December 2 #2
Kevin’s fingers tightened around hers and she heard his breathing elevate with her own. Her mind was reeling now. She was hot and flustered and on the verge of losing her mind. “What are you talking about?!” She didn’t mean to shout. It just came out that way. “Rajan is my father.”
Jayshree’s eyes widened a little, but she still maintained her calm and collected composure.
“After our discussion this year, I thought he would have told you the truth.” She sighed and shook her head.
“Your father is a druggie and filthy con-artist, which is why I left you with Rajan in the first place. God knows what would have happened to you if I left you with your real father. You would have ended up on the streets, sniffing coke and spreading your legs for anyone who would pay for it.”
Tears brimmed in her eyes but she didn’t allow them to fall. “You’re lying.”
“Jasmin,” Kevin said softly from beside her, “we should go.”
She stood up and banged her fist on the table. “You’re lying! He wouldn’t have kept that from me. He wouldn’t have raised me by himself for nineteen years if he wasn’t my real father.”
“If you don’t believe me, just ask him.” Her tone indicated that she was done with this conversation.
“And your friend is right. You should leave. I’ve worked hard to get to where I am and I will not allow this to ruin my marriage.
I finally have the life I wanted. I’m not scrounging for food, not begging for money.
I’m not living paycheck to paycheck and that’s because of Amit.
Understand, Jasmintha, it’s not that I don’t care about you.
There are just other things I care about more. ”
She said it in the same cold, unfeeling tone and Jasmin couldn’t bring herself to believe that she cared at all.
“C’mon, Kevin,” she said with as much calmness as she could muster. She waited for him to stand up as well, then gave her mother a tight smile. “Thank you for your time, Mrs. Kapoor.”
She left the boardroom and headed straight for the elevators.
Kevin kept worried eyes on her as they traveled back down to the ground floor.
She marched out of the building and down the stairs to her car.
He barely closed the door before she zoomed away from the curb.
She was unwinding, unravelling at the speed of light.
How was it possible that she was considered to be a genius and yet her brain couldn’t seem to wrap around anything that just happened?
How was it possible that she knew the ins and outs of biochemistry and yet she couldn’t understand something as simple as her father not being her father?
She just needed time to process it, that’s all.
Just a few hours and she would be able to make sense of it and then this pain would go away.
“Jasmin,” Kevin said apprehensively, “whatever the fuck you’re doing in your head, just stop it. Just…just let yourself feel it. It’s okay to feel it.”
She ignored him because he didn’t know what he was talking about.
What exactly did he want her to feel? Was it rejection?
Betrayal? Abandonment? Or the fact that her own mother saw her as a mistake?
Because, really, if that’s what he was referring to, she would prefer being numb.
She zipped through traffic, weaving her way through the cars.
“Jasmin, slow down.”
She noticed that he was tense, gripping onto the seat, but she couldn’t ease her foot off the accelerator. She just wanted to put as much as distance as she could between herself and a foolish dream she’d once had.
“Slow down…please.”
It was only when she heard the fear in his voice that she came to her senses. He’d been in a traumatic car accident and she was speeding like a maniac.
“I’m sorry.” She took her foot off the pedal and slowed down to below the speed limit.
She needed to get off the road because she was in no state to be driving.
It took eight minutes before she spotted a motel and she immediately turned right into the parking lot.
She took out her cell phone and handed her knapsack to Kevin.
“Check us in,” she said, opening the door.
She waited for him to be out of earshot before she frantically scrolled through her phone for the number she wanted.
“Hello, Bhajia.”
His happy tone immediately set her off. How could he be happy when he’d been lying to her for nineteen years? “So is that why you didn’t want me to talk to her? Because you didn’t want me to find out that you’re not my real father?”
She couldn’t see his face, but his breathing became heavier. “Jasmintha, what did your mother tell you?”
“Everything! So many lies, Da—” She stopped herself because she didn’t know what to call him anymore.
“You blackmailed her so that she wouldn’t contact me.
That should have been my choice…But it doesn’t matter.
She doesn’t want me anyway.” Her voice was beginning to crack, squeaking with the emotion she was trying to bury. “I was just a burden to her…and you.”
“You were never a burden to me,” he said quickly.
She couldn’t take his lies anymore. His words always contradicted his actions.
“I am,” she argued. “That’s why you’re never around…why you always make excuses to not spend time with me. If…if I were your real daughter…things would have been different. I’m sure you would have made the time if I weren’t some bastard child who was basically dumped on your doorstep.”
