"Are you still at my house?" Jill asked.

Jill had been her cover since high school. Whenever Rasika went somewhere that she didn"t want her parents to know about, she told them she was with Jill. "Yeah. Why?"

"Jared and I are going out for dinner."

"That"s fine. If my mom calls you, just tell her I"m with you. Anyway, I"ve got my phone on. She shouldn"t call you, plus I"m going home soon. Have a good night, I"ll call you later." Rasika closed the phone. She probably shouldn"t have bothered lying to her parents tonight. She hadn"t planned to spend any time with a man, and Abhay wasn"t anyone special. Still, she wanted to be absolutely safe on the day before such an important occasion.

She dropped her phone into her purse. "What"re you planning to do, now that you"re home?"

"I came home mostly because I didn"t know what else to do, or where else to go. But once I got here, I realized it was a good opportunity to reconnect with my parents. As an adult."

"What do you mean?"

"Before I left for the commune, I was angry because they treated me like a kid. Even after I graduated from college, Mom tried to buy clothes for me, do my laundry, and tell me to eat my breakfast. Dad tried to get me to apply to law school or graduate school. They"d tell me what time to be home when-"

"All Indian parents are like that," Rasika interrupted.

"But why? That"s what I want to find out. We had these personal development sessions at Rising Star, and I learned that any relationship is the product of all the people involved." Abhay drew a circle in the air with his forefinger. "I realized maybe my parents treated me like a kid because I acted like one. I either obeyed them, or rebelled against whatever they were saying."

"So how"s it working now that you"re home? Are they treating you like an adult?" Rasika sat very straight and silent, hands clasped in her lap, gazing out over the memorial hill. She had discovered some years ago that by making her body still, she could also quiet the thoughts racing around in her mind. The football-playing students had left. Leaves rustled softly around her in the slight breeze. There was no one else nearby.

"I"m not sure. Mom"s gotten involved with some sort of pyramid marketing scheme, selling educational games through home parties."

"My mom mentioned that to me."

"She seems almost like a different person to me now. I mean, she seems happy. In a way. But she quit her job for this new thing."

"She used to work in your dad"s department, right?"

"Yeah. She was the administrative a.s.sistant for the physics department. Now she"s cut her hair-it"s really short." He made a cap with his hands around his head. "And she wears these pantsuits. She used to wear knit pants and blouses."

"I really like your mom," Rasika said. "She"s so gentle and sweet."

"She is, and I"m worried that this company is taking advantage of her."

"How"s your dad?"

"The same. He was upset with me all through college because I couldn"t pick a major and took five years to graduate, finally, with a degree in general studies. He wanted me to pick something lucrative, and I managed to drive him crazy by not choosing anything at all."

"Well, you"re so smart. I"m sure it would drive any parent crazy to see their kid, who"s been getting straight As since he was born, wander around completely lost like you did."

"Yeah. I can see that now."

"So how is he, now that you"re home?"

Abhay laughed and shook his head. "He"s still upset. I haven"t done anything that would look decent on a resume. In his opinion, at least."

Rasika felt like she was becoming too interested in Abhay. She wanted to keep herself clean and separate, ready to meet and merge with Viraj. She willed herself to think about something else. She chose one of her favorite subjects-the kind of engagement ring she would like-and concentrated on following her thoughts, trying not to pay too much attention to Abhay. "So you"ve decided to settle down at home?"

"I thought I"d hang out here for several months. Regroup. Earn some money. Figure out what to do next. Now that I"m here, I can see that I"ll eventually need to get out to explore different parts of the country and figure out where I belong."

"Don"t you feel like you belong here?"

"Not really. Do you? I mean, we ended up here more or less by chance. Our fathers got jobs here, and then they just stayed. We both ended up at Kent State because it"s the closest four-year college. Plus, I got free tuition because my dad"s a professor. There"s nothing special about northeastern Ohio for our families. We could be anywhere, and our parents would want the same things. They"d want to keep doing their poojas and having their parties, while taking full advantage of the financial and shopping opportunities offered in the U.S. That"s what all Indians are like."

