“Me too.” She was suddenly grateful for Mohan’s lighthearted presence, such a contrast to Nandini’s dour demeanor.
Mohan gestured toward the back seat as they pulled out of the hotel driveway. “By the way, we have omelet sandwiches in the cooler, in case you’re hungry,” he said. “Zarine Auntie is a fabulous cook.”
“Your landlady made you sandwiches this morning?” Smita said.
“Landlady? She’s more like a second mother to me, yaar. But it’s true. She spoils me rotten.”
“Aren’t all Indian men spoiled?” Smita said, a smile in her voice. She thought of Papa, who had never cooked a meal for himself until her mother died. Papa. How happy he’d been to learn she was extending her vacation by a week, not suspecting a thing.
“Maybe,” Mohan replied. He lowered the volume on the radio. “Mostly by our mothers. Not like those poor American children. Forced to leave their homes at eighteen so that their parents can enjoy being—what’s that term you Americans use?—empty nesters. As if human beings are birds.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I’ve read about it. How you must leave your home the instant you turn eighteen. Whereas here in India, my God. Parents would kill themselves before they would force their child to leave.”
“First of all, nobody is forced to leave. Most teenagers are dying to strike out on their own. And secondly, didn’t you leave your parents’ home?”
He gave her a quick look. “True, true. But that was for my schooling.”
“And now?”
“Now?” He sighed. “What to do, yaar? Now, I’m in love with this mad city. Once you’ve had a taste of Mumbai, you can’t live anywhere else.”
For a moment, Smita hated Mohan for his smugness. “And yet, millions of people do,” she murmured.
“Right you are.” Mohan swerved to avoid a pothole. “So why did your family leave?”
She was instantly on guard. “My papa got a job in America,” she said shortly.
“What does he do?”
She turned her head to see what movie was playing at Regal Cinema as they passed it. “He’s a professor. He teaches at a university in Ohio.”
“Wow.” He opened his mouth to ask another question, but Smita beat him to it.
“You’ve never thought of settling overseas?” she asked.
“Me? He considered for a moment. “Yah, maybe when I was younger. But life is too hard abroad. Here we have every convenience.”
Smita took in the bumper-to-bumper traffic, the blare of the horns, the plumes of smog from the truck in front of them. “Life is too hard abroad?” she repeated, her tone incredulous.
“Of course. Here, I have the dhobi come to the house on Sunday to pick up my laundry. The cleaner washes my car each morning. For lunch, Zarine Auntie sends a hot tiffin to my workplace. The peons at my office go to the post office or the bank or run any errand I ask them to. When I get home in the evening, the servant has swept and cleaned my room. Tell me, who does all this for you in America?”
“I do. But I like doing it. It makes me feel independent. Competent. See what I mean?”
Mohan nodded. He lowered the window for a moment, letting in a blast of midmorning heat, then rolled it back up. “You must be mad, yaar,” he said. “What’s so bloody great about being ‘independent’？”
With his Ray-Bans and in his blue jeans and sneakers, Mohan looked like a modern guy. But really, Smita thought, he was like all the other pampered Indian men she had known in America.
“Bolo?” he said, and she realized he was waiting for her reply.
“I . . . I don’t even know how to answer that. I mean, being self-sufficient is its own reward. I think it’s just one of the most valuable traits a person can . . .”
“Valuable to whom, yaar?” he drawled. “Does it help my dhobi if I wash my own clothes? How will he feed his children? And what about Shilpi, who cleans my room every day? How does she survive? Besides, you’re dependent, too. You’re just dependent on machines. Whereas I’m dependent on people who depend on me to pay them. It’s better this way, no? Can you imagine what the unemployment rate would be like if Indians became . . . independent?”
“Your argument would make more sense if these people were paid a fair wage,” Smita said, remembering how upset her former neighbors used to get every time Mummy gave their servants a raise, accusing her of raising the bar for the rest of them.