Unaccustomed Earth

The story opens with Sang, who lives with two roommates named Heather and Paul. Although Sang’s full name is Sangeeta (last name Biswas), she goes by Sang. She regularly receives phone calls at her home from Bengali suitors scattered across the country, who have heard that she is “pretty and smart and thirty and Bengali and still single,” and wish to marry her (174). They have heard these things through her familial and community network of Bengalis, but do not know the full truth: that Sang has a boyfriend, that she studied philosophy (not physics) at NYU (not Colombia), and that she has dropped out of her Harvard doctoral program in favor of a part-time job at a bookstore in Harvard Square.

Paul observes, with disappointment, that Sang is never ill-mannered to her suitors. She entertains them with polite questions and courtesy, while using her nonexistent coursework to stave them off, and only complains about their impingement upon her privacy once she has hung up the phone.

Heather, an unattractive and involuntarily single woman studying law at Boston College, is openly resentful of all of the attention that Sang receives. Paul, who is preparing for his English Literature orals and nursing a crush on Sang, tells Sang that she is like the Odyssey’s Penelope.

Paul recalls that he was the one to answer the phone when Sang called inquiring about the open room in the house. He also greeted her alone when she arrived, as Heather was in the shower. He remembers enjoying the way that her hair, which she wore down that day, “clung protectively to her body, over the rise of her shoulder blades” (177). That day, Sang had admired the only notably luxurious thing about the home: its marvelously-constructed central staircase. Everything else in the apartment—including its mildewed bathroom, oatmeal-colored carpeting, and thinly-painted white walls—was shabby. There is also only one phone line in the house, owing to the expense of adding an additional line.

When Sang moved in, with the help of her friend Charles, she brought virtually nothing to add to the home, except “an ailing hanging plant that shed yellow heart-shaped leaves” (179). However, she surprised Heather and Paul by painting her own room in sage green and a pale lavender—named “mole” by the paint company. Paul remembers that Sudha played Billie Holiday while painting her room, and also her outfit, as she worked: a tank top whose straps were reminiscent of a bra, with cut-off jean shorts. When she remarked that her music must be bothering him, he lied, saying that he often studied with music playing.

Sang’s Egyptian boyfriend, Farouk, who teaches Middle Eastern History at Harvard, was in Cairo visiting his parents when Sang moved in to the house. Paul remembers listening to the conversation that Sang and Charles had when she moved in: Sang remarked that she didn’t know how long she’d be living there, and that Farouk refused to live with her until they were married, although they’d been together for three years.

Later, Sang’s sister calls the house, and Paul realizes that Sang’s sister’s voice is exactly the same as Sang’s.

Sang is impressed by how far Paul has progressed with his PhD: when she dropped out of her doctoral program, her father stopped talking to her and her mother was bedridden for a week. Sang had hated the competitiveness and insularity of academia. She even looked with distaste at the way Farouk had to isolate himself in order to attend to his academic duties. Sang asks Paul what his oral exam will entail; he reports that it is a three-hour session with three interlocutors, covering 300 years of English and European literature. He doesn’t divulge that he has already failed his first attempt, fulfilling all of his nightmare visions by freezing up and having to be dismissed when an interlocutor ended the session, saying he was simply not ready.

One day, when a phone suitor asks Paul if he is Sang’s boyfriend, he is quietly thrilled by the question, although he truthfully replies that he is merely her housemate. Sang, entertained by the question and by the prospect of appalling a suitor with the information that she lives with a man, tells Paul to answer “yes” next time.

On another day, Farouk calls, and when Paul asks who he is, as a matter of course, Farouk replies, without warmth or kindness, that he is her boyfriend: “The words [land] in Paul’s chest like the dull yet painful taps of a doctor’s instrument” (183).

Paul eventually glimpses Farouk when he comes to visit Sang. Farouk arrives in a BMW painted a bottle-green, and enjoys a readily apparent intimacy with Sang. When Farouk hears a dog bark as he and Sang approach the front door, he moves to place Sang in front of him, asking if there is a dog inside. Sang assures him that, while choosing a new room, she had specifically sought out dog-free and smoke-free properties, for Farouk’s sake. Farouk introduces himself to Paul as “Freddy”; Sang tells him, in a hackneyed manner, that she will never call him that. To her, her own nickname is at least a part of her true name, which justifies it.

Sang soon begins to spend much of her time away from the house, to Paul’s displeasure. He pictures Farouk’s home as a stately one on Brattle Street, although he has no idea what or where it actually is.

