In a boxy apartment building in an American university town, Romola Mitra, a young bride, anxiously awaits her first letter from home in India. When she accidentally opens the wrong letter, it changes her life. Decades later, her son Amit finds the letter and thinks he has discovered his mother's secret. But secrets have their own secrets sometimes, and a way of following their keepers.

Moving from adolescent rooftop games to adult encounters in gay bars, from hair salons in Calcutta to McDonald's drive-thrus in California, this is an unforgettable story about family, the struggle between having what we want and doing what we feel we must - and the sacrifices we make for those we love.