When Bela wept, certain she would never see him again, his own voice grew rough with tears. “Don’t cry. I love you. I’ll send for you as soon as I can, God-promise. I’ve written everything down for you, what I want you to do meanwhile. Go to your mother’s sweet shop tomorrow morning at ten. On the way, someone will give you a letter.”
Sure enough, the next day, as she was getting down from the bus near Durga Sweets, a scruffy young man pressed a crumpled note into her hand. Bela learned that Sanjay’s friend Bishu, who was now working in America and possessed connections, had somehow managed to arrange fake documents for him. He would do the same for her. When her papers were ready, and her ticket, the same young man who had given her the note—a friend of Bishu’s—would call her. Meanwhile, she was to act as though she had given up on Sanjay and do whatever her mother wanted.
Bela believed Sanjay because the alternative was unthinkable. Following his instructions, she dressed neatly each day in an ironed sari and placed a matching bindi on her forehead. When college started back up, she no longer complained about the doorman. Sabitri suggested, gently, that she needed to forget the missing Sanjay and move on with her life; she didn’t argue. She let Sabitri take her out to Flury’s on her birthday (a special treat; Flury’s was generally beyond their budget), where they ate meringues with cream. A few months later, Sabitri asked if she would be willing to have an arranged marriage—to someone who would let her complete college, of course. Bela protested mildly but then acquiesced. She sat meekly through the bride viewings, smiling as she recited a fierce litany inside her head: Don’t choose me, don’t choose me. Perhaps it worked, for the matches fell through. At night, she massaged Sabitri’s legs with glycerin water—she tended to get cramps from being on her feet at work all day. This last act was not a pretense. It was Bela’s apology to her mother, whom she loved more than anyone except Sanjay, for her upcoming betrayal.
Tonight when Sanjay came into their little apartment, there was no song and dance because Bishu was with him, huffing from climbing the stairs. (The elevator was out of order again.) The years had gifted Bishu with a prosperous paunch, though actual prosperity had proved more elusive. He worked at odd jobs ever since he was laid off from his engineering firm a year ago. Recently Sanjay had told her that Bishu’s wife, a white woman he had met at his office some years back, was filing for divorce. She had asked him to move out of their house, Sanjay said angrily. He did not volunteer further information, and Bela, though curious, thought it best not to ask.
From the first, Bishu was a thorn between them. Sanjay often chided Bela for not being as friendly as she should be to him. “Like I told you, I was an orphan, brought up in my uncle’s home, where nobody cared for me. All through my childhood, Bishu-da was more than a brother to me. He helped me with studies, made sure I was included in the neighborhood football games, got me a doctor, even, once when I was very sick. If Bishu-da hadn’t called in favors when I got in trouble, if he hadn’t taken out a huge loan so that people in India could be bribed into providing me—and later, you—with false papers, neither of us would be in America now. In fact, I’d be dead.”
Bela realized the truth of this. She was grateful to Bishu, she really was. But she couldn’t help being annoyed that Bishu felt entitled to drop in unannounced for dinner whenever he wanted.
“Ah, good, solid Bengali food, Bela,” he would say with an appreciative belch once he had finished eating. “That fried fish was quite fine. But the cauliflower curry could have done with a little more coriander.” She resented him, too, for continuing to advise Sanjay about his career, though Sanjay now made more money than he did. She hated how, at such times, Sanjay, though otherwise masterful (just last week he had fought with a neighbor who had parked in their spot, making him remove his car), regressed into a teenagerish deference. Yes, Bishu-da, you’re right, Bishu-da, I should be careful about what I say to my supervisor.
This night, once he had caught his breath, Bishu said, “We have some great news for you, Bela!”
Bela looked at her husband. Why, she asked in wordless husband-wife code, didn’t you tell me this great news? Why do I have to hear it from a stranger?
Bishu-da isn’t a stranger, he coded back with a frown.
“You tell her, Shonu,” Bishu offered regally.
A boyish grin split open Sanjay’s face. “We’re buying a house!”
