Bina sees all that in a blur now, all those moments that created the scaffolding of their relationship. “I just keep wondering where we—I—went wrong. Natasha has taken us on a ride plenty of times, but it’s as though she’s committed to being self-destructive.”

Deepak gives her the same sympathetic look she imagines he gives his patients when they’re in the midst of a crisis. “We have to separate ourselves from what she does. Our kids are adults.”

Of course, Bina accepted a long time ago that there are parts of her children she won’t have access to. She’s heard them lower their voices to whispers late at night, seen them minimize the windows on their laptop screens, and known they put the private settings on their social media accounts. But Suhani and Anuj always made sense to her. Natasha was always equal parts known and unknown, familiar and terrifying.

“You’re always so easy on her,” Bina says. “And look at where we are now!”

“So you’re blaming me for all this?”

Bina sighs. “I didn’t say that. It’s just that obviously, at some point, we didn’t do what she needed.”

Mothers might have trouble admitting where they’ve gone wrong out loud, but they think about it all the time. Bina returns to a thought that she only visits in her lowest moments: I deserve this. Ma warned her she’d one day have a daughter who failed her, and only then would she know how it all felt. But until now, Bina never really believed disappointment would be their family heirloom.

“Or we did everything, and at the end of the day, she’s her own person,” Deepak says.

“That sounds nice, but you and I both know that everyone blames the mother when things go wrong with a kid.” Bina purses her lips, which are painted with a new bright-pink shade Suhani bought her from Sephora.

“I’m going to give you some space. It’ll be good for you to just not think about this for a little while, okay?” Deepak says in his calmest, most composed psychiatrist voice before he saunters into the parking lot.

I don’t want space or solutions! Bina wants to say. I just want to vent!

As he walks away, she wonders if her irritation at his being home more is less about him and more about her. Maybe it reminds her that she didn’t do enough with her own life.

“Bina! Are you okay?” Kavita, one of her and Anita’s closest friends, approaches her.

Bina forces a smile. “Of course. How are you?” One of the best parts of her acting background is that she can always rearrange her face at a moment’s notice to convey exactly what she needs. Devi once told Bina she could teach a class on just facial expressions.