resentful aunt and uncle after the death of his parents, no one had cared enough to be responsible for him. Everything Rishi had become was due to his own hard work.
She poured cream into his coffee and brought it to him. “I am glad you slept. You are tired. It’s no wonder you stayed in bed a bit on your day off.”
“You are good to me.”
He was easy to be good to, but she didn’t say so. Theirs was not that kind of marriage.
“I made your favorite.” She returned with the omelet, prepared the way they were made in Mumbai, where she had grown up. The eggs had been whipped with finely chopped red onion, tomatoes, chilies and herbs, cooked on one side, then flipped. The fruit was fanned out at the bottom of the plate like a happy smile.
“Ah, Janya, I have no idea what I did to deserve you.”
“You arrived in India at precisely the right moment.” She smiled to let him see that even if this was true, the truth was now a joke. She was sure Rishi knew he was more to her than simply the man who had rescued her from a bad situation in her home country.
“Lord Vishnu must have guided my footsteps.”
“I am glad he was not too busy to guide them to me.” Janya returned with her own plate and settled herself across from him.
“I am particularly sorry I overslept,” he said. “I had hoped to spend some of the morning with you, but now I must get ready and go to work.”
“Again?” Janya was surprised, and surprise was quickly followed by worry. Rishi was a wiry, athletic man in excellent health. But lately he had been distant, a fact she blamed on exhaustion. He was working later and later each evening, and this was not the first Saturday that he had gone into the office. In fact, working through the weekend was becoming normal. She missed her husband and the intimacy they had slowly begun to develop, the give-and-take of a marriage built on more than convenience and tradition.
When she didn’t speak, he cocked his head. “And now you are angry with me?”
“How can I be angry? My mother telephoned last night.” Janya shook off her concerns and proceeded to tell Rishi what had transpired.
He finished the last bite of his fruit before he spoke. “And you have no idea what she is sending?”
“Perhaps a photograph album of all the grandchildren of her friends. To shame me.”
Rishi looked uncomfortable. “You told her that we have decided to have children?”
“There was no time and no inclination. We do not need my mother keeping track of our progress.”
“That we do not.”
Janya lifted one shoulder. “Besides there was nothing to tell her. No good news, anyway.”
He looked uncomfortable, as men often seemed to when anything personal was discussed. He glanced past her to the clock in the kitchen, then he stood. “Do you have plans for the day?”
She wanted to say her plans had included him, and now they would have to be remade. Instead she shook her head.
“Will you be home for supper?”
“I will try.” He picked up his plate and took it into the kitchen.
Janya wished she could remind her husband that leaving her alone for so many hours was not the best way to start their family. But that, like so many things, was too direct, too emotional. They might be living far away from the country of their births, but they were still products of its culture, a culture they respected. She told herself she would see Rishi through this difficult time at work. And everything else would take care of itself.
Saturday’s lunch shift at the Dancing Shrimp was always jammed and tips were good, but despite that, it was Dana’s least favorite shift. During the week, when Lizzie was in school, Dana didn’t have to worry about child care. Tips weren’t as good, but at least Lizzie could walk to the restaurant after school. Usually by then Dana was ready to take her back to the Driftwood Inn, the run-down motel that nowadays passed for home.
Unfortunately, on Saturdays Lizzie had nowhere to go. She was the only child who lived in the two-story building, so there was no hope of a friend’s mother watching her. Dana thought of the Driftwood as the Drifter Inn, since the residents—mostly male—seemed to drift here and there while they tried to find a reason or place to set down roots. Before she and