The words swooshed around in Bela’s head like wild birds. That was her secret dream: a house of her own. She had lived in a house only once, in her childhood, a magical sprawling place in Assam with giant hydrangea bushes that leaned up against the walls. Her father was still alive then; she remembered walking with him in the mango grove, gathering golden fruit from the ground. Was that why she wanted a house so badly? She hadn’t told Sanjay because it was an unreasonable longing, with her earning only minimum wage, and loans, so many of them still: his student loan, their ticket money, payments to various middlemen who had arranged their visas.
“Bishu-da found us an excellent deal,” Sanjay said, handing her a blurry photo. “Look!”
She thought the shingle-roofed tract home was the most beautiful house she had seen. She traced, with a shaky finger, the narrow front window, the line of the roof, the wood fence. She imagined herself cooking in a kitchen with new flooring and enough shelves so her spices and dals didn’t have to be piled in untidy heaps on the counter. She would sit with Sanjay at the dining table drinking tea on a Sunday morning, and look out at the backyard where she had planted gardenias. In bed they wouldn’t have to worry that the neighbors heard their cries.
“We can’t afford it,” she said flatly, though she couldn’t bear to hand the photo back to him.
“It isn’t to live in, silly.” Bishu was avuncular in his kindness. “It’s an investment. We’re pooling our savings for the down payment. We’ll rent it out. The rent will cover the monthly mortgage. Property values increase fast in the Bay Area. In a few years we can sell it, or take out a second mortgage and buy another home.”
All through dinner, the men discussed the things they’d have to do: negotiate with the realtor, who was known to Bishu, and bring down the price; get the loan—thank God Bishu knew an agent, because otherwise they wouldn’t qualify; advertise for a tenant. The house needed new carpets; the rooms had to be painted so they could charge more rent. They could do the painting themselves, couldn’t they, and save money? Their voices were excited and self-assured and conspiratorial, the way they used to be in India, when they were political leaders. As she watched them it struck her that America might have saved their lives, but it had also diminished them.
Immersed in her own plans, Bela heard only snippets. As she carried dishes back and forth from the kitchen, she glanced at the photo, which she had propped up on the counter, and which she would paste, afterward, into the album where she was accumulating—slowly, because film was expensive—Polaroids of their American life. She had seen an announcement at Lucky’s a couple days back. They needed shelf stockers. She could get on a late shift, after her stint at Tiny Treasures. Save the entire amount. When she had enough, she would hand it triumphantly to Sanjay and insist that he buy out Bishu. Finally, then, she would have a house of her own.
Sooner than she had believed possible, they were the proud co-owners of a small house in Fremont, just a few miles from the apartment. Over the weekend the three of them went there, armed with rollers and brushes. Bela carried a bucket filled with mops, sponges, Comet. How big the house was, at least three times the size of their seven-hundred-square-foot apartment. It had a separate living room, and an upstairs master bedroom with its own bathroom. From the window you could see all the way across the freeway to a grove of eucalyptus. She polished mirrors, wiped down kitchen shelves, scoured the wide boat of a sink, and cleaned up paint spills from the bright faux-marble hallway. (The men were enthusiastic but clumsy.) Every so often, she had to stop, close her eyes, and breathe deep, so overcome was she with jealousy
of the woman who would live here. Foolishness, but she couldn’t stop herself. Her apartment, when she returned to it, seemed newly dingy, unbearable. Each cracked shower tile, each discolored patch of linoleum, each stain in the shag carpet that smelled of ancient pets made her want to throw up.
But no. The nausea was because she was pregnant. The discovery terrified her. How could it be? Hadn’t they taken precautions, buying all those expensive condoms they couldn’t afford? At Tiny Treasures, she moved like a sleepwalker, wiping noses, separating fighting children, vainly trying to soothe the two-year-olds who routinely threw themselves on the floor, screaming. On weekends, instead of conversing with Sanjay she turned on the TV, feigning a manic cheerfulness as she watched one comedy show after another. It was the only way she knew to keep herself from dissolving into tears. She missed Sabitri more than she had in a long time. She was constantly tired. Weeknights, she fell asleep on the sofa before Sanjay returned, and woke grudgingly when he shook her shoulder, calling her name. Taking up a second job was out of the question. Goodbye, dream house.
