sign, apart from all the seaweed that had washed like empty nests up on the sand, of the storm there had been.
3.
He wanted to tell Udayan. Somehow, he wanted to confess to his brother the profound step heâd taken. He wanted to describe who Holly was, what she looked like, how she lived. To discuss the knowledge of women that they now shared. But it wasnât something he could convey in a letter or a telegram. Not a conversation he could imagine, even if a connection were possible, taking place over the phone.
Friday evenings: this was when he was able to visit Holly at the cottage and to spend the night. The rest of the time he kept a distance, sometimes meeting her for a sandwich on the beach but nothing more. For most of the week he was able to pretend, if he needed to, that he did not know her, and that nothing in his life had changed.
But on Friday evenings he drove to her cottage, turning off the highway onto the long wooded road that gave way to the salt marsh. Through Saturday, sometimes as late as Sunday morning, he stayed. She was undemanding, always at ease with him. Trusting, each time they parted, that they would meet again.
They walked along the beach, on firm sand ribbed by the tide. He swam with her in the cold water, tasting its salt in his mouth. It seemed to enter his bloodstream, into every cell, purifying him, leaving sand in his hair. On his back he floated weightless, his arms spread, the world silenced. Only the seaâs low-pitched hum, and the sun glowing like hot coals behind his eyes.
Once or twice they did certain ordinary things, as if they were already husband and wife. Going together to the supermarket, filling the cart with food, putting the bags in the trunk of her car. Things he would not have done with a woman, in Calcutta, before getting married.
In Calcutta, when he was a student, it had been enough to feel an attraction toward certain women. Heâd been too shy to pursue them. He didnât court Holly as heâd observed college friends trying to impress women they were interested in, women who almost always became their wives. As Udayan had surely courted Gauri. He didnât take Holly to the movies or to restaurants. He didnât write her notes, delivered, so as not to rouse suspicion from a girlâs parents, by the aid of a friend, asking her to meet him here or there.
Holly was beyond such things. The only place it made sense for them to meet was at her home, where it was easiest to be, where he liked to spend time, and where she saw to their immediate needs. The hours passed with their talking, long conversations about their families, their pasts, though she didnât talk about her marriage. She never tired of asking him about his upbringing. The most ordinary details of his life, which would have made no impression on a girl from Calcutta, were what made him distinctive to her.
One evening, as they drove back together from the grocery store, having corn and watermelon to celebrate the Fourth of July, Subhash described his father setting out each morning to the market, carrying a burlap sack in his hand. If their mother complained that he hadnât brought back enough, heâd say, Better to eat a small piece of fish with flavor than a large one without. Heâd witnessed a famine of devastating proportions, never taking a single meal for granted.
Some mornings, Subhash told her, he and Udayan had accompanied their father to shop, or to pick up rationed rice and coal. They had waited with him in the long lines, under the shade of his umbrella when the sun was strong.
They had helped him to carry back the fish and the vegetables, the mangoes that their father sniffed and prodded, that he sometimes set to further ripen under the bed. On Sundays they bought meat from the butcher, carved from a hanging goat carcass, weighed on the scale, wrapped in a packet of dried leaves.
Are you close to your father? Holly asked him.
For some reason he
3.
He wanted to tell Udayan. Somehow, he wanted to confess to his brother the profound step heâd taken. He wanted to describe who Holly was, what she looked like, how she lived. To discuss the knowledge of women that they now shared. But it wasnât something he could convey in a letter or a telegram. Not a conversation he could imagine, even if a connection were possible, taking place over the phone.
Friday evenings: this was when he was able to visit Holly at the cottage and to spend the night. The rest of the time he kept a distance, sometimes meeting her for a sandwich on the beach but nothing more. For most of the week he was able to pretend, if he needed to, that he did not know her, and that nothing in his life had changed.
But on Friday evenings he drove to her cottage, turning off the highway onto the long wooded road that gave way to the salt marsh. Through Saturday, sometimes as late as Sunday morning, he stayed. She was undemanding, always at ease with him. Trusting, each time they parted, that they would meet again.
They walked along the beach, on firm sand ribbed by the tide. He swam with her in the cold water, tasting its salt in his mouth. It seemed to enter his bloodstream, into every cell, purifying him, leaving sand in his hair. On his back he floated weightless, his arms spread, the world silenced. Only the seaâs low-pitched hum, and the sun glowing like hot coals behind his eyes.
Once or twice they did certain ordinary things, as if they were already husband and wife. Going together to the supermarket, filling the cart with food, putting the bags in the trunk of her car. Things he would not have done with a woman, in Calcutta, before getting married.
In Calcutta, when he was a student, it had been enough to feel an attraction toward certain women. Heâd been too shy to pursue them. He didnât court Holly as heâd observed college friends trying to impress women they were interested in, women who almost always became their wives. As Udayan had surely courted Gauri. He didnât take Holly to the movies or to restaurants. He didnât write her notes, delivered, so as not to rouse suspicion from a girlâs parents, by the aid of a friend, asking her to meet him here or there.
Holly was beyond such things. The only place it made sense for them to meet was at her home, where it was easiest to be, where he liked to spend time, and where she saw to their immediate needs. The hours passed with their talking, long conversations about their families, their pasts, though she didnât talk about her marriage. She never tired of asking him about his upbringing. The most ordinary details of his life, which would have made no impression on a girl from Calcutta, were what made him distinctive to her.
One evening, as they drove back together from the grocery store, having corn and watermelon to celebrate the Fourth of July, Subhash described his father setting out each morning to the market, carrying a burlap sack in his hand. If their mother complained that he hadnât brought back enough, heâd say, Better to eat a small piece of fish with flavor than a large one without. Heâd witnessed a famine of devastating proportions, never taking a single meal for granted.
Some mornings, Subhash told her, he and Udayan had accompanied their father to shop, or to pick up rationed rice and coal. They had waited with him in the long lines, under the shade of his umbrella when the sun was strong.
They had helped him to carry back the fish and the vegetables, the mangoes that their father sniffed and prodded, that he sometimes set to further ripen under the bed. On Sundays they bought meat from the butcher, carved from a hanging goat carcass, weighed on the scale, wrapped in a packet of dried leaves.
Are you close to your father? Holly asked him.
For some reason he
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