More in this series:
A Fix
Three Lamborghinis, two Maseratis, and something that might be a Bugatti.
She adjusts the red silk, smooths her lipstick in the side mirror of a Range Rover, and walks toward the marble steps.
She could do this. She told herself. Just a few hours. She could hold on to something at the very worst. Or sit on the stairs.
Inside, crystal chandeliers cast everything in golden light. Women drip in diamonds that catch the illumination like tiny fireworks. Men hold whisky glasses, facing each other, turning their eyes every so often. Something in them dissolves like ice luke warm water although she cannot quite put her finger on it yet. It would be far too simple to say ambition or lust.
She recognizes his profile immediately—the careful attention he pays to whoever is speaking, as if every conversation might contain the chemical formula for professional transformation. He's wearing a navy blazer that fits well but not perfectly, the kind of effort that suggests importance without quite achieving it. His hair is freshly cut, shorter than she remembers, and he keeps touching the back of his neck as if checking that his careful construction hasn't come undone.
He's nodding seriously at whatever a woman in emeralds is saying, but his eyes drift across the room until they find hers. For a moment, something unlatches—recognition, perhaps, or just the hormone that silks her legs when she sees him. Then his attention returns to the emerald woman with professional focus, and she wonders if she confuses this with love.
"Darling! You must be new."
A woman with hair that defies physics approaches, air-kissing the space near her cheeks.
"I'm P. PM. We live in Jor Bagh. You?"
"Defence Colony."
"Oh." The woman's smile flickers. "How... practical."
What does it feel like, she wonders, to wake up next to one woman and spend your evening calculating angles to touch another? Does he think of her when he brushes his teeth in the morning, or is that sacred time reserved for S? Maybe he doesn't think at all—maybe that's the secret. The simplicity of compartmentalization. She must keep busy with more practical matters. Really.
"Defence Colony, you said?"
Another woman has materialized, this one wearing what appears to be an entire jewelry store.
"Yes."
"The old Defence Colony or the new parts?"
"I... I'm not sure."
"Oh, you'd know if it was the old part. Much more established. We're in Sundar Nagar. Third generation.”
Third generation— what does that mean? That she still sleeps on the bed she was born in? Good grief.
A man in an expensive kurta joins their circle.
"Are you in the arts?" he asks. "You have that creative energy about you."
"I'm a writer."
"Wonderful! Fiction or non-fiction?"
"Fiction."
"How marvelous. We desperately need more serious literary voices. Which publisher are you with?"
"I'm... still working on getting published."
"Ah." His smile dims slightly. "Well, that's... that's how it begins, isn't it? We all start somewhere."
The jewelry woman suddenly seems less interested in continuing the conversation.
She excuses herself and walks toward the terrace, needing air and distance from property valuations and literary patronizing. He's there already, checking his phone, drink in hand. They nearly collide at the doorway.
Is he texting S right now? Something mundane about when he'll be home, or elaborate lies about deadline pressures? What do married men text their wives from parties where they're hunting other women? 'Home soon, darling'? 'Just finishing up? Do adulterers feel guilt?
Sometimes, she wishes she was a man, just so she could understand the other side of matters.
There are matters, no matter which side. It all matters.
"Sorry," she says.
"No, my fault entirely." He steps aside with exaggerated politeness, the way one does with strangers. But there's something in his voice, a careful neutrality that sounds almost rehearsed.
"Lovely party," she offers.
"Yes. R always throws quite a gathering."
"You know the host well?"
"We've met a few times."
"Everyone's very... interested in my publishing record."
"Ah. You're a writer?"
"Aspiring writer."
"Published writers get better wine. It's an unspoken rule."
She can't tell if he's joking.
She steps onto the terrace, but when she glances back, he's still watching her through the glass doors.
Twenty minutes later, she's trapped in a conversation about art galleries when a woman approaches.
"You're the new writer, aren't you? I heard someone mention it."
"Yes."
"How exciting! I'm K. My husband and I run the FCTB Gallery. We've sponsored several literary events."
“That’s…great.”
Lovely. She meant lovely.
She finds herself caught between wanting to disappear into the marble walls and simultaneously craving this recognition. She could be valedictorian if the metrics were for navigating the space between visibility and anonymity, for calculating her best chance at being seen without being truly known.
"Which publications have featured your work?
"I've had a few pieces in smaller journals. In the US."