Dangerous fantasies flitted through her mind. If she had allowed Sabitri to arrange her marriage, she would have been living in India. She would have gone to her mother’s home for the birthing, as was the tradition, to be cared for and pampered. Sabitri knew what she liked in a way that Sanjay never would. Her favorite desserts from Durga Sweets, sandesh stuffed with chocolate, or dark, glistening balls of pantuas in rosewater syrup. Her tea made with so much milk that it turned a pale pink. Sabitri would have made sure she got a mustard-oil massage each day, fresh-fried rui fish for protein.
She couldn’t bring herself to tell Sanjay about her body’s betrayal, but he suspected it after he caught her throwing up in the bathroom. She was afraid he would blame her. However, once he got over the shock, he was mostly happy. She would have preferred them to keep the news to themselves for a while, but Sanjay insisted on telling Bishu.
She steeled herself for Bishu’s response—an overabundance of parental advice (though he had no children himself), or perhaps chastisement about their inopportune timing, their lack of planning. Didn’t you realize that you don’t have enough money to bring up a child, which in America, let me tell you, is horribly expensive? But he only said, “I’m going to be an uncle! How about that!” For the rest of the evening he sat on the sofa, unusually quiet, a bemused smile on his face. She watched him from the kitchen alcove as she washed the dishes, a little bemused herself. Why, you could be acquainted with a person for years, thinking you knew them. Then suddenly they’d do something that showed you there were layers to them you hadn’t ever suspected.
Before he left, Bishu said, “This baby will bring us luck, I’m sure of it.”
Maybe Bishu was right, because that same week, just as Bela was beginning to worry about how they would pay the mortgage, they found a tenant. He worked at an auto dealership. A solid family man, with a wife and a three-year-old boy. Sanjay and Bishu took Bela with them to the house to hand him the key.
The tenant had a frank guffaw of a laugh and clapped the men on the shoulder, promising to take care of the place like it was his own. His son peeked curiously at them from behind his mother. His wife gave Bela a smile and said hello and what a pretty house this is and how clean you’ve kept it. Bela tried not to hate her, but she didn’t try very hard. Why should this cabbage-faced woman get to live in spread-out luxury in Bela’s house, while Bela and her baby were crammed into a tiny, mildewed apartment?
The tenant also had a Pekingese about whom he had not told them, a small, grizzled, pesky animal that yapped around their ankles. Bela could see that Bishu was annoyed by this omission. But he controlled himself. What was the point of a fight now, with the rental papers signed already? Plus they couldn’t afford to have the house sit empty any longer. He told the tenant that he’d have to pay an additional pet deposit, and the man agreed to send it in.
On the way back, Sanjay grumbled that dogs peed on carpets and chewed up the edges of cabinets.
Bishu shrugged, surprisingly philosophical. “Beggars can’t be choosers.”
The phrase startled Bela with its unexpected familiarity. She had learned it in class three, filling out a blue handwriting sampler where students copied sentences over and over in order to learn penmanship. How could she have forgotten those thrifty proverbs? A stitch in time saves nine. Waste not, want not. A friend in need is a friend indeed. Beggars can’t be choosers. What else out of her past, she wondered, had she pushed into oblivion?
One Tuesday evening a few weeks later, Bela saw the woman at Lucky’s with her son. She followed them at a distance, a kind of recon mission. The little boy sat cross-legged in the grocery cart and pointed to the things he wanted, and his mother picked them up and handed them to him so he could arrange them in neat piles. Bela memorized their shapes and colors so that later she could examine them. What exotic items they chose, a window into an America she didn’t know. Betty Crocker Supermoist Rainbow Chip Cake Mix. Chef Boyardee Mini Ravioli in Hearty Tomato and Meat Sauce. Beef was forbidden, but Bela bought a can of cheese ravioli, though later she was disappointed at its blandness.
