Chapter 5
CHAMPAGNE how, maybe, she shouldn’t eat quite so many carbs, and join him in the gym. Douchebag!
I take the red dress off, and Latika whistles.
“Matching bra and undies!”
I look down at my black underwear, which, yes, I bought two days ago on . Because they were on sale. That’s why I got them. At least that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
“Big deal.”
“You’re never coordinated.” She giggles. “Are you hoping someone’s going to see you in those?”
I flip her off and put on the black dress she insisted I buy at Nordstrom Rack a few months ago.
It’s a Tahari dress.
Business casual. Black. Sheath.
It’s classic.
And I guess, one would say elegant. I can wear it with my black flats and walk to the restaurant, which is only 15 minutes away.
Maybe I’ll give a Desi Audrey Hepburn vibe?
“What will you do with your hair?” she asks.
I touch my hair. It’s washed. Blow-dried, and since I put plenty of serum in, it isn’t as frizzy as it can be. I have tied it into a loose ponytail, like someone I saw on Instagram, and it looks pretty chic, if I do say so myself.
“What’s wrong with leaving it like this?”
She gasps. “You’re not going to bundle it up in a bun to look like a severe teacher auntie?”
“I can’t have hair all over my face when I’m working, okay? I’m a nurse. You can wear whatever you want to code…not me.”
Latika works as a programmer at a software company in the Bay Area, which she admits she has no ambition for. Her secret wish is to work in a bookstore, but that’s not going to fly, not when she and her husband are saving up to buy a house—and in California, you need a solid dual income.
“Look, babe, if this is an apology dinner, you don’t need armor.”
“You’re right. Because if it’s a date…well, it’s not like I know how to dress for that,” I say sullenly.
“None of that pity party, madam,” she snaps. “Chin up, tits out…and go have fun…and let me know what moules frites tastes like.”
I give myself a last once over.
LBD, check.
Panties and bra, check.
Perfume, Marc Jacobs’ Daisy, check.
Cute ballet flats, check.
Light pink lipstick, check.
Kajal, check.
Purse with lip balm and hand cream, check.
I take a deep breath and then leave my apartment.
I’m halfway there when I start to worry about being stood up, and by the time I get to the fancy French restaurant, I’ve convinced myself that he’s not going to be there.
But he is. Outside. Waiting. For me?
He’s in a blue shirt, the sleeves rolled, and dark dress pants. His hands are stuffed in his pockets and…he looks less like Doctor Vincenzo and more like a man trying not to screw this up.
He appears nervous. It’s endearing.
Let’s hope he finds my nervousness as endearing as I do his.
“Hi,” I say, a little breathless.
“Hi,” he answers, a fraction too quickly.
Wait? Is he nervous because he’s taking me out to dinner or because he’s going to tell me he can’t? Am I being dumped even before the pseudo-date begins?
He smiles and pulls his hands out of his pockets. “You look lovely.”
God, that smile is so hot. “You…ah…you look nice, too.”
He does.
He’s got that dark hair that frames his face beautifully.
Blue eyes—that seem bluer, probably because of the light outside the restaurant and his blue shirt.
Cheekbones that…well, as the cliché goes, could cut glass.
He’s just this side of brooding, even with that charming smile.
If I visualized Mister Rochester, he’d be Evan Vincenzo.
He extends his hand toward the door of the restaurant. “Shall we?”
I nod, swallowing. My throat is dry.
The last time I went on a date was in college before my mother fell sick.
It was a Desi guy that an auntie set me up with. We went to an Indian restaurant in The Mont.
He talked about crypto the whole time and how he was set for world domination—he was so tech-bro, he was bleeding bits and bytes.
I let him kiss me at the end of the date, hoping it would be a good kiss, and then who knows, we could have sex.
To paraphrase Taylor, “I can make a boring guy interesting for a weekend.”
The kiss was awkward. He was arrogant. I lost his number promptly and never went on a date with anyone an auntie suggested again.
This is not a date, Navya. This is an apology dinner.
He puts his hand on the small of my back, just like men do in the movies.