When Farouk visits Sang, he slips in and out of the house like a ghost, never leaving a trace of himself behind. Farouk and Sang spend most of their time holed up in her room instead of the common areas, and Farouk is unfriendly, acting as if Sang is the only one who lives there. Paul also observes that Sang is constantly performing tasks for Farouk, such as spending an entire morning on the phone in order to price tiles for Farouk’s kitchen remodel.

Towards the end of September, Paul has nailed down a routine: On Mondays, one of Sang’s days off, Farouk visits for lunch. Paul observes that they make love silently, unlike other couples who have come and gone from the space. It has been three years since Theresa, the only girlfriend Paul has ever had, broke up with him by telling him that the way he kissed her brought her displeasure. He has dated no one since.

Soon, Paul begins observing that Sang is returning alone from her evenings with Farouk in a cab, at around 2 o’clock in the morning. Although there are no indications that Sang and Farouk are fighting, Paul begins staying up in order to make sure that Sang returns home safely.

Heather begins to date a man named Kevin, an MIT physicist. She views the way that Sang washes Farouk’s underwear for him with distaste. 

By the time Thanksgiving arrives, Sang and Farouk have begun to fight. Paul begins to hear Sang crying on the phone in her room. One fight is about a party that Farouk does not wish to attend with Sang, and another involves Farouk’s birthday. He even hears them fighting one day that Farouk is at the house: Sang demands to know why Farouk never wants to meet her friends, why he doesn’t invite her to his cousin’s house for Thanksgiving, why he doesn’t even have the courtesy to drive her home at night. Farouk responds that he pays for the cabs, and that he cannot sleep with Sang in his home, while Sang rejects the entire scenario as abnormal. When Sang begins to cry, he warns her that he “will not spend his life with a woman who makes scenes” (189). Paul then hears a plate or a glass strike the wall and come apart.

The next day, Paul and Sang find themselves in the hallway after Sang has showered. He has anticipated seeing her this way, swaddled in a towel with her arms and legs bare, but feels unprepared for the sight nonetheless. Sang apologizes for the earlier commotion; Paul assures her that it is OK.

Farouk does not call for a week, although Sang moves quickly to pick up the phone whenever it rings. Paul overhears Sang asking her sister, over the phone, if she thinks it’s normal that Farouk once told her to wash her armpits because she smelled bad. When Sang backs out of plans to see a movie with Paul, Heather, and Kevin, Heather guesses that she and Farouk have split. However, this is not the case; rather, Farouk now refuses to come inside the house, opting instead to beep three times to announce his presence before driving off when Sang joins him.

Sang travels to London to visit her sister and new baby nephew during winter break. Before she goes, she shows Paul all of the presents she has purchased for her nephew, and excitedly says that the baby will call her “Sang Mashi”—explaining that “Mashi” is the Bengali word for “Aunt”. Sang realizes that the word feels peculiar on her tongue, as she speaks Bengali so infrequently.

In the absence of Sang, Paul finds it easier to study for his exam, which is already scheduled for six months away—on the first Tuesday of May. He has declined his customary invitation to his aunt’s home for Christmas, and Heather is away with Kevin. Paul begins to spread all of his study materials all over the empty house, as part of his new study routine.

One day, a package for Sang from J. Crew arrives. Paul goes to deposit the package at Sang’s bedroom door, and is quickly drawn into voyeurism. He observes the “two framed Indian miniatures of palace scenes, men smoking hookahs and reclining on cushions, bare-bellied women dancing in a ring” (192). He unties a scarf that Sang has affixed to a curtain, taking in the aroma of her perfume without putting the scarf to his face. He settles in for a moment and unclasps his belt buckle before his desire quickly deserts him in the physical absence of Sang. He then falls asleep in her room and is awoken by a phone call. 

When he picks up, he hears a dog barking before the caller hangs up. Later that evening, the phone rings again. This time, he hears a woman chastising the dog, apparently named Balthazar. He takes the woman’s name, Deirdre Frain, down on a notepad before they hang up. Deirdre calls again the following day and asks for Sang. When Paul informs her that Sang is not in, Deirdre demands to know where she is. Paul says that Sang is out of the country, and is surprised when Deirdre guesses that she is in Cairo. He replies that Sang is in London, which Deirdre receives with relief.