That stunned him into silence for a few moments. “How…” His voice was thick and strained, as if she’d just kicked him in the gut. “How can you say that?”
“Because it’s the truth! None of you ever cared about me. Not you. Not her. Not my real father, whoever the hell he is.”
“Bhajia, please listen to me…Your mother has a way of manipulating the truth and—”
She saw Kevin opening a door to one of the motel rooms and hung up. There were only so many lies she could bear. She didn’t even bother to take the bags out of the car, just marched straight past him and into the bathroom.
“Jasmin—”
She ignored him and slammed the door shut.
Once she was inside, in a safe little cocoon, she slumped against the door and slid down to the floor.
It came all at once. No buildup. No easing into it.
It hit her with a cataclysmic force and she couldn’t stop it.
For the second time in eight years, the second time on this trip—she cried.
Hard, aching wails. Tears flowed ceaselessly.
Eight years’ worth. Every broken promise.
Every pitiful excuse. Every shattered dream.
It flowed. Every meal she’d eaten alone.
Every movie she’d watched by herself. Every Christmas decoration she’d hung up on her own.
It flowed. Every nanny who left without a second thought.
Every friend she never had. Every person who confirmed the same thing: she wasn’t worth their time. It flowed.
She’d conquered loneliness many years ago, but this wasn’t loneliness.
Desolate: to be deserted of people and in a state of bleak and dismal emptiness. That’s how she felt. Desolate.
She heard a thump and knew that Kevin had seated himself outside the door, just like he’d done outside that restroom in Utah. It took almost half an hour before her throat loosened enough for her to speak and she knew he hadn’t moved in that time.
“I wish I never drove down here, Kevin,” she said loud enough for him to hear her through the door. “I wish I just bought a plane ticket and came here completely oblivious. That way…I wouldn’t have met women like…Connie. She was working two jobs so Beth could go to college, remember?”
“I remember.”
“Or…like Loretta…who makes popcorn strings and hot chocolate for her kids…or like your mom…I haven’t met her, but she calls just to check in on you because she worries about you.
I wish I didn’t know that before I walked into that boardroom.
This would have been so much easier if I didn’t know what a real mother is supposed to be like.
” She sighed heavily, thinking back on the conversation earlier. “She said I was a mistake.”
“You’re not.”
“She said that if she left me with my real father, I would’ve been a drug addict.
She made it seem like she did me a favor, but the fact is that she still would have left me.
It didn’t really matter who it was with.
She just wanted to get rid of me.” With a slight groan, she knocked her head against the door.
“At least I met one person who doesn’t treat me differently because I’m a genius.
You know…I…I actually thought she’d be proud of me…
I wanted her to be proud of me.” The tears were starting up again.
“I thought she’d say…my girl…my girl did all that. I thought she’d be proud of me.”
“You don’t need her validation, Jazz. She’s a douche.”
She stood up and when she opened the door, he was already standing as well. “She is a douche,” she agreed and his hand came up to her face to wipe the moisture off her cheeks.
“I want you to know that as soon as she opened her mouth, I scratched her off my cougar list.”
She gave him half a smile. “Do you regret it?”
“A little. But there are some sacrifices I’m willing make…Come here.” He pulled her towards him, encapsulating her in the strength of his arms—a pillar to lean on for a few heart-wrenching moments.
Lifting up onto her toes, she held him tighter and kissed him. Although hesitant, he kissed her back. She walked backwards until the back of her knees hit the bed, only breaking the kiss for the second it took to tug her sweater over her head.
“Jasmin…this was a really shitty day for you, but you need to find a way of dealing with what happened. Sex isn’t going to solve anything.”
“I know. Tomorrow…I’ll think about it tomorrow.
” Her hands went to his jeans, unfastening the button and tugging down the zip.
“But tonight…I want you to wrap me in your arms and make it go away. Tonight I wanna feel like nothing else exists except you.” She caught the edges of his sweatshirt and he lifted his arms so she could pull it off.
“I know you don’t love me, Kevin…but for tonight…
can you make me feel like you do?” She squeezed her eyes tight in a vain attempt to hold back the tears and pressed her mouth against his chest. “Can you do that?”
He pushed slightly, gently easing her onto the bed. “Yeah,” he whispered, brushing his lips against hers. “I can definitely do that.”
And he did. All night.