Chapter 53
“She wrote you back?”
I stare at my grandmother’s familiar face as she frowns at me through my laptop screen. It’s Christmas Eve, and even though they don’t celebrate the Christian holiday in their household, after spending the day with the Krauts, I had a craving to hear my grandmother’s voice. Nani holds a simple white envelope, and I catch a glimpse of Robin’s name and my address beneath it in the top left corner.
Robin never mentioned writing to Nani.
“Yes. Her handwriting is not very good. But the letter is well-written.”
“What did she say?” My heart pounds, and sweat gathers on my palms as I agonize over what she might have scrawled on that paper.
Nani slips on her reading glasses, pulls the letter from the envelope, and holds the missive close to her face.
“Dear Dhruvi Anand,
“Thank you for sharing about your grandson. In my short time living with Arthur, I’ve found everything you said to be true. He’s kind and a good caregiver. He keeps me well-fed, loves his family, and is loyal. I think he might be the best person I’ve ever known.
“I’m honored to have him as someone in my life. I know you hope we will develop a romantic relationship, probably because you want to see your grandson settled and cared for. Trust me when I tell you, he will find that.
“Only it won’t be with me.”
Fuck. I consider pretending the call dropped so I can suffer the pain of Robin’s words on my own.
But Nani isn’t done reading.
“Arthur is working to become the best partner he can be, so it’s a matter of time before he finds the person he loves beyond compare. His soulmate. That’s a lucky person. A lot of days, I’m jealous of that person.
“But I also know I’m not them.
“Thank you for thinking I could be though. Trying to convince me to marry your grandson—believing that I could be the one to make him happy—is the highest compliment I’ve ever received.
“One day, I hope I’m as decent of a person as you believed me to be.
“Sincerely, Robin Dunn.”
Nani sets the paper down with a thwack that rattles her screen, then glares at me over her spectacles.
“What is she saying? Why did she write that? You don’t want her?” She’s talking too fast for me to answer her questions, not that I have a response. “I called your father and asked him about this girl. He told me it is good news. Told me all about this Robin Dunn and how she is wonderful and how our good boy has finally found a woman for him. And now, she writes to say you don’t want her. Why?”
At this point, my grandmother’s voice rises, and she switches over to Hindi. Apparently, I was decently fluent in the language when I was younger and Nani lived with us for almost a full year after my mother’s death. But she returned to Chandigarh when my grandfather had a heart attack, and I lost most of my comprehension over the years from disuse. Now, I only know enough to tell she’s ranting about me, marriage, grandkids, and being stubborn.
But even that is hard to pick up on when my mind is sifting through Robin’s words.
“A lot of days, I’m jealous of that person.”
That makes no sense. Not unless . . .
Does Robin want to be my soulmate?
Can’t be. Robin is bluntly honest. If she wanted to be my soulmate, then she would have said something.
“Arthur.” Nani’s sharp voice snaps me out of my musings. I meet her burning eyes. “When did you last tell Robin Dunn you love her? How many times a day do you remind her?”
“I . . .” On the tiny square in the top corner of my screen, I watch my mouth bob open like a dying trout on the line.
“When?” my grandmother snaps.
“I haven’t.”
If Nani could reach through the internet and strangle me, I’m sure she would. I see it in her furious expression.
“You do not love her then?”
“I do.”
I think I always have, since that first visit, when Robin grinned up at me and said, “Damn, that’s an impressive beard. Do you use it to intimidate your cousins into submission?”
Daren dragged her away after that comment, claiming he could grow a beard just as big if she wanted.
I wonder if he sensed then how I’d immediately become infatuated with Robin Dunn.
But I got used to denying how deeply I felt for her. Keeping an unbreakable seal on the bottle of my emotions. One I refused to crack, even when Robin held me close, took me inside her, and gazed into my eyes, as if I meant something more than a means to revenge.
More frustrated Hindi spills through the laptop speakers, and then Nani stops the flow with a deep breath and spears me with her stare.
“You and your father. The same! He loved my Nimisha.” Her voice catches on my mother’s name. “But he let her leave. She finished her degree, and when he said goodbye, she left. She came home. When I hugged her close, I saw only sadness in her eyes. As if she had left her heart behind.”
I know this story. How my dad realized his mistake in less than a day and used all his savings to buy a plane ticket and chase after her. Apparently, my Chandigarh relatives gave him hell when he showed up on their doorstep, but my mom threw her arms around him and kissed him in front of the whole family.
“He said he didn’t want to make her choose. But that was cruel. Giving her no choice at all.” Nani wipes her fingers across her bronze cheeks, and I realize tears have been dripping down her face. “I hated him for taking my Nimisha. But she loved him for it. For giving her a choice. My daughter did what she wanted every day of her life. She chose her happiness. Do not take that away from your Robin. How can she choose you if she doesn’t know?”
Give her a choice. In all these months, I never thought of it like that. Never considered that my silence was taking something away from Robin.
That is the opposite of what I intended. My urge was only to give to her. To support and care for her and not make demands. Not impress my needs on her when the Krauts had already taken so much.
I’m not Daren. His sins are not mine to repay.
This, a simple realization, has my gut bottoming out. How long have I approached Robin with the belief that she thinks of my cousin and me as a package deal?
True, the man will always be in my life. But Robin knows that.
And if the way she handled him at the end of our hike was any indication, she’s not about to let him have the upper hand. Neither am I.
Would she choose me? If I told her I loved her?
I think of my mom flying away from the man she loved. How she must’ve sat in those tiny plane seats, heartbroken, thinking her soulmate didn’t love her the way she did him. Nani said my father and I were the same, but in this moment, I feel more Nimisha Anand’s son than I ever have before.
What if I don’t get chosen?
Or . . . what if I do?
What if I do, and Robin is my father?
I clear my throat multiple times before I can respond to my grandmother.
“You’re right. I didn’t give her a choice.” With my mind on how Robin and my relationship might reflect my parents’, I have to ask a question. “You hated dad?”
Nani’s indignation fades, the corners of her eyes drooping in sadness. “I did. In the beginning. But only because I loved your mother so much. I did not trust him. I did not know him.”
“What if . . .” I clench my fists on my thighs where she can’t see them. “What if they hate Robin? If they never forgive her for picking me?” Could I ask Robin to love me, be with me, and deal with Kraut shit for years to come? There was always supposed to be an end date when she could walk away. “She deserves better.”
“A woman does not need forgiveness for picking a good man!” The screen shakes, and I realize Nani pounded a fist on her table. “If they try to shame her, you will bring her here. And we will love her with you.” She points a finger at her camera, scolding me. “We are your family, too. And you tell those Krauts if they hurt your Robin—my new granddaughter—they will answer to me.”
A smile tugs at my mouth at the thought of my cousins getting lectured by my grandmother. Nani is a good foot shorter than all of them. Not that the size difference would ever make her back down.
Robin would never back down either.
Not as long as she knows there’s something to fight for.