Deirdre calls a fourth time, late into the night. This time, she sounds out of breath and intoxicated. When she enunciates Sang’s name, it is with an unpleasant intonation. Paul hears soft horn music in the background, as well as the sound of ice in a glass. Deirdre takes on a flirtatious tone that disarms Paul, who has not been spoken to in this way for a long time. Deirdre asks Paul if Sang and Farouk, whom she calls Freddy, are cousins. Paul is upset by Deirdre’s intrusiveness, but then Deirdre begins to cry. She tells Paul that she loves Freddy, before Paul hangs up. Paul, upset, immediately wants to both take a shower and erase Deirdre’s name from the note he took earlier. He looks at the phone, which bears Sang’s mole-colored fingerprints from when she had been painting, and picked up the phone. He feels lonely in the empty house for the first time since the holiday began, and dismisses the phone call as a fluke, or a ploy devised by one of Sang’s suitors. He recites the details of Sang and Farouk’s functioning relationship to himself: they had stopped fighting. They seemed fine. Sang made dinner reservations for them before she departed, and bought Farouk a nice Christmas present. Farouk had driven her to the airport.

The next day, the phone begins ringing incessantly. Refusing to pick it up, Paul unplugs it. He studies, uneasily, for the remainder of the day. He begins to wonder what kind of a person Deirdre is, if she may be the type to down an entire pill bottle. He continues to torment himself about Deirdre before finally picking up the phone and calling her himself, using the number that she had given him. He tells her that he just wants to see if she is alright. Deirdre tells him that he is sweet, before he also tells her not to call again. Deirdre pulls him into further conversation, however. She tells Paul that Freddy is her friend. He asks her how she knows Farouk. The two then slip into more conversation, during which Deirdre reveals that she is originally from Vancouver, and that she moved to Boston during her twenties, for the purpose of studying interior design. She met Farouk one year ago, after he pursued her down the street, regarding her with “unconcealed desire,” and soon took her on a date at Walden Pond (197). She says that Farouk adores her home, which is an old farmhouse on a five-acre plot of land. She also divulges that Farouk asked her to devise the plans for his kitchen remodel, and that they took a hike on Labor Day. Paul does not know whether to accept that Deirdre and Farouk are having a full-fledged affair, or whether he is listening to the intoxicated fantasies of a stranger. He goes back to Sang’s room to make sure that the scarf he untied is back in its rightful place.

Still on the phone, Deirdre asks Paul if he is happy. He deflects the question, and Deirdre asks once more for confirmation that Farouk and Sang are cousins. Paul then informs Deirdre that Farouk and Sang are not cousins, and that they are, in fact, a serious couple. He tells Deirdre that they spend four nights a week together and have been seeing each other for over three years. Deirdre’s rejoinder is that she and Farouk are also a serious couple: “I saw him tonight”, she says, “He was here for dinner, here in my house. He made love to me on my staircase, Paul. An hour ago, I could still feel him dripping down my legs” (198).

Sang returns from London with presents for the house in tow, and a photograph of her nephew that she affixes to the refrigerator. Paul sees that Farouk is the one to drop her off at the house. Paul finds himself unable to descend the grand staircase without picturing Farouk and a naked woman together. He pours drinks for himself and Sang.

Sang, seeing the note with Deirdre’s name on it, announces that she doesn’t know anyone named Deirdre. She asks Paul if she should call Deirdre back before crossing the name out with a pencil and dismissing her as a telemarketer.

In order to avoid Sang, Paul takes up studying at the university library. He begins to avoid answering the phone when it rings, but Deirdre does not call again. As he continues to witness the rituals and movements of Sang and Farouk’s ongoing relationship, Paul waits for his conversation with Deirdre to fade from his consciousness, but it does not. Finally, after two months of silence, his fear that Deirdre will call again is quelled. 

Paul takes a study vacation during spring break. One day, he makes a cassoulet, and finds Sang engaging him in conversation about a mysterious phone call she has just been on. It was with Deirdre, who has claimed to Sang that she is a friend of Farouk’s from out of town. Sang, perplexed, says that Farouk has never mentioned anyone named Deirdre, and that he in fact has no friends aside from her. She wonders how Deirdre has gotten her number; Paul knows that Deirdre had gotten it out of Farouk’s address book based on their previous conversation. Paul, feigning ignorance, suggests that Sang ask Farouk about it.

Later that evening, Paul goes to warm up the cassoulet. Sang informs him that Farouk has been out all day. Sang asks him when, exactly, Deirdre called. Paul tells her that he does not remember. Sang presses him, asking what exactly Deirdre said. Paul maintains that he said nothing to her, and that Deirdre simply wanted Sang to call her back, though Deirdre did not leave her number. Sang asks Paul if Deirdre seemed like a strange person; Paul recalls Deirdre’s tears and her declaration of love for Farouk while deflecting the question. When Sang asks to see the notepad again, and asserts that she wants to call Deirdre, Paul asks Sang why she wants to do that. Annoyed, she answers, “Because I want to, Paul. Is that a problem with you?” (203). 

