Chapter Sixteen
Jackson Heights reminds me of Devon Avenue in Chicago. Every Saturday of my childhood my mother took us there to pick up Indian fruits and vegetables from the grocery stores in Little India to stock at Bombay Masala for a markup. One of my oldest memories is Rumi and me helping her carry cardboard boxes filled with sharp-smelling curry leaves, curly-skinned bitter melon, extra-hot Thai green chilies, hairy brown taro root, young green mango, and bunches of fenugreek and cilantro with the dirt they were pulled from still clinging to their roots. I’d wait eagerly to get everything loaded into the trunk of our van so we could have our special treat. One plate of pani puri split between the three of us. Two pieces for each of us.
I’ve never been to India, but in my head Devon’s Little India always stood in for visits to where my parents are from, even though I’m pretty sure Indian towns don’t look and feel anything like that. Or like this: shop windows with gold-embellished ghagras and saris, interspersed with grocery stores and restaurants that fill the air with the aroma of smoky tandoori chicken and buttery samosas.
In the Indian movies I’ve watched, the teeming heat, dust, color, and crowds captured on screen make these streets seem like an anemic shadow of what they’re aspiring to be. It’s a bubble, an island, still intrinsically New York, with different skin and clothes. Or the other way around: Indian on the inside but placed firmly in a foreign context. A little like me. I don’t know which of those two I am either.
I’ve been nervous about my visit to India next month, but suddenly I’m curious. An entire country and culture that’s a significant part of my identity, and I have no idea what its reality is.
As Krish and I stop outside the Jackson Heights subway station and study our phones for where to start, I wonder if he’s ever been to the land of our ancestors. He doesn’t seem to be experiencing the existential thoughts crowding my brain.
He’s also not nearly as rumpled as he was yesterday. His stubble is gone, and his clean-shaven jaw is smooth and angular. His hair is pulled back into a simple elastic tie, and the result is the strangest combination of nerdy and outdoorsy.
“So which way?” I ask.
He looks up from his phone. “I think we go that way.”
On the subway ride here, we identified the route we would follow to cover all the jewelry stores. Until we got off the train and took the stairs up, he seemed as loose limbed and at home in his skin as ever. Now behind him is a giant store sign for Meena Bazaar written in five different Indian languages, and he looks like a martian who’s just made an Earth landing.
This isn’t the first time I’ve noticed it, the minuscule ways in which his body language screams unfamiliar when he’s presented with anything from the Indian subcontinent. It reminds me of the way the kids at my school looked at the dal and rice in my lunch, even though that was my lunch every single day. Not so much discomfort as distance.
“Have you never been to Jackson Heights before?” I ask.
“Not a whole lot.” That’s it. That’s all he says. No anecdotes of coming here with his family, or food memories, or any nostalgic associations.
There’s a very particular way in which he seems to protect information about himself. Maybe it has to do with the fact that as a reporter he spends a lot of time digging information out of others and that’s made him conscious of how to keep information to himself. His disconnection is subtle, but my superpower for homing in on any kind of discomfort goes into overdrive.
“Did you grow up in New York?”
“Connecticut,” he says. “New Canaan.” The word fills his mouth the way the names of our hometowns always fill our mouths, as though we can taste them.
I’ve never heard of it, but I’ve obviously heard the most common stereotype about Connecticut: that a lot of rich people who work in New York live there.
“Are there a lot of Indian families there?” I don’t even know why I ask that, except I’m feeling inexplicably curious, and evidently ungenerous. Most brown kids I grew up with got over their brown-discomfort by high school, or at least by college.
He laughs and says no, but he’s really saying Hell, no .
“Was that hard?” I say. Rumi and I were one of about ten Indian kids across our grade in elementary school. There was still a strange isolating spotlight I remember feeling when I was surrounded by the hundred kids who looked different from me and seemed to know it. How I felt wasn’t so much conscious but a sensation under my skin. I never really identified the feeling until much later.
I can’t imagine what being the only one might feel like. “How did your family decide to live there?” To this day, my parents act noticeably strange when “foreigners” walk into the store. It’s almost as though, like their ancestors, they’re still living in colonized India, and a colonizer just walked in.
