THE IMMIGRANT by Manju Kapur Read Free Book Online Page B

were walking to a downtown film hall behind Kim and Gary, who were also holding hands. Kim’s long white legs ended in wedges. Her skirt was short, her blouse fitting. Both girls were unself-conscious about their bodies, even with so much uncovered. He admired that ease.
    Ananda’s background, his tragic history, his Lucknow medical college, the stories he told of India, all made him a romantic figure. A few more dates and Sue wanted to carry their intimacy further. Gary continually asked whether they had done it yet. Anxiety and desire grew in similar proportions.
    A few weekends later Sue invited him to a Kim-less apartment. She took the initiative, kissing him, unbuttoning his shirt, zipping open his pants, while his hands and tongue followed where they were led. He climaxed before he reached the desired goal, then threw himself face down between her legs, so that hopefully she wouldn’t hold it against him.
    Later Sue asked, ‘Was I your first?’
    Yes, she was.
    Sue giggled, mused and melted at this. Half an hour later she wanted to do it again. The result was no better.
    Next time he took her to his own room. She admired the gay bedspread from Five Seas, the cosy light the papier-mâché lamp threw on the bed, the fluted wine glasses he set out for their drinks, the sitar music he played on his little two-in-one. When he could no longer linger over foreplay, he breathed deeply and desperately, tried for entry, but again to no avail.
    Sue, it turned out, felt the need for discussion.
    ‘Maybe you have issues around sex. Here it’s no big deal, but in your culture it must be different. Deep down perhaps you are not comfortable?’
    ‘Not at all. I am very broadminded.’
    ‘Well, that’s always one possibility. On the other hand you could have a problem. Just temporarily, you know. Some men do, it’s nothing to be ashamed of.’
    The relationship cooled; a few more encounters and it turned quite cold. The tactful ceasing of Gary’s questions led him to believe that knowledge of his failure had spread. He abhorred the experience of Western women, which gave them the ability to compare.
    It became worse when Gary started going out with Sue. Sue the voracious. She reminded him of Nandita.
    ‘What about Kim?’ he questioned.
    ‘We weren’t making it man, Sue is more my type.’
    ‘But still her friend and all?’
    ‘Hey, man, nobody owns anybody.’
    ‘Is that Kim’s view?’
    ‘Why don’t you ask her if you are so concerned?’ snapped Gary. ‘Besides she’ll find someone else, plenty of fish in the sea.’
    The sea could be crawling with fish, but to meet the one his friend was now dating was going to embarrass him terribly.
    Gary made no further attempt to fix up dates for Ananda. ‘There are always solutions to problems, man,’ he said invitingly, but Ananda chose not to get into this discussion. Gary was his dearest friend, but how could he explain a difficulty he barely understood? There was a lack of inhibition in the women he met that excited and alarmed him. He had to match up in some unknown way. After his encounter with Sue he went over his performance in minute detail. Where had he gone wrong? He had so longed to abandon himself in her arms—Sue, who stood for the whole race, who was the book of knowledge.
    As he tried to figure out his feelings in the dark watches of the night, he wondered whether his inability to love a white woman meant he had never really left India. Perhaps he was still clinging to his parents, still unable to come to terms with their deaths, still faithful to the notions of purity they had instilled in him. In his more despairing moments he liked to imagine he was indelibly marked by a tragedy that had imperceptibly seeped into his blood, bones and muscle. He who had never failed at anything was now failing in this most fundamental act, an act which even the poorest, meanest, most deprived peasant in India performed with ease.
    In his less despondent moments he