By Trent Lewin

Heated ghee crackles in a pan. Smell of soft fat circulates through the kitchen.

Upstairs, Bakshi opens the window and smokes. Across the street, an ice cream van sits in a driveway, same place it’s been for ten years. The decals on the side are fading.

When the ghee is hot, add wheat flour. I cook the mixture until it’s golden. Water comes next, then sugar.

When I was young, in the gurdwara, I would sit at the back of the hall, unwilling to be the child that gave out napkins to the cross-legged people. Just hand each person a napkin and move on, my father would tell me. But why is this necessary? I’d ask. Why do they need napkins? 

Because prasad is full of fat. It’s greasy. And it’s holy. Don’t forget that it’s holy.  

In the gurdwara, you do not drop prasad. It is a holy food when made in a holy place, and if you drop some on the carpet or on your clothes, you pick it up and eat it, whether it’s dirty or not. 

When Bakshi was born, I made prasad to celebrate the event. Dad and the Uncles gathered to see the newborn. My father took my baby outside, to the edge of the grass, and sat. When he was done, he came in and ate prasad with his brothers. Asked later if they might have some whiskey to celebrate. Good, Canadian whiskey.

For Bakshi, school is a candy cane. Eat it in moderation, preferably once a season. Just get through it and move on. When you’re eighteen, you have this luxury.

Well? says a text from big sister Suraj.

Dad invited the Uncles over, returns Bakshi. Mum staying in her room.

Go see Mum. Go on.

No way.

She’s Mum! Tell me when you do it.

Bakshi heads down the hallway. Mum’s door is open a crack. She is on the bed, on her side. She’s awake but isn’t moving. 

She’s shut-in, Bakshi texts.

Dad?

He’s making prasad. The house smells. Used too much butter. Ghee, says sister.

I promised that I wouldn’t with the whiskey. But the prasad is done, and Dad and the Uncles will be here soon. Upstairs, Asha refuses to get out of bed. I stood at the door and asked her to help me, that I needed my wife for this conversation, but she curled around her pillow like a tree root and squeezed. Bakshi is smoking in the bedroom. I can smell it. I have two children. Suraj is finished with university, a banker. She tells me she is never going to get married, and that I should get used to it, but she is young, pretty, and makes money. Men will pursue her, and perhaps one will convince her otherwise. When Dad and the Uncles arrive, I will sit them down. They will ask: Where is Asha? And I will tell them that she is sick, as I serve them my best whiskey. Oh! they will say. What a good way to start a Saturday! Thank you for calling us over. Is that prasad in the air?

I made it myself, I will tell them, and they will laugh, because in this house, I make the prasad. Whiskey and prasad: holy drink and holy food, as Dad and the Uncles laugh.

I’ll give them two drinks before I get their attention. Dad. Uncles. I have something to tell you about Bakshi.

Once, Bakshi was a track star. Short sprints were his favorite, acceleration without regard for endurance, blazing down the course. That ended with a broken knee in a car crash, due to sister Suraj learning to drive and not doing a good job of it. “Are you hurt?” Suraj had asked, two windows shattered, the front of the car wrapped around a light pole. 

It’s the only time Bakshi’s been in an ambulance. The paramedic had told jokes, like this was nothing compared to what he’d seen in the past. Indian houses have a smell, made of coriander, garam masala, chickpeas, and basmati rice. And ghee. It’s made of ghee more than anything, a thickness that becomes condensate on Sunday mornings, raining down the windowpanes to gather on the sills. But hospitals are a different smell. “This is nothing,” the paramedic had told Bakshi, wheeling the gurney through the halls.

Fixed, but no longer a track star, Bakshi had accepted the apologies of sister Suraj. After that, he’d moved to the pursuit of girls, especially the pretty white ones in jeans. A first kiss behind a portable, making sure that a few people on the playground would see this sudden huddle. Arriving late to a dance with a girl, this tall beautiful Indian boy whose clothes smelled of mothballs, whose hair jutted in Bollywood curls, standing at attention like some director had ordered them to perform. The former track star who’d been in an accident, and whose sister Suraj was known to get around.

