — if her father had gotten a job closer to home, if her mother had received that promotion.

Mohan Lal turned on the radio, and a cheery voice announced a five-car pileup farther south on 91. Mohan Lal merged onto the Wilbur Cross Parkway, where the traffic wasn’t any better. Siddharth’s eyes started to flutter, and soon he was asleep too.

When he awoke, the car wasn’t moving at all. After rubbing the sleep from his face, he could make out a hazy line of cars extending all the way to the West Rock Tunnel. The windshield was fogging up, and Mohan Lal pressed a button on the dashboard. A wave of hot air washed through the car.

“I think I’ve strained my neck,” said Mohan Lal.

If Siddharth weren’t so sleepy, he would have said something. He would have told his father that he needed to do his stretches, the ones he used to do after he’d thrown out his back cleaning the gutters.

Ms. Farber said, “Tell me where. I’m pretty good with knots.”

As they exited the tunnel, she reached her hand toward Mohan Lal. Siddharth scowled, unsure if he was really seeing what he was seeing. Ms. Farber gasped all of a sudden, and her hand went to her chest. She said, “Oh my God.” The words came out as a whisper.

“Jesus,” said Mohan Lal.

Red and blue lights reflected off of Siddharth’s white karate uniform. He craned his neck and made out some road flares. Then a police officer came into view. The cop was wearing a trench coat and a cowboy hat. He was using a baton to direct traffic but looked as if he was trying to swat a fly.

After they passed the cop, Siddharth saw a maimed Buick sedan and an ambulance. Then came the deer with immense, intricate antlers. Its mouth was bloody. Its eyes were still open even though it was clearly dead. Siddharth’s mouth dried out; it felt like it was lined with sandpaper. “Jesus Christ,” he mumbled.

“Siddharth?” said Ms. Farber. She reached back and squeezed his knee. “Look away, honey. Look somewhere else.”

“Why look away?” said Mohan Lal. “The kids should see such things. These are the laws of the jungle.”

They passed the dead deer and approached another policeman, who was blocking their exit. Ms. Farber rolled down her window and the cop said, “Ramp’s closed, ma’am. Get off at 52 and follow signs for the detour.”

Exit 52 was where the Aroras got off when coming from the north. Although it was less than two miles away, it took them forty-five minutes to reach it. Once they got off the parkway, the roads in South Haven were treacherous. The van lurched and bucked as they passed the old Foster Farm. When Mohan Lal braked for a red light, the vehicle slid into the middle of the intersection.

“This is just horrible,” said Ms. Farber. “There has to be a better way home.”

Mohan Lal said something back, but Siddharth was thinking too hard to really listen.

He had seen people die on television, and he’d seen dead fish and dead mice. But he never saw his own mother’s dead body. That deer was the largest dead thing he’d ever seen, and the image of its glassy eyes was now seared into his brain. Had his mother had the same ghostly look after the accident? Whenever he’d imagined her dead, her eyes had always been closed. His mind shifted to his father. Mohan Lal would turn fifty-seven in the spring. That was officially old. Siddharth wouldn’t be able go through it again. He wouldn’t be able to live in a world without his father.

* * *

That night, he had a strange dream.

He was walking to Deer Run to practice baseball with Arjun. It was a beautiful spring day, with leaves on the trees and bright blooming forsythia. When he got to the playground, he found his brother’s rawhide glove and wooden bat resting against the school’s brick wall. He looked around for his brother, but Arjun was nowhere to be found. Siddharth was relieved for a moment, because baseball was never fun. But upon turning toward the backfield, he grew frightened.

At first it seemed the field was occupied by dogs, but upon closer look, the animals revealed themselves to be wolves. Some of them were lying on the ground and panting. Others were on the baseball diamond, grazing like livestock. A particularly large wolf stopped munching grass and stared in his direction. As Siddharth started striding toward the parking lot, the wolf trotted closer to him, so he broke into a run.

“Wait!” said the wolf.

Siddharth suddenly found himself frozen. The wolf approached him and sniffed his leg. It was totally gray except for a white line that ran from its nose to its green eyes. Some red substance, possibly blood, had stained its whiskers.

“Your brother’s gone,” said the wolf. It sounded familiar, a little like Mr. Iverson from up the street. “You must come with us. There are no other options but to come with us.”

Fortunately, the vigorous creaking of the baseboards forced him to open his eyes.

He floated between sleep and wakefulness for a few moments, indulging one of his favorite fantasies. His dream had been so real and yet ended up being fake, which meant everything else — last night and also the past twenty-one months — could have been fiction too. The sight of a breathing body on his brother’s bed seemed to confirm this suspicion. Arjun. Maybe he hadn’t even left for college yet. The sleeping body kicked off its covers, exposing New York Giants boxers and pale legs covered in hair. But it wasn’t ugly hair. It wasn’t the Indian kind. These legs belonged to Marc.