After Paul showers, he returns downstairs to find Sang rifling through the recycling bin, convinced that she threw away the piece of paper with Deirdre’s full name on it, and wishing to retrieve it. He, too, has forgotten Deirdre’s last name. Sang then apologizes for her harshness in their previous conversation. Paul tells her that it is fine, and they begin share some cassoulet and salad.

Paul offers that perhaps Deirdre was a bit strange. He then reveals that Deirdre had been crying on the phone, but claims that Deirdre simply cried and then requested that Sang call her back. Sang becomes incensed that Paul did not divulge this information earlier, and marches over to Paul with her fists clenched. He thinks that she is going to strike him, but instead she asks him what is wrong with him in an extremely shrill voice.

Sang quickly begins to avoid Paul; Paul, in turn, begins to not miss Sang in the least. Soon, Sang offers Paul the explanation she had been fed by Farouk. The false story is that Deirdre is an old college friend of Farouk’s who lives in Canada, with whom Farouk only speaks a few times a year. Farouk also claims that Deirdre was trying to go through Sang to contact him because she is getting married. Sang seems enlivened by this lie. Then, she tells Paul that Farouk has called Deirdre to get confirmation about Paul’s story, and that Deirdre has supposedly denied that she was crying on the phone. When Paul asks if Sang is calling him a liar, she is silent. Paul feels indignant, knowing that he only told Sang about the crying in order to try to alert her to the truth of her situation. Sang asks Paul if he truly thought that his lie would cause her to leave Farouk. Paul denies this implication, to which Sang replies: “I mean, it’s one thing for you to like me, Paul…It’s one thing for you to have a crush. But to make up a story like that…It’s pathetic, really. Pathetic” (206). Then she leaves the room.    

Sang does not apologize this time. She assumes an attitude of indifference toward Paul, who notices that Sang has been circling housing ads in the house copy of the local paper.

The next time Sang has a shift at the bookstore, Paul takes his turn rifling through the recycling bin. He cannot find the slip of paper, but then suddenly remembers Deirdre’s last name: Frain. He finds a matching listing in the phone book, naming a Belmont address, and calls the number the next day. There is no answer. Paul leaves many messages asking Deirdre to call him back in the ensuing days, until she finally does. Paul tells Deirdre that it was wrong of her to throw him, who had been kind to her, under the bus. She then admits that she was wrong and says that she will call him back. Paul presses her to give him a time, and she promises to call at 10:00pm. Paul feels a flash of inspiration and goes to Radio Shack to purchase a new phone and an adapter with two jacks.

As usual, Sang is home by 9:00pm from the bookstore. Paul informs her that Deirdre will be calling at 10:00pm, and invites Sang to listen in on the conversation using the new phone and adapter. Sang reacts with scornful disbelief, but when 10:00pm comes, the contraption successfully works and she is listening in on the call.

In the call, Paul states that Deirdre cried about Farouk, and Deirdre confirms it.

Then he asserts that she made Paul out to be a liar; “It was Freddy’s idea,” Deirdre replies (209). Paul tells her that Deirdre went along with the lie, while eyeing Sang, who has begun forcefully biting into her lower lip. Deirdre claims that she had no other option when Farouk became enraged that she had called Sang’s house, and that he subsequently began to refuse to speak to her. Sang, attempting to push the table away from her, ends up pushing her own chair back, and it catches against the linoleum. Deirdre apologizes for putting Paul in the middle of everything. She says that Farouk (whom she still calls Freddy) kept on lying and saying that Sang was his cousin while refusing to introduce them to one another: “I didn’t care at first. I figured I wasn’t the only woman in his life. But then I fell in love with him” (210).

Deirdre says that she is a 35-year-old divorcee with no patience for such games, but also that she has ended the affair. She says that it is Farouk’s way to manipulate women into feeling needed and tasked with keeping his life together: “He doesn’t have any friends, you see. Only lovers. I think he needs them, the way other people need a family or friends” (210). As the dog begins to bark in the background, Sang closes her eyes and shakes her head. Deirdre explains that the dog is hers, and that, although it is only the size of a football, Freddy makes her put it behind a guardrail every time he is at her house. Sang inhales harshly, and puts the phone down on the table. Before they hang up, Deirdre tells Paul that she thinks Paul should tell Sang everything.

Paul feels no relief at having cleared his name. Eventually, Sang stands up, but it is as if she is in a trance. Paul tells her that he is sorry, and asks her if she needs anything when she shuts herself in her room. She opens the door and tells him that she needs a ride.