There aren’t discrete moments in life. Only continuances, propagations. Even elongations. During high school, Mum had caught Bakshi on the computer, watching something he should not have been. Into her bedroom Mum had gone, a whole week of being in the bedroom, unwilling to talk to her son, sure that this was an affront to her. A ruination of her wonderful life, a disruption of the fabric of the Indian house, the place with the smells.

There hadn’t been a switch for Bakshi. To think that there would have been, that’s ridiculous. Life stretches. It’s the same moment, the one when we’re born, just pulled like a rubber band over the surface of the world, interacting with so many people as it gets tighter, thinner. But it’s the same moment, and for Bakshi, the realization one warm night in the backyard, drinking beer with his sister. Not even a confession, really. Just an elongation of the original moment. “I’m not surprised,” Suraj had said, opening another beer.

“They will be,” Bakshi had said. The bottles sweated on the teak table, as inside the house, Mum and Dad watched a Hindi movie, asleep and unaware of the beautiful dance number occurring on the screen, in a hill station where flakes of snow fell on the actors as they leaned on a handrail over a chasm that backed on all of India.

We’ll deliver two weddings to the family, I had always thought. For the girl, we’ll have to save up money. For the boy, we’ll have an immense party. After that, Asha and I will be done with that part of our life. We’ll travel. Visit the grandchildren. 

You have to get Mum, texts Suraj.

She won’t come, I tell her.

You need her to, Dad. Go get.

I let the message ride, as I put out the whiskey glasses. The living room has a leather couch, three reclining chairs, vases at the edge of the bay window.

Behind me, the dining room. 

Dad. Uncles. I have to tell you something. 

I made prasad, I text Suraj.

What the fuck for?

Tradition. Don’t swear.

You think this is traditional? Go get Mum!

I put down the phone and make a plan, because Dad and the Uncles are coming. They’re walking together through the neighborhood, remarking on the best lawns, averting eyes from the female joggers, shaking their heads at the morning bikers in their tight shorts and colorful shirts. Gentlemen. Thank you for coming! It’s the 2020s. As you know, I’m an engineer, respectable. I build mining equipment for the extraction of minerals that we need, even though my children assure me that these activities contribute to climate change. So does driving cars to Starbucks, am I right! <Dad and the Uncles laugh.> In this modern age, we have to expect that things change. This is not Punjab the way we remember it. This is Ontario. Canada. The very prasad you eat was not made by my wife. Asha does not even know how to make prasad! Here, a man makes it and serves it with whiskey. Let’s talk about my children. The eldest, you see, had an abortion. We didn’t tell you about it, because we don’t talk about these things. I drove her early morning to a clinic. I wore a hat and glasses, an old pair of jeans with holes in them that’s been in my closet for years. Brilliant disguise, right? It was the type of clinic you don’t see in Punjab. Or maybe you do, but no one talks about them. Everything went fine. Everything is fine with the eldest. As for the second child . . .

The phone buzzes. Hope you’re not just going to get them drunk! texts older daughter.

It’s Saturday morning, I remind her.

Don’t get them drunk. Won’t do any good.

Dad, though. Dad likes whiskey. Uncles, too.

The most complicated thing for Bakshi is a matter of respect. In the gurdwara, men sit on one side of the aisle, women on the other. It’s a simple separation, as all eyes face the Guru Granth Sahib and listen to prayers. At the end of the main ceremony, young children move through both sides of the aisle, distributing napkins—because prasad has a lot of fat. Then comes the holy food itself, placed into your cupped hands, as you try to make sure you don’t drop any. But you have to choose, in that holy place, which side of the aisle to sit on. Bakshi has always sat with Dad on the men’s side, but those days are coming to an end. They have already ended. Out of respect, Bakshi will continue to go to the gurdwara, although the words of the Granthi are foreign. This holy book version of Punjabi, a language Bakshi can understand when it’s spoken in its regular format, is ridiculously arcane. But Bakshi will sit and listen, and pretend to absorb the words, the songs, the harmonium music. Bakshi will do this out of respect but will no longer sit with Dad on that side.