Having indulged such delusions before, Siddharth knew what came next. His stomach would buzz and churn, and the only way to feel better would be to watch a movie or some television.

“Marc,” said Siddharth.

Marc groaned, placing a pillow over his head.

Siddharth smiled. Marc Kaufman had slept over at his house. Siddharth propped himself up and noticed that his stomach felt fine. He eyed his friend’s boxers, which were so much cooler than his own tight white underwear. Marc’s back was a little pudgy, but his shoulders were broad and strong. Strands of stringy hair sprouted from the crevices under his shoulders. Siddharth fingered his own armpit. It was totally smooth, the armpit of a child.

He got out of bed and raised one of his curtains. It was sunny out, but the rhododendron bush was buckling under eight inches of snow. He didn’t even need to turn on the radio; school would definitely be cancelled. He felt relieved, like he was filled with helium and could float. He put on his Michigan sweatshirt and headed to Mohan Lal’s room, but the door was completely shut. Normally, Siddharth would have barged in. But something inside him told him to knock. He got no response and began to worry. Turning the knob, he peeked inside and couldn’t believe what he saw. It had just turned eight, and Mohan Lal’s bed was already made. He gripped the back of his neck. It felt thick and numb — foreign, as if it were somebody else’s.

He headed to his father’s bathroom, where he half-expected to find him sprawled on the vinyl floor. When Siddharth had traveled to Delhi the summer after his mother’s death, Mohan Lal tripped while stepping off the plane onto the runway, briefly losing consciousness. Siddharth had been so scared he vomited on the drive to his uncle’s home in Greater Kailash 1.

The bathroom was empty and, strangely, Siddharth felt disappointed. He had prepared himself to find his father strewn across the floor — to make the call to 911. If people could read his mind, they would think he was crazy. He stared out the bathroom window. The backyard was an unblemished blanket of white except for some deer tracks. They began at the woods and stopped below the sagging maple, right underneath the rusting, empty bird feeder. His mother used to fill the feeder at least once a week, even during winter. When the temperature fell below zero, she would put out leftovers for the deer and turkey. One time, Mohan Lal had told her to stop, saying that she was interfering with the laws of Darwin. She told him that he was cruel, that she considered herself a part of the animals’ evolution.

Siddharth headed to the hallway, passing his mother’s framed oil paintings of boats and fruit bowls. She’d won various ribbons for these at the South Haven County Fair. He passed the framed certificate of appreciation from the nurses at the VA hospital, where she’d worked as an attending anesthesiologist for twelve years. He glanced at the black-and-white photo from his parents’ wedding, in which his mother was wearing an ugly sari and his father a silly turban, like a real sand nigger. Siddharth didn’t know much about their pasts, but he knew the story of their courtship by heart.

After nine years in Manhattan, Mohan Lal had finally returned to India. He spotted Siddharth’s mother at a friend’s party and immediately knew she was the one. He spent the next two months convincing her to marry him, buying her flowers and taking her out for secret coffee dates on a motorcycle. Mohan Lal had to provide her father letters of recommendation to prove the strength of his character.

Siddharth shook his head and kept walking. As he reached the heart of the house, he could hear Ms. Farber’s voice coming from the kitchen. He paused in the family room, turning his attention to the coffee table, where a half-empty jug of Canei wine towered over the usual bills and legal pads. Next to it was a bowl of pink pistachio shells. Taking a few steps into the room, he couldn’t see them yet, but he could hear every word they were saying. She was talking about something called a kibbutz until Mohan Lal interrupted her. “You know,” he said, “I once managed a farm — in Kashipur, one of the most beautiful places. Let me tell you, the life of a rancher is a good one.” Siddharth had heard his father speak about such things before. When his parents used to fight, Mohan Lal would say he was going to run away to this Kashipur.

Siddharth warmed his feet on the family room’s thin burgundy carpeting, peering through the sliding glass doors into the porch. It was messy, filled with rickety cane furniture, discarded tools, and deflated balls. His father was dicing tomatoes at the counter. He had on his bulky wire-framed glasses, and his unshaven face was covered with tiny dots of gray.

Ms. Farber told Mohan Lal he had very unconventional perspectives. “Is that why you left India?” she asked. “A man like you — you couldn’t have had an easy time in a place that’s so traditional.”

Mohan Lal cracked a smile. “You could say that.” He came down hard on an onion and proceeded to chop it fast, as if he were a machine. “Yes, such a backward place can be stifling.”

“For me it was a little different,” said Ms. Farber. “I left home to—”

“But ask me why I chose to live here,” Mohan Lal interrupted.

“Uh, okay. Why here?”

She sounded annoyed, and Siddharth hoped his father hadn’t offended her.