"Oh. Well, that's... different. The Indian literary scene is quite different. What book for yours would I have read?”
"Not yet. I mean, I don’t have a book yet. Just stories here and there.”
“Ah.Well, when you do publish something substantial, you must let us know."
She drifts away, leaving her standing alone near an indoor waterfall. She now realizes the irony of it all— that she has moved to Delhi seeking obscurity after years of New York's relentless ambition. The MFA, the rejections that followed. She really should have chosen Pondicherry. She recognizes the accusation in her own behavior: the way she adjusts her posture when someone calls her a writer, how she tries to mask her nasal tone.
"Rough crowd tonight."
She turns. He's appeared beside her again, this time holding two glasses of wine.
"You heard that?"
"Hard to miss. K;s voice carries like a proclamation."
"Do you know her?”
He gives her the look.
Right. Delhi.
“Actually we had a big argument on Twitter once.”
"What did you tell her?"
"That true writing counts more than her husband's real estate empire counts as art patronage."
"Harsh."
"Accurate. But then, we're all performing some version of ourselves we wish were real."
He hands her one of the wine glasses. Their fingers brush—a small accusation.
But also a confession.
"This is better wine, by the way."
"The published writer wine?"
"Exactly. I may have lied about your publishing credentials to the bartender."
"You told him I was published?"
"I told him you were working on something that would change literature forever. Technically true, isn't it?"
"Technically."
She sips the wine. It tastes like expensive forgiveness. "And what version are you performing?"
"The successful journalist who doesn't need anyone's approval."
"Very convincing performance."
"Years of practice. What about you?"
"The mysterious writer from New York who definitely doesn't crave attention from literary society while simultaneously hiding from it."
"Ah. The classic approach-avoidance paradox."
"Is that what this is?"
"Everything here is a paradox. We attend parties to be seen by people we claim to despise, discuss books with people who treat literature like stock portfolios."
She recognizes the truth in this—The failures. The ever-afters of forgiveness she's already lived through in New York, now repeating in Delhi with different accents. A new beginning. The same mistakes.
She drifts toward the kitchen, hoping to find water and escape more conversations about her unpublished status.
He's there too, apparently with the same idea. Or maybe not the same idea at all.
"We meet again," he says, with a small smile that could mean anything.
"The universe is very small tonight."
"Or some cosmic force that has brought us together."
"Are we?”
“What?”
What did she mean? Together? Maybe a small part of her right brain, the cool part, thought so.
“Nothing.”
"You're escaping the literary inquisition. I'm escaping someone who wants me to write a feature about their son's startup."
"What kind of startup?"
"Something involving blockchain and ayurveda. I stopped listening."
They stand side by side at the counter, both reaching for glasses. His hand brushes hers when they both grab for the same water bottle—the kind of collision that makes her breath split into three directions.
"Sorry," he says, pulling back.
"It's fine."
"Do you think they serve the same water to unpublished writers?"
But neither of them moves away immediately. They stand there, drinking water in silence, breathing in the space between what they offer each other and what they want to receive.
"I should get back," she says finally.
"To the interrogation?"
"To the networking."
"Ah yes. Very important to network with people who won't remember your name tomorrow."
"You're cynical."
"I'm experienced."
"Same thing?"
"Often."
The phrasing is odd—but she already feels as if they're a unit that might be missed together.
Before she can think about it too much, he's gone.
Where is S tonight? Home in her nightgown, reading a book? Watching television? Does she wait up for him the way she used to wait for E—counting ceiling cracks until she heard his key in the door? Or has she learned the brutal efficiency of wives who no longer expect explanations? Sorry is a tired word.
What do they talk about when he gets home? The weather? Electricity bills? The condition of India's democracy? Do they still have sex? No, she doesn’t want to know that.
She finds herself talking to a couple who own Delhi's most exclusive home furnishing store.
"You're D's sister!" the woman exclaims. "I can't believe it. D never mentioned you.”
“We adore her,” the husband adds.
"And you're a writer too! How wonderful. Are you published?"
"Working on it.” There, the rehearsed smile appears.
"Oh." The woman's smile narrows. "Well, D mentioned you were in New York”
"We simply must have you both for dinner once you've... established yourself. D knows everyone worth knowing. But we must have YOU over.”
"That's very kind."
