Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
W hen Monday morning came, Arjun did not return to the basement office. Instead, he found Adam D’Antonio and asked if he could have his old office back.
His boss gave him a curious look. “You want to come back to PSI?” he asked hesitantly, as though he hadn’t heard correctly the first time.
“I mean, I never really left PSI, did I?” said Arjun, trying to make light of it. “I still work here, you know.”
Adam guffawed. “You’ve got me there,” he said. “But, after all this time, why come back upstairs? Did things go south with you and that girl?”
Arjun feigned a smile. Was it that obvious? he wondered. “Nothing like that,” he replied. “It’s just time for me to return to where I belong.”
His boss grinned. “I like the sound of that,” he said, clapping Arjun on the shoulder with one of his gigantic hands. “Welcome back to the land of the living!”
Kelley was equally enthused when Arjun broke the news to her. “Finally,” she said, kicking her feet up on her old desk just outside his office. “This is much better than that bullpen at the Current. I mean, honestly, Arjun—what were you thinking?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know.”
The truth was, there was only one thing on his mind: Nisha Nandan. Since their fight in the hotel room, Nisha had drifted through his thoughts like a ghost. When he closed his eyes, he saw her: typing away at her computer, her face screwed up in concentration; playing the guitar, her fingers moving deftly over the frets; leaning in to kiss him, her eyes closing just before their lips met.
Arjun tried to distract himself with work, but even the crushing monotony was not enough to tear his thoughts away from her. Half of him wanted desperately to rise from his desk and sprint down to the basement, to fling open the door and see if Nisha was still there. He could have texted her, of course, but he hadn’t spoken to her since the previous morning. In fact, he hadn’t told anyone about their night together, not even Dan or Erica (who, by this time, must have been on their honeymoon flight to Tokyo).
There was a knock at his office door. It was Kevin McPherson, dressed as usual in one of his flamboyant Hawaiian shirts. “Hey, Kevin,” said Arjun, turning away from his desktop. “What’s up?”
“Nothing much,” said Kevin, sitting as Arjun gestured to one of the chairs across his desk. “We haven’t talked much since…you know.”
Arjun smiled. “Since Emily Richter stole my storefront from under me? It’s okay to say it.”
“What are you going to do now? Are you going to find a new restaurant?” Kevin pulled a folded sheet of paper out of his pocket. “I took the liberty of finding some other buildings for lease across the city. I know it’s not the location you wanted, but…”
Arjun took the paper as Kevin slid it across the desk, genuinely touched by the other man’s thoughtfulness. “I really appreciate this,” he said, scanning the list. “But I don’t know if that’s the move I want to make now. A friend actually helped me to turn the recipes I developed for the restaurant into a book, Raja’s Kitchen . I put it up on Amazon a few days ago.”
Kevin raised an eyebrow. “That’s great news. How many copies have you sold?”
Arjun laughed mirthlessly. “Two,” he said. Dan and Erica had bought one copy; Kelley had bought another.
Arjun sighed. “Maybe this is a sign,” he said. “I mean, nobody seems to care about the recipes. And the food in the book is the food I was going to serve at the restaurant. So perhaps this is the universe’s way of saving me from a very expensive mistake.”
Kevin frowned. “So, what does this mean for Raja’s?”
Arjun shrugged. “It’s dead, Kev.” Until now, he hadn’t actually heard those words aloud. But there was a finality to them, a weight that attached itself to his soul and nearly dragged him through the floorboards.
“Thanks for stopping by,” he said. “And thanks for the list. But I should probably get back to work.”
Arjun was still in a depressive slump that night during dinner with Sophia. She’d returned from her conference in Austin with a new haircut: she’d trimmed off the ends of her hair that had been dyed blonde, leaving her with a sleek black mane that fell just past her shoulders.
Arjun listened distractedly as she told him about the various lectures she’d attended. His mind was elsewhere: How do I get more book sales? he wondered.
I could throw a couple thousand dollars at a marketing firm, he thought. But who knows if that would work.
I could beg bookstores to stock it and hold a reading…but who would show up?
I could get some restaurant critic to write a glowing profile on the book.
That last one was the most promising…but Arjun didn’t know any restaurant critics. He stared down at his food; his appetite was nonexistent.
Across the table, Sophia perked up. “I almost forgot!” she said, rummaging in her purse. “These arrived today from the printer.”
She drew out a white envelope and slid it across the table. Inside was a card: gold lettering embossed onto thick maroon cardstock. “What do you think?”
“It’s nice,” he said. His mind flashed back to that night in the hotel room with Nisha, and he felt a sudden pang of guilt. He’d been agonizing over whether or not to tell Sophia, but he’d eventually decided against it. He and Nisha hadn’t slept together—well, technically they had, but nothing more. But, if it’s no big deal, why not tell Sophia? he thought.