After some convincing, Paul drives Sang to Farouk’s apartment. There, in the lobby, the doorman smiles at Sang and lets her in. Sang and Paul take the elevator to the 10th floor, where she uses the ornate door knocker to rap on Farouk’s door. They can hear the sound of a television inside, and then silence. Sang announces herself, and then tells Farouk that she heard the phone call between Deirdre and Paul. She asks Farouk to open the door. Farouk, unshaven and wearing an outfit that seems incongruous with the style of a philanderer in Paul’s eyes, opens the door. Farouk scornfully tells Paul that he is uninvited, and asks Paul to give himself and Sang privacy, for once. Paul responds that Sang asked him to be there. Farouk then physically attacks Paul, launching himself at him with a powerful shove. The two of them end up on the floor of the apartment building hallway, with Paul pinning Farouk, who stops resisting: “All she wants is for you to admit it…I think you owe her that”, Paul says (213). Farouk spits in Paul’s face before retreating into his apartment with Sang and slamming the door.

Paul hears a commotion inside. He hears Farouk saying, “Stop it, please, please, it’s not as bad as you think”, to which Sang replies, “How many times did you do it? Did you do it here on the bed?” (213). Then, the building super, carrying a set of keys, appears in the hallway. He demands to know who Paul is. Paul says that he lives with the woman who is inside the apartment, and answers “no” when the super asks if he is Sang’s husband. The super then knocks on the door, explaining that the neighbors have called the police.

When the door opens, Paul sees that Farouk’s living room is painted in the same sage green as Sang’s room. Sang is shivering and kneeling on an Oriental rug, retrieving the broken pieces of what seems to have been a glass vase. There are flower petals in her hair and on her face and neck. A bouquet lies in disarray throughout the room, along with a large quantity of water. However, Sang is now methodically assembling the glass shards on the coffee table. There are angry welts across her neckline. The men stand, silently gawking at her. A policeman arrives and asks Sang if Farouk hit her. She shakes her head no. Her reply to the policeman’s question about whether she lives in the apartment or not is that she painted the walls. The policeman asks her to explain the welts on her neck. Sang, tears running down her face, says that she both bought the flowers and gave herself the welts. The officer fills out his report, the super leaves while muttering something about a fine to Farouk, and Farouk begins to clean up. The policeman regards Paul for the first time; Paul offers that he is Sang’s housemate, and gave her a ride.

The following morning, Paul awakens to a note from Sang, in which she thanks him for the previous day and informs him that she is going to London. She has left him her rent check. Sang is gone for a month, during which the bookstore calls to fire her. Farouk begins to call, and by chance catches Heather on the phone, who informs him that Sang has left the country. His calls then stop.

When rent comes due again, Paul and Heather cannot cover Sang’s share. He looks up Sang’s sister’s London phone number and calls it. He is told that Sang is indisposed. Charles arrives to pack up Sang’s belongings. Charles tells Paul that although he never even met Farouk, he always told Sang to break up with him. When he departs, all that remains of Sang is her painted room. Paul realizes that Sang never told Charles about Paul’s part in the saga. He remembers the way that Sang crouched on all fours in Farouk’s closet that night, after going to the bathroom to compose herself. In the closet, she cried hysterically and began hitting herself with a shoe, refusing to come out until the policeman removed her forcefully from the apartment. With flower petals still clinging to her hair, she had taken Paul’s hand during the elevator ride down, and held it throughout the journey back to their house, as she sat with her face between her knees, weeping.

Paul passes his oral exam and is taken out for drinks at the Four Seasons by two of his professors. His committee tells him that they’ll all pretend that his previous failure never occurred. He then goes to the bathroom to splash his face with water, and returns to the lobby, which is festooned with large flower bouquets and stately accouterments. He watches the fancy-looking guests and the scene at-large as if in a daze. Suddenly, he feels a hunger for money—enough of it to secure himself a hotel room and its silent repose.

Drunk, Paul makes his way to the street, where he runs into Farouk and a woman who is “willowy but haggard…her bony nose…a little too large for her face (218). He loosens his tie while occupying a bench opposite the couple and fixes Farouk with a direct gaze. He scrutinizes the man who caused Sang so much lovelorn anguish, who had made her into a fool, who had made love to and possessed Sang. Farouk and the woman eye each other as Paul snickers. He feels invincible, knowing Farouk cannot confront him with this new woman next to him. He settles into a prone position on the bench and is roused by Farouk, who informs him that Paul is fortunate that he did not pursue legal action against him, as Farouk’s shoulder was injured during the altercation and requires surgery. The woman, who stands behind Farouk, says something inaudible.

Paul watches them walk away, noticing “a small yellow dog at the end of a very long leash, stretched taut in the woman’s hand, pulling her along the path” (219).