I wish I could have said I felt the kind of thrill a man is supposed to feel when he is released from the confines of daily existence in late capitalism and offered a chance to truly live. To overthrow the system, in some small way! Unfortunately, I was a coward rather than a revolutionary. My stomach gave a growl that suggested I had eaten something rotten. When Anita got home after working a late charity gala, I was on the toilet, reading Crime and Punishment. I came out waving it, only a little embarrassed to have been caught with a book in the bathroom.

“We are not Raskolnikov.” She rolled her eyes when I insisted on reading aloud the gory details of the old woman’s death, how her sister appeared at the wrong instant and the criminal had to kill twice. Blood, unplanned-for blood. “This isn’t a murder, Neil. We’re being sensible. There’s hardly even real security—there will be no weapons. I mean, I’m in control—”

I couldn’t help it, though. I was seeing a carousel of possible obstacles. I heard the convention center door banging open behind me as I laid hands on the car. Saw a figure standing there, twice my size, a great bearded Sikh vendor leading with a paunch, lifting a single brawny hand that could pound my brain into the wall. Me, pissing myself with fear. Or what about this? A train of cars, women leaving early to beat traffic, that signature desi move (arrive late, leave at odd times), blocking our route. Me, dropping the lehenga on the asphalt, gold winking on blackness, conspicuously brightened by the California sunshine. Gold, covered in my prints… Anita, racing past me, grabbing the stolen goods, turning her head only briefly before gunning it to Sunnyvale, leaving me alone….

Her, reminding me: I’m just following the plan. Don’t take it personally.

“If you don’t think I’m sick about it…” She coughed. “But I’m being rational. I’m accounting for everything. If you’re nervous, put that energy toward working as hard as I am.”

I went into Anita’s room that night. She rolled over, and there she was, again, ready for me. She liked to feel small in bed, she’d whispered not long ago. I had the sense it was the first time she’d made that admission, clearly full of tempest and drama for her. She liked a little shove, a strength around her neck. She liked me to toss her here and there.

“Hey,” she whispered after we’d finished. She’d asked me to try calling her things. I was too awkward to comply. The daylight Anita bossed me through heist planning with the same efficiency she’d once used to run our childhood games of house, but the bedroom Anita wanted this constructed cruelty. I couldn’t always reconcile the two. “I feel weird about that stuff.”