I come from an Indian community where men don’t just randomly touch women. I mean, we have the whole namaste* business, so that we don’t even have to shake hands.
It feels nice. Warm. And, dare I say, comforting.
“Bonsoir*, Dr. Vincenzo,” the ma?tre d’ greets us and then says something in rapid French.
Great. I had to Google menu items, and this is his regular haunt, where he casually speaks Francais with the waiters.
I hope he’s not expecting me to help order wine because I know white, red, and sparkling—and that’s about it.
I know that any wine costing more than thirty dollars is too expensive for me.
I also know that any wine under ten dollars is swill.
“Thank you, Jean Pierre,” Evan replies in English.
Jean Pierre appears chagrined and bows toward me. “I have a table ready for you.”
The restaurant smells like butter. You know, like a French bakery, only better.
There are candles on the table. The conversations are hushed like this is a freaking library. I feel so out of place, it’s ridiculous.
When we get to our table, Evan pulls out my chair.
He pulls out my chair! The first time anyone has ever done that. I could be in a movie—the gauche heroine with her sophisticated hero…you know, like Margaret Hale to John Thornton.
I sit smoothing my dress.
“This is…ah…nice,” I murmur lamely as he takes his seat.
“It’s one of my favorite restaurants, and no tongue or eel on the menu. I checked.” There’s a glint of amusement in his eyes, and I wonder if he’s making fun of me.
A server comes along and asks what kind of water we want. He says sparkling. I nod in agreement even though I’m fine with tap water. Bottled water is a scam and bad for the environment.
“Do you find this suitable for an apology dinner?” he asks, a teasing glint in his voice.
I chuckle uneasily. “Ah…really, Dr. Vincenzo, you didn’t have—”
“If you don’t want me to call you Nurse Rana all evening, you should call me Evan,” he cuts me off smoothly as he picks up the menu.
I do the same.
Damn it! I shouldn’t have come.
This is so uncomfortable.
What if I order something stupid?
I don’t go to French restaurants regularly…or at all.
I don’t know stuff.
I’m twenty-six, barely solvent, a nurse, and I haven’t ever had sex—and I grew up in Fremont, where the only outside-of-home food I ate was Indian and maybe some Italian and Mexican, because they do spices like we do.
“Should we start with a glass of champagne?” he suggests. “You know, to mark our first dinner together.”
“Yes, absolutely.”
Please don’t ask me what champagne I like. Please don’t ask me what champagne I like. Please don’t ask me what champagne I like.
“Is there a champagne you especially like?”
I sigh and roll my eyes, mostly in self-deprecation. “Evan,” I decide to come clean, “I’ve never been to a French restaurant, ever. In fact, I had to look up half the menu online. I don’t know wine at all. So….”
He looks contrite. “Do you want to go somewhere else?”
I let out a soft laugh and shake my head. “No. What I’m saying is that this is…all wildly unfamiliar.”
“I guess I’d feel the same way if I were in an Indian restaurant,” he muses.
He’s not a snob. He isn’t saying, "Oh, you don’t know what moules means?" He’s saying, "Relax, this isn’t a test."
“Everyone knows Indian food,” I state dryly.
He shakes his head. “Barely. I haven’t eaten much Indian food. You’ll have to teach me.”
That brightens me up. So, the suave and sophisticated Dr. Vincenzo doesn’t know everything, and I can teach him about Indian food and culture.
I grin and hold out my hand for a shake. “Deal.”
His eyes crinkle with amusement as he takes my hand in both of his, leans, and brushes his lips against my knuckles. “Affare fatto*.” He let’s go of my hand. “That means done deal.”
I cock an eyebrow. “If that was your way of making me feel less intimidated, as in you speak Italian, you didn’t help.”
He sits back and gives me a measured look. “How many Indian languages do you speak?”
I’m taken aback by the question. A lot of non-Indians tend to think that Indian is a language. “Ah…Hindi, some Punjabi because my friend Latika is from there, and Marathi, because my mother was from Mumbai.”
“That’s four languages, including English.”
I wave a hand dismissively. “But they’re Indian languages.”
“Still languages. I speak English, Italian, decent Spanish, and less than decent French.”