The Weight of Heaven by Thrity Umrigar

never once sat on the porch and waved to you as you
    crossed the lawn to take the stone steps down to the beach. As Ellie
    was doing right now. “Hello, miss,” he muttered as he hurried past
    the flowering bushes and toward the steps.
    The Americans seemed to spend all their time on the porch. God
    knows why. A perfectly nice, big house with air-conditioning in
    every room, and instead they preferred to bake in the afternoon sun.
    Unlike him, who had no choice but to be out in the sun if he wanted
    to avoid Edna’s nagging. Some days, he wanted to burn down their
    one-room shack, just to get away from the shrillness of her voice.
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    And the disappointment that seemed to permanently reside in her
    eyes, like fish in a pond.
    He lit a bidi as soon as he reached the beach. Ellie had forbidden him from smoking in his own house, lecturing him on how
    bad the smoke was for Ramesh. So many times he’d wanted to
    remind them that Ramesh was his flesh, not theirs. So many times
    he’d had to look away so that they would not see the anger that
    rumbled inside him. What was it that Rakesh had said at Anand’s
    funeral? That the gora s poked their noses into other people’s business so much, it was a miracle they were still attached to their
    faces. Prakash laughed out loud, imagining Frank without a nose.
    He walked along the water, moved fast, wishing to get away from
    Ellie’s line of vision.
    Ellie was nice. Polite to him and Edna. Best of all, she never mistook Ramesh for her son. And when she looked at them, she saw
    them. Unlike Frank, who looked through him and Edna as if they
    were air. Always searching, searching for Ramesh, like they were
    water he had to look through to get to the bottom of the glass where
    Ramesh was.
    At least the tamasha about Anand’s death had kept Frank away
    from Prakash’s family for a few days. He was spending all his time
    at the factory now. For that Prakash was grateful. For several days
    now, there had been no thump, thump of the basketball in the driveway as the American and his son played game after game, jabbering away in English. Ramesh’s squeals of delight felt like pinches
    on Prakash’s body, then. And Frank was coming home too late to
    help the boy with his homework. Just last night Prakash had ordered
    Edna to help Ramesh, but after struggling for an hour, Edna had
    given up. He had looked away then, not wanting to see the shame
    and helplessness in his wife’s eyes. Already, their son knew more
    about the world than both of them. Of this fact, they were proud—
    and ashamed.
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    Edna had not wanted to go to the funeral with him. Out of loyalty to them. The Americans. “How it look if we go?” she’d asked.
    “Like we supporting the union?”
    “I knew Anand from the day he was born. His mother is a good
    woman.” He didn’t say the rest—that Shanti, who was several years
    older than Prakash, had always been nice to him. That was how
    Prakash judged all the villagers—who had been nice to him and
    who had scorned him when he was a little orphan boy, wandering
    from home to home.
    “You go, then. I don’t even know these people.”
    “You living in Girbaug all these years and still putting on Goa
    airs. You must come. A wife must follow the husband. It says in the
    Bible.”
    Edna let out a snort. “What you know about the Bible, you heathen? Illiterate as a mouse, you are.”
    He looked outraged. “I know Bible say the husband have right to
    beat his wife if she is not listening. You must go.”
    The truth was, he wouldn’t have gone to the funeral without Edna. He had not lived in the village for years now, not since
    they had moved into the servant’s quarters of the house by the sea.
    Finding it hard to feed his new bride on his auto mechanic’s salary,
    Prakash had years ago approached the scary-looking German who
    had come to him with a car repair question and tried to convince
    him that