Arjun picked up the card and read aloud: “You are cordially invited to the engagement ceremony for Mr. Arjun Rishi Chowdhury and Dr. Nandita Sophia Verma at the Sri Datta Sai Mandir in San Ramon, CA.” There was a date inscribed below the invitation: June thirteenth, less than two weeks away.
“I was thinking we’d keep it small,” said Sophia. “Just our families and close friends.”
Arjun nodded. “That sounds good to me.” While Sarita had told most of his relatives about Sophia, he still hadn’t told most of his friends and acquaintances that he was getting an arranged marriage. He doubted they’d have the patience to sit through a roka ceremony, anyway. Besides: “fiancée” was easier to explain than whatever nebulous term defined the status between the first meeting and the engagement.
“Of course, the wedding itself will be much bigger,” Sophia continued. “Actually, I wanted to know: what would you think of getting married in India?”
“India?” repeated Arjun.
“That’s what I said,” she replied, a note of irritation rising in her voice. “It’s much cheaper than getting married in the US, let alone San Francisco. I don’t know if you’ve saved anything for a wedding, but I’ve basically been a poor graduate student for the past decade, and I don’t want my parents to shell out too much.”
Arjun nodded. “I’ll think about it,” he said—though, in truth, he’d always envisioned his wedding in San Francisco.
“Please do,” said Sophia, blowing on a spoonful of hot soup.
Arjun wondered again if he should tell her about Nisha. You have to, he decided. It’s impossible to keep a secret this big. You owe it to Sophia to be honest.
He looked up from his food. “Sophia, there’s something I need to tell you…”
“What is it?”
His mouth went dry. “Nothing,” he said. “Let’s get married in India.”
She smiled. “You come around quick.”
They walked back to Arjun’s apartment after dinner. Now that it was June, evenings had become warmer, and the air hummed with the songs of grasshoppers and cicadas. “It’s still early,” said Arjun, climbing the steps to his front door. “Do you want to come inside for a drink?”
The implications of what he’d just asked suddenly occurred to him. Do you really want this? he wondered. Or was it some way of assuaging his shame? Sleeping with Sophia would move their relationship further than his relationship with Nisha—and perhaps, his guilty conscience would quiet down once again.
But Sophia shook her head. “I’m old-fashioned about that kind of thing,” she said, lingering on the sidewalk. “I think I’ll just head home.”
Arjun nodded. “All right.” He waited with her on the curb until her Uber came, hugged her goodbye, and headed inside for the night.
Sitting on his couch and cuddling with his dog, Arjun found the episode strange. After all, he and Sophia would be engaged in less than three weeks—and they hadn’t so much as kissed. What will it be like when we get married? he wondered. He tried to picture their first coupling: the demurely averted eyes, the first furtive movements, his hand moving uncertainly over her waist and drawing her in to kiss. Would the first time be awkward? It always is, he acknowledged—but, usually, the first time occurred before a couple walked down the aisle.
Arjun’s phone buzzed. It was a text from Sophia: Dinner again tomorrow? I’ve heard good things about Quince.
Let’s do it , he replied without thinking. He sunk back into the couch. Sally found a spot by his feet and was asleep in seconds. His laptop was on the coffee table, and he opened it and checked on his book again. The numbers were no more encouraging than they’d been that morning: despite everything he’d put into it, it had still only sold three measly copies (Kevin McPherson had purchased the third).
He sighed. He was closer than ever to his goal of marriage, but he felt like a dish towel with all of the water wrung out. He picked up his phone again and, without thinking, fired off a text to Nisha. Hey, he typed. Hope you’re doing well .
A few dots appeared at the bottom of the screen, indicating that Nisha had read his message and was typing her response. Then, suddenly, the dots faded away. Nisha was ignoring him…and could he blame her? I love you , she’d told him, and what had he done? I left her all alone, he thought bitterly.
His mother called a few hours later, after Arjun had become fully entrapped by some terrible B-movie on Showtime. “Hey, Mom,” Arjun said, pausing the movie. “Did you call to talk to Sally?”
“Very funny,” Sarita replied. “How is my grandpuppy doing?”
Arjun laughed. “She’s great. Getting some nice shut-eye. What’s up?”
“Nothing,” said Sarita. “I just wanted to call and tell you…I’m proud of you, Arjun.”
He sat up. “What did you say?” In his thirty years on Earth, his mother had hinted around it—but she’d never outright said those words to him, not even when he got into Yale and Stanford.
“I’m proud of you,” she repeated. “I was worried about you for the longest time, beta. These past few years, it’s like you’ve been…unmoored. Having a girl will be good for you. And you found a good one, Arjun. Sophia is perfect.”
Arjun stood up. His mother was right about Sophia—much as it chagrined him, she was always right. But, still, his mind was not on Sophia. It was still back in that hotel room, with Nisha’s words echoing through his mind:
I love you.