Bela changed her shopping schedule to Tuesday evenings. As she had hoped, she saw the mother-and-child pair several times. She observed them carefully. Sometimes the woman shook her head in refusal, and the boy agreed with good grace. He was a docile child, not like the monsters Bela had to deal with in Tiny Treasures, who sometimes kicked her on the shin when they were in a bad mood. She had even been bitten a couple of times. Bela had to admit that the woman was a good mother, though this did not lessen her resentment of her. Once, the woman turned around and noticed Bela and waved to her in a friendly way. She said something to the boy, and he waved, too. Bela almost waved back, but then she turned her cart and hurried into the next aisle.
She did not know much about being pregnant, what to expect from it. Her mind felt as bloated as her body. Was that natural? The advice in the books she borrowed from the library seemed confusing and contradictory; the world grew newly dangerous. Exercise more. Too much exercise can cause a miscarriage. Rest. Don’t be sedentary. Drink fruit juices. Cut out sugars. Avoid runny eggs, caffeine, paint, nonstick frying pans, insect spray, household cleaners. How was a woman to manage, then? And had she damaged the baby by breathing in Comet fumes when she cleaned the house that was and was not hers? She thought longingly of calling her mother, asking her opinion. But Sanjay hated Sabitri. Though reasonable about most things, he still fumed about the humiliation of Sabitri sending that doorman-guard to college with Bela, to protect her from him. And he always checked the phone bill because Bishu had told him that phone companies had a habit of charging you for calls you hadn’t made. He would see the call to India, Bela would have to explain, there would be an argument—oh, she didn’t have the energy for it. So she wrote instead.
The reply came so quickly that Sabitri must have sat down and penned it as soon as she received Bela’s letter.
Don’t worry about all those newfangled notions. You and your baby come of sturdy village stock. You’ll do fine. I want to go to America to take care of you—and the baby when it arrives. When should I plan my trip? Bipin Babu will be quite capable of running Durga Sweets once I go over a few things with him. I can cook for you, give oil-massages to the baby. You won’t have to buy my ticket—I have enough in my bank account—
When she read that part, Bela began to cry. She knew her mother didn’t have much in her savings. She’d put everything into Durga Sweets, but because she took pride in using the best ingredients and serving only what was made fresh each day, the shop wasn’t as profitable as it might have been. Growing up, Bela had both loved the shop and been jealous of it because Durga Sweets was Sabitri’s life. Even on her days off, Sabitri would stop in there—just to breathe that sweet air, she said. How much she must love Bela—and even more, the little one who was coming—to be willing to hand it over. But Sanjay would never agree to having
her here.
Great, racking sobs erupted from Bela. She hadn’t wept like this since she was a child. She couldn’t stop even though she knew that getting worked up was bad for the baby: all the books had agreed on that. But everything she had tamped down, all her disappointments since—yes, for the first time she admitted it—her marriage, swirled in her like a dust storm. She was stuck in this dingy apartment, stuck in a dead-end job she hated, stuck under a load of unpaid loans so heavy that she’d probably never be able to squirm out from under them and go back to college.
“Oh, baby,” she whispered. “What am I going to do?”
Then she felt it, a movement, for the first time. It was like a tickle inside her. As though you were trying to cheer me up, she would tell Tara later, to stop me from all that crying.
Shocked into silent wonder, she walked to the bed and lay down, holding her belly, waiting for it to happen again, for her baby to talk to her with its body. Warmth pulsated from her stomach through her hand to the rest of her body. All the things she had been so upset about a few minutes ago faded in its glow.
She ran to Sanjay when he came in the door, pressed his palm against her. Move, Baby, she whispered, and as though it heard her, there was a flutter. Once, twice. She laughed at the disbelief on Sanjay’s face. It’s really real, he kept saying through dinner—tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches, which he ate uncomplainingly night after night because everything else made her nauseous. What a good husband he was. Lying in bed with his arm around her, his lips nuzzling the back of her neck, she thought, Tomorrow I’ll ask him about having Ma come and visit. Maybe, for the baby’s sake, he’ll agree.