“My family has lived there since they got off the Mayflower ,” he says flatly. “Can we start on our list of jewelers? You have less than two days to do this.”
“Your family came here on the Mayflower ? The Mayflower - Mayflower , or is that code for some sort of visa I don’t know about?”
His face does a thing where he doesn’t seem to know if I’m joking or serious. “I wouldn’t have pegged you for someone so nosy.”
“I wouldn’t have pegged you for such a fortress.” Truth is I’m never nosy unless I’m interrogating my patients for sources of pain.
“Let’s start with Nolandas. That’s at the northern end of Seventy-Fourth. It’s going to take us a while to hit them all.”
He’s right: we don’t have time for anything else. Why do I care, anyway, that his family chose to move to a place that’s made him this uncomfortable with his heritage? I start walking. He shoves his hands into his pockets and falls in step next to me. He might have cleaned up his appearance, but he’s wearing the same worn-in dark jeans he’s had on since I met him. I imagine him with a closet full of identical clothes and want to smile.
Instead of a gray Henley, he’s in an olive green quarter-zip fleece. It’s a good twenty degrees cooler today than yesterday, and I forgot to carry my hoodie. I packed mostly summer dresses that I picked up when Druv and I first bought our tickets. I also bought dressy evening outfits, which I’m glad I left at home.
The first time we rescheduled, I canceled our dinner reservations at all the fancy New York restaurants Druv wanted to take me to. I haven’t had a chance to give much thought to the itinerary Druv and I so painstakingly put together. This trip hasn’t exactly been the engagement-moon we’d planned, but my heart is still racing with excitement as we head to the first jewelry store.
It takes three hours to visit twelve stores, with no luck.
Krish sinks into a bench outside a boba shop, which, much like him, feels entirely out of place here.
I sit down next to him. “Was it really necessary to be so rude to the salesperson?” I ask.
“You’ve answered questions about your wedding in each store. I wasn’t rude, I just left before I had to hear the answers for the twelfth time.”
“Jewelers are in the business of weddings. They’re interested. It breaks the ice.”
“Okay.”
“It wasn’t like I was planning to spend my vacation visiting jewelry shops.” With a grumpy reporter in tow. “I haven’t seen one single thing on my checklist.”
“Let me guess,” he says in the most patronizing tone ever. “Central Park, Times Square, the Empire State, the Statue of Liberty, the Friends coffee shop ... What did I miss?”
My chin goes up, but I refuse to be this petulant child I’m feeling like, and I lower it. “The MoMA. I love Van Gogh, and I’ve only seen what they have at the Art Institute in Chicago.” In third grade we did a project on Van Gogh’s paintings, and I remember becoming obsessed with drawing the blue swirling sky of his Starry Night over and over again. It felt like a portal sucking me out of where I was, and sucking things out of me. I also remember throwing the art away so Aie wouldn’t yell at me for wasting my time. “And I’ve never watched Friends .”
Of all things, his eyebrows shoot up at that.
“I tried. But it felt fake. Or it made me feel odd, like my life was too far from normal.”
He doesn’t respond. Just looks at me through his frameless glasses with an odd kind of curiosity. His eyes are the translucent brown of beer bottles, and his lashes are so long and thick they seem to crisscross and clump together.
“What happens if we can’t find the ring’s owner?” he asks finally.
“You don’t think we will.”
“It is a possibility. Actually it’s more of a probability.”
Technically, he’s not wrong, but disappointment grips me, and his expression softens into something too close to sympathy.
“It would be such a waste,” I say. “For me to fall, for me to find the ring, for me to post that video, for you to find me. It would all be such a waste if the person who lost the ring doesn’t get it back. It’s almost like the universe is conspiring for something to happen, and I can’t figure out how to do my part.”
“So, this person not getting their ring back is your fault?” He smiles. Like the rest of him, his smile is restrained. As though he’s being observed, being photographed when he smiles. Actually, it’s not just restrained, it’s performative. I know because I’ve seen my own smile in pictures.
“It feels that way. How can two million people have watched that video and no one who knows anything about the ring has seen it? It’s not a common design. If I saw it on someone, I’d remember. I just don’t get it.”
“Do you always take responsibility for everything that goes wrong in the world? There are several wars going on right now that no one wants to take blame for. They might need you.”
