My thoughts were interrupted by a clinking sound coming toward me. Keys. I looked around at the mess I’d created, wishing I could have put everything back before Indira Mami had come home.
“Here you are,” Indira Mami said, stepping into her closet room. “How—” She stopped when she saw the photos spread around me. “What is all this?”
She hoisted up the pleats of her soft pink sari and sat with me on the cold tiles. “I haven’t seen these in many years.” She picked up a photo of Hari when he was ten years old. “Now he is married,” she said, a nostalgic look creeping onto her face. She had remained calm and collected during his entire wedding, but it was interesting to see how a picture from the past could now pierce her stoic facade.
My eyes fell on a stiff wedding photo of my parents. It reminded me of some of the pictures I had taken of Hari and Laila in the days leading up to their wedding, two virtual strangers thrown together and hoping for the best. My family thought that even a less-than-perfect marriage was better than the public shame of ending up alone. It explained why my parents were so desperate to see me settle down. It would have given them some relief that if something happened to them, then I’d be taken care of. I appreciated the sentiment but had a hard time getting them to understand that being single didn’t mean I could not take care of myself. And I’d rather take care of myself than be tied forever to someone I hardly knew, or worse, be stuck taking care of someone else for whom I had no feelings because his parents had not taught him the necessary life skills to take care of himself. I could not deny that despite the many problems my parents and I had when dealing with each other, they had taught me how to survive, no matter how difficult things became.
I picked up another photo of my mother, one in which she was dressed in a traditional sari like the elaborate one she wore in the wedding photos with my dad. But I didn’t know the man in the photo standing next to her. He was shorter than my father and had broader shoulders. My mother’s smile in that photo was more natural. It was a look of which I had only caught glimpses because Mom was typically so reserved. I couldn’t recall when I’d last seen it.
“Who is this?” I asked.
When Indira Mami took the photo, her expression darkened. “I don’t know him.”
It was clear she was lying. “You must. Who is it?” I persisted.
She shoved the photo back into the box and dumped a stack of photos on top of it before she rose awkwardly to her feet. “That’s enough for now. I should start the chai before everyone returns.”
I bit back my instinct to chase after her and make her answer my questions. That sort of behavior would never get me any results in this country. I gathered the remaining photos and placed them back in the cabinet. I heard the click as the bolt slid into place. I thought back to the conversation I’d overheard at the wedding and still wasn’t sure what nasib meant, but I was certain this man was part of it.
Later that day, I was at the snack shop in the small shopping center across from our subdivision picking up the preordered sev for my dad to take back with him when I heard Biren call my name.
“Mingling with the locals, are you?” he asked with a smile. He was wearing blue jeans and a plaid button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up.
“Running errands.” I held up my purchase.
“You’ll give yourself a heart attack if you eat all of that!” He laughed and pointed at the large two-kilo bag of sev.
I laughed. “It’s not for me, but you can let my father know that! So what are you doing around here?”
“On my way back from the gym.” He ran his fingers through his hair, still damp, with the ends curling slightly. It was a good look for him.
He took the bag from my arms and walked back to Lakshmi with me to deposit the sev. “How are you adjusting?”
“Okay, I guess. My mom decided to stay with me. Us, I guess. Neel and Dipti aren’t leaving yet either. Only my dad is flying back tonight.”
He laughed. “I suppose that’ll make for an interesting stay.”
“Tell me about it.”
“She’s not so bad. Maybe you’ll enjoy having her here.”
Once we arrived at the house, Biren placed the sev on the dining table. Indira Mami insisted on making him some chai for his trouble, so Biren and I sat on the hichko in the garden while she prepared it. Sitting next to a guy wearing jeans and having a conversation in English felt so normal. A feeling I hadn’t had since I’d arrived, because I’d been so steeped in the pain of losing Uma and then Alex. If it weren’t for the monkeys in the green mango tree opposite us at the end of our yard, and the fact that Biren was Indian, I’d have thought I was back in LA.