“Why are you courting me?” she asked as they began to eat. His fluency in Spanish came and went. At this question, he stammered, then felt a moment of lightness and laughed when she did. Then he was bothered by that laugh. Was she making fun of him? Did she not think him manly? He had brought roti and beans; he had asked Kishen to make something as close to Mexican food as she could, in an effort to show they could be familiar. But she was taunting him, giggling. “I am a Mexican girl, and you are a Hindu.”

He corrected her, telling her he was Sikh, not Hindu. That was why he wore the dastar. That was why he wore the iron bangle.

“Why do they call you Hindu?” she asked.

“I do not know.” Then he laughed again, though he was disheartened by her question. “We are from Hindustan. So to them we are Hindu. Maybe.” He looked at her. “We call ourselves Hindustani.”

She did not seem to understand all the nuance. “So I am a Mexican girl, and you are a Sikh.”

“Don’t we live in America, where such things can happen? Where we are equal?”

“Does equal mean that we mix like this?” she said.

SHE CHALLENGED HIM, but not in a way he couldn’t surmount. And he didn’t feel he had impressed her. He did not want to take her to the cinema, even if they would be allowed in, on the west side. He did not want her to see how the people in town looked at him with his dastar. He felt he could not go to the Mexican Hall; he did not know their customs and dances. What did cinemas and dance halls have to do with life on a farm? This is what puzzled him always about western women. They wanted to be courted, but what did courting have to do with real life?