“Funny you say that. It’s quite the opposite, actually. I’m usually accused of not taking responsibility for my own life.”
“Really? I was getting a more hyperresponsible vibe.”
“You should talk to Rumi. Or my mom and dad. It’s a totally fake vibe.”
“And the fiancé? Does he blame you for everything too?”
“I never said they blame me for everything,” I snap. “It’s just that ... never mind. Let’s just go back to looking, please.”
Without another word he stands and starts walking toward the next jeweler on our list. Heera Mahal. The Diamond Palace.
“What if you’re right and it’s the end of the road?” I fall in step next to him.
“It won’t be. You’re right. It would be an awful waste of coincidences if you had fallen and found the ring for nothing.”
I’m so surprised I stop in my tracks. He doesn’t seem like someone who’s so easily convinced.
Last night in my hotel room I fell down the rabbit hole of looking up Krish’s work. Every one of his stories proves he’s a hard-ass. Everything I found was unapologetically weighty: political lobbying and gerrymandering, corruption on Wall Street, corporate cover-ups. I don’t even know why he’s interested in this little-ole-me story. Maybe it’s a bet?
“Why are you being like this?” I ask.
“Being like what?”
“Why do you suddenly believe me?”
He looks at me as though he has no idea what I mean, so I elaborate. “The things I said about there being a reason why I found the ring. I wasn’t even that convincing. Why are you suddenly convinced?”
“You were convincing. That’s the whole story. Your belief that you are meant to ... that you are going to find the owner. If we don’t believe that, why are we even here?”
“So you’re waiting for the crash and burn?”
“Mira, you believe in this. You’ve believed it with such passion from the start. Why are you letting how I feel get in the way of that?”
“So you don’t believe we’re going to find it. You’re just doing this for the story.”
“I don’t know if we’re going to find it. I do know that we’re going to try our damndest.” He turns to me. “The only thing I can tell you for sure is that I’m not doing it only for the story.” With that cryptic pronouncement, he steps up to the glass door of Heera Mahal and waits for me to give him a sign that I’m still in.
I nod, and we enter the thirteenth store on our list.
Unlike all the other stores, this one isn’t brightly lit. Like all the other stores we’ve visited already, this one hasn’t been updated in a while. Honestly, at this point it’s impossible to tell one store from the other. They all have blue or maroon velvet-lined shelves that carry nearly identical necklace-and-earring sets that are large enough to be seen across a room. They do have more delicate wares, but those are arranged in display cases under the glass countertops.
“May I help you?” a salesperson says for the thirteenth time. This one is wearing a pink silk kurta. I feel a little weary.
“I’m Krish Hale,” Krish says. “I’m a reporter with the New York Times . We’re trying to track down the owner of a lost ring.” We’ve started each interaction exactly this way.
The man looks baffled. “We don’t know anything about lost rings,” he says, sticking out his chest and looking at once terrified and brave. This, too, has been the pattern: an initial reaction of fear and suspicion. Half the salespeople relaxed and turned friendly soon enough, asking questions and trying to sell us things. The other half looked at the ring, told us they’d never seen it before, and rushed to get us out of the store. Only half of those cracked when I tried to make small talk about my wedding to get them to relax.
“Could you take a look at it for us? We have reason to believe it was recently repaired.” Krish looks at me, and I pull the pouch out of my bag, unzip it, and hold the ring out.
Without taking the ring, the guy leads us to the counter and moves to the other side. He puts a velvet-lined tray on the glass between us and waits.
I put the ring on the tray. I think I’ve just been chastised for not treating jewelry with the respect it deserves. I want to smile, but I don’t, and I notice that Krish isn’t smiling, either, but behind his glasses, his eyes definitely are.
The salesman picks up the ring. He looks as impressed as the others have. “It’s antique. Over a hundred years old. They don’t make gold like this anymore. It’s twenty-four karats. They don’t make jewelry with twenty-four karats anymore because pure gold is too soft, and it doesn’t hold shape.” He indicates some curving along the ring where the ring has lost its form.
“We were wondering if there’s any way to know if it was brought here for repairs,” I say.
