Her lips pressed together. She placed the trays on the counter and ripped off a large piece of aluminum foil.
“I was seven when we left India. Of course it’s not home for me.”
Neel wiped his hands on the towel as he headed for the door. “If you two are going to get into this again, that’s my cue to check on Dipti.”
The foil crackled as my mother wrapped samosas. “It’s still your country.”
“No, it’s not! This is my country.” I pointed my finger toward the ground. “I’ve got a passport to prove it.”
“When people look at you, they see who you are, not your passport.”
I cringed inwardly when she touched upon one of my biggest insecurities. Even though I felt American and wanted to be seen that way, with my brown skin and dark hair, I knew I didn’t look the part. Everywhere I went, my Indian culture and appearance followed me. When I was fifteen, within months of getting my American citizenship, I’d been at the grocery store with my mother, and an older white man had cut in front of us in the checkout line. I looked at my mother, and her eyes told me to ignore it. But I thought it was a simple mistake. I got his attention and politely said he’d cut in front of us, assuming he’d apologize and take a step back. Instead, he glared at me and said words I’d heard both before and after that day, but the chill in his tone was something I never forgot: “Go back to your country.” My passport had changed nothing of who I was. To this day, when someone cut in front of me, I remained quiet.
After several moments of strained silence, my mother said, “It’s good you came for Dipti’s baby shower.”
I was taken aback by the change of subject and compliment. Varsha Desai wasn’t big on thank-yous, so this was as close as it got. If she was trying, I guessed I should too.
Before I could open my mouth to say something polite in response, she continued. “But you should be coming to India to celebrate your cousin’s wedding. I didn’t raise you this way.”
There it was. Her trademarked, patent-pending civil comment followed by an insult. Why should I think our first conversation after our falling-out would be any different from any of the ones before it?
I threw up my hands. “Four months ago you told me you wanted nothing to do with me because Alex didn’t meet your biodata requirements. I assumed that included family weddings.”
She stopped packing the leftovers and met my gaze. “I was trying to protect you. You need someone who shares your culture and values.”
“I didn’t ask for your protection. I can take care of myself.” That last part was mostly true. She didn’t need to know that even though I hated saris, the real reason I didn’t wear one today was because I’d lost so much weight from the stress of the breakup that the form-fitted sari blouses I owned sagged off my shoulders in a way that no amount of safety pins could salvage. “Did you ever consider that if you had looked past the fact that he wasn’t Indian, then maybe you would have liked him?”
“Preeti, start taking responsibility for your actions. I told you to do whatever you want.”
“Oh, sure! And you also said if I stayed with him, I wouldn’t be welcome in this house again.” I put my hands on my hips. “So, which is it? If I were still dating Alex, would you have invited me to Dipti’s baby shower today? Would you still want me to come to the wedding?”
My mother waved her hand as if shooing away a fly. “Why do you always have to talk back? I reached out. You are the one who did not respond.”
I thought back to the birthday card she had mailed me last month. It remained unopened in the shoebox in which I stored all the birthday cards I’d received from my parents since we’d first moved to America. There were a couple voice mails before the card, but I’d ignored those too.
“You’d already said enough. I wasn’t going to read whatever backhanded, gloating comment you put in some card too.”
My mother wrinkled her brow. “What? You didn’t . . .” Her voice trailed off, her expression shifting from confused to sullen. She nodded, more to herself than to anyone else. Maybe she was understanding for the first time that I had been so hurt, so infuriated, by what had happened between us that I couldn’t even open her birthday card and see her familiar scrawl.
Neel walked back in, the kitchen towel slung over his shoulder. “You two still at it?” He swiped a pakora from the aluminum pack our mother was wrapping.
She and I both glared at him, but he seemed oblivious.