Another woman with perfectly coiffed hair passes, champagne glass in hand. She gives her the look. Even though she hasn’t been to a party in a long time, she knows how to give the look. And everyone understands the look.
The woman enters their minage-e-trois. “You look lost, darling. First time at one of Rajesh's gatherings?"
"Yes."
"I'm SS. Let me give you the grand tour—not of the house, of the people. Much more interesting."
She takes her arm conspiratorially.
"See that gentleman by the piano? That's Arjun Malhotra. He is a writer. The New Yorker has given him three pages on his first book. Lives in agorgeous haveli in Nizamuddin.”
“East or West”
The woman looked like she just stepped on dog poop, unearthed months after the winter snow had eroded.
“West. Right next door to Vikram Seth, actually. They have the best parties in town.”
"Really?"
"Oh yes. And that woman in the green sari? MK. She is the editor of Vanity Fair. That's her husband next to her—he's in defense contracts. Quite successful."
"Defense contracts?"
"Arms dealing, darling."
SS sips her champagne and continues her commentary.
"The couple by the bookshelf—they own the largest chain of luxury hotels in Rajasthan. And see that man with the beard? He's a Supreme Court judge. Very progressive. His wife is that elegant lady discussing art—she curates exhibitions for the National Gallery."
"Everyone seems very accomplished."
She points discreetly toward a group near the terrace.
"That woman in pearls? She's married to the textile minister. The man she's talking to owns the largest steel plant in Haryana. And that charming couple by the window—they control most of the cinema distribution in North India."
"And where do unpublished writers fit in?"
SS laughs, a sound like tinkling crystal.
Should she have said that? She always said the wrong thing only to find out the next day from her sister.
Oh well.
When she escapes to the bathroom, he's in the hallway outside again.
”Popular bathroom," she says.
"Apparently the only functional one on this floor."
"How do you know it's functional?"
"I've been to enough of these parties. The other bathrooms are usually locked or broken or for people in pairs"
She wondered if he were referring to cocaine or sex.
May be in India they were part of a whoe.
”You'd be surprised what Delhi's cultural elite do between discussing Proust."
"Are you speaking from experience?"
"Journalistic observation."
"Is that different from regular observation?"
"It pays better."
The bathroom door opens and someone emerges, an index finger brushes their nose as swiftly as a blink.
”Point proven," he says quietly.
She goes in, but when she comes out, he's still there, leaning against the wall.
"My turn," he says, but doesn't move toward the door immediately.
"Unless you're planning to write an exposé about bathroom habits."
"Not enough material for a full piece."
"You could pad it with statistics about Delhi real estate. Everything here eventually comes back to property values."
"Even literature?"
"Especially literature. Published writers can afford better neighborhoods."
"Ah. So that's why everyone keeps asking about my publishing status."
"And what's your determination?” She asks.
He looks at her for a long moment.
"I'm still gathering data."
The pattern continues all evening. She goes to refresh her drink—he's at the bar. She steps out for air—he's on the balcony, talking to someone with a beard who is…a journalist. Definitely a journalist.
She has not started using the word ‘journo’ yet.
But his eyes find hers over the other man's shoulder. She wouldn’t mind if they carried on just like this— meeting at parties and being watched. One carries their shoulder almost in a different way when they know. That power— nothing feels makes one feel more in control . Nothing as devastating.
She examines the host's art collection—he appears beside her, studying the same painting although she knows he knows nothing about art.
This is exhausting, she thinks.
"Interesting piece," he says, nodding at a canvas covered in angry red brushstrokes.
"Very... energetic."
"The artist is well known in the Delhi circles.” When he mentions the name, she knows his work from the Venice Biennale few years ago. He would not know what the Venice Biennale is, although he knew the diaries of the prime minister by heart.
There's something weary in his voice, a familiarity with disappointment that makes her look at him more carefully.
Maybe adultery isn't the electric thrill of transgression but just another form of work—the exhausting labor of maintaining two versions of yourself simultaneously.
"And you? What's your excuse for being here?"
"Research," she says. "For a story."
"About Delhi society?"
"About people who pretend to be strangers when they're not."
The words slip out before she can stop them. He stares at her, and for a moment the careful politeness drops from his face.
There it is, she thinks.
For a second, he forgot to calculate his response. Is this what honesty looks like on a married man's face?
"That would be quite a story," he says quietly.
"Wouldn't it?"