He examines the ring again. “This repair?” He points at the part where the flame-shaped bezel has the finest line on it where it might have broken off and been reattached. “This was done years ago, at least forty years ago. This isn’t a new repair job. No one uses this kind of soldering anymore. And this was done in India. This is a one hundred percent desi technique of repair that needs a master goldsmith to do it.”
“Are you sure?” I ask and get a haughty look in return.
“I’ve been working with gold for fifty years. I started apprenticing for my dad in Zaveri Bazaar in Mumbai when I was twelve. I can recognize the origin of any piece of jewelry.” He looks at my ears. “Those solitaires are from Costco. The design is from about two years ago. Point seven-two carats, VVS1, and G color.” Then he throws my engagement ring a glance. “That’s Tiffany. Two carats.” He turns to Krish. “Good eye, sir. You were going for the big gesture, ha? But the same diamond, better quality, from us would have saved you at least two thousand dollar.”
Krish slides me a glance but leaves how I want to respond to me.
“He’s not my fiancé,” I say quickly. “He’s just helping me find the ring’s owner.”
“Oh. Sorry. My mistake. I can match a jewel with its store, but I guess I can’t match human jewels as skillfully.” He laughs. “But I did get your other jewels correct, did I not?”
“You did. I’m impressed,” I say.
“I am renowned for it. Maybe if your fiancé was here, I wouldn’t have gotten that wrong either.” He points at Krish. “I guess I was looking at the wrong piece.” He laughs, far too thrilled with his own joke, and I smile politely.
Suddenly Krish sits up. “Can I see the chain?”
When I don’t respond because it takes me a moment to figure out what he’s talking about, he adds, “The chain with the ring.”
“Of course.” I pull the chain from the pouch, and a light bulb goes on in my head as I realize what Krish is thinking. Maybe we’ve been showing them the wrong piece.
I place it on the velvet tray. “Can you tell us anything about this chain?”
The jeweler picks up the chain and studies it. “Easy, this is from Anderson’s in Brooklyn. They’ve been there for a hundred years, I think, but this is a newer design. Maybe 2015 or so. But it’s a faulty design. See ...” He shows us where the link is broken as though that should tell us something. “Sooner or later this kind of twisted wire snaps. Especially when someone wears it every day. Was the chain used to wear the ring around the neck?”
“Yes,” both Krish and I say together.
He tut-tuts disapprovingly. “That chain is not strong enough for the weight of that ring. The jeweler should have told the customer that.”
“Does the store have multiple locations?” Krish asks.
“No, it’s family owned, and the old man still runs the store. One of his sons was working with him to take over from him. Then he died last year. Very sad. The other son is a waste of space, no interest in the family legacy. I think he sings in some bar or something.”
Krish lets him finish with the most absorbed expression. I’m practically bouncing in my seat. Krish starts tapping on his phone. “Did you say Anderson’s?”
“Yes, they’re in Williamsburg. They close in half an hour. I don’t think you can make it there with this traffic. And with the subway line disruptions, it will take at least an hour to make it there by subway.”
“So, we can’t make it there until tomorrow morning?” I say, and my heart all but sinks.
“It would appear that way,” the man says kindly.
Krish’s eyes are searching the street through the shop windows. He picks up the ring and chain and hands it to me. Then goes to the door, steps out on the street, looks around, and comes back in. “There’s a motorcycle parked outside the store. Does that belong to any of your guys?” He throws a glance at the two other salespeople.
“It’s mine,” the younger man says.
“Two hundred dollars if you let us borrow it for the evening. We’ll drop it off at the store tomorrow morning. You can look me up on the internet. I work at the New York Times . Krish Hale. I’m not going to disappear.”
“Two hundred dollars?” the young man and I say together.
“Yes, and I’ll leave my watch as collateral. You can keep it if I don’t come back.” He removes his very expensive-looking watch and holds it up.
The man pulls the keys from his pocket and tosses them at Krish, who naturally catches them midair, because suddenly we’re in some sort of dude-bro movie.
“Thank you, man.” Krish manufactures two hundred-dollar notes and slaps them, along with the watch, on the counter in front of the man, and they do some sort of testosterone-laced shoulder bump.
“Let’s go,” Krish says to me. “We have half an hour to make it to Brooklyn.”