But Guruji’s whispering had struck a match in me; I spent Tuesday pacing around the neighborhood feeling not much less fevered than Thomas, more and more convinced with every sweaty hour that he really was going to confess to the Batras, if he hadn’t done it already. Is there a name for a version of hypochondria in which, instead of being convinced you have a disease, you’re convinced that the thing you’d least like to happen is unfolding just outside your view? Every thought I had seemed to tug on the ends of a knot in my intestines. I’d known, of course, at some depths of my brain, that my trip would cover the anniversary of the accident, but the date had always been like a dead key on a piano; I did my best to play around it, or to speed on as if it didn’t exist. But now the dead key, the hollow tapping, was all I could hear. I’m getting ready, when it’s time I will do what needs to be done …
I spent hours in the coffee shop/Internet café, doing exactly the kind of research I’d spent the past twelve years avoiding. The computer had a greasy mouse pad with a drawing of a butterfly riding a lion. My mouth tasted strongly of bitter, cold coffee, which I kept trying to fix by taking more sips of bitter, cold coffee. Manish Batra Amita Batra New Delhi. Manish Batra Amita Batra Washington D.C. New Delhi car crash. I sent emails to Raymond (Do you think I could possibly meet with Guruji again? Would he be willing to talk on the phone?) that I immediately wished I could take back. I even checked my old girlfriend Claire’s Facebook page, just to leave no seed of unhappiness unwatered. (Check out new half marathon pics—gotta love the short shorts!) Driving yourself insane on the Internet is as easy as checking the weather.
Almost everything I managed to pull up about the Batras was nonsense: law associate listings, LinkedIn profiles, academic papers, consumer fraud websites. Maybe finding them really was hopeless. Maybe Thomas was right then babbling a confession to the Hanuman statue in Karol Bagh. But at some point on Wednesday night, when I was sitting at a computer in the back corner of the café, carving out new lows for myself on an hourly basis, I found what I was looking for, or what I was looking away from. It was in the June/July 2001 newsletter of the Hindu Temple of Greater D.C. This was where they’d held Mira’s memorial service (one of my first searches had turned up the ancient Washington Post story with the death announcement). My stomach wobbled as I sat waiting for the PDF to load, breathing through flared nostrils. WARNING: 3 Minutes Remaining in Session, Click HERE to Purchase 15 Extra Minutes.
On the front of the newsletter, above a message from HTGDC president Deepika Sharma, was a logo like a Mardi Gras elephant sitting on a throne. The community announcements were printed in columns on the second-to-last page.
As many of you know the strong and committed support of Manish and Amita Batra has been integral to our temple growing in leaps and bounds in these past fifteen years. It is therefore with heavy hearts that we must ask you to join us and say “farewell” and also “good wishes” as they prepare to leave the HTGDC community and return to New Delhi, where family and great opportunities await. May the remover of all obstacles bless Manish and Amita as he blesses you all.
Many have asked questions as regarding the progress of the Rathi Spiritual Center, which we can happily tell you continues to advance rapidly with thanks to the generous work of …
There should be studies done on the relationship between panic and bowel urgency. Within seconds of reading the newsletter, I was, for the fifth time that day, locked in the paper-towel-less unisex bathroom, trembling and sweating as if, on top of everything else, I had giardia. Being a human, having a body, can be such a terrible thing.
I ran back to the apartment, past the hubcap heap and the man selling bananas for one rupee each, clutching the newsletter printout with wet hands, looking for Rory so I could borrow his phone. I kept having to remind myself that all I’d learned was that the Batras had moved back; Thomas still wouldn’t have been able to find them; they might even have moved again. But my inner organs weren’t having any of it. Rory was eating a bowl of Ready Brek at the kitchen table. “No worries, no worries,” he said, standing up, wiping his mouth. His crappy little blue phone worked only if you took it up to the roof and stood hunched in the corner that overlooked an alley full of old planks. The night was thick and breezy; under the layers of car exhaust it felt almost tropical.
I pressed the dozen or so numbers, waited through a series of beeps, and then adjusted the angle of my hunching until the ringing came into focus. It was nine and a half hours earlier in D.C. than in Delhi, which is to say that for the woman who finally answered the phone at the Hindu Temple of Greater D.C. it was just after ten in the morning.