South Haven

by Hirsh Sawhney

  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?”

  S
iddharth 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, b
ut 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.”