They sat in silence for a few minutes before Jarminder broke that silence by yelling in Punjabi. She scolded him about the cruelty of his character and guilted him about his selfish capacity to discard the wishes of his family, using cultural sayings as scaffolding for each argument. Her outcry bled her clean of the life she had always imagined for him until the only thing that was left was her fear of losing him.

Jarminder started to cry. Neeraj handed her a tissue to blow her nose, but she continued to sniff. “I am your mother. All I ever wanted was your happiness,” she said.

“I know, Mama. My happiness is Aria. Mama, she is the light of my life and I cannot live without her, please understand me.” There was silence for a few moments.

“Where did you meet her? Where is she from? Who are her parents?” Neeraj asked, surprised at himself for being interested.

Omkar looked at the carpet, knowing that what he was about to say would not be received well. “I met her here at the shop. She came in one day and I started talking to her. Papa, it was love at first sight.”

Neeraj was surprised at his son’s answer. He had assumed that Omkar and Aria had met at school. Suddenly, he didn’t know whether he felt good about Omkar tending the store after all. He certainly hadn’t expected it to be the family’s undoing.

Omkar continued, “Aria doesn’t have parents. I knew this was going to upset you. But it isn’t her fault, Papa. She lost them just like we lost Ajit and Shashi. Papa, it wouldn’t be fair if someone thought badly of you because they died. It isn’t fair to think badly of Aria because her parents died. She was sent here to live with an uncle, but he started abusing her, Papa. When she refused to sleep with him, he kicked her out of the house.”

Neeraj was disgusted. His pride in the honor and decency of his own culture swelled within him. Only in white culture would a child be abandoned to a person like that. At the same time, his sense of Aria began to change. He could see that in contrast to his original impression, Aria was pure. Her chastity obviously meant so much to her that she was unwilling to trade it for her basic needs. Neeraj respected that quality in a woman. Despite his desire as a parent to remain dismissive of her, it made him feel protective of her.