Rasika"s thoughts about the diamond ring ended abruptly. Was Abhay right? Were her parents and their entire Indian community that shallow? "I don"t think you can make a blanket statement like that about all Indians."

"Fair enough. But I"ll say that for many of the Indians I know, the U.S. is just a place to get a high-paying job and buy stuff. That"s the way it"s been for my parents, at least, and I think for yours, too. They"re just here on a.s.signment; they run back to visit India every chance they get."

"We go to India almost every year," Rasika agreed.

"I went every three or four years when I was a kid until I finally put my foot down, right before my senior year in high school, and refused to waste my summers that way. I feel like I have no particular roots in India or in Ohio. I have no roots anywhere, and neither do you."

"That"s so depressing. I can"t believe that"s true."

"Are your parents citizens?"

"Not yet. My mom almost became a citizen when I turned eighteen and went through the process, but then at the last minute she decided not to. She said she couldn"t see any reason to go through the trouble. And for my dad, it"s an emotional thing. He likes having an Indian pa.s.sport."

"That"s right. It"s cultural loyalty. My parents aren"t citizens yet either. What"s holding them back? It"s only because they don"t really think of themselves as Americans. They don"t want to vote. They don"t want to get involved with the local community."

"We have our own community here. The Indian community."

"Exactly my point. Your parents probably have very few non-Indian friends, right?"

Rasika had to admit this was true. "So what? People of every culture prefer to hang out with others like them. Anyway, Ohio"s not such a bad place. We have friends here, connections." Rasika felt like she was grasping at straws. She did want to stay in this area. She wanted to be near the people who knew her and appreciated her high quality. The Indian community here valued her impeccable taste when it came to both Indian and Western clothes, gifts, and other social niceties. If she went elsewhere, would anyone even care about how special she was? She couldn"t say this to Abhay. He would think she was vain. Not that she cared what he thought.

"In a way, it"s good that I don"t have any ties here," Abhay said. "I can choose to settle anywhere, and I certainly wouldn"t choose this place. The only thing people seem to care about around here is building more shopping malls and parking lots. In other parts of the country, they"re putting in bike lanes and creating more parks. I come back here and see more housing developments everywhere. They"ve ripped up perfectly good fields to put in more buildings, more pavement."

"Abhay, you"re being kind of naive. People do need to shop. They need to live somewhere."

"They don"t need to buy a bunch of stuff made by people working for slave wages in factories in China and Mexico. They don"t need to buy a bunch of plastic that"s going to break and go into a landfill." Abhay waved his arms as he talked, as though trying to foment some action out of the air.

Rasika laughed. "Do you think the world will ever be the way you want it to be?"

"I don"t know." He looked at his toes, scratched his knee, and then gazed up into the sky. "I"m searching. I"m feeling kinda lost right now."

"I guess I feel closer to India because I was born there, and I didn"t come here until I was eight."

"But you don"t feel Indian anymore, do you?"

Rasika rubbed a palm over the tan skin of her forearm. She was Indian. She knew that. Yet she was also aware that, since she"d arrived in the U.S. in the third grade, her feeling of being Indian had grown more and more tenuous. "Once I get married, I"ll feel completely Indian," she said.

"It sounds like you want to get married to find yourself."

"I"m not lost. Not like you."

He glanced at her for a moment, and then sat up straight and turned his face to the sky. She followed his gaze. High above them a pale moon had appeared in the blue evening sky. Rasika fixed her mind on the engagement ring again. She hoped Viraj hadn"t gone and picked out the ring himself. She didn"t necessarily care about a large diamond. She wanted one of high quality, very clear and sparkling. Some men-and she could certainly imagine Viraj in this category, given what she knew about him-just thought bigger was better. And what if his mother had bought the ring from an Indian jewelry store? It would be set in that bright yellow Indian gold, and it wouldn"t be a high-quality stone. Diamonds mined in India generally weren"t the highest quality. If Viraj had bought the ring already, she wondered how she could persuade him to do things her way, without coming across as spoiled or difficult.