HE’S GOING TO DRUNK THEM UP! screams sister’s text.

Heard worse ideas, Bakshi responds.

Babaji and his brothers will be here soon. They’re already on their way, their cheap sandals slapping the sidewalk, nodding at the mediocre cars they wouldn’t think to buy, whistling at the ones they wish they could. 

Dear Babaji. Dear Uncles. I’m going to keep my name. Bakshi. It’s not going to change, because it’s a good name. By rights, I could change it, but why would I? It means paymaster. What’s a paymaster, anyway? Apparently, the person who used to distribute wages, but we don’t have a need for that anymore. Direct deposit, am I right? <surely, this makes them laugh> My name doesn’t have any applicability these days, which is sad, and makes me think that, yes, maybe I should consider changing it. But I promise I won’t. I promise I’m still Bakshi. Bakshi the paymaster, distributor of wages. The doorbell rings.

They’re early, I think, wondering as they are about this Saturday morning request for gathering. Dad and the Uncles live within walking distance. We made sure of this, everyone buying houses in a neighborhood that we could afford, a place where the cousins could play together.

I met Asha in university. She was an engineer, too, but more clever than me. An environmental engineer, the type of person that rescues the mines that I help create. I am your opposite, she used to tell me, in bed, as we lay there fully clothed. How many kids do you want? I would ask. And she would smile. Just give me one of each, and I will be okay. Can you do that? 

It’s not up to me, I’d say, aching against my jeans, desperate to take off her top and suck on her breasts, the bits I could see suggesting so much more underneath her clothes, an exploration that I wanted badly to make. Try really hard, she would say, her hand glancing against my hip, as though to say that she was fully aware of my state. 

I should get her before I admit Dad and the Uncles. She should be sitting next to me, on dining room chairs, as we face everyone. But Asha never cared how many children she would have, as long as she had one of each. Some reasonable prospect of grandchildren. An element of conventionality in the Indian lifestyle interpreted by a Canadian climate. I can’t help but think that I’m still in that bed, my groin studiously not near her, but she fully aware of my state. This moment is just that moment, playing itself out, as though we’re under those covers. Warm and expectant, young and hopeful.

I go to the door and take a breath. Dad, Uncles. It’s about Bakshi.

They’re here, Bakshi texts his sister.

He’s going to put this on you, she says.

It is on me.

He’s going to blame!

 Down the hallway, there is movement. Mum has gotten out of bed to close the door. I hear it latch. 

Going downstairs, I text.

If they gang up, just leave!

Might have to use your spare bedroom.

Of course! 

I packed a bag.

Older sister is probably crying, thinks Bakshi. She never cries. Even when she left home for university, she didn’t cry. When she decided to move to another city for her job, she didn’t shed a tear. 

Good luck, says sister. You are beautiful.

Maybe. Sure. Yes. I don’t know.

Bakshi heads down the hallway.

The saddest thing in the world is an old ice cream truck. It used to drive up and down the neighborhood, ringing a bell or playing music, stopping to sell treats. The man who owns it did this as his retirement. He used to be a lawyer. He’d made his money, but loved the thought that he could bring joy just by driving down the street. Children would line up on the sidewalk as he parked against the curb and opened the sliding window. Brown children, white children, boys and girls, the composition changing over time, but the joy, all the same.

He drove that truck until one day, he couldn’t drive anymore. Something about his eyesight. So, he parked the truck in his driveway and left it there, unwilling to sell it. Now and then, he goes inside to make sure everything is in working condition, that the ice cream could still be dispensed if need be. It’s pristine in there, even though the outside of the truck is peeling in the sunshine. But that’s just cosmetics. Appearances. Things that can deceive you so easily, often do. 

