An American Brat by Bapsi Sidhwa

Author:Bapsi Sidhwa
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Milkweed Editions

Jo took up with the state trooper who had given Feroza’s driving test. But so far as she was concerned, it was an uninspiring alliance, despite the uniform.

“He’s the first nice guy you’ve dated,” Feroza said. “He’s good-looking and he’s steady. He seems to really care for you.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jo said. “That’s why I don’t care for him. He’s boring. I’m gonna stop seeing him.”

Feroza decided to keep her mouth shut.

Mike showed up again, as if nothing had happened and he had not vanished for fifteen days.

When the trooper phoned, Jo barely spoke to him, and she wasn’t home when he came by. When he eventually got the message, Feroza spent ten minutes consoling him and packed him off saying, “Whatever happens, happens for the best.”

Ecstatic at the unexpected reprieve, Jo fed Mike huge meals, washed his clothes, cleaned his filthy apartment, lent him her car, and tolerated his callous unreliability with a stoic resilience that would have done a masochist proud.

Mike was asking Jo for money. Feroza fathomed this when Jo skipped classes, started working two jobs, and borrowed money from her. Mike was almost living off Jo. Feroza also guessed by the way his eyes oscillated, by his sometimes slow and sometimes fluid movements that reminded her of the kid in the bus in New York, that Mike was on drugs.

Then she suspected he was a thief. Things were missing, like the little gold chain with the angel Asho Farohar’s winged image she wore around her neck beneath her clothes. She remembered putting it on the TV. Then she couldn’t find an onyx bowl in which they kept nuts. Jo’s electric clock in the kitchen disappeared.

Feroza sat her friend down late one night and talked to her seriously. Mike had as usual stood her up. “Why’re you working your butt off for that creep? He takes your money, borrows your car, and treats you like shit. Can’t you tell he’s on drugs?” And she accosted Jo with her latest discovery. “Things are missing. He’s a thief.”

“You just hate him!” Jo screamed.

After which she broke down. She knew he was on drugs; no matter how much money she gave him, it was never enough. She suspected he did a bit of dealing and was sometimes a fence for stolen goods. Nothing serious or regular, just to make a little cash now and then. She had hocked her watch and her gold bracelet. At times she didn’t know what to do. “But he’s a good kid, he just needs work. He’s basically good. All he needs is a little help.” She loved him so much she would change him. He needed her, really needed her, and she could not just let him down like the rest of the world had. He was making progress.

“You’re kidding yourself,” Feroza said angrily, thinking Jo was as addicted to Mike as he was to drugs. “You’ll fail your classes. You’re ruining your life!”

Jo bawled.

Early one evening, Mike walloped Jo in the parking lot. Jo thudded up the stairs noisily and came in crying and sobbing and showing off.

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