“I thought you said you wanted to buy a coat?”
“Oh! I . . . I didn’t know you had heard me.” She perched on the edge of the loveseat, trying to think of something to say. She was suddenly so hot, she felt sick. She took off her coat and laid it on her lap.
Sanjay looked at her coat, at the bag that she had just dropped by her feet.
“You went shopping?”
“Alyona took me to the thrift store. I really had no idea you’d be home early to take me shopping”
“Thrift store. Seriously? Thrift store?”
His voice was rising, driving jagged bits of alarm into her heart.
“What did I leave work early for? You couldn’t wait one evening? And thrift store? You disgust me.” He stormed out of the living room. She heard the water run in the bathroom after a while, and she imagined an angry steam thickly cloaking him—like attracting like. She sat on the loveseat feeling weepy.
When he returned to the living room, her voice was still shaky with guilt. “Can I serve dinner?” she asked. He looked fresh after a shower, but his face still had grumpy written over it. He ignored her question and settled on the recliner, a glass of red wine in his hand. He turned on the TV, switched channels.
Tara tried again. “Will you be having dinner? I made some minestrone soup to go with garlic bread.”
He kept his eyes glued to the TV and acted like she didn’t exist. She waited an hour for him to say something, anything, before she decided she had to eat before going to bed. She shrank into the kitchen where he couldn’t see her, hunched over her bowl on the counter. Her appetite faded after four spoons of soup and a thin chunk of garlic bread. She was upset that she had upset him. But somewhere at the back of her head, in a little crevice, was a slim happy feeling too. He had made the effort to come early to buy her a coat. If only she hadn’t listened to that foolish Alyona.
Sanjay did not speak to Tara the next day or the day after. Fear burgeoned in her heart. She hoped Sanjay would not ignore her forever. By the time they went to bed the third night after the incident, Tara could take his silence no more; it had left her too high-strung all day. She pulled his rigid arm out with all the strength she could muster, and snuggled into him. He didn’t react.
“I am sorry. Please let it go, no?” she implored. He lay immobile, eyes closed. She slipped her hand under his T-shirt and gently played with his chest hair. He didn’t react, but he didn’t push her hand away either. Encouraged, she played more; her fingers explored, caressed, moved downward, until they disappeared into his shorts. He grabbed her by her shoulders and turned her over. His passion was back, and hers even stronger after the strains and fears of the past three days. She melted into him with all her being.
He did not offer to buy her a coat again. Tara spent the winter wearing the black woolen thrift store coat, which hung a little too loose on her lean frame.
“It is the thought that counts,” Amma said during their next phone chat. “Don’t encourage the Russian girl if he doesn’t like it.”
“But Amma, I don’t have anybody else to talk to.”
“Doesn’t he have any friends?”
“He does, but they don’t ever come home. He goes out with them sometimes.”
“Are they bachelors?”
“I don’t know who they are.”
Tara had once met Sanjay’s coworker. They were on their way home from Publix when Sanjay had made a quick stop at Target to buy a razor. She was sure she hadn’t imagined it—Sanjay was taken aback when the friend called out his name in the parking lot. It was an Indian guy, a little older than Sanjay, with a friendly manner. His name was Avinash, she learned. He worked for the same company as Sanjay, but that was the extent of Sanjay’s introduction.
“This is Tara. She is visiting from India,” Sanjay had grudgingly introduced her to Avinash, who kept glancing in her direction, all smiles, questions bursting from his bespectacled eyes.
Tara had only said hello, when Sanjay had quickly mumbled an excuse about being late for an imaginary engagement and run into Target.
Sanjay was awkward, and it troubled Tara. Was he ashamed of her?
“Why didn’t you say I am your wife?” she had asked him on their way back home.
He was dismissive. “Oh, didn’t I? I thought I had.”
“Why did you say I am visiting from India?”
“Are you nitpicking?”
“Are you ashamed of me?”
“Now you are making me mad.”
She had bitten her lip and looked away.
When Christmas season arrived, little lights mushroomed everywhere. Elves, reindeers, snowmen, Santas—they all came alive each evening, in the front yards of West Hill Road. Pretty wreaths adorned the front doors and windows, and a twinkling, decorated Christmas tree stood inside each home, visible from the road, through the frosted glass windows. The little white house had a nativity scene, much like the Christian homes in Mangalore.
Sanjay took her one evening to see the seventy-foot-tall pine Christmas tree that had been hoisted to the roof of the Lenox Mall in Buckhead. What a magnificent sight it was! Thousands of lights, ornaments, and mirror balls glistened in the night, merging into one glorious, luminous pine shape.
“People come from all over the Southeast to see this tree,” said Sanjay. “The Rich’s tree has been an annual tradition since 1947. Just this year, it was moved from Underground Atlanta to Lenox Mall.”
Tara looked around her. Some of the hundreds of visitors who came every year were here tonight, looking at the tree with as much interest as she was. Inside the mall, little kids flocked around a rotund Santa who sat on his throne in a white fence enclosure, a kid on his lap, smiling benevolently for the cameras. Some of the Christmas spirit was rubbing on to her, even though she wondered what the festival actually meant for Americans, beyond the lights.
Alyona’s wreath was old and slightly misshapen, and her tiny tree was fake and had built-in lights. Viktor had left for his dad’s for the holidays, so Alyona had no plans to celebrate at home. Two days before Christmas, the owner of Eclips Salon hosted a party for all her employees, with fruit punch, olivje salad, salami sandwiches and lymonnyk pies.
That evening, Alyona arrived with Tara’s share of the party goodies, and a Christmas gift—a small square box wrapped in shiny red paper with a gold bow stuck to the top. Tara smiled happily for Alyona’s gleaming digital camera, holding her wrapped gift lovingly against her cheek. Her smile widened when she opened the box. She loved the tiny, shiny turquoise earrings set in white metal, more so because they were a gift. She picked up one earring, held it against her ear, and the stone and metal radiated the joy she felt across her face.
“Thank you!” she whispered with moist eyes. “I shall treasure these earrings forever. This is the first gift I have received in America.”
She was rewarded for her gratitude with whoops of joy and a warm bear hug. Tara wondered what she would give Alyona in return. She had no money to buy her friend a gift, and she could not ask Sanjay. She pondered over it all evening. Then she had a brainwave.
On Christmas Eve, she took a large casserole filled with chicken biryani over to Alyona’s. The culinary adventure had taken four calls to Amma for consultation and guidance, and two major crises of confidence. It was an elaborate dish that called for the chicken to be marinated and cooked in a gentle blend of spices, the rice undercooked just right and lightly folded into the curried chicken in layers, and the mixture baked in the oven until it came out fluffy, aromatic, and multicolored. In the end, the rice was a little too dry, the chicken a little overcooked, and she had added a little too much salt, but Alyona savored every morsel like it was the most delicious food she had ever eaten.