On Sunday evenings, he’ll have a beer or two and climb into the truck, cleaning it. Bit by bit, until it’s perfect. He never had kids. Never got married. He’s not sure why. But he keeps the van in a perfect state, just in case. 

Across the street, a bunch of Indian men are ringing the doorbell. It’s Saturday morning. There’s a smell of melted fat coming from the house, and it reminds the old lawyer of ice cream, even though it couldn’t possibly be. “Dad, Uncles! Come in!” I tell them. They take off their shoes and hand me their jackets. I hang them up one-by-one as they stream into the living room. “Do you want some whiskey?” I ask. (Godforsaken boy, he let me down, and I’m going to make you drunk before I tell you about it . . . No. Don’t do that. Don’t do it that way. Bakshi is your child. Your child. Find a better way.) Dad’s eyes are wide. “It’s Saturday morning. Too early for whiskey, right?” The Uncles look at each other, shrugging. Is it? Is it too early? The moment too inopportune?

“Shit, yaar,” says one of them. “Why not?”

And they laugh, like it’s the old days, me the little kid running through the mass of Uncles, being snatched up again and again. Music playing, the dancing so inelegant and inarticulate, drink flowing after the meal. Women sitting in the dining room around the table, talking about serious matters, things I never understood. 

I sit down. “Dad, Uncles. I have to talk to you about something.” “Shit,” says an Uncle.

The stairs groan. It’s Asha. Her eyes are puffy, and it’s obvious that she’s been crying. Asha cries at everything. She cries at sad movies. She cries at happy ones. She cries when she looks at photographs, or when she talks to her mother on the phone. She’s the opposite of her eldest daughter, who never cries at anything. 

Asha sits next to me, and I put a hand in hers. We’re on two dining room chairs, facing the couches and the recliners, Dad and the Uncles.

“Who’s sick?” asks Dad. He hasn’t shaved in a week. A month more, and he would look like a Guru.

“No one,” I reply.

He breathes, relieved. “Then everything is fine. I’m not so worried suddenly.”

Beside me, Asha twitches. She’s holding back tears, I can feel it in her body. I turn and kiss her on the cheek, a thing we don’t do in public. Once, at a wedding, just after we were first married, I kissed Asha on the lips. One of the Uncles chastised me for that on the way home and told me never to do it again. There’s silence in the room. I don’t know what to say.

Across the road, the old man is hosing his ice cream truck. He does this every Saturday morning. I’ve said ten words to him since we’ve lived here. He was a lawyer. No family. No visitors. Just the ice cream truck, which he doesn’t drive, only cleans.

“Well,” says Dad, finally, “is that prasad I smell?”

“He made it himself,” comes Bakshi’s voice, from the doorway. 6’2”, muscular, short black hair, features that are more Asha’s than mine, skin lighter than ours. I always thought Bakshi would look like a Bollywood star someday, and that’s the one thing that’s come true. My child, the movie star. A dancer. A singer. A track star. A fighter. “Babaji, Uncles, would you like some?” They nod. Of course they would.

We serve it like we would in the gurdwara, into their cupped hands. They mutter about that. Why no bowls and spoons? This isn’t a holy place! But they accept the offerings and eat. I take Bakshi’s arm, have to look up at the brown eyes. Am required to acknowledge how strong this child is, how far we’ve traveled together since that first day; and this, just a stretching of that moment, the same but more taut, slightly strained but not by too much. Not too much at all. That’s what I want to tell my child. That’s all.

In Bakshi’s hand is a pack of napkins. Hands me one before distributing the rest to Dad and the Uncles, who are licking their fingers of ghee and sugar, picking up crumbs that have landed on their jeans or that have fallen to the carpet. This is not a holy place, I think. When the prasad is done, I collect the used napkins, and we sit down to talk.

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Trent Lewin is a writer of East Indian origin, an immigrant to Canada and a climate advocate, who has been published by Boulevard, december, The New Quarterly, and Grain. He won the Lascaux Prize in Short Fiction in 2025. Lewin is working on two novels and numerous short stories. He lives in Waterloo, Ontario. trentlewin.com