The Paris Review - Fall 2016

The Well
AKHIL SHARMA
We lived frugally. If somebody was
coming to the house, my mother
moved the plastic gallon jugs of
milk to the front of the refrigerator and filled the
other shelves with vegetables from the crisper. The
only meal my mother did not cook herself was our
Saturday lunch. For this, my father walked six or
seven blocks to get us slices of pizza. One Saturday
morning, my father went to see a man who had
recently come back from India with pickles and
letters for his acquaintances, the way people used
to do in the seventies. My father came home with a
jar of mango pickles, but without the greasy paper
bag from the pizza parlor. He took off his shoes and
lay down on the bed with a cup of tea and the newspaper.
When my mother went into the bedroom
and asked if he was hungry, I heard my father say
he had already eaten. My mother said nothing, only
stepped out of the bedroom and closed the door
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