There were five missed calls. By the time I got around to calling Asghar back, it was past midnight but he wouldn’t mind, I was certain. We often talked into the wee hours even on weekdays. He never said a word about having to be up at six in the morning and dropping the kids off at school at a quarter to eight. My own brother might say something like, some of us have real jobs, you know? Not Asghar.

I used to get drunk a few times a year and call him, raving and ranting about how I was passed over yet again, the injustice of it, and how I was sick of everyone, mostly myself. Asghar would get me through the night and into the pale dawn of a new day. Me pouring myself cheap gins, him rooting about in the fridge for a midnight snack. He didn’t get fat, no matter how many kebabs and cream rolls he ate, and his eyes never failed to crinkle when I called him a good-looking bastard with his head of curls, hazel eyes, and lanky frame. If he spent any time at all in the gym, he’d have the kind of torso that...