“I stayed because this is a great country. Or should I say, it was a great country.” Mohan Lal turned toward Ms. Farber, and his face hardened as he glimpsed Siddharth. “Son?”

Siddharth stared down at the holes in his tube socks.

“Morning, son. Come here.” Mohan Lal sounded very formal, like a stranger.

He entered the kitchen, and Ms. Farber asked him how he’d slept. Her voice was weird too, a little too sweet for his liking.

“Fine,” he said. He stared at the white brooch that was pinned below her collar. It depicted two masks, one smiling and the other frowning.

Ms. Farber got up and filled the kettle at the sink, her free hand hovering behind Mohan Lal’s back without actually touching it. “Instant coffee takes me back,” she said. “My parents — they used to drink it every single morning.” Returning to her seat, she paused in front of Siddharth and smiled. Her teeth seemed particularly yellow today. Tiny wrinkles engulfed her honey-colored eyes. The mole on her cheek didn’t look like a mole this morning — it looked like a small mountain. “You were fabulous yesterday,” she said.

“Yeah, thanks,” Siddharth replied. “Dad, I’m gonna watch TV.”

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” said Mohan Lal.

“Forgetting something?”

“Sunday morning rules. Pour yourself some milk and take a seat.”

“Sunday morning rules?” He had no idea what his father was talking about. But something odd was in the air, so he sat down.

Ms. Farber stared at the photographs and magazine cutouts on the fridge, which had been up there for ages. “So you were saying?”

“Pardon me?” said Mohan Lal.

“This country used to be great? If it used to be great, then why stay? It’s not like you don’t have other options.”

Mohan Lal beat some eggs with an electric mixer. He said, “Siddharth, please tell me — what is the definition of wealth?”

“Dad, come on — I haven’t even had breakfast yet.”

“Just say it,” said Mohan Lal.

Siddharth explained that a wealthy country was one that had the ability to manufacture, a phrase his father had uttered thousands of times.

“Very impressive,” said Ms. Farber.

“You see, Rachel, when I came to this country in 1959, the Eastern seaboard was the manufacturing capital of the world. They made clocks and tools — such products of high quality, I tell you. Right here in Connecticut, the ball-bearing industry was the greatest in the world.”

“So what happened?”

“Greed — greedy politicians and greedy businessmen.” Mohan Lal launched into an explanation of how American ball-bearing manufacturers started helping the Japanese set up more cost-effective factories. “Yes, a few barons got rich. But the country — the people? No. They lost a genuine source of wealth.”

“But that’s capitalism,” said Ms. Farber. “Show me a better system and I’ll give you a million bucks.”

“True, there is no better system than capitalism. But what I have described isn’t capitalism. Tell me, where’s your free market if the Japanese government is subsidizing production? And what about our own government? It must provide conditions in which business can prosper.”

The kettle whistled, and Ms. Farber got up to finish making her coffee. Mohan Lal started sautéing some spices, and Siddharth cringed as the odor of Indian food filled the kitchen.

“That smells wonderful,” said Ms. Farber. “I’d love to learn a few dishes.”

“Anytime,” said Mohan Lal, dumping the onions into his wok. “Siddharth, set the table and put in some English muffins.”

Siddharth begrudgingly got four white plates out of the cabinet, and then some forks and knives. Ms. Farber was back at the table, pressing her mug against her cheek and staring out the window.

“Rachel?” said Mohan Lal.

She didn’t respond. Siddharth had seen her look this way before. Her mind was in some far-off place now.

“Rachel?” Mohan Lal repeated.

Siddharth glared at him.

She shuddered, then faked a smile. “I’m so sorry. I’m used to a little more sleep, I guess.”

Mohan Lal turned down the burner and dumped in the tomatoes. “I hope I haven’t offended you.”

“Offended me?”

“Dad,” said Siddharth, “how many muffins do you want?”

Mohan Lal ignored him. “If you were a jingo, my words may have been offensive.”

Ms. Farber laughed, then grasped her mug with her long, bony fingers. “No, not at all. I was just thinking about my father. He had a factory in New Jersey. They made some sort of widget that went into fluorescent lightbulbs. He was always complaining about Japan — Japan, Taiwan, and, of course, the Germans.” She paused and shook her head. “To be honest, I always thought it was all a bunch of excuses.”

“Dad?” said Siddharth. “Hello? I asked you a question.”

“Put in three,” said Mohan Lal. “We’ll make a fresh one for Marc when he wakes up.” He poured in the eggs. “Let me tell you, this country’s greatest asset was its entrepreneurs — amazing men who we took for granted.”

“Amazing?” said Ms. Farber. “I would have settled for functional.” She arched her eyebrows. “My mother, she died a few weeks after my sixteenth birthday. Dad — he wasn’t like you. He fell apart, into a million little pieces.”