They're standing very close now, both pretending to study the angry red painting. She can smell his cologne—the same one he always wears, though she's not sure how she knows that.
How does he choose what cologne to wear to parties where he'll meet me versus dinners with S? Does he have a different scent for each version of himself? God, the logistics of deception. Unless—and this is the truly terrifying thought—unless it's not exhausting at all. Unless dividing your heart between two people is breathing.
"I should—" he begins.
"Yes," she agrees quickly. "You should."
But neither of them moves.
"There you are!"
A voice pounds across the room; a headache. A man with silver hair swept back like a 1950s film star approaches, cigar smoke trailing behind him like a personal weather system. His suit is Savile Row perfect, his smile calculated to charm. When he draws on his Cuban cigar, he holds the smoke like a sommelier tasting wine before exhaling through his nose in precise streams.
“I’m..call me VK."
He's noticed her from across the room and approached with the authority of someone who's never been refused.
"Nice to meet you."
"And you are?"
She gives her name. His eyes widen theatrically.
"You're D's sister?"
"Yes."
"The one who was in New York? The writer?"
"Yes."
"My God." He turns to address the room at large. "This gorgeous creature has been hiding in our city and nobody informed me. This is a scandal of the highest order."
He pulls out his phone and waves it like a scepter.
"Your number. Immediately. We're going to remedy this tragic oversight."
From the corner of her eye, she sees him backing away from their group, returning to safer conversations about book launches and cultural events.
"I don't really—"
"Nonsense." VK takes a long draw from his cigar, exhales slowly through his nose like a dragon marking territory.
She glances around the room. Half the men look like they broker deals in shadows and Swiss bank accounts.
"So what do you write? Romance novels?"
“Short stories.”
"Ah." He nods approvingly, ash from his cigar falling onto marble floors like a discarded piece from MichaelAngelo’s marble.
"Very impressive. Though between you and me, romance pays considerably better."
He leans closer, and she can see the careful way his hair is arranged to disguise a receding hairline, the slight tremor in his hands.
Twenty minutes later, she escapes VK's monologue and finds herself talking to two young men with Australian accents.
"I'm James, this is David. We're researching contemporary South Asian fiction."
"I write fiction.” Mental note to keep the voice down.
"Would we have read anything?" David asks with academic interest.
"No. I mean, some short stories here and there."
"That's wonderful. We were just discussing whether diaspora literature has become too predictable."
"Every generation finds its own way to tell familiar stories," she offers.
"Exactly!" James says. "Though the execution varies considerably."
"Have you read Jhumpa Lahiri's latest?" David asks.
She makes a slight face. That’s as discreet as she can be.
The doctors had told her if it was MS, she wouldn’t have been able to make these facial expressions.
"What did you think of the Italian experiments?"
"Ambitious. Maybe overly ambitious."
They continue discussing books for twenty minutes. Not particularly riveting conversation but when you are desperate, you crawl to those very same doors. She nods dutifully, contributes when appropriate. Whenever they glance another way she thinks of something else, something more interesting to say.
"We should head back to the hotel," David says eventually. "Early morning flight."
"Of course. Nice meeting you both."
"Likewise. Best of luck with your writing."
They disappear, leaving her standing alone as the last cracker on the cheese platter. VK is still holding court, his voice carrying across the room, cigar smoke creating a halo around his silver head.
She spots him near the entrance, shaking hands with their host, making polite departure sounds.
Feeling bold from wine and the evening's strange dance of avoidance, she approaches.
"Excuse me, do you happen to know if there are taxis in this area?"
He turns, shows what might be surprise at seeing her again.
"I doubt it. Very residential neighborhood."
"Oh."
"I'm driving back toward central Delhi. If you need transportation."
"That would be wonderful.”
Lovely
"Of course."
They walk to his car in careful silence, past luxury vehicles that gleam like jewelry under spotlights. His Honda looks humble among the Lamborghinis, the kind of practical choice that suggests someone more concerned with reliability than impression.
“Welcome to Delhi, he says.”
She’s not sure if she’s offended or secretly pleased that he talks to her like a foreigner.
“I’m Indian too you know.”
“Your a New Yorker.”
Yes, that’s what she was. Someone who rode the train from Park Slope to Upper West Side just for her favorite chocolate chip cookie; who took walks every morning at six with her dog. Who biked to the Lower East Side courts with her tennis bag slung behind her— of course this he did not know. He’d only met her afterwards. After the damage had been done.
"I met VK."
"I saw."
“What is he?”
“You’ll figure out, eventually”
He starts the engine, pulls slowly out of the driveway. Two blocks later, he stops under a streetlight.
"This is absurd."
"What is?"
"Pretending."
"Are we pretending?"
"Aren't we?"
He reaches across the space between their seats. She meets him halfway. They kiss and she realizes she has been holding her breath all evening.
No, she’d been holding her breath from the MRI. Through the whole list: lupus, MS, autoimmune disorder, Stiff Man Syndrome, PTSD, Conversion Theory— all to be read with the passive, yet authoritative accent of Swami Nirajananada Saraswati when he calls out the Yoga Nidra instructions.
She tastes wine and lies on his mouth, the mezcal flavor of secrets shared in car seats under streetlights.
"Your dress," he says against her mouth.
"What about it?"
"I've been thinking about it all night. About you in it. About taking it off you. Everyone noticed. Especially VK."
"Good."
"Was that the intention?"
"Maybe. Maybe I wanted to see what it felt like to be the thing that unlatches your ribs.”
Maybe I wanted to see if I could ever walk again without having to fake it.
"You don't confuse that with love, do you?”
My name is Frida.
The question hangs between them like smoke. She adjusts her breath, recognizes this accusation that is also a confession.
They drive the rest of the way in silence. Although not the kind of silence she drove with her father, as a child, at six in the morning when they were off to playing tennis—when she listened to a audio book on cassette while he pondered about—his backswing? The elections?
As they near her building, she breaks it.
"So where does S think you are tonight?"
He glances at her, surprised by the directness.
"Working late. Editorial meeting."
"On a Saturday night?"
"Journalism doesn't observe weekends."
"Convenient."
"It's not convenient. It's necessary."
"For whom?"
He doesn't answer immediately, focusing on the traffic light ahead.
"Does she know about these parties?"
"She knows I attend professional events."
"Professional events. Is that what we're calling them?"
"What would you call them?"
"Networking opportunities for married men who want to taste grapefruit and guilt from someone else's mouth."
"That's cynical."
It’s true.
He pulls up outside her building, keeps the engine running like a getaway car.
This is when they lean over, she thought.
"She was’t feeling well," he says finally.
"Smart woman."
"Sometimes."
"You mean she's boring."
"I didn't say that."
"You didn't deny it either."
He turns to look at her properly for the first time since they got in the car.
"Why are you asking about S?"
"Curiosity about the woman who gets to sleep next to you."
"About what?"
"About what kind of woman keeps a man like you calculating angles for escape instead of entry."
"I'm not calculating anything."
"No? Then why are we sitting in your car at midnight instead of going upstairs? Why do I always offer you more than you're willing to take?"
He doesn't have an answer for that. The silence between them tastes like years of service in the scales of care that never balance.
“Talk soon?”
He doesn’t say.
She gets out, walks toward her building without looking back. The security guard nods.
In her apartment, she pours wine, kicks off her heels. Her phone buzzes.
"Drinks tomorrow. Ambassador Hotel. 8 PM. Don't disappoint me. - VK"
She stares at the message.
She thinks of the essay she's been writing, okay, has been wanting to write— about women who excel in the serious ethics of wanting what they cannot have. About the chemical structure of desire and how to calculate your best chance for transformation from across a room full of morally ambiguous mouths.
She will write it. Along with a visual documentary about men urinating in public; and the story of VK. And the cleaning lady who went into a trance, began talking to herself, pointing towards the ceiling and punching at her chest. Now that was a story.
She would write all of this once all of this was over.
When?
Soon.
Someday, any day— the little song she had created in her head.
"Sure," she types back.
This is not her life.
This is just an interim.
She opens her laptop, starts typing:
For so long, I offered others the availability they wanted to receive, the cursive letters of my phone number and the balanced equations of my understanding. Years of service in the scales of care that never balanced. But tonight, watching him disappear into the Delhi darkness, I recognize this: I have been both hooded and wolfed in this city of beautiful predators.
Change my story, she types. Accept me.
No. There is no room for sympathy in literature. She might as well join Bollywood at that rate.
She deletes it all and writes instead:
The man with the cigar
Smokes like a rampant dragon…
Somewhere the sun dares to rise.