"Have you already decided to marry this guy?" Abhay asked. "The one you"re meeting tomorrow?"

"Yes," she said.

"Are you sure?"

"Of course," she said flatly. "I"m not going to turn him down after they"ve traveled all the way out here. My parents have wanted me to get married since I graduated from college. It"s been hard to find someone that we all agree on. Now we"ve found him. It"s time for me to get married, and he meets all my criteria. It"s as simple as that."

"What kind of future do you want to have?" He was sitting sideways, one bent leg resting on the bench, looking at her intently. "What do you really want out of life?"

She wondered how to address Abhay"s questions. She didn"t want to come out and tell Abhay her dearest wish, which was to impress people with her taste, beauty, and elegance. It would make it sound too cra.s.s to say it out loud.

She"d always been confident of her own high quality, as she liked to think of it, but it had sometimes been difficult to persuade others to see this. Growing up, some of the other kids just thought she was aloof. In high school, she stuck with cla.s.sic clothes, mostly jeans and sweaters, and had avoided most of the fashion horrors other kids were embracing, such as extra-short baby doll dresses, and dirty flannel shirts, and baggy overalls (although one year she had gotten her hair cut in the popular bouncy, s.h.a.ggy style of the character Rachel on Friends). Of course at that age she never flirted with boys. During her soph.o.m.ore year, she"d made friends with Ashley Smith, the most popular girl in the school, a head cheerleader. Ashley had invited Rasika to a party one Sat.u.r.day night. Rasika had worn a pretty sweater over her jeans, and had taken a box of chocolates for Ashley"s mother. When she got to the house, the mother was nowhere to be seen. Neither was the father. The house was dark and milling with bodies, some of whom she recognized from high school. Pounding music filled every room. The focal point of the party was the keg of beer in the bas.e.m.e.nt. Rasika retreated to the kitchen, where she left her chocolates on the table, called her father, and waited at the end of the driveway for him to pick her up.

After that, she hadn"t made much effort to be friends with the popular girls at school. She"d mostly just kept to herself, and maintained her friends from elementary school. Her teachers loved her poise and good manners. As she grew older, in college and the work world, some of her peers came to appreciate her elegance and sophistication.

"I just want what most people want," she finally said to Abhay. "A nice place to live, a family. And we"ll have that, Viraj and I." It sounded strange to couple his name with hers. She"d get used to it.

"What are you pa.s.sionate about?"

She was pa.s.sionate about-she didn"t know. Besides inappropriate men, that is. Could a person be pa.s.sionate about material objects? She loved beautiful things. Sometimes she wished she could have been a jeweler, but that wasn"t a suitable career for her family. So instead, she had to deal with the idea of money, with numbers on a computer screen.

It was best, she felt, not to be pa.s.sionate about anything. Pa.s.sion had steered her into the arms of the wrong man enough times. She crossed her arms over her chest. Of course, she hoped she would feel pa.s.sion for Viraj. That would be fitting.

"I"m trying to figure out how other people make decisions," Abhay said. "Do you feel drawn, or pulled, to do certain things? Is it an emotional decision, or an intellectual decision?"

She wanted to put an end to these questions, in a gracious way. She turned to him and raised her eyebrows. "I"m a pretty simple person, Abhay. I just want what most people want." She stood up, strolled a few steps away, and stopped with her back to him. She was aware that he was gazing at her, and that her slim figure made a pretty picture against the fading sky.

"I mean, I hope you"re not doing this just out of obedience to your parents," Abhay said.

"I"m not. This is what I want to do." She was still facing away.

"Your parents want you to be happy. They think the way to make sure you"re happy is to try to run your life for you. But you don"t have to let them."

"You"re one to talk. It"s not like you"ve figured your life out." Rasika"s phone sang again. She grabbed for her purse on the bench.

"I hate it when people are slaves to their phone," Abhay said.

"Let me just see who it is. My mother"ll keep calling if I don"t pick up."

Instead, Benito"s name was on the screen. She shoved the phone to the bottom of her purse. Benito was her gym trainer-very sweet, very encouraging. He had been interested in her for months. She clutched the purse in her lap until the phone went silent, then set her purse on the bench again. "What were we talking about?"

"The fact that you"re held captive by your phone."

"Before that."

"You were telling me that I haven"t figured my life out."

"Right." She crossed her legs and leaned her knees toward Abhay. "Life"s not so hard. Just pick something and do it. Get a job. Make some money. Get on with things."

"You sound like my dad," he said. "I thought I had figured it out. I thought I"d live and work at Rising Star all my life. I thought I"d experience a working-together feeling, but without the judgmental nature of traditional cultures. It didn"t work for me."

The air was cooler now, and she slipped on her jacket. "You can"t solve all the world"s problems by yourself." Talking to Abhay made her appreciate her own life. She wanted to be ready for tomorrow, ready to meet her future husband. "What do you know about tennis?"

"Why?"

"Viraj is interested in tennis. I need to know the latest news."

"Why don"t you ask him?"

"I don"t want to appear completely clueless."

"So you want to pretend like you know all about tennis?"

"At least enough to ask a few intelligent questions."

"The U.S. Open is coming up."

"What should I ask him about that?"

"Ask who he thinks will win."

Rasika considered this. That might draw him out. Men always had opinions on the future results of sporting events. "What are some of the names of the players?"

"I don"t know."

"Where"s it going to be?"

"Somewhere in New York."

Her phone rang again. She dug it out of her purse. It was her mother this time. She turned off the phone and stood up. "I need to get home. I"ll give you a ride to your house." She felt ready to face her real life now, after this little interlude with Abhay.

When Abhay got out of Rasika"s car in front of his parents" ranch house, it was about seven o"clock. He saw his mother at the dining table behind the picture window. She had taken over the dining room to display her product samples. He pushed open the door, kicked off his sandals, and dropped his backpack inside the door.

The heavy, dark chairs and china cabinet took up all the air s.p.a.ce in the small dining room. A few small, lonely photos arranged in no particular order hung on one wall: his grandparents, his graduation photo, his sister Seema"s school picture. The china cabinet contained a haphazard collection of useless items too nice to throw away: cloth dolls and little wooden toys from India, a carved soapstone pen caddy someone had given him for a graduation present, various cutesy porcelain figures Mom had received from the "girls" she used to work with.

"Good time you had?" Mom gave him her new, practiced smile. She sat at the table, which was covered with a lace tablecloth under a clear plastic protective sheet. She was reading a book called Unleash Your Selling Capacity and jotting notes on a legal pad.

"I ran into Rasika." He pulled out a chair and sat down in front of a stack of educational game boxes. The cover of the top game showed two crudely drawn anthropomorphic animals with huge eyes, playing with a spinning dial with numbers on it.

"Rasika." Mom tapped her pen on her legal pad. "Her mother I must call. Sujata said she will give name of someone to host sales party." She pointed her pen at Abhay. "Key to success is networking."

Growing up, Abhay had often wished his mother would find some interests of her own and stop meddling in his life. Yet he never imagined his steady, sensible mother would have been taken in by this company. He lifted one of the educational game boxes closer to him. "Mom, do you really know what you"re getting into? How much did these samples cost, anyway?"

She thumped her palm on the table"s plastic covering. "It is investment," she said. "In myself I must invest."

Abhay was glad his father wasn"t around. He"d not only make fun of Mom"s bad English-which was for some reason worse than that of most other Indians they knew, and certainly worse than his father"s perfect speech-but also of her new sales talk.

Despite his mother"s poor English, his parents always spoke English at home; they didn"t actually share a common Indian language. Abhay"s mother had grown up all over India, as her father was posted here and there for his government job. Her family had spoken an odd mixture of Telugu, Hindi, and English at home. His mother could get by in five or six languages, but according to his father, she had never learned any language properly. His father, in contrast, had grown up in Bangalore and had mastered a fluent, literary-quality Kannada (at least in his own opinion). To practice his English, he used to listen to speeches by Winston Churchill and Jawaharlal Nehru. Abhay"s parents had not felt it necessary to